August 17, 2021
Training Frequency: How Often Should You Train?
Training frequency – how often you train – is essential for endurance training. But, how do you determine how much training to do?
Eliud Kipchoge trains a lot. So does Jan Frodeno and Flora Duffy. I know Zane and Jake Robertson do, and I’m sure that Gwen Jorgensen does too.
I certainly did during my pro days.
Training frequency – how often you train – is an essential component in high-performance endurance training, and that’s why the vast majority of elite endurance athletes train so much.
Essentially, the more you practice, the better you get. Most things are like that.
Obviously, there are some caveats to that statement, but for the most part, it holds true.
How Often Should You Train?
If performance is your primary objective, I believe you should train as much as you can recover from, without getting sick, injured or losing motivation.
That’s a broad statement, but it’s a pretty simple guideline that works for most.
As much as you can recover from will vary between athletes based on your commitments outside of sport, athletic background, current fitness level, and various other factors.
Sickness, illness or a lack of motivation to train are all signs that you may have bitten off more than you can chew. When you find that happening, you may need to reassess and lower your training load.
When considering how often you train, here are several things you should consider …
1. Commitments Outside Of Training
Your schedule should be your first consideration when deciding on your training frequency. What commitments outside of training do you have to take into account and balance with training.
Professional athletes may be able to train 30-hours per week because that’s their sole focus. Even if amateurs had the physical ability to train that much, it’s probably not feasible to balance that level of training with a full-time job, family and a social life.
Recovery would be compromised, and so would performance. You need to experiment to find the optimal load for your circumstances.
2. Your Goals
Your goals determine the structure of your training plan and, therefore, your overall training load.
Goals can vary widely from staying healthy to losing weight or becoming the fastest athlete possible. Ambitious goals like becoming the fastest athlete you’re capable of will ultimately require more training than exercising for health.
As mentioned earlier, there’s a reason the best athletes in the world train so much. It’s necessary for milking the best performance out of yourself.
Cut Race Times, Not Corners.
Racing at your potential and enjoying training is easy when you’re following the right programme.
3. History Of Injury
If you are coming back from an injury or are injury-prone, you may not be able to tolerate a high frequency of training.
You might be better focusing on the quality of each of your sessions and working on your technical skill and muscle imbalances so that you can reduce your chances of getting injured in the future.
As your progress and injuries become less of an issue, you can increase how often you train to reflect the improvements you have made.
4. Recovery
Performance lies in the balance of stress (training) and rest. Train more than you can recover from, and you’ll find performance hindered. You could also suffer from injury, illness or see your motivation slide out from under you. None of that is ideal because consistency is the ultimate performance enhancer.
Typically, young athletes will recover faster than us over 40’s, so age also plays a role here.
Monitoring your resting heart rate (RHR) or heart rate variability (HRV) daily can help you assess your recovery from training and racing. When you see an elevated resting HR or suppressed HRV, that’s feedback you are under stress and may need to ease off to recover adequately.
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We’re all individuals with different genetic make-ups, circumstances and goals.
If you can structure your training in a way that allows you to train as much as you can recover from, without getting sick, injured or losing motivation, there’s a good chance that you’ll be able to train consistently and achieve the goals you have set for yourself.
Good luck!
If you need any help structuring your training, please consider getting Coached. We’d love to work with you.
Ben Pulham