Post run OJ, faster 5k, and upper body weight | TTT Oct 2022
Using a coach to run a faster 5k, half marathon and more
🏃🏽♂️Skim time (5k pace): 35 seconds
🚶🏽♀️Read time (long run pace): 3 min 51 sec
What is up! Welcome to the DLake (mostly) and Mike Trees (sometimes) newsletter; Three Thing Thursday aka TTT.
What is TTT?
Great questions deserve great answers.
TTT is a monthly (ish) email newsletter that showcases the internet’s deepest and darkest, tips, tricks and random facts. All so that you can perform better in your training, racing and life.
We bring all facts, no fluff in less time than you can run an 80 metres (80 yards?!) strider at the end of your workout. The running internet is a big place so you’re probably like…
👋🏽 Hello to the new peeps who signed up and hi to all the ones that’s been on the journey.
Let’s get into this month’s newsletter and touch on;
And…
My current training updates aka Ye Ol’ Fitness-Health-O-Meter
Masters of Some Community Spotlight
Feeling this? Share this link with a friend - dlakecreates.substack.com
🏁Thing One: An ex-pro coached me to my fastest 5k time
Coaches, mentors, advisors, SHERPAS?! These people help us do things that we can’t do ourselves. And I’m sure that “thing” for you might be running.
I resisted getting a running coach for about 15 years (out of mental laziness), then met Mike Trees (run.nrg on Instagram) and he gave me some simple yet amazing advice to help me run a 16:47 5k.
Find out about that in detail here.
PS - If you want to run faster/further than you have before I finally have a few coaching spots open. See the bottom of this email for more info or go here to learn more.
💪🏽Thing Two: How does upper body weight affect run performance?
We all just assume that having bigger and stronger legs means you will run faster. But how exactly does your upper body weight (in particular muscle) affect how you run?
The arms counterbalance the leg movement to direct the momentum in the forward (vs. rotational) direction—allowing you to run more efficiently. For sprinters, this is obviously an advantage. And for distance runners, it helps with posture, and not wasting energy twisting side to side so you can go longer.
But what’s bad about too much weight? You have to carry that extra weight over the course of tens to hundreds of miles uphill.
Get a more in-depth answer here.
🧃Thing Three: Consider orange juice after your next run
Are you one of those psychos (no judgement) that likes orange juice post-run/workout? (GROSS, I can't!). New studies have shown that orange juice and even more generally fruit juice have the same benefits as sports drinks and might be even better than just plain water (spoiler: the acidic/citrus nature of it means it is packed with much-needed electrolytes that we sweat out).
Sure, makes enough sense. But I then thought about how in the hell our society got hooked on the ‘juice from the naranja. (I’m a curious dude!)
If you’re like “Yo Daren, how did we get hooked on that OJ?” Well, here’s the rabbit hole I went down and history why.
📅 My current training
September was interesting. I got the fittest in the fastest time ever in my life. (5 weeks from base fitness to race fitness)
I was so fit that I was able to run my fastest half marathon and accidentally got second place. Woah.
I’ll chalk it up to having a solid plan, execution and consistency. But ramping up my load like that so fast meant some slight nagging Achilles issue. Nothing major but more evidence that the more fit you get the more unhealthy you get. Two sides of the same coin.
🤷🏽♂️ #SorryNotSorry to the Americans for using metric. It’s such an easy system! Email me for the conversion or Google it.
Notable Quotable
On respecting rest & recovery
Master of Some(s)
If you’re curious, you are probably a Master of Some. The goal in life is not to master all, not master none, but to try to be a MASTER OF SOME.
This is a new section that is a community shoutout to all the new folks that signed up. The objective is to hold them accountable (in a good way) for their upcoming race and event. I’ll check in with them periodically to see how they did and support them.
Myra - Doing her 5th full marathon at California International Marathon in Dec (just completed her 10th half Ironman 70.3 triathlon!) Follow their journey on Instagram @myraschwartz.plantpowered
Robert ran a 3:21 at the Baystate marathon and finished strong even though he had an injury leading up to the race. Congrats!
Samuel - Crushed his 2nd marathon running a personal best time of 3hrs and 3 mins. Respect!
And…
…for October.
🙏🏾 Thanks for reading! Again, if you like this stuff, please share a link with cool folks like you. If you got any feedback (good or bad), hit me up - talk@dlakecreates.com
For real-world documentation of my training/races, follow me on Instagram & Strava.
Train smart: race easy,
Daren DLake
PS - If you were in need of a coach, I’m finally offering limited coaching spaces. Go here or email me if interested - coach@dlakecreates.com