The Biggest Training Plan Mistake Athletes Make (Before They Even Start)

Most athletes think building a training plan starts with workouts.

It doesn’t.

In this episode, we break down what actually needs to happen before a single workout is written—the foundational decisions that determine whether your plan will work… or fall apart within weeks.

This is the first part of a 3-part series on training plan creation, where we walk through the exact framework we use as coaches to build sustainable, effective plans for endurance athletes.

In Part 1, we focus on the foundation:

The questions every coach should ask before building a plan
Why your available time is often misunderstood (and overestimated)
How injury history shapes your entire training approach
The difference between time availability vs. training capacity
Why recovery, mobility, and fueling must be accounted for upfront
The role of motivation—and why “surface-level goals” often fail

If you’ve ever:

Struggled to stick to a training plan
Felt like your plan didn’t fit your life
Or found yourself constantly adjusting or restarting

This episode will show you why—and how to fix it.

Because the reality is:

Most training plans don’t fail because of bad workouts.
They fail because the foundation was never built correctly.

📊 This is Part 1 of a 3-Part Series:

• Part 1: Building the Foundation (this episode)
• Part 2: How to Set Weekly Training Volume
• Part 3: How to Structure Your Training Week

Timestamps:
00:00 – Training Plan Series Overview (Start Here)
02:15 – Why Your “Why” Matters More Than Your Workouts
04:15 – The Questions Coaches Ask Before Building a Plan
08:45 – Athlete Background: Experience, Injuries, and Lifestyle
10:50 – Understanding Weekly Volume and Intensity
13:05 – How Sport Type Impacts Training Approach (Running vs Triathlon)
15:40 – The Truth About the 10% Rule and Recovery Limits
18:15 – Adjusting Training Based on Feedback and Real Life
22:35 – Why Subjective Feedback Matters More Than You Think
27:15 – When (and How) to Progress Training Volume Safely
33:15 – Managing Training Load to Avoid Injury
37:40 – Recovery Isn’t Optional: Building It Into the Plan
42:00 – Balancing Stress Across Multiple Disciplines
46:30 – From Foundation to Structure: Mapping Your Training Plan
49:35 – Building a Macro Plan: Peak Volume and Taper Strategy

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For coaching inquiries:

Coach Katie → https://fuel2run.com

Coach Justin → https://tabularasaracing.com

Podcast Email → theenduranceathletejourney@gmail.com

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:10

Welcome everyone to the Endurance Athletic Journey Podcast. I'm your host, Coach Justin. I'm here with Coach Katie. And today's episode is 81. We're going to be talking about training plan creation. And so I'm going to how I'm going to describe how we're going to go about this process over the next couple episodes is I'm going to create an analogy. This is like us building a house. So in this topic, in this conversation for this episode, we're going to lay the foundation. We're going to pour the concrete footers. We're going to lay the concrete slab in order to build the house. And then we're going to frame the house. And so the way that we can look at this is that we're going to talk about how we as coaches, talking to a new athlete, what are the things that we have to do before we even start talking about workouts? Before we even start talking about training plans. How do we lay that groundwork? What are the kind of the questions that we have to ask people in order to start the conversation on how to develop this plan? That's the foundation. Then we start to frame the house. So we're putting up the two by fours and everything else. We're going to create the frame of the house. And we're going to talk about how do we manage and create the weekly volume. All we're looking at is like if this is an eight-week plan, how do we set each week's total volume? Uh, and how do we want to grow that? How do we want to manage it? Are we talking about uh four four weeks on, one week off in terms of you know rollback weeks? How do we lay the foundation? How do we set this framework so that before we can even go in to create workouts, which is going to be part two of the series, and we're gonna go in and we're gonna say, now that we've got all this weekly volume, we're going to divide this, parse this weekly volume out into days and then workouts. And how do we sequence these workouts in a way that keeps the athlete healthy and able to progress forward so that when they reach that starting line on race day, they are the best prepared they can possibly be. They are as healthy as they can be in order to have the day that they want. Uh so that's gonna be the process over the next couple episodes here at the Endurance Athlete Journey Podcast. So thank you guys for joining us and we're gonna dive right on in. So uh so the way that we can look at this is because I I tend to focus on multi-sport, which is a very different method for building training plans than what may maybe Katie would use as runners. And the reason that I say that is because running, uh just the nature of running is a high impact on the body. It can beat the body down if you're not uh already at a point where you can handle that volume. And so the maybe the way that Katie would create a training plan for a runner may be significantly different than the way that I would build a training plan for, let's say, a triathlete or a cyclist where or swimmer, where you do have some non-impact sport within the overall umbrella of what we're training for. And so there's a way to manage that volume. You know, we may grow different aspects of the training plan at faster rates than than others. You know, I may grow the cyclists, the the cycling portion of a training plan faster or more aggressively than I would grow the run portion of of a triathlete training plan. So uh let's start the conversation. So, Katie, uh I'm gonna create a scenario here for you. And you have somebody who's coming to you who is new to the sport. Uh I don't even know if if race race distance uh matters all that much, you know, if we're talking about uh a true beginner. So, but let's just assume uh for simplicity's sake that it's gonna be a sh a short course, right? Which is where naturally a beginner would want to start. So we're talking 5k, 10k, uh maybe the little 10 milers, uh, you know, something that's definitely less than a half marathon. That's where we're starting. And this person is on, let's assume that they are effectively couched to whatever it is uh that they're that they're that they want to train for. What is the conversation like between you and this athlete before you start talking about training plans and and volumes? What what sort of things are you are you asking and trying to to gather information uh so that you know how to create the the framework of the training plan?

