 There we go. Just applying a little sunscreen, sunblock, whatever you like to call it. It is nice and Denver today. And okay, we are going to hop into the gym here in a minute. First I'm going to go get my run in and then head on in. Now my marathon is a little under seven weeks away. It's crazy. It's like, it's not that far away. But if you've been watching the vlog now for two to three months, you know that I've been doing a lot of lifting, but it's more bought. It's been body weight lifting. So just lifting my own body weight in order to get ready to get ready. So I don't just jump into lifting like doing squats, which I will do today for you. It's been a process of building the strength quote unquote naturally with my body weight so that I can arrive at this point right now where I can begin to add extra weight just to build the strength of everything, my hips, my knees, like the muscles around my knees, my calves, the suppleness of my ankles and all that good stuff in and upper body. We're going to do upper body as well today. So this is all about running faster. All right, let's go run. Come on. Oh, good times. Not in the studio, in the parking lot. There you have it. Nice long run, aerobic efforts in the bank. And for this how to run faster business, last year, I ran two or three 5ks just really on a whim, no speed training. And I ran, I think my fastest was 15, like 46, 47 or right around there. So stay tuned. I'm doing the cookie chase 5k this Sunday. And as I'm talking about this how to run faster business, like I'm not your coach, you got to listen to your coach. If you have a coach, you got to listen to your body, you know, that sensory data, I will do my best to communicate with you tips and tricks and ideas that I use. But the proof is in the pudding, right? So let's see what happens this Sunday at the 5k. And again, I've done one track session, but I'm going to be curious to see based on the aerobic base that I've built a little bit of strength training, what happens at the 5k. Okay, one last thing. I think I've published four or five videos now vlogs about how to run faster. I've decided to create a brand new playlist upper right hand corner. If you're really curious about aerobic development, uphill running, red blood cells, all of that base training that goes into running faster, in my opinion, go check it out upper right hand corner. This video about strength training will end up in that playlist. And at some point, at some point, I will make better videos about how to run faster. I just didn't realize that the enthusiasm would be there at such a high level for these types of vlogs from all of you. But you guys rock and you want to chase down PRs. And so I'm going to continue to make videos that you want to watch and where you get value. Alright, enough talking. Let's go get down to business. And we're back from the gym back in the studio. A box arrived today. Come back tomorrow. I will open this box tomorrow. It's a company, a running shoe brand. I've never, ever, I've never even held one in my hands before. You know who you are who sent this to me. Thank you so much. Okay, today, we are talking about how to run faster. My strength training philosophy and therefore over the next five to six minutes, you're going to see on your screen lifts that I do. But this is not an extensive list. I promise I'll get back in the gym next week and I'll film a more detailed update to this video today. I want to focus more so on the philosophy. Okay, let's jump into it. Point number one. Runners are strange. We are strange people. Nobody else. Okay, I'm over exaggerating, but many people around you in the gym, if you're lifting on a consistent basis, most of those folks are not going out and running 30, 40, 80, 100 miles a week. So you got to think about that as a runner. Think about the pounding that you are putting into your legs and take that into account when you are developing a lifting program for your body and especially for your lower body. Okay, so that's point number one. Don't forget, we runners, we are strange. We put a lot of pounding into our legs and therefore it leads right into point number two. Lifting for me, strength training for me is supplemental. What do I mean by that? I want to make sure when I leave the gym, my legs have gotten a good workout, but if I'm leaving the gym dead tired to the point where I know the next morning I'm going to be so sore, so tired, I'm not going to be able to pick up my aerobic development the next day and the next day and the next day, then I frankly, I'm not going to do it. I'm not going to do it. And so this is just my strategy. I emphasize way, way more so aerobic development, cadence over strength training. It's good. Okay. Strength training is critical. It's so important for runners, but it is not the end all be all. It is supplemental in my overall training philosophy and point number three. I'm a huge fan, huge fan of isolation, lifting, meaning I'm working on one leg and then I'm working on the other leg. I'm working on one foot. I'm working on the other foot. I'm working on one arm and then I'm working on the other arm. That's why I was doing the dumbbells with dumbbells instead of a bar. So doing the bench press. I like to isolate different parts of the body. So one leg, one leg, one arm, one arm. Why? My left leg is weak. My left foot is weak. It's a major issue, everybody. It is a major issue. I need to focus more, be honest to my training and focus more so on isolating my left leg especially. It's just not pulling the weight literally. Like you've got your torso and then you've got your legs. Every single stride you take, your leg is propelling you for your legs. Sorry. No, your leg is propelling you forward and I know they're working together. Like your right and the left, they're working together. But at the same time, imagine