The “run-walk” protocol (RW) is nothing new. Advocates of the low heart-rate/fat-burning
training approach have long waxed lyrical about the benefits of walking up
steep hills during training runs in order to keep your heart-rate (HR) within
aerobic limits and burn fat efficiently.
This phenomenon has also been extended to racing, where athletes have been known to mow down the opposition in the crunch phases of an event due to their "walk breaks."
I’ve always agreed with this approach, but have never had
the discipline to implement it effectively owing to a number of factors, ego being at the forefront! Walking during races? Are you mad?
Over the past few years, the phenomenon of walking during
running races of over 30km has interested me, where the RW method seems to have
been adopted successfully by a number of woman athletes. These same ladies
always seem so fresh and composed, often “klapping” me in the longer races.
After a series of these instances and listening to a couple of podcasts on the
subject, I decided that I had to try this and see for myself.
The legendary running coach, Bobby McGee, is possibly one of the strongest
advocates for the RW protocol. He has implemented this system with great
success with elite athletes, achieving staggering results such as sub 2hr30min
marathon times using a combination of 10min running and 30 seconds fast
walking.
The secret here is the walking component of the RW protocol;
it is not meant to be a stroll. The athlete walks a similar cadence to their
running form complete with a rapid arm swing. As Bobby says, if the athlete
were running behind a waist-height wall and transitioned into a walk, you would
see no difference in their posture or upper body other than their moving
slightly slower
For an in depth discussion on this topic, click here
for a highly informative and interesting podcast.
After almost a year of training and racing like this, I can
honestly say that the RW method is the way forward. The key is that one needs
to let go of the ego and practice the method in training. Almost all of my
training runs incorporate short burst of walking. You burn fat more efficiently, recovery is quicker and it just makes so much sense
Recently, I put the method to test in the rainy and windy
Cape Town Marathon. Since I don’t run with a watch, I decided to walk for 20-30
steps every 2km, starting from the 2km mark. Suffice to say that I was able to
speed up considerably in the final 15km of the race where I would normally be
going backwards, and even made up several places in the final 5km. It was a
great feeling. The key was to be disciplined enough to stick to this from the
2km mark, despite the funny looks and chirps from my fellow male runners.
An old dog can certainly learn new tricks, especially from
those petite and wily lady runners.
