Remember the D.F. when training.

This is one of my biggest errors when training for the high altitude race last week. I was so focused on the high altitude aspect that I forgot to include the D.F. conversion into my training.

What is D.F.? It is the Difficulty Factor! For most runners who do their races on roads, the only issue they worry about is hills. And the “dreaded” Boston Marathon Heartbreak Hill is only about 400ft. SHEEESSHHH! They should try climbing from 7,000ft. to 9,000ft and then see if they whine about Heartbreak Hill.

Let’s get back to D.F. and your training. So, my mistake was training for 31 miles in Florida with our dinky hills. But that in no way compares to 31 miles of major climbs and technical skills (loose rocks) on the race trails. My idea is to multiply the 31 Florida miles by the mountain D.F. and run 45miles on dinky hills to give my body the equivalent wear and tear.

Remember the quote by the legendary master Sun Tzu in his book “The Art of War”-“he who underestimates the enemy will surely be defeated”.

Lesson learned by Coach K.

In the interest of training mo smarter, I will have the D.F. meter working for my next race.