SPEAKER_01 4:31

Like have you been running at all, or is this like are you truly like just inspired to do a race? And then that, you know, so it's just basically getting any idea of their current fitness level, like what's you know, what are they doing for exercise? Is it are they running at all? Is there any running happening? Are they just inspired to do a race? Or are they doing anything, you know, Peloton or some sort of weekly classes? Like, is there a a a base level of fitness or not? You know, so is it let's just assume here that there's a little somebody that maybe goes out and jogs a couple miles, or maybe they just run a little bit, or maybe even, yeah, just just a little bit of running, and maybe they do some other exercise classes or something, like maybe Peloton or cycling class. And so there's a little bit of fitness already. I'm basically really just gonna start pretty, pretty slow. You know, it might be I'm probably not gonna have them run generally every day. It'd be like every other day, and maybe just progressing that to a couple hours of running initially, like an hour, maybe two slowly, just kind of over the course of like a couple of weeks, seeing how they're doing with it. Like maybe it's a run-walk kind of program, like we've talked about before, where maybe I'm having them even start there. Like, let's just have you run a couple of minutes, walk a minute, you know, progress it up that way. So that's like truly, it's not even about volume. Because at that point, yeah, you don't want to go from zero to 10 miles all at once, but it's just sort of slowly kind of getting them used to running, and this the time they're running is shorter at each time, and there's more like recovery in between, and then you're sort of building up from there. And so once I kind of get them at to a baseline of maybe like five or ten miles a week, or maybe two out a couple hours, two or three hours a week, then it's kind of like then it's more um scientific, maybe with that. It's just sort of like let's then that five to ten percent principle um slowly increasing it. Well, we'll talk more about the weekly, how the week looks, but that's kind of how I'm approaching that very, very beginner. So it's it's kind of a slow pro process and like a run walk program or something like that just to get them there. Um, and then obviously, depending on when they want to run the race and their goals, kind of working around that. But that's probably what I would approach for a newbie runner.

SPEAKER_00 6:59

Let's let's take it once but not even intensity.

SPEAKER_01 7:02

It's just like it's just purely just to get them to be able to complete a 5K or 10K, right? We're not even talking any intensity. I'm not giving them speed workouts, I'm not giving them track workouts, I'm not it's none of that really for new runners. Just like let's just have you get to the point where you can hopefully maybe run the whole race and and actually run it. Um, you know, I might talk a little bit about pacing so they don't go out full throttle for the first half mile and then die, but it won't be like any sort of other than maybe like short, maybe just to get the leg torn over a little bit if they're comfortable with it, doing some short like strides and things like that. But it's very much just the running portion. There's not even any where like real structured workouts in the sense of like intensity or um it's just okay, run this distance, run this time, run run walk, you know. So that's how I'd approach that. Very, very beginner.

SPEAKER_00 8:01

Let's take it even one step step back a little bit. So let's say that this person comes to you and you're having your initial consultation with them and you're just kind of getting to know them a little bit. What are some of the questions that you would ask uh a new uh somebody who's coming to you for the consultation before we start talking training plans and methods and things like that? What questions are you asking them?

SPEAKER_01 8:23

I think like I'd want to know kind of what inspired them to want to work with me. Like why what are what's their w why for doing what they're doing? Because that's important to me to know why. Like, why do you want to do this now? Like, is there something that is is inspiring you? Um, because then I I want to use that information to hopefully help continue to motivate them, you know, because it's hard. You know, when you start running can be hard. It's not always easy. So finding that why so I can help be their coach and help motivate them. But then I'm asking them about their life, you know, like is there what it what time do they have to to put towards this every day? Like it do they have an hour a day to even though I might not initially be prescribing that much exercise? It like how much time do they have? When, you know, those questions of just generally when, like when they typically work out, you know, basically like those basic background questions and then stress life, other stuff, like, you know, do you have kids? Do you have a job, you know, job? Like, tell me more about your date, your your week, your your you know, your schedule so that I kind of know what's going on in their lives a little bit. If they're an executive super busy with like three kids, is you know, they're my what I want them to accomplish. I mean, it just might be a little different than somebody that maybe has a little bit more time on their hands. Um, so I just need to know a lot. I ask a lot of questions what they're and then again, like what they're currently doing fitness-wise, um, and then kind of building from there. Like then I'm thinking, okay, you know, day to day also is there's certain days you can't run, like certain days you have to not do anything, like what are your weekends like? Just everything like that, and then it's building from there. Okay. Kind of getting more in detail. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 10:12

So so your approach with with somebody like that is you start you start talking about, you know, what what's your why? So why is it that you want to accom to do this? Uh and availability is kind of your your two big things. Okay.

