Changes

Taking a break during your long training runs is okay, and can even be an important part of training. For instance, a [[Walking Breaks|walking break]] can increase the distance you can cover on a long run. These walking breaks [[Walking Breaks]] obviously vital if you're intending to race with a run/walk pattern. However, if you pause your watch during a break, you can get into problems. Having done a 20 mile run with 3 hours showing on your watch, you assume you can run 20 miles in 3 hours (9 min/mile). If the watch was paused for 20 minutes for toilet breaks, waiting for people to catch up, changing clothes, etc., you actually did 20 miles in 3 hours 20 minutes (10 min/mile). If you then try to race a marathon at 9 min/mile pace, you will be surprised by how tough it is. This also means that if you have a GPS with an 'auto-pause' feature, you need to turn that off as well.

It is important that the race simulation mimics the elevation profile of the actual race. Training on the flat for hilly race has obvious problems, but training on hilly terrain for flat race is also a mistake. Gentle hills tend to provide variety in which [[Muscle|muscles ]] are used at any given point, and some runners find that the flat race causes them problems because of the lack of this variety. The other problem that can be encountered when training for a hilly race is the length of the hills. Running many small hills does not replicate running a few long hills even if the gradient is the same. The [[Delayed Onset Muscle Soreness]] that comes from [[Downhill Running]] is greater on longer hills then multiple short downhills.

It is obviously hard to replicate the [[Practical Tapering|taper]] in training without having a huge impact on the training schedule. However, it should be possible to perform a very short 'micro taper' that will help understand how the taper affects your running. A weeklong taper, which training volume is cut back while intensity is maintained should not affect your training should feel unduly. Understanding how different tapers work for you is important. The [[The Science of Tapering 101|science of tapering]] has shown large individual variability, so trying different taper patterns and different taper nutrition will help you decide what works for you.