Arriving at year’s end, it’s time to open the books. The stats project an awesome shadow, but are vague. No nuance but a fortress of trying. Therefore I will elaborate on each metric and try to illuminate what I think counts.
Les chiffres 2023
790 training hours
361691m d+ (1.2 million ft)
7318km (4547 miles)
Time
Altogether a nice distribution and a metric that matters a lot to me. Training time shows dedication and consistency. I never train to ‘kill time’, and that’s why, like all these metrics, more for more is not the point.
The goal is to maximize the possible, get what you can with what you have on a daily basis.
Notes:
Cross training goes a long way to pad these figures.
Sept/Oct were soft due to UTMB complications and atypical build-up to Les Templiers
Winter training is underway!
Climb
Digesting this chart chronologically:
Winter hit-and miss: After a long recovery from the Grand Raid + holidays in Ohio, I was de-trained. Fortunately I found good form building to Penyagolosa, hitting solid numbers throughout block 1. Notice my “reverse-taper” strategy, which yielded a good result.
Block 2 grind it out: I jumped back into training too quickly and picked up some tendonitis in my knee which effected training leading to Andorra, but still got the job done.
Block 3 crushing workouts: This time I respected the recovery before getting back into training for UTMB. I am proud of the work I did, despite not having a result to justify the effort.
Block 4 something to prove: The lack of climbing is evident and corresponds with diminished training volume to allow for more intensity.
Winter On-Target: Carrying the momentum of a good year into winter, I am logging extensive time and vert.
More on Climbing
Vert is a proxy for intensity. When you start running and hiking up-mountain, it hurts. The body is working hard against gravity.
With practice you get stronger and aerobically fit. Eventually going uphill can be done efficiently and the fruits of labor are ready for harvest.
For context: a jog up a 20% grade will push my HR from 120 → 148 (on the cusp of the first ventilatory threshold). The equivalent intensity on the flats are sub 6 minute miles (3:45 min/km).
Considering my training is vertically oriented 5-6 days a week, I spend a ton of time locked into upper aerobic intensity without the injury risk of running a lot of fast miles.
It’s no wonder the king of trails, Killian Jornet, logged over 500,000m of climbing this year, and every year for the past decade.
Given that I did 70% of the vert as Killian, there is plenty of room to grow, which leads us to the question, how much is too much?
He crushes half his climbing/year on the skis and I don’t believe there is a limit to low impact climbing.
I do think that too much run vert, which inevitably requires getting down should be tempered.
Finding ways to use vertical gain as a tool for good and not destruction is essential. I stomached 280000m of gain and loss running trails and roads.
Looking ahead I am not interested in boosting this number, but becoming smarter in my applications of climbing and continuing to source vert from other modalities (ski, treadmill, bike).
Distance
The folly of focusing on distance
We define a race first by its distance. We hold bigger races in greater prestige. Marathon vs. 10k, UTMB vs CCC.
This bias to more = better is a shit way to train. Of course to become a decent runner, you must run a lot. But eventually the pressure we put on ourselves to do a little more every week will result in injury.
Unless we are talking about preparing for flat races, distance is only relevant when combined with speed or vertical gain. Otherwise it’s a senseless beating.
Don’t get me wrong, I am a glutton for punishment. But distance has rapidly become my least favorite training metric.
If you train a lot, the miles flow. There are more valuble things to focus on.
Year over Year
Training hours +8.8%
Climbing +24.5%
Distance (run) +0.5%
The Lag
The work you do in one year lays the foundation for the next. The results I achieved this year were more a product of last years hard work (and continued effort) than any race-prep block.
If this theory has any merit, next year should be interesting.