SPEAKER_01 10:27

But availability and then just like yeah, like life's stress, what's kind of going on in your life. But I think the why is important if someone's like, I just want to do a 5k because I want to lose some weight. I might have a conversation with them about that in a deeper way of like, okay, like, is this because that to me is not a generally a deep enough why. Because it w when you're doing when you're out there, you're like, uh, like, this sucks. I don't like running. Like, you're gonna you're not gonna be able to stick with it. So it's just like I need to know, especially if someone's a newbie coming at me, like with wanting help, I need to know their why, and then maybe digging a little deeper, like, okay, well, tell me more about that. You know, like so it's it is a little bit of an interview of like trying to figure them out and figure out um, like, yeah, injury, like it's just questions about any injuries, any like issues with um in the past, if they've done sports in the past, have they ever done running? Have they ever been on a running team in cross country in high school? This all those like background questions of like what's you know, get you meet so I get to know their experience too. Like maybe they did run a lot at one point and then they stopped. So maybe they do have more experience, they just haven't been running in a while. So it's like you have to kind of gather all of this information and um yeah, and any injury history, um, any issues they have physically, um, like, you know, it's anything. You know, I mean are they do they have like a one leg longer than the other? I don't know. Just anything that might be important that you'd want to make sure to note so that you're keeping that in mind when you're building something, you're kind of asking them about it, making sure you're checking in so that they don't get injured. I mean, you know, as coaches, we really want to we really like prefer our athletes to to keep them healthy, right? So they can accomplish what they've tr hired us to do to help them with. So yeah. Yeah, I think for me, if you have anything to add, anything you ask more.

SPEAKER_00 12:25

I think for me, the two things that I tend to focus on is the availability and the injury history is kind of the two things that that I tend to focus on. I'm I don't know, maybe it's just me, but I I'm not too I don't really typically ask a whole lot of you know, what's your why questions, uh and which I find it fascinating that that is like that was like one of the first things that you said that you asked them is the why. Yeah. Where I don't typically ask that.

SPEAKER_01 12:50

And I think because I feel I feel like that's the key though. Why are you because endurance sports, especially something like a triathlon or somebody that, you know, I don't know, any anything like a 5K, like net it's hard, yeah, it's not easy, you know. Like well. So to me, it's like if their why isn't deep enough, they're just kind of like had this inspiration all of a sudden to train for something, I feel like I'm gonna lose them if their why isn't there and I haven't had that conversation, right? So I don't want my athletes to decide like a month in that it's too, you know, hopefully I'm still having those conversations with them, but I don't want them to be like, oh, I just wanted to lose some weight and this is like a lot harder than I thought it was gonna be. And I'm this sucks and I'm not gonna do it. Um if so if they're why, if the reason they're signing up is a little nut. Um, or they don't see it seems like they don't have enough, like, I don't know the right word, like of a why superficial why is what is what you're saying about. Yeah, and I and so that's why I like to ask more questions. It's like, okay, well, is there something that happened that you know that made you think, okay, I'm gonna do this and then hopefully try to lose some weight? Is it and then it's like, oh yeah, my you know, my grandma had diabetes. I don't know. Like I don't want to have diabetes, or I have kids and I want to be able to run around with them and play, and I want to show them what it's like to be a healthy person that that goes towards a goal. So, okay, there. That's a good why. Now every time you tell me this is hard, I'm gonna be like, okay, but your kids are watching you and you are setting an example for your kids to be healthy and in and do exercise. So you you know, that is why you're getting up tomorrow morning and you're gonna do this workout, you know? Like, so that's important.

SPEAKER_00 14:38

Yeah, I definitely think it's important, but it's it's definitely not in the top top two or three questions that I asked. So I think that that was pretty interesting that that it was right up there uh for you. Uh was like the first or second question that you would ask uh somebody. So um yeah, for me I think that it is uh availability. So it's it's more of the like the lifestyle questions, you know, what's what's your life like? Do you have a high-demanding job? Do you travel a lot? You know, do you have kids? How how active are the kids? Um you know, are are you married? Are there stuff how do you guys you know travel a lot? And so that's gonna tell me how easy is it going to be for these maybe longer sessions, which typically will happen on the weekend, but if they're always traveling somewhere with the weekend, that's going to create some friction uh between the athlete and myself and trying to get them or for them to execute the sessions that I've designed for them to do. So I I think availability is probably the first one, and then my my injury-related questions, because I need to be able to know when I start to build the plan, what things do I have to keep in my mind uh and how to manage the stress that they're going to be under. You know, if I'm dealing, I I coached somebody one time, I built a training plan for her, and she had uh she had a really, really bad knee. So it's some I think it was like an ACL thing where she had basically torn it when she was in high school and never and it's never been replaced and never been fixed. And so when she runs, like the knee just kind of like it moves to the left and right, but she's moving north and south. And so when I watched her run, I was like, oh my god, I do not want I I don't know how to coach this person because I don't want to completely break them. So I had to keep that in mind, you know, in terms of how much stress am I going to induce on on this athlete and how am I going to manage that stress? So the injury history is probably you know number two. That's important. Number two that I would ask. And I think I think a lot of it is because it's a lot that I've had to deal with in terms of setbacks and injuries and things. So it's really, it's really prominent in my mind because I have to do the same thing for myself. When I go to sit down and develop my plan, I have to fake I have to keep that in mind. It's like, okay, you know, is it winter? Is it winter time where I tend to have joint issues and what can I can and can I do during the wintertime, but I can do in the summer, so it tells me how I can progress my plan and maybe do focus blocks of things. Um, so I think that that's number two that I would ask for somebody. And then I think before the conversation ends, I definitely kind of bring up the why because I I do agree with you. I think that it's important uh for them to have I I don't see, I don't want to take on the role of determining whether whether I think that their why is strong enough. Uh it just has to be strong enough for them.

