How to Run Strides

Back in the day, I thought that if you just wanted to run faster you had to simply run fast - all the time. Boy, was I wrong. I did get faster, for a season. But, then I ended up burnt out and inured. If you want to get faster, a huge piece of growth in speed is running slow (more on this later) and having a day a week or so dedicated to speed work. Speed work looks different from person to person and if you’ve never done speed work before you will want to start adding it in cautiously. Fast running and teaching (yes, teaching - your body learns how to run fast!) your body to run fast adds a lot of stress to the body, so you want to build the speed conservatively.

However, if you want to get faster and start incorporating speed into your running routine right now, strides are a great way to start doing that! Strides are fun, easy, and a great first step to add that element of speed work into your weekly running routine!

What are strides?

Strides are 20 second long bursts of fast running (NOT sprinting around a 8/10 effort). You can run these on pavement, the track (always nice to have that extra soft surface) or grass.

When should I run these?

Ideally, strides should be preformed at the end of an easy run or before harder effort portions of a speed workout or before the beginning of a race. Strides wake up your legs and teach your body how to be more efficient, have a better, more economical leg turnover, and help your body learn how to move faster (i.e. run faster)

How do they look in a weekly routine?

Once you finish your run, run fast for 20 seconds, building through the entire 20 seconds. Walk back and recover for around a full 60 seconds (this should be the amount of time it takes to walk back to your starting point.) Run again the designated amount of time. Usually 3-5x, per set. You can do these after your easy runs, each week -
2-3 x a week.

And there you have it, simple, effective speed work that can help tremendously, in your journey to becoming a faster, more efficient runner!

Hello from Bethany!

Well, it has been a minute! Between the chaos of 2020, my focus shifting off of blogging for the past couple years, and then my blog, Luluruns, having crazy issues, I’m over here on my biz website sharing with the world once again. I like to think you all have missed my random, behind the scenes look at my exciting (haha) life, but I think I really am the one who missed it. I think I forgot how much I truly do enjoy writing and how much of a part of it I will also really, deeply enjoy. I don’t know how often I will be blogging or writing, but I think a good amount of soul searching really needs to happen.

You know when you haven’t done something for a long time and then sit down and do it and it feels just - right. That’s how I feel right now. It feels so good to sit down and right and just let me thoughts flow onto paper. (eh, computer)

This may not go anywhere or get big in the whole blog world, but I love it and I think that is worth something.

So, here we are, I’m run coaching right now, some amazing women who I feel so privileged to be apart of. These ladies are so different, but so similar in their desire to grow, chase after goals, and work toward their dreams. I am honored to be part of that journey and excited to help them work toward some fun things this winter season.

When I am not coaching, I am in the full swing of motherhood. Momming to two kiddos is a whole different ball game than just one child, but I find it easier in some ways. In some aspects it feels a lot more challenging, but I think I have also found it easier than expected - which is a grace. Do not get this wrong, we have our moments. Wow and so many moments where I literally feel like I have no clue how to respond or what to do and that is so humbling. It really hasn’t hit me fully until year four of mothering that I have really had some of the toughest moments of “Lord, I really need you,” desperate prayer time pleas, but this year of parenting has really been teaching me how really, deeply dependent I am on God’s grace and mercy. I know I had moments like these before, but I think I’ve just had enough of them this year to really feel the weight of motherhood. Momming isn’t easy, but it really is wonderful.

This year, Landon and I also bought our first home! It was such a fun ride looking for homes, putting in an offer, and closing and the Lord really did bless the whole experience. Our home is really so suited for us and has already blessed us in so many ways, we didn’t expect! I am realizing though (as I write this) just how much work having a home is. Benaiah and I worked on raking for an hour plus today and I think I got about .5% of the leaves out of the yard for today. haha. But for all the work, it is such a joy and blessing to own this home and we couldn’t be more thankful.

Overall, so thankful for Jesus. For His grace. His truth. His wisdom. His goodness. He alone is good and I think this year has really been teaching me that Jesus loves me and He is always good, unchanging and faithful. And that is enough. :)

Overall, so glad to have a little corner of the web to share with you, I have to fix some major issues with my other site, so for now, you can find me here or on my Instagram. :)

My Favorite Ways to Keep Nutrition Simple

You've heard it before but it is true. Running and really exercise is just one piece of the puzzle. If you want to be a all around, healthy individual nutrition is huge. And as runners, eating the right foods and the right amounts is important.

