Welcome, hope you all smashed last week’s training!
I’m writing this one from South Africa, and being back on these roads has me reminiscing. The dirt paths where I first fell in love with running, the early mornings, the races that still play in my head like they happened yesterday. Funny how a place can hand you your whole running life back in a single run.
I’m deep in base-building right now, nothing but easy miles until the ramp starts on 1 September. And that quieter phase is exactly when your training log earns its keep, so this week is all about it: where it came from, how to read yours, and the man who kept his for sixty years.
Let’s get into it.
One of those memories: the last time I really let it rip. Racing shoes on, took a segment more seriously than a race. 5AM. Full send. Some runs you never forget.
This Week:
→ This week’s throwback: the original sub-15, relived kilometre by kilometre. 700,000 views and counting
→ This week’s blog: the worst notification in running, and how to actually use Strava
→ Inside Running: he logged every mile for 60 years. Then his diary told him to stop
→ Your subscriber perks: BEST10, plus this week’s drop in the Hub
This Week’s Throwback: The Day The Log Paid Off
No new video this week. Instead, I did the homework I set you in the blog: I went back through my own history to the best day in it.
This is the original sub-15 video. My thoughts, kilometre by kilometre, on the day it finally happened.
Over 700,000 runners have watched this one since, which still blows my mind. Watching it back now, what strikes me is everything in the training log that led up to it. The race was four and a bit minutes times three and a bit. The log was years.
If you have never seen it, this is the one to start with. And if you have, watch it again with this week’s blog in mind and you will spot the logbook fingerprints all over it.
The one notification every runner dreads
There is one notification I fear more than any other, and it is not a bill. It is the one that says another runner has taken your Strava segment crown.
In this week’s blog: my full 5AM segment confession, the training diary trick that shows you exactly what your best block looked like, who to follow and why your feed is quietly part of your training, and the trap where Strava stops working for you and you start working for it.
Inside Running: He Logged Every Mile For 60 Years
This week’s blog is about your training log. So let me tell you about the greatest logbook in the history of our sport. It belonged to a textile chemist from Lancashire called Ron Hill.
→ He started a handwritten training diary as a schoolboy in the mid 1950s and never stopped. By the end it held more than 158,000 miles, enough to circle the planet six times
→ From 20 December 1964 he ran every single day, at least one mile, for 52 years and 39 days. The streak survived a car crash that broke his sternum, and a mile in 27 minutes in a plaster cast, on a crutch
→ And he could RUN. Boston champion in 2:10:30. European champion in Athens. Commonwealth champion in 2:09:28, only the second man in history under 2:10
In January 2017, aged 78, his heart started hurting 400 metres into his daily mile. His words: “By the time I got to the one mile point I thought I was going to die.” He finished the mile. Then he ended the streak the next day, for his family.
The man who never missed a day knew exactly when the next day was no longer worth it.
His best advice for runners was not about sessions or shoes. It was: keep a training log, and learn from any mistakes. The full story, and what it teaches us, is in the Hub. Two numbers wanted in the comments: your current run streak, and the year of the oldest run in your log.
Workout of the Week
The blog will send you segment hunting, so here is the leg speed to do it with. Straight from my 5K bank:
The session: 8 × 400m, then 8 × 200m
→ Recovery: 60 seconds static between all reps
→ Effort: 400s at goal 5K pace, 200s slightly faster than goal 5K pace
→ Warm-up: 10 to 15 minutes easy, then drills
→ Cool-down: 10 to 15 minutes easy, then stretch
Focus: the point is to get completely comfortable at goal pace, then teach the legs there is more underneath it.
Why this week: because a segment is just a rep with a leaderboard.
Tip of the week: add one honest line to every run you log. How it felt. Your future self will thank you inside a year. This week’s blog explains why.
Your Subscriber Perks
Two things for you this week, and both are always on.
→ BEST10 gets you 10% off gear and merch. Same code, always on for you.
→ A free month of TrainingPeaks, plans that sync straight to your watch. Claim it inside the Hub.
What’s Next
These South African roads are where the base gets built, quietly, before the ramp on 1 September. Which sets up next Monday’s question: why you cannot hold peak fitness all year round, and how to time the one day you can.
And this week’s homework is simple. Open your log, find your best ever block, and go and see what you were actually doing. Then come and tell me in the Hub.
Thanks for reading all the way through. It honestly means a lot.
Boom Shakalaka! 🔥
Coach Nick