SPEAKER_01 17:33

I need them, that's important. I've worked enough as a dietitian, I've seen enough people have very yeah, if if your only goal is to something superficial, you're not gonna stick with it. I've had clients who just their goal was so superficial that they when it going got tough, the tough, I guess I don't know what's the right word, but like yeah, they just don't, they don't stick to it. And I know that. And it's like it's not so much I won't work with them, it's more like I'll coach them a little bit to be like, and I'm not a mental, I'm not like a mental health like professional, but I mean I take on many roles as a coach and a dietitian. I'm not it's like a health a health coach. I'm sometimes like a cheerleader. So like what I do is that's important to me, but it's not like, oh, your why is not deep amount deep enough. It's just making sure that, okay, well, I dig dig a little deeper. Like what is because there's usually like a deeper why. It's not usually so superficial, but I find if I don't ask those questions and get them really thinking about it, like, oh, really, why am I wanting to do this? What is it? Um, I find that when it does get tough, they don't stick to it as well or they tend to fall off, or they they're like, oh, I, you know, they don't complete the workout or something. So uh that I can also bring that in when it does get tough and or give them some suggestions of like, okay, this is your, you know, you're thinking about your, I don't know, you're doing this for your, you're you want to complete a marathon because you want to do it for cancer because your dad died of cancer. I want you to stick that picture of your dad on your like somewhere where you see it every morning when you get up before you do your workout. You're looking at that picture of your dad, you know, stuff like that. Cause yes, I'm not a psychologist, but I want my athletes to be successful. And I know that sometimes for myself, when I'm struggling, you know, I have to have a real meaningful reason why I'm gonna get up every day and do the work. Otherwise, it's hard to keep going and doing it. So it helps people, and I think that's a in my opinion, really very important.

SPEAKER_00 19:33

So yeah, it definitely it does give you some insight. And I'll I'll admit that I've I've struggled this with this as a coach before, where um where they when they hired me, I think that they hired me as a as a way to think that they were it was going to make them disciplined and motivated. That you know, by having a coach, that it was going to be my job to say, all right, put your shoes on, let's go, kind of thing. Where it's almost kind of like this parent-child relationship. And I I I will admit that I may not have handled those situations very easily very well, uh, because I didn't quite understand you know what they what they were trying to get from me, and what they were trying to get from me was not necessarily a plan, they were trying to get motivation from me. And the way that I view this in terms of coaching and motivation, and sometimes I waver on this, is that it's really not my job to motivate you. Uh it's my job to guide you and support you and and build a plan that that makes you as prepared as we possibly can be and while keeping you healthy. The motivation is on you. I'm not going to be by your bedside saying, hey, crack the whip, let's go. Yeah. Kind of thing.

