Leading up to the Tough Guy Tough Gal Challenge we tried to train as specifically as possible to the type of physical challenges we could expect. The idea of sport-specific training refers to “being able to duplicate or imitate a specific skill or aspect of one’s sport or activity”, thus, it is critical when training for a purpose or event such as Tough Guy Tough Gal. For our training programme, each week we completed a 50 minute circuit session, a 1 km run with a 2 min rest (increased dist. each week), and a Long Slow Distance (LSD) - also known as continuous training. I also had both a soccer training and game each week. I believe this was an effective training programme when comparing fitness levels of start to finish, however it was not
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Although our age group had been split up into two to start, there were still an overwhelming amount of competitors starting at once, which meant that at every mud obstacle was hard to get through without slowing my pace to a walk - or even stopping in some cases. This made finding my steady state that much harder as I was constantly having to stop and start because of people getting in my way. During our training, I never had to worry about other people as our class had varied fitness levels, thus, whenever we did exercise as a group I did not face the issue of others getting in my way, causing me to slow down. However, as I entered the race it soon became apparent that training with only a small class had disadvantaged me. Because of this I then had to apply some tactics (tactical awareness). Tactical awareness can be defined as “the perception of environmental elements and events with respect to time or space, the comprehension of their meaning, and the projection of their status after some variable has changed, such as time, or some other variable, such as a predetermined event”. Of course, this negatively impacted my ability to gauge time/distance as well as get into a steady rhythm in which to maintain. As I was focusing on tactical awareness, such as running the tangents (straightest line possible), I became aware that this may not be the best tactic after all. This, for two reasons 1) there was often people in the way 2) there was particularly muddy patches, both of which would slow me down. Overall tactical awareness became undoubtedly important throughout the race as it helped to improve my time, however this would have improved further had there been less people in the course at one time. Greg McMillan, author of Runner’s World, also believes tactics are important when running, saying “awareness of the course as you race it can
Although our age group had been split up into two to start, there were still an overwhelming amount of competitors starting at once, which meant that at every mud obstacle was hard to get through without slowing my pace to a walk - or even stopping in some cases. This made finding my steady state that much harder as I was constantly having to stop and start because of people getting in my way. During our training, I never had to worry about other people as our class had varied fitness levels, thus, whenever we did exercise as a group I did not face the issue of others getting in my way, causing me to slow down. However, as I entered the race it soon became apparent that training with only a small class had disadvantaged me. Because of this I then had to apply some tactics (tactical awareness). Tactical awareness can be defined as “the perception of environmental elements and events with respect to time or space, the comprehension of their meaning, and the projection of their status after some variable has changed, such as time, or some other variable, such as a predetermined event”. Of course, this negatively impacted my ability to gauge time/distance as well as get into a steady rhythm in which to maintain. As I was focusing on tactical awareness, such as running the tangents (straightest line possible), I became aware that this may not be the best tactic after all. This, for two reasons 1) there was often people in the way 2) there was particularly muddy patches, both of which would slow me down. Overall tactical awareness became undoubtedly important throughout the race as it helped to improve my time, however this would have improved further had there been less people in the course at one time. Greg McMillan, author of Runner’s World, also believes tactics are important when running, saying “awareness of the course as you race it can