"In 1966, Andy Dufresne escaped from Shawshank prison. All they found of him was a muddy set of prison clothes, a bar of soap, and an old rock hammer, damn near worn down to the nub. I used to think it would take six-hundred years to tunnel under the wall with it. Old Andy did it in less than twenty. Oh, Andy loved geology. I guess it appealed to his meticulous nature. An ice age here, a million years of mountain building there. Geology is the study of pressure and time. That's all it takes really, pressure, and time. That, and a big god-damned poster."
- Red, Shawshank Redemption
If you are under time constraints and don't feel like reading the rest of this diatribe. The above pretty much summarizes this post for you. This is how I view endurance sport training. Training for a marathon, or an Ironman, or any of those other crazy long events is like studying Geology - it is a matter of time & pressure.
Stated another way, the way to success in endurance sports - in my view - is a simple equation of the proper stresses applied over enough time. Sounds simple enough to me. What I think it means is that success in endurance sports can be achieved with a fairly simple approach of keeping workouts fairly moderate and applied day after day, week after week, month after...you get the picture.
It's a matter of "Go until you're tired, then stop. Repeat tomorrow. And the next day. And so on." As the days build to weeks and months, I find I go a little bit farther and I can do it a little bit faster. Not necessarily every run or bike is faster and longer than the day before, but over the weeks and months, what used to be a hard 5 mile run can become a hard 9 mile run. It just happens. Seriously, it just does.
Why does it happen? I'm not a doctor or phys science major. Those type have filled volumes explaining how we respond to different workouts. What I know is that, if I stay injury free and I find a consistent volume of training (in the case of triathlon, consistent runs, bikes & swims), then over time, I get better. A lot better.
And I find this fact particularly compelling.