SPEAKER_01 20:46

But yeah. You have to tell people that though. You can't assume people know that. So it's not that I'm asking the why because I need to motivate them every day. I I think that helps them think about why they're doing it. But I generally will have a conversation like that. Like I'm giving you the, you know, training, especially if I'm finding that they're not doing it or something's happening. It's kind of those questions of like what's going on. And then it's like I can't be there to like cheer you on every day or check in with you every single day to see if you've done the workouts. Like I'll check in with you. Don't, you know, don't get me wrong. I definitely like to be involved, but I can't call you in the morning and make sure you're gonna do your workout every day, you know what I mean, or be there physically. So like that is something I think that needs to be sort of I mean, I don't generally think you need to necessarily say that, but if you're starting to get that vibe, like it is a conversation that needs to have. The reason I I think the why thing for me is just more to get them really thinking about that because I do I do think it is something that they can leverage and I can leverage to help them, you know, maybe motivate a little bit, but I'm not thinking, oh, I'm gonna take over the role of cheerleader would be their full motivation. And that's the other thing is like I I feel like if sometimes it gets to the bottom of it if they really do not have a very deep why and they maybe were just told or felt like I'm just doing this because I don't know, my friend is doing it and I want to I feel like I need to do something or something like that. Then and you're just asking the question, then you can kind of almost like parse out the people who are not going to really be able that aren't like internally motivated and aren't, you know, are going to struggle with the workouts because, you know, I I'll keep asking questions until I'm like, okay, well, it doesn't seem like your reason for doing this is very strong. I suggest you find like, and I'll explain that to them. Like the reason I'm asking this is because it's hard to train for something and it's going to take dedication, and I can't be there every day to cheer you on and make sure you're doing the workouts. So it's I recommend really thinking about why you want to do this and really having something that's going to motivate you when the going gets tough, you know, when you when you have to wake up and it's dark outside and cold or whatever, you know, like that that's that's when it's gonna get hard. So you need to have something that's gonna get you out there because I can't be the one at 5 a.m. calling, you know, trying to motivate you to go out. I have my own stuff. Yeah. Right. Like I can't do that for all my athletes. So it's that's the reasoning, I think, is just to be able to get to the bottom of that a little bit more and then have those conversations. For me, sometimes the conversations, I guess in that sense can be a little bit uncomfortable, but it helps. I think it's necessary, yeah. So it's it's kind of top of my list for that reason because I want to parse out like, why are you even doing why do you want to do this to begin with? Okay, so we have, or maybe there's they're like a a long-term athlete, maybe they already have a lot of motivation. I still ask those questions. Like it's helpful, like, oh, you want to do another marathon or you're trying to get this PR. Like, what is your sort of why for that? Because like I ran into if it's all outcome-based, it's all because you want the PR, you know, that that can be troublesome too, because you're not maybe doing it because always because you absolutely love the process and you're so hooked on the outcome. So it's just getting the the bottom of that. And yes, sometimes I do think I my role sometimes does become a little bit more um asking the deep questions and helping people work through that so that they can enjoy it. I want them to enjoy it too. I don't want them to be, you know, so it's it's I think it's just part part of why I asked. So it can be from the beginner to the very to somebody very experienced. They still want to ask that question. And then all the other questions about life and of course injury are also important. So like I would say my top three would be like the why, the life, like just their life schedule, like injury. I think like, yeah, yeah, like obviously that kind of goes with the availability and then like timing of workouts, all that stuff. But it I think I'm trying to think if there's anything else I would put in my those are people top three questions, I think. So, and I don't know if there's any other questions. I guess little questions here and there about their life. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 25:11

But I find that people that are are outcome-driven people um typically are harder to stay motivated or harder to motivate than process-driven people. Process-driven people, I I don't have to, I don't have to say, hey, did you do your workout today? They did it because they bought into the process. Outcome-oriented people, those are the ones that I have to pay a little bit more attention to, uh, and saying, okay, if I start to see like a couple days of reds and training peaks, and then and I know that they're outcome driven, that's when I start to ask questions like, hey, what's what's going on? Is there something that that you need to tell me? Um, you know, is there something, you know, is there some kind of breakdown of communication there? And that's when I kind of step in. But usually outcome or or process-driven people, I I really don't have a problem motivating them because they're self-motivated. Right, absolutely.

SPEAKER_01 26:07

Yeah, I think that's why it's kind of important to ask those questions of people so you kind of know where their motivation comes from. And and if you can kind of drive them a little bit more, you know, I can't like, yeah, I I don't know if I'm have enough background in psychology to move someone from like being outcomes to like more process motivated, but I think it's just having some conversations with them about it and being like, well, what happens if you know you do everything right and something happens on race day and you and you don't get that PR? Like just kind of asking some deeper questions sometimes in our calls, um, and just being not that I don't want them to be successful, but just like what you know so what can we do each day to enjoy it? Like what can we sort of get out of the the process a little more and kind of and and diving deeper into that? So yeah.

SPEAKER_00 26:58

All right. Um those are the reason that yeah, so let's I know that people dialed into this thing and they're just like, when are we talking when are we going to start talking about training plans? But I I think that this conversation is is really important because like I described in the beginning, it's laying the foundation. We're laying the groundwork for how to build this training plan. And so, you know, if you're self-coached and you're sitting out there today and you're just like, you know, I I need to find a way to build this plan. So how do I go about doing it? The reason is I want you to ask yourself these same questions that we would be asking you. You know, what's your why? How much time do you realistically have available? How not how much time do you think that you have? How much time do you actually have available to you that you know that you could execute?

SPEAKER_01 27:51

An exercise of like going through your day and don't just be like, oh, I think I have, I definitely have 10 hours just willy-nilly. Like go through and look at your daily schedule and like think about, okay, when would I be able to do the training and how much time can I block off? Like, would it be at night or in the morning or during the day somewhere, and then kind of add it up and sort of see, you know, don't just assume you have all this time, because sometimes we can find time, but sometimes we can't. And then you're over you've over uh scheduled yourself.

SPEAKER_00 28:23

I think I when I when I work with people, I think I find more people that overestimate their availability than underestimate their availability. I think most most of the people that I that I come across would say, yeah, I I have I have eight hours a week that I can train, but realistically it's like closer to five. You know? So you know if I go in and I build a plan that is conducive to an eight hour, eight hour a week athlete, I've already over overloaded them with stuff that they're not going to be able to do and they're not going to they're not going to be able to buy into that process because they overestimated their availability.

