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The Unfair Advantage #003: Run Course Recon |
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Welcome to the brand new Endurance Nation newsletter. Every edition will contain actionable, detailed advice for your endurance lifestyle in a simple five-minute read. __________________________________ 🪝The HookImagine this. You are at the crux of your run. It’s hot. You only have a few miles to go. As you come upon the last hill, you casually glance down at the calf of the athlete in front of you, and you know they are in your age group. They start to walk. Head down. Beaten. You stride past, hitting the hill, knowing just how long it will be because you see that funky mailbox and lamppost and know exactly where the grade backs off. You surge by and never look back. Are you ready to let your run off the leash? We thought so! In this week’s edition of The Unfair Advantage, master the run before the start line! 🕶️ The Bottom LineTo properly recon your run course, you need to ask yourself a few simple questions on the following topics and how they all fit together.
The questions are simple, but the key is how they relate to each other and how you incorporate them into your training. It’s not that hard. Being smarter about your run course is free speed on race day! 👀The Run Starts on the BikeYour run course recon starts with your bike course recon and execution because your best bike split is one that sets up your best run. (Learn how to Recon the bike here) A great bike split, followed by a poor run is actually a BAD bike split. 🤔 Think about it. Imagine getting off the bike and ready to run.
⚡Unfair Advantage: Plan backward and rehearse! Start with your ideal bike endstate: You are hydrated, fueled, and ready to run off the bike. Plan out your bike effort, hydration, and fueling around that, then go do it! Go practice! Rehearse the pacing, hydration, and fueling that gets you off the bike, ready to run. Use the bike to set up the run. Don’t blindly chase that power number or mph. Bike your “should” and you will run your could! 🔭 Looking At vs KNOWING the Weather and CourseThis one is so obvious. I’m sure you glance at the weather and look at the course map from the race website. But, glancing at the weather and looking at the map is different than KNOWING the weather, terrain and the turns. Knowing these details is applying it to you in context of your race execution. Know the Weather: Race day heat, humidity, and wind are always the “X” factors, especially for longer races. Start with a historical review of the temperature and wind direction.
Know the Elevation and the Course
⚡Unfair Advantage: Use weather history and Google Maps to know more about your weather and terrain. Use https://www.wunderground.com/history to get a historical hour-by-hour summary of temperature, humidity, and wind direction for any venue and date. Use Pegman (that little yellow man in Google street view) to get a preview of the course before you set foot in the venue. Identify key landmarks and use them to check off your progress and as mental cues on what you will focus on – like the funky mailbox midway up that crux climb, where the gradient eases off just a few miles from the finish. 🤜💥🤛 Put Your Race Plan Together and RehearseHere is the magic. 🪄🔮 Put the puzzle together and practice. 🧩 Think through the most likely and most demanding scenarios. Look at the bike course map and make mental notes on how you will approach the bike to set up your best run. Here are a few key questions to help you find your secret sauce and make your run magic happen on race day.
⚡Unfair Advantage: Do a race rehearsal. Yep. Take the pacing, hydration, and fueling plan and do it in a local situation that’s a close approximation of the event itself. Swim, bike, and run. There’s no need to replicate the course exactly; you can do about 75% of each race distance. We are looking to duplicate the time and intensity level you’ll be riding and running, with the pre-fatigue of swimming. 🤯 Expand Your MindHere are just a few of the run course recons that we have done with our athletes in the past: #1 From Ironman Wisconsin
#2 From Ironman Chattanooga Listen to our Podcasts! Coach Patrick offers weekly advice, and there are monthly DudeGuy conversations on current (endurance) events! www.endurancenation.us/podcasts 🫱🫲 Join Us for an Unfair Advantage 🏅Become a Member and join 600+ athletes who use our training plans and online coaching to save time and achieve their personal best. Discover our winning equation: Fitter + Smarter = 🏅Faster. With our coaching expertise and friendly community, you’ll not only get fitter, you’ll have more fun doing it! Say goodbye to inconsistency and performance plateaus. You will get faster. But the onus is on you. If working hard, engaging with the coaches and the team, and learning our proven race strategies is appealing to you. It will happen. It’s that simple. You have direct access to your coach and all of our successful age group athletes in our group chat. If you want to talk in person – join one of our standing meetups on Monday or Wednesday. Check-in, give us an update. Got a question about workouts? Training modifications adn recommendations for travel? Injury? Buying new gear? We have you covered. Don’t miss out on this opportunity to join our community of athletes who consistently outshine the competition. You’ll never look back! 👋 Ask Questions How can we help? Get your training, racing, nutrition, and strategy questions answered. 🛍 Save Money Use our discounts to save hundreds each year on equipment and nutrition! 🤝 Meet Friends Meet fellow athletes, mentors and build life-long friends. 💻 Join Weekly Meetups Monday Evening Team Check-In Video Calls 🗞 See Race Reports Share and learn using race reports from our library. 🎓 Get Expert Feedback Get feedback from 600+ endurance athletes. 📺 Attend Live Seminars Learn alongside your teammates and build team resources. 🎁 Contribute Expertise Share your lessons learned with your fellow teammates. 🎽 Epic Gear & Swag Red is the fastest color, you know. ⭐ Become a WSM Join the elite ranks of members helping grow the Team.
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