'Van Aaken Recommends Walking Breaks...'
I have been carrying out an experiment on my own body for the past week… I have been running around 10 miles a day and keeping these miles slow, slow, slow; I have been keeping my heart rate in the high 120’s and just into the low 130’s, and taking some walking breaks too…
Apart from Sunday, I have conducting this experiment on the ‘flatland’ of Ipsos seafront, and around my chalky football pitch…
Today under the bright sunny, cloudless sky heat, of the new day, clean from the storms and rain of last night… I meandered along the lane that leads away from the football pitch…
I jogged past goats munching in the hedgerow, with their goatherd lady sitting nearby, still and peaceful on a stool…
She waved as I ran by.
Past the gobble gobble of turkeys; three skinny little cats all delving into the rubbish bins; chickens scratching in dusty earth….
And then I spotted an emu, in an enclosure with a dog too, lying lazily in his kennel… Emu came helpfully towards me with curiosity, as I stood trying to photograph her…
The lane started to climb, and the trees arching over me, created shade and knarled olive tree cool…
Jog, jog, jog… I am enjoying building the miles in this way; my body is relaxed and it is easy easy easy… ‘Easy, light and smooth…’
No sign of fast yet, until I run some intervals again… But this weekend we are travelling to the mainland, for another trail race….
I chose these trail races to give me a ‘race on the horizon’.… A destination to head for… I respond to journeying towards a goal, however illusionary this might be.
I respond to the ‘goal’ by ‘going running’… It helps me create the rhythm of my days….
In ‘week one’ of this experiment, the pace of my jogging has come down all on its own…
A week ago, I started by running 3 miles on this HR, which meant I ran at a slow slow slow 10.24 per mile…
Today I ran 8 miles on the same HR and the miles ‘came out’ at exactly a 10 minute mile pace…
For four years now, I have had an inner voice suggesting ‘go back to basics, back to what you know…’
And since my Achilles injury, shedding nearly all we owned, and setting off as nomads, I have been doing just that…
Greg Funnell who treated my hurt Achilles, described it as the rebuilding injury, for this very reason. It needs alot of care, and attention in the ‘coming back’; specialised rehabilitation exercises and listening to the body... I started to write this blog as I set off once more on the running road, taking a new route, a road to a new unexplored land… and here we all are ‘Oh best beloved’
Training once again with the ‘Van Aaken’ method…
I first heard this method of training in 1979… I had been to Spain for my first international X country race abroad. Five glorious sunny days, running on the burnt red land. The following weekend, back in England, I went for a run with Nigel, who I had met in Spain the previous weekend…
We set off for a snowy 22 mile run on a bitterly cold English February Sunday morning…After about four miles, I felt the horribly uncomfortable rumbles of ‘Spanish tummy’… There was nothing for it, but to dive into the loos at Grayshott… All was well, a loo near to hand at that desperate moment….!
On we ran, the same feeling in my lower gut a few miles further on… But there were only bushes now… Running with a guy too, our first run together!
There was nothing to be done but disappear into the bushes…
Mortifyingly, this happened five more agonisingly embarrassing times….
Nigel was kind, understanding and relaxed about the whole thing…
At one point he said... ‘It's okay, Van Aaken recommends walking breaks…’
This was the first I had heard about the German doctor and his ideas on training…
But running slowly, building a big strong aerobic base has always worked for me. Which is why Van Aaken’s book spoke to me; because it resonated with my own inner knowing…
There are many ways to achieve the best we can in our given endeavor; many many ways…
It is important that we make no one our authority, not a book or a person or any single idea…
Of course we will all learn from one another; and we will gain valuable insights and knowledge and ways to do things from many people…
But ultimately we must make our own decisions; and we will discover what resonates with us; what is right for us… What we will take from a book or a teaching or a mentor; and what we will discard…
Ultimately we are all the expert on ourselves and we will discover and uncover our own way, even sometimes by first following the way of another and discovering it is not for us…
The best coaches, teachers and books lead us to the threshold of our own understanding…