Once upon a time, I thought that if I ate less, worked out more, ran more (and fast all the time) and lost weight I would be a good runner. And it worked. For a little bit. Until I lost the joy of running and so much weight that my entire senior year of high school is a blur in my mind and that my body eventually started breaking down (i.e. getting injured) because I wasn't eating enough. I say all this to make a point, that running well requires fuel. It requires enough of the right kind of fuel, but enough. And it really doesn't have to be too complicated.

Over the years, I've tried a LOT of different approaches to eating and what I find the most lifegiving (for me) and what works the best for me is to not over complicate things. This is especially important because it is so easy to get discouraged or give up when nutrition is or seems hard.

So don't overthink nutrition too much when it comes right down to it.

I like to focus on fueling my body with as much whole, real foods as possible.

By real foods I mean things that came out of the ground or had eyeballs at one time ;)

I then try to eat enough of a combo of protein/carbs/fats/veggies at each meal. I eyeball all of my food and eat until I am satisfied with foods that I know gives me the best bang for my buck. Do I still eat ice cream? Of course! I find that having room in my overall diet for weekly treats helps me stay on track with my nutrition and also gives me something to look forward to.

Let me make this even more practical for you guys with some examples...

A couple ideas for what to eat before/during/after

Before running // IF I am going out early and for a shorter run, I don't eat anything except sip my coffee and have water. If it is a longer run, then I have toast with PB. If I am running later in the day, I eat a full breakfast, usually something that is easy to digest and gives me a good boost of energy like oatmeal or toast and eggs.

During a run // on shorter runs, I don't use anything. On long runs over 60+ min, I use GU chews (these seem to work well for me) Honeystinger waffles (these are so good!), or the kids' fruit snacks. Nothing too crazy. I also make sure I am hydrating with water and on really long runs, some type of electrolyte drink.

After a run // my favorite, go-to post workout is a smoothie. Whether it is summer or winter, I love a good post-workout smoothie. I usually throw in frozen bananas, almond milk, ice, pb, @designerprotein whey or egg protein and spinach!

Keep nutrition simple, focus on getting real foods, eat lots of plants, and have fun experimenting in the kitchen!

PROPER KEYS TO RECOVERY FOR ATHLETES

A couple months ago, I listened to a podcast and this top level Crossfit coach was sharing about how important recovery is. He even went so far as to say that the athlete who recovers the fastest and most will be the best athlete. Why? Because that athlete is able to do more and take on more work load and training stress BECAUSE they recover faster. This was quite the light bulb moment for me (as someone who struggles with prioritizing stretching/recovering #keepingitreal)

But, there is so much truth in what he said. Recovery is vital and if we can be pros at recovering well and growing in our strength, our running will only improve.

Here are a couple of my go-tos for recovery and rehab work:

1. Hip routines. The stronger your hips are as a runner, the less likely you will be injured and the stronger/faster you will be able to run. My hip routine I do is really simple, takes as little as ten minutes or less and doesn’t require any weights or equipment. I do a mixture of donkey kicks/fire hydrants/clam shells, and bridge raises to strengthen my lower body using only body weight. (If you want a video of this, comment below and I can send one to you!)

2. Legs up on the wall. This seems so strange, but really helps alleviate inflammation and promotes healthy blood flow, etc. Feels strange, but effective.

3. Foam rolling. Foam rolling and I have a love/hate relationship but foam rolling really is so beneficial. You can stretch, but it is hard to really break up some of that tissue and massage your muscles without using a foam roller!

4. Another piece of recovery is fuel. The way we eat so impacts our training. When I wasn’t eating enough, I was the most injured. Why? Because my body was breaking down and not rebuilding. Muscle growth, in a nutshell is basically muscles breaking down and then rebuilding stronger than before to ensure the next time that workout comes it will be stronger to handle it than before. But, if depleted from the proper nutrients it needs to build, it will not rebuild and continue to simply break down. Eat real food. Refuel with protein/carbs after runs. I love a good smoothie with protein powder and bananas

5. Warm ups. Another piece of training I didn’t do for years was warming my legs up before just heading out the door. After implementing this into my training, I’ve seen a big improvement in how I feel on the run and how I feel after. Leg swings (back/forward/side to side) and banded lateral walks/monster walks are some of my favorite warm up movements!

It is hard to continue to do ‘all the things’ on top of running four plus times a week, but as long as I remember that these things will help me stay running four plus times a week, I am more likely to remember to do them. So, you guys can hold me accountable okay? I want to the best at recovery these time around and I know that will only impact my running in a positive way!