5 reasons why static plans are not the best

One of the most crucial elements in endurance sports training and competition is the development of an effective training plan. Simply put, a good training plan lays out the steps an athlete will take over time to be successful on race day. Athletes typically choose between static, non-adaptive training plans and working with a coach. Static training plans are inexpensive and provide a road map from the start of training, but do not accommodate detours from that map. Athletes without a coach or using “Cliché” or coach-generated, static plans are faced with five key limitations, all of which threaten to hamper performance and reduce enjoyment of training and competition. 

These limitations are: 

(1) Overtraining or injury risk 

“No horse has ever ridden itself to death without a woman or a man on its back” 

                                                       – George Sheehan

There is a constant battle for endurance athletes to avoid and mitigate injuries and overtraining. For most, there have been times when their target race has been put in jeopardy by injury or illness - events they have worked up to for many months. Each of us, being unique, responds individually to the training process (different types of training, duration, combinations thereof), yielding different results: becoming stronger, weaker, or staying the same. Under-recovery, overtraining, undertraining, starting the wrong cycle of training after having missed a session (personal reasons, work, illnesses) are common mistakes that athletes go through, following up an "off the shelf" or even custom designed training plan. Training to achieve a desired race performance requires balancing too many factors that are mostly not taken into consideration in static plans. Each athlete is unique and responds idiosyncratically to the training process, including different types and durations of workouts. 

This differential response yields one of three possible results: improved performance, poorer performance, or stasis. Under-recovery; overtraining; undertraining; and failing to adjust the training plan after missing training sessions are common mistakes all athletes, including elite competitors, make, even if they are using a training plan. These errors can occur with both “off the rack” and custom plans if the plans aren’t adjusted to address the athlete’s progress and response to training.

To reduce overtraining and injury risk your training plan should smooth training load; incorporate strength workouts that can reduce injury risk; include cross-training; and take into account sleep quality and daily stress, which are strong predictors of illness and injury.

(2) Lack of optimal taper design

“Taper” is the period leading up to a key competition where an athlete reduces training volume and intensity in order to achieve optimal performance. The tapering phase is the best way to elevate the athlete’s preparedness and stimulate a supercompensation of performance that will increase the athlete’s performance potential during the competition. Tapering phase should last 8 to 14 days and can use various methods of reducing volume and training intensity. The proper tapering strategies dissipate fatigue, maintain fitness, elevate preparedness, and improve performance.

(3) Difficulty in achieving multiple goals during the season

The ultimate goal of an athlete’s training plan is to optimize performance in specific competitions throughout the training year. This goal is accomplished through careful sequencing of the annual training plan. Skiers, runners, and cyclists can choose from a multitude of races throughout each season. It is almost impossible or at least highly challenging to incorporate all races during a season into an off-the-shelf plan; prioritize these races and update the plan to achieve desired performance in next race.

(4) Scheduling challenges with work, family, and other commitments 

Endurance athletes are often strongly motivated and highly functioning professionals who lack free time. This time constraint puts an emphasis on training with maximum efficiency. Training plans are static in the sense that there are fixed periods in the plan and static plans do not consider your availability to train and access to training facilities. Training plans need to be adaptable to accommodate real life scheduling challenges, but adaptable training plans are typically only available through personalized coaching, which is expensive. For instance, if you don’t have a rollers ski or access to the gym how would you follow a plan that prescribed these training modalities?

(5) Combining various rational training methodologies (alternative training vs specific training; strength training with different protocols).

A sports science-based plan should be coherent. It should be evidence-based and use an approach that is consistent. Too often, static plans mix different training approaches, incorporating outdated training methods. When evaluating a training plan, whether off-the-shelf or generated by a coach, it’s important to ask about the evidence basis for the approach in the plan and to evaluate the “philosophy” guiding it.

To summarize the challenges facing endurance athletes with cliché or static training plans:

• Plans are not a guaranteed means to reach an athlete’s best performance on race day.
• Training to achieve a desired race performance requires balancing too many factors that are mostly not taken into consideration in the plan.
• Training plans need to be adaptable to accommodate real-life scheduling challenges but adaptable training plans are typically only available through personalized coaching, which is expensive and often faces frustration finding a coach or contending with variable quality of coaching.