SPEAKER_01 29:00

And so I think with the volume too, because it was what we're going to talk about. I mean, I think that's why I always like to figure out where they're at, you know, currently with their um current volume. And then as we're building it slowly, there might become a point in time where they're like this um they're just not able to complete more volume, you know, like because it takes time. So if you're taking someone who's already doing five hours and they're like, I want to do ten, well, they're already doing five, so you know they can do five, you know, based off what they're telling you. And you start, you know, slowly increasing that, there may be like a point in time where it's like that at eight, seven or eight hours where you start to add more volume and they're kind of like, okay, I don't have more time, right? And so then that's the limiting factor for their volume, you know. So uh in an optimal world, you know, you you would be able to, depending on what race you are wanting to do, you would maybe slowly ramp up the volume and and the time you're doing it until you kind of get to a max, right? At least, you know, we'll talk a little bit about how we we we think about that. But I think it sometimes is just like self-limiting a little bit because they'll realize, oh, I actually don't have 10 hours, you know, I only have eight, maybe, you know, and so that's okay, well, that's where that's where you're gonna cap out at, I guess. And then we have to like then maybe bring in different elements into that eight hours, so like maybe intensity and whatever, but it's sometimes um that's when we talk about volume, and that's kind of where we're gonna go, is like sometimes the limiting factor is just how much time you have. I think a lot of people get caught up by like, oh, like so and so, this elite athlete is doing 140 miles a week, or uh, you know, and I think unfortunately we have that comparison game. I know I'm a little bit, I do that a little bit myself sometimes, like, oh, well, more is better. And if I get more volume, it's I'm gonna be better. But it always comes down to like there's only so much time in the day, and there's going to be like a cap at what volume you can do. And that's unfortunately for us people who don't get paid for running and training and triathlon, we just that's sometimes where the limit is. And so I think having that's where it's so important to kind of have those conversations because you kind of know um what you're at and then what maybe the max you can get at. And that's gonna be really what in terms of hours or you know, usually I think it's kind of hours per week. This is where hours works well, like time, because you might not be able to get more than that. And that's that's where the volume probably will end up maxing out, right? So um, but we don't want to start at 10 hours. So you don't want to go from like, well, I have 10 hours, so I'm gonna go from five to 10 hours next week. That's and I mean, maybe for running, I might might be able to do that a little bit more for triathlon. I mean, I don't know if I would recommend going from five to ten hours of total aerobic volume, you know, but you could probably increase it a little bit more for triathlon because, like you said, the cycling and the swimming are less impact, but you don't want to do that for running for sure, you'll be injured.

SPEAKER_00 32:15

It's still it's still an issue of stress, you know. So I'm glad that you brought this up because you could you could be sitting there saying, I have 10 hours available to me, no problem. So you develop that training plan to be a 10-hour plan. But the problem is that your body can't absorb 10 hours of training. And so your body may be only able to absorb and recover from eight hours of stress that you put on the body through training. So even though you have the availability of 10, you can only absorb eight. And so that that's something also that we have to keep in mind is that it may not be availability that is your limiter, it's the body that you have in order to absorb it. I find this to be also the case when I work with older athletes as well. They have all the availability that they could possibly want. Yeah, they're not going to be able to do that. But the issue is what can their body handle and what can they recover from. And so that's another really important thing. So when uh when I coach older athletes, I may use a different model uh in terms of you know, we may move from that seven-day model to a 10-day model. It's just a different way because I need more time built in in order to aid recovery. And I think that this is one of the things that most athletes do not consider when they build their training plan is the amount of time that is going to be required for some purposeful recovery. Uh, and this is this is going to be stuff like stretching, rolling, uh whether you use uh mobility stuff, percussion therapy, compression therapy, um, heat therapy, cold therapy, all the other types of therapy modalities. I think that many people completely ignore it and they only focus on, hey, I've got 10 hours available to myself, so they stack on 10 hours of training, aerobic or strength-based training at 10 hours. And then they realize, oh, I need more in order to recover. And so one of the things that I did this year for my own training was for the first few months of the year, I put I built in the recovery stuff as workouts. So if you look at my training peaks, you'll see um sauna time, 30 minutes. You'll see uh Norma Tech uh doing the legs for you know 60 minutes here, uh, another workout of 20 minutes of of uh percussion therapy and rolling. Because I that was one of the things that I did was I was so bad at the recovery stuff that I didn't have an appreciation for how much time is re is required to to do that to keep me healthy enough to be able to do the aerobic stuff. And so I really wanted to build that appreciation in my mind, and the only way that I could see that is if I saw it on the screen and I saw the green and I saw it's like, oh wow.

SPEAKER_01 35:07

Because you're you're motivated by having the green.

SPEAKER_00 35:10

I know that my my training plan was eight hours of aerobic training, eight hours of strength training, but I had a 20-hour a week training plan, and I looked at it, I was like, man, this is a lot. And it's because I built in like four hours a week of recovery stuff spanning over seven days, which is not unrealistic uh at all, if you really like account for it. And so I think it really was a great exercise for me to gain that appreciation that I needed. Uh, and also when I talk with other athletes, uh, and I I think that this is something that I definitely bring up now where I didn't used to bring it up before, is like, okay, you have you have the 10 hours available, but let's think about this as well. You may have 10 hours available, your body may be able to absorb 10 hours, but we're completely ignoring the recovery stuff. And so if I tell them it's like, you know, we're getting into the training plan, they're just like, oh, my calves are hurting and stuff like that, then we didn't account for the time of managing and trying to do something that's purposeful to aid recovery. We're just hoping that the body does it on its own, and that's not going to be the case all the time. So Right.

