Training For Older Runners with Dave Taylor

The phrase “use it or lose it” could have been invented for trail runners. Strength doesn’t hang around if you ignore it. Speed fades if you stop asking your legs to turn over quickly. And at some point, most of us have to make peace with the fact that we’re probably not dipping under 18 minutes at Parkrun again, and those 40-odd-year-olds look quicker every year.

But here’s the good news: we’re all ageing together. The start line doesn’t disappear, it just reshuffles. New categories emerge with new goals and new reasons to push yourself.

We caught up with experienced fell runner and running coach, Dave Taylor, to get his expert advice on training for older runners.

Getting old sucks! Things hurt more, you are more injury prone, it takes you longer to recover from races and you’re getting slower every year. Unfortunately, some things are inevitable, but as we get older, there are some changes we can make to our training in order to prolong our running career.

Why do we slow down?

As we get older, we lose muscle mass. Known as sarcopenia, this basically means that our muscles get smaller and weaker with age. Small, weak muscles aren’t good for running and are susceptible to injury!

We also lose tendon strength and elasticity. That Achilles tendon that was once a strong spring no longer absorbs the impact or propels you up the hill like it used to.

And as if it isn’t bad enough, our heart starts to lose efficiency too, our maximum heart rate decreases, and the amount of blood that can be pumped per beat reduces. This means that less oxygenated blood gets pumped to the working muscles.

Add failing eyesight to the mix and you’ve got a recipe for slowing down!

What can we do about slowing down?

The good news is that although we can’t halt this age-related decline, we can do some things to slow it down.

Strength Training

Runners often neglect strength training but it is vital that we do it as it can help preserve muscle mass and tendon strength. Heavy resistance training is best i.e. with heavy weights and low repetitions. We need to target the muscles that both propel us and absorb the impact as we run, namely - calves, hamstrings, quads and glutes. Key exercises include:

Calf raises and lowers, lunges, rear foot elevated squats (Bulgarians), single leg deadlifts, squats. Also box step-ups, downs and box jumps. You don’t need a gym membership you can do these at home, a few dumbells or even improvised weights (e.g. a rucksack full of water bottles) is all you need. 3 or 4 sets of 8 heavy reps (where 12 reps is your maximum) is effective.

We can also incorporate strength work into our running by choosing hilly terrain. I call this strength training in disguise. Examples are:

Hill sprints – run very fast up a steep slope for 8 seconds. Take a long recovery and repeat five more times.

Rock hopping – find a rock or small boulder and jump over it at speed both uphill and downhill. The uphill action requires power whilst the downhill part develops eccentric muscle strength, i.e. absorbing the impact forces as you land.

Kenyan hills – find a short hilly loop that takes you a minute to complete at fast pace e.g. 35 seconds up 25 seconds down. Take 2 minutes to recover then repeat several times. The key is to run hard both up and down, again the downhill is working on eccentric leg strength.

What about our day-to-day running?

If we’ve been running for years we’ve got plenty of aerobic conditioning in the bank. We don’t need to focus too much on this, maintaining strength and speed is more important. That means that we don’t need to be doing long fatiguing runs every week, we can afford to cut back on the distance and focus on some faster and harder running. That doesn’t mean we shouldn’t do long runs, just that they aren’t our priority.

Speed Training 

As mentioned, our muscles weaken as we age, particularly the fast twitch fibres that contract forcefully. This means our power declines, our stride length shortens and we slow down. We therefore need to incorporate some faster-paced running in order to train these fast-twitch muscle fibres.

Hill sprints - previously mentioned will help with this and also we can also include some fast running on flat terrain. 

Strides – these are bursts of 10 seconds at just below sprint speed that can be added towards the end of an easy run.

Hill sprints or strides are a staple and should be included on a weekly basis, often added to the end of an easy run.

Interval training – rather than settling for a steady shuffle we should still include some more intense training. Intervals of between 1 and 5 minutes with a couple of minutes recovery are a good way of maintaining some speed. Because the reps are short you can afford to push the pace – something slightly faster than your 5k pace is a good target. Aim to include an interval session at least once every couple of weeks.

Recovery – older runners need more time to recover from hard runs and races. Just because you could race twice a week in your early 40s doesn’t mean that you can now that you are in your 50s! However recovery days don’t mean sitting on your backside doing nothing, easy low impact activity is best. This could be swimming, cycling, hiking or even just walking the dog.

Recovery also involves nutrition. Muscles require protein to rebuild and repair so ensuring that you eat enough protein after hard sessions is vital.

About the author

Dave Taylor is an experienced fell runner and running coach. He is the current English Fell Running Champion for the V60 age category and has previously won the V50 category.  

He offers individual coaching sessions and training plans: www.fellrunningguide.co.uk