Ely Runners Library

Max, 2005-05-10 12:22:54

This is a book from a leading American coach who has managed to compress years of experience into a very tidy volume. I've read it through several times and all the information is explained in a very clear and straightforward way; there is hardly a page that is not packed with good advice.

The "formula" in the title can be taken quite literally and Daniels gives a simple mathematical formula for just about everything related to training and how fast or how far you should run. In particular, I think that the way he has described the different sorts of interval and repetition training sheds light on a topic that can appear as a something of a black art to runners who don't come from a track and field background. Anyone new to interval training should use the tables in the book to get a good idea of how fast to run intervals, and just as importantly how you should feel when you run them, and how long you should take to recover between each bout.

For anyone who's main enjoyment from running comes from getting out in the fresh air and enjoying the countryside this book is probably of not much interest. For those who are keen to get their times down in races there is clear guidance on how to construct a six month training plan broken down into four distinct blocks. There are three marathon schedules, for instance, although two of these are only for high mileage runners rather than your average club runner who trains three or four times a week. The main failing is that is doesn't give any concrete training plans for low mileage runners.