if you could get just 3%, maybe 5% more propulsion forward, more strength, more... Yeah, I'll just say propulsion forward from your weak leg, which for me is definitely my left leg. So anyway, that's point number three. I focus on isolation lifting. And point number four in my strength training philosophy, straightforward. What do I mean by that? Everything I do in the gym, I'm trying to envision. How is this lift helping me go straightforward? How is it helping my gait cycle, my foot strike, push me down the road, down the track, down the trail as straight as possible without losing any energy, okay? Without twisting my body. Like I just want to go straight down the track. Now, as you see on the treadmill right now, I do fire different parts, different muscles and tendons and ligaments as well. That's why I do some ankle rotations. I get on the treadmill and go side to side because that's important as well, those stabilizing muscles. But overall, I'm concerned most of all about how do I create resistance in my lifting to push me straightforward as fast as possible because that's what we want to do as runners. We want to run as fast as possible as straight. We're not soccer players. I would have no clue how to coach or train a soccer player or a basketball player or a hockey player in lifting because they are cutting, they're moving, they're jump, like they're doing everything totally different from us distance runners. We are going boom, boom, boom down the track. And fifth and final point for my training philosophy when it comes to the gym, comes to strength. Here we go. You're ready for this? Channel your inner ballerina. That's right. Channel your inner ballerina. If there's anyone out there who's a former ballerina and is now a runner, let us know down in the comments. Listen to this. Hear me out. Basically, I love strengthening my quads. That's why I run up in the hills. I love strengthening my hamstrings, my calves. That's why I do the calf raises. But I think as runners, we underestimate the power that is awaiting us in our ankles. That's right. Our ankles, our Achilles tendon, and yes, our foot muscles. I really think that combination of where your foot is striking the ground and the ability to propel yourself forward. Just another half an inch and a half an inch further and a half an inch further. Like that is where we're going to get faster. Like a ballerina, like go watch some ballerinas on YouTube. Like it's crazy. The amount of strength and suppleness that they have in their ankles and how do runners run faster? Increasing our stride length and our cadence. Our cadence. So how fast can we move through the gate cycle? And can we strengthen, can we lengthen our stride just a half an inch or three quarters of an inch? Just a little teeny tiny bit. That is how we're going to run faster. Obviously, we have to take into consideration the aerobic development as well. And again, I love working the big muscles in our legs, but we cannot forget about the joints, the tendons, the suppleness that is awaiting us in our ankles specifically. Like I just, the more that I run, the more I'm realizing if I focus on my foot strike, there's a lot of power there that is lying dormant because I'm not firing the correct muscles in my ankles and my feet to make sure I'm getting the most out of each foot strike down the road, down the track, et cetera, et cetera. So in conclusion, is strength training important for running faster? I absolutely, absolutely it is. It's oh, it's running is all about walking the line. I say that a lot and I'm realizing like you want to you want to get strong, but you don't want to bulk up, right? It's walking that line. You want to work your muscle groups, but you also in my opinion, you want to focus on those tendons and those ankles and those those just those joints that are maybe overlooked in some strength training circles. Okay. And then also, I know you're busy, you've got work, you've got family life, you've got school. I personally, in this training block, I'm going to the gym once a week. It's all I can do. It's all I've got time for. I think once a week is beautiful. If you can do twice a week, maybe one day is a little harder than the other. The second day, maybe is just a little more massage and like stretching and making sure your body's feeling good, especially if you're at high volume and high intensity. So anyway, I think once a week is perfect for runners and especially long distance runners, 800 meter runners, 1500 meter runners, you probably need a little bit more power in from the gym. But for the longer stuff, I think once a week is a great place to start. Alright, keyword is strength. And again, we will continue this discussion. Again, upper right hand corner for that how to run faster playlist. And I'm just going to continue to add to it because it seems like a lot of people are interested in these topics. And we're just scratching the surface of strength training. We'll continue to dig into this moving forward. Alright, question of the day. Do you go to the gym? Or do you lift at your house? If so, how often? And what is your strength training philosophy? And if you don't go to the gym, it's all good. It's all good. Like I know you're busy. And I know I know you're putting in work out on the roads like you're working hard in your running. And that's a great place to start. But I think to run faster, it really can help to get to the gym once a week. Alright, we're gonna call it there. What a great day. Thanks for coming along my little workout routine. See beauty, work hard and love each other. Thank you for spreading the word by the way about the channel. I don't know what's going on. We are going forward like in amazing ways that I never thought frankly, whatever happened. So it's happening. Thanks to all of you just wanted to mention that. See you tomorrow.