Training After College: The Necessities

Little known fact: I am a big fan of lists.  It’s pretty much my favorite thing ever.  And while I am by no means an awesome professional athlete, I do know a thing or two about training hard after college.  So here’s a list of things that I can’t live without - everything an aspiring post-collegiate has to have.

1. Shoes.  Lots and lots of shoes.

Here’s a chart of my weekly mileage for the last 10 weeks.  

That dip in the week beginning Sept 2nd is actually 110 miles

So that’s 1,213 miles (an average of 121 miles per week) in the last 2+ months.  Even if you wear your shoes for 700-800 miles per pair like yours truly (not that you necessarily should), that’s quite a few pairs per year - especially when you start considering racing flats, lightweight trainers, etc.  So if you can find a supportive local running store, or a willing shoe company to spot you a few pairs, that always helps.  Because those things are like, really expensive on their own.  

2. Foam roller.

Get it.  Use it.  Love it.  Some people ask what book you would bring to a desert island if you could only bring one.  I would bring a foam roller because my IT bands would get really tight from running in tiny circles on sand.

3. This one is important: the right job.

All of us non-professionals have to do something to pay the bills.  Exactly how you pay the bills is a big determinant of whether you’ll be successful in training.  I’ve worked a few different jobs now after college, some of them great, some of them not so much, and if there’s one thing I’ve learned, it’s that sometimes the total hours that you work is not really the most important factor.  My current job (and the one I’ll be at for the foreseeable future) is with a company that values employees who have outside interests and hobbies.  So instead of hiding the fact that I’m spending 2 hours a day running, I can just tell my boss that I’m gonna go knock out 6 miles at lunch and get nothing more in response than “cool, see you in a few”.

4. Even more important: The Right Spouse.

That look?  That's love, baby

Or be single.  Because if you’re with someone unwilling to put up with some unusual habits, you’ll be single soon anyway.  I’m not going to say that dating fellow runners is the only way, but man it sure helps.  Let’s review:

• I only stay up past 10:30pm in the winter, because I can run later in the morning and it’s still cool
• I get up 90 minutes earlier than I need to before work each day to get my run in. 
• I literally spend 14 and 15 hours on average each week just running.  That doesn’t include stretching, core work, extra driving to get to a track, or anything else.

Most people would have divorced me by now.  If your significant other doesn’t accept the crazy ways of distance runners, it’s going to be a lot of extra stress that you just don’t need.

5. Love what you’re doing

This one is last, but it’s the most important.  A lot of the things that define cross country and track in college disappear immediately once you graduate.  Teammates, coaches, structure, a predetermined race schedule: all gone.  So if you only ran because someone else expected you to, or if you rely on others to motivate you, it’s pretty much inevitable that at some point you’ll wake up for an early morning 10 miler and say “why am I doing this?”

My big advantage?  I love getting up for that 10 miler.  I love setting my own race schedule, and creating my own training, and just getting out there to see how fast I can go.  So if I had one piece of advice for anyone looking to continue training, at whatever level, after college, it would be to figure out what it is you truly want to accomplish.  For me it’s as simple as being better than I was; no further thought required.  Once I decided I was going to take this at least somewhat seriously, the training itself became as routine a part of my life as waking up in the morning.  

Happy Running!