Simple Tenets

When I first started coaching about 7 years ago, a close friend advised me, before I began, to read everything I could find regarding the great coaches and their methods, about exercise physiology and exactly why these particular coaches had been successful. He told me plain and simple "Write down your philosophy and always stay true to it". Of course, he didn't mean to ignore what others advised nor did he mean that I shouldn't stay up to date with the latest research in the field...only that I should think long and think hard should I consider breaking one of my tenets. While the original wording has changed over time, the list remains almost exactly the same as I wrote it in my first of many marble notebooks. They are:

-An athlete that is 10% under-trained can have a great day, but one that is 1% over-trained never will.

-The principle of specificity must be honored as often as possible

-Training must be individual

-Training must be progressive...it takes about six weeks to adapt to a particular level of stress

-Every workout has a purpose

-An athlete is either capable of higher output from their body over a given time or (equivalently) they must be able to hold previous levels of output longer...otherwise, they are not training.

-The primary predictor of success in endurance sports is maximum sustainable (or Functional Threshold) pace/power

-Sessions at/near maximum sustainable effort are the backbone of endurance training.

-The adaptations from L2-L5 (Endurance through VO2) are identical...we merely trade volume for intensity.

-The shorter, hard(er) session(s) precede the longer, easier sessions after recovery

I'll try to keep on top of the blog and go through each in a bit of detail in coming entries.
Cheers.