SPEAKER_01 36:20

And I I want to just put this out there too. I think we usually have more time, but you just um maybe you have to find it. Yeah. Like it's when you're scrolling on your phone, which is fine, because I do that, but then maybe I'm like, okay, I'm gonna do my mobility and I'm gonna listen to a podcast, or I'm gonna, um, okay, it's nighttime and we're about to go to bed. I have 10 minutes, I could just sit here, which is what I want to do, and just do nothing, but I'm gonna do my mobility. And so there's usually more time you can kind of carve out for that. And I found, yeah, like instead of wasting my time, you know, I don't know, on YouTube or something, I can probably multitask and like watch this video and do my mobility or my percussions, like they're a gun, those type, those, those types of things that I can need to be doing for recovery. Like I can multitask and do them if I'm watching TV or something, and also just trying to chill. And generally, like I think that especially the mobility at the end of the day is a little bit relaxing because you're stretching and there's something kind of relaxing about that. So it could be kind of built in that way. If you're not wanting to like put it in as an actual workout, I think just trying to figure out looking through your whole day and figure out those like idle moments and multitasking. Yeah, some days I kind of feel like I'm just like boom, boom, boom, all day long. I never really had a time to sit down and relax. But that's because I'm trying to maximize my day the best I can and and I have to fit in the mobility. So if usually, you know, you find the time for the running or you have the time available for like the workouts and stuff, you can usually find extra time. And if you find that you can't find that extra time, then you do, I would say then it's like you have to go in and be realistic. Okay, I maybe I really don't have 10 hours of you know, volume for aerobic exercise and strength training. I have to then carve in some of that towards this other stuff because it is so important. It is, it's a big part of it. And I think that that's where people kind of get into trouble, even not even just thinking about like this would be maybe more in that weekly topic, but like um you have an hour an hour and a half total to train. Maybe even in that, like you, you know, a lot of people are like, okay, I've been an hour and a half, I'm gonna go out and I'm gonna run an hour and a half. But you probably I want to think about like the warming up of it, like some some activation drills and just little things to get your body ready to go, or even when you get back, like having a little time to just stretch a minute, you know, get yourself warmed down, like you know, kind of just get yourself ready for the day a little bit, instead of just jumping right into the next task. And I know I'm guilty of that sometimes, but I find when I carve out that time to do that stuff, my workout goes a hundred percent so much better. Yeah. Like not a hundred percent better, but a lot much better, you know, or even just the time to like be done and and refuel even. If I haven't thought about that part of my training, then I'm missing out on a very important aspect of like even just recovering adequately or being ready for the workout to begin with. And so I think that people are very guilty of that. Oh, yeah, I have an hour and a half a day of it. And then they're thinking, oh, I'm gonna do that entire hour and a half is all going to be aerobic exercise or my running or my cycling. And it's like, well, really, you need a little bit of buffer on each end to do some of that important stuff, right?

SPEAKER_02 39:40

Yep.

SPEAKER_01 39:40

We have you know, if you're creating your own plan, I really encourage you to think about that when you're looking at your time because it's not all going to be just training. Right. You know, and if you if that's all you're doing, I think you're setting yourself up maybe for injury or not recovering or not, you know, fueling adequately, that kind of stuff.

SPEAKER_00 39:58

Uh I think it's funny that you brought this up because I'm actually working with an athlete right now who uh when we started working together, uh, I would just put in just her workouts. And I told her, I said, you know what? Um I'm going to operate under the assumption that you're doing your pre-workout stuff. You're doing, you know, before you go for a run, you're doing your activation stuff, you're doing your stretching, your your dynamic mobility, that kind of stuff. I'm go I'm operating under the assumption that you are doing that. Um and she said, uh, put it in as a workout. So you know that for athletes. Yeah. So right now in in her plan is there's the run, and then there's uh I think it's like 10 to 15 minutes or something like that of just pre-run, pre-run warm-up uh or pre-run activities or whatever it is that we're gonna call it. Because it helped it it helped her become accountable for it. Because she said, if I see it, I'll do it. If I don't see it, I'm not going to do it. And it was such a great lesson uh to me, personally, as an athlete and as a coach, uh, that she really kind of opened my eyes. It's like, you know what, she's right. And that's when I started to experiment with this stuff. It's like, okay, well, let me let me put in my recovery stuff as actual warmups or as workouts to hold me accountable for doing it and to get an appreciation as to what are all the other stuff that I'm not doing that I need to do in order to stay healthy and and progress like I want to. And so I'm really eternally grateful to her for for having having the gust to say, no, just put it as a workout, just put it in there because it really just put it in there for you.

SPEAKER_01 41:37

It was great.

SPEAKER_00 41:38

I I really appreciate that she did that and it taught me something.

