With Coach Kelvin, offering Online Running Coaching for We Run and the We Run Virtual Running Club, and 1:1 Running Coach for Leeds and surrounding areas.
Introduction
Hi folks, it’s Kelvin here. We Run coaching in Leeds and the surrounding areas, as well as offering online coaching.
In this video, I’m going to share some thoughts on fatigue resistance.
What Do We Mean by Fatigue Resistance?
By fatigue resistance, I mean teaching the body to keep pushing later on in harder workouts and races.
There’s both a physiological and a psychological element to this. The way we work on it is fairly straightforward – towards the end of harder workouts and longer runs, we finish stronger.
The Psychological Benefits
The psychological positives are clear. Finishing strong gives people confidence that they can still push later on in events. Training runs are never going to be as demanding as the race itself, but adding some speed towards the end is achievable while still being tough.
This builds confidence and also gets us used to the feeling of how challenging it will be towards the end of an event.
The Physiological Benefits
From a physiological standpoint, what we’re doing is pre-fatiguing the body. Running longer efforts tires out our slow twitch muscle fibres, which are the ones we mainly use while running.
When we then run faster, we’re forcing our fast twitch muscle fibres to work in a way that’s more like slow twitch fibres. This trains the fast twitch fibres that we don’t usually rely on until very late in events, when the motor units controlling slow twitch fibres start to shut down and the body has to bring in faster twitch fibres that aren’t used to that workload.
That’s often why, late on in events, legs can feel flat and heavy – the pool of fibres we’re drawing from is slightly different.
How to Train Fatigue Resistance
So how do we actually train this? Here are some examples:
- Strong finishes: Add pace at the end of a run or rep.
- 50/50 runs: Run the first half easy, then the second half at tempo.
- Progression runs: Start at marathon pace, then cut down to half marathon pace, and finish at 10k pace.
- Mixed sessions: For example, today I did a five-mile hard push on a hilly trail run, then switched into road shoes and added two one-mile efforts at tempo.
- Marathon pace with threshold: A classic marathon session might be three times three miles. Instead of stopping at marathon pace, add half a mile at threshold at the end of each rep, without extra recovery. Do this three times, with three to four minutes recovery depending on the individual.
- Hill sprints: After an easier long run, add six to eight one-minute hills at a strong but controlled pace. The aim is not VO2 max work but a strong effort that doesn’t risk injury on tired legs.
Why It Works
Training this way helps us stay strong, feel faster and fresher, and cope better with the demands of longer races. It conditions both the body and mind to push through the late-race fatigue.
I hope that makes sense. If you’ve got any questions, please pop them in the comments below. And for now, happy running!
