Really I am. I am getting sick and tired of Austrian people telling me that I don't know what I'm doing when it comes to training. What I fail to understand is how some of these people take the time to criticise or analyse my training methods without looking at their own training first, or that people who have never been a top athlete or trainer, have never even started a trainer education themselves can speak out against my training.
I was very fortunate in that I was able to grow up in a country like South Africa. There are many differences to Austria, but one of those is that in SA you HAVE to do sport at school, and this from the early age of around 8 years. I was never a ball man (i.e Cricket, Soccer or Rugby were not my strong points - I was too small) and so I took to other sports where my smallness wasn't a problem. At that time it was Cross Country running and I have stuck with it my whole life - it has become a way of life for me and one that I have been following for 26 years.
When I was 11 I won my first school championships and although I have only ever won 2 running races in my entire life (thanks Dion :)) I have trained regularly since I was about 11 years old. Then I hit the jackpot. After school I went to University, where I joined the UCT running club. At this time, and throughout my entire Uni life, I had the pleasure of a coach called Chris Sole.
Chris is without a doubt, and will remain until the day I die, my absolute idol. He was possibly one of the best coaches in South Africa and had a personality that made him one of the most successful athletics coaches the length and breadth of South Africa. Chris himself was the only person ever to run 26 consecutive South African X-C Championships. Chris's love was for the forest and hill running and he instilled in me a deep respect for the simple things in life and hard training. I cannot remember how many times I ran with him through Newlands forest with my other running buddies and we discussed training.
Chris did 2 things as a coach that I feel made him exceptional. One was that he was always able to explain to me why he was doing what training, so that I learned to understand what we were doing, when and why, and second was that he ran with us, trained with us, knew our strengths inside and out and trained us accordingly. If I had a problem Chris always knew where to start with the diagnostic. I never questioned him. If he said run, I did, if he said stop, I did. I did not pretend that I knew more than him (nor will I ever), and I never argued with him (I was only in my early twenties and he was in his mid thirties) about training. I just listened and learned.
In Austria it all works different. In order to be recognised as a trainer, you have to qualify and pass a trainers exam. What a load of crap. Here in Austria, every second person thinks they can be a trainer just because they have done the education, doesn't matter what their actual experience is or their age. The other side of the coin is that if you don't have this qualification, well then obviously you cannot know anything about training can you? Well I've heard it from various people and I see it all the time, that is just not the way it works. Most of the trainers here are quite useless, especially the trained ones, and the more successful ones are often those that come through the sporting lines and are not qualified - go figure! This is the opinion of a large part of the coaches who train athletes here in my own Salzburg area.
I have even thought about getting this qualification myself once or twice, but you know what, I don't think I'll bother. It occurs time and time again, where I see that my training is not only more effective, but also based on sound principles that help the runner improve and learn at the same time. I model my training on Chris Sole - that's good enough for me,
and apparently for the Junior European Champion as well!
I have read books, spoken to top athletes and trained with some of the best runners the world has to offer (I have trained with Paul Tergat once). I believe I can provide a certain amount of experience when it comes to training. Last night one of my running buddies again told me I was talking crap, contradicting myself and not making sense. He claimed he has read all the same books as me and come to completely different conclusions, that he has spoken to top Austrian athletes and heard other stories, that he reads lots of web sites from the top athletes and knows how and what they train, so I did him a favour and went through those books and web sites, just to ensure that I wasn't talking crap - and what did I find out? Well you guess!
Please do not misunderstand me. I know that there are a lot of people out there who have different ideas about training, and that these ideas also bring success. I do not pretend to know every thing about training, and I am constantly learning. However, in my 26 years of running, I believe I have tried just about every form of training that there is and I still try new forms all the time - I take what I finds works best (through experience) and use this. The basic principle works for me, as well as for a top runner, as well as for a social jogger.
I am sick and tired of constant excuses and moaning. I continually hear about illness, iron problems, stomach problems, injuries, lack of talent, tiredness and demotivation. Cruches, all of it! I have one piece of advice to all you doubting Thomases out there. The time has come! I have proved I know what I'm doing, now it's your turn. It's your turn to shut your mouths and to prove to everybody that you actually do know what you are talking about. It's time for deeds not discussions. It's time for all you qualified trainers out there to prove me wrong. It's time for you athletes out there who believe your training is better to prove it. IT HAS BEEN LONG ENOUGH NOW!
Stop talking about it and show me!
Well, I am surprized, especially after yesterdays failure (I was aiming for 30 plus kms and only ended up with 23), but I still managed a record week. And this record week seems to be an all time Austria record week, as I cannot find any mention of a week more than 115 km or so in my logs - doesn't mean there wasn't - just means I can't find it!
Some pics (taken with the phone) included from yetserdays run! 10 - 15 cm new snow on all the roads, more off the beaten track, so very physical run. 2hrs 40 for 23km plus 600 hm!
