Pete Julian on Recovery Days
I recently came across a chapter in the book Running Tough on recovery from hard training which featured then-athlete (and now-coach) Pete Julian.
Here’s an expert:
When he was running, Pete Julian, said his most important runs of the week were not his workouts, but his recovery runs.
Most runners plan their week around their hard days. Not Julian. He planned his training week around the days he’d be recovering and build his schedule from there.
He usually took Wednesday and Saturday as his recovery days. He aimed to keep his heart rate between 130-140 bpm and went 3 - 10 miles. Pace did not matter. It was usually very slow. Or as Julian put it, “whatever pace I thought is easy, I’d go about 10% slower, and that was usually right.”
“Recovery days have been the crux of my training. I really try and nail my easy days. There are a lot of workouts that can get you to the top, but if you don’t take your easy days seriously, the rest of the week suffers. The mistake I always see is that many runners don’t know how to run easy. It’s hard for highly motivated runners to do, but a necessary ingredient for getting better.”
On this topic, Pete is spot on.