Running a marathon with cross training
DISCLAIMER: this is NOT the recommend training method on how to prepare yourself for a marathon.
In december I met Luuk, a vibrant young business man who had signed-up to run the marathon of Barcelona. Two weeks before he had done a run of 25K btut afterwards his knee started to hurt and that’s how we got in contact. We agreed to do a 1-1 running gait analysis session to fix his knee pain and afterwards he asked me if I could coach him too for the marathon.
Taking into account his knee pain and the fact that he was not really able to train a lot in January because of business travels, we agreed on focusing on cross training (cycling & elliptical) to improve his aerobic capacity without putting too much impact on his weakened knees.
Once he was done with travelling, we started integrating more running workouts again in this training routine. However, far from the recommend distances during a marathon preparation. I did this for two reasons 1) I wanted his body to give the time to get used again to the impact of running and 2) I wanted to minimise the risk of injury as much as possible. Thanks to Luuk’s dedication to the training plan, he crossed the marathon with a big smile on his face.