SPEAKER_01 41:41

I've done that for for athletes too, who I think would really benefit from some sort of pre-workout activation, like sort of mobility stuff that I'll put in there. And so I've I do that for I've done that for myself, but I do that. I have done that, like some bandwork or some just different drills and things. Like, because they're it's like, oh, if I just tell them to do it, sometimes they don't know what they're what I'm asking of them to do. You know, they're like, well, there's a million different like videos on this or things that I could be doing that I found online and that I I found for me, like if it's just like relying on me to just do something, it isn't I I don't know sometimes I know what I need to do, but there's a million different types of drills and things I could be doing. So if I kind of put it out there, like this is what I'm gonna be doing, either it's in like this mobility app I follow that they have some activation like movements that they just sort of set and you follow it, or it's something I've set in training peaks or something, but I find that very helpful, like to even offer that to some of my people I work with is just like, do you want me to put in some warm-up, or even for a race? Like, I'm gonna put the the warm-up drills in there. Um, there might be some videos in there, but I want you to watch like how to maybe do strides correctly, or how to do the skips, the A skip, B skip, you know, some of those skipping movements, like, and then that's kind of what I want, and this is kind of how much I want you to do, and this is what you're gonna do. And um, it's very helpful, I think. And then they feel like, okay, I've I've got something. It's not just like relying on them to like figure it out. So it's something I do, and I kind of enjoy doing that because yeah, it is important.

SPEAKER_00 43:17

All right, so I think that we've done we've done a pretty good job now, I think, of of laying the foundation. So we've poured the footers for the house. And so now let's start to frame this house up. Right. So now that we've kind we've had the the consultative part of the discussion, now it's our job as a coach to sit down and start to map this out.

SPEAKER_01 43:39

Hey everybody, this is Coach Katie, and I'm actually jumping in here because we're going to end this podcast, this first section right here. And we're gonna come at you next week with the second part um of the episode. So we're going to actually break it into three part episode. So we're going to have them. A third portion coming at you the following week. So this episode was all about laying the foundation, the things that we might ask athletes that we're working with, and the things that we really want you to encourage thinking about yourself when you're planning your training plan. So, you know, this may seem sound like kind of an episode about coaching and what we what we do as coaches, but in reality, if you aren't working with a coach or you are working with a coach and they aren't asking you these types of questions, maybe that is, you know, maybe that is something to think about is, you know, these are very important things to that coaches should be asking. But also if you're just writing your own training plan, I think kind of giving these things a thought. Um, for instance, like how much time you have, but really how much time do you have to train? And also considering the time that you need for recovery, mobility, all of those things and fueling. So it's not always, you know, I have 10 hours to train. It's maybe you actually have seven or eight hours to train and you have to dedicate two of those hours to other things that are going to help support your training. So that's sort of what we're talking about here. We also want you to consider things like injury history. And of course, I talk a lot about your why and why are you doing what you're doing and really having that deeper reason. It doesn't have to be always something extremely deep, but some it has to be something that is gonna get you out of bed in the morning when it's dark and cold outside, for instance. So we're laying the foundation. Next week we're gonna come at you with a discussion all about volume and and how we think about building a training plan in volume. Um, and then that third part is actually gonna be like the week itself. How are we thinking about structuring that plan once we have an idea of the weekly volume, then kind of coming in and getting down to the nitty-gritty of how we're looking at a whole week's worth of training and how we might structure that. So we've got three parts. This is part one. We'll see you next week for part two with a discussion more on volume, and then a third part uh coming out the next the week after that. So thank you so much. Um, I do want to mention, please, if you can leave us a rating and review in wherever you listen to your podcast, that would be super helpful. Share our podcast with others if you think that they might enjoy and get some benefit from it. So please share, please subscribe, please like, and um review us if you can. We do really uh appreciate your feedback. And as always, if you want to find us, we're on Facebook at the endurance athlete journey podcasts, and you can do the private group, the endurance athlete journey podcast group, all on Facebook. You can email us at the endurance athlete journey at gmail.com, and you can reach out to us individually. So Justin is at tabularassaracing.com and I'm at fuel to run, so the number to run.com. And we'd love to hear from you, so please reach out, even if it's just for a question or something you want us to talk about on the podcast. We'd really appreciate it. So thank you so much, and we'll look at coming at you next week with the second part of this three-part series. All right, bye.

SPEAKER_00 47:40

Endurance sports have a way of teaching us patience, humility, and resilience. Lessons that carry far beyond the workout. Progress in endurance sports doesn't come from shortcuts, it comes from consistency, discipline, and doing the work when it's not glamorous. Wherever you are on your endurance journey, keep trusting the process and honoring the work you put in each day. If today's episode resonated, please subscribe, leave a review, and share it with someone to help on their endurance journey. Don't forget to join the conversation on our social sites to help build and foster a community where we all learn and support one another. We'll be back with more stories and insights from Coach Justin and Katie. Until then, visit the podcast website at the endurance athlete journey.buzzsprout.com for more episodes from the Endurance Athlete Journey Podcast. Have questions or comments about the podcast? Feel free to send us an email at the endurance athlete journey at gmail.com. For all things coaching, visit Coach Katie at fuel the number two run.com and Coach Justin at tabula rasteracing.com. Again, thank you for listening to the Endurance Athlete Journey Podcast, and remember to find joy in the journey.