Yancy Camp Workout 537

Improving your ability in most sports relies heavily on improving what we call your current “ceiling”. In the sport of OCR, this absolutely holds true. Here are a few basic examples:
Spartan Sprint/Super/Beast and many other races/brands – If your 2 miles/3200m time improves from 16:00min to a 14:00min, you’re now covering the distance 1min/per mile faster than you were in the past. You’re now able to do one of two things. You can now press a faster pace run during the transition periods between obstacles, or you’re able to maintain your old pace at a lower heart rate.
Tough Mudder TMX – If your power clean 1RM (1 repetition max) increases, each rep of the 105lb sandbag clean will feel easier. If your time to completes a strength endurance workout that includes 105lb sandbag cleans x 15 improves, this means your strength endurance and aerobic and anaerobic engine has improved and this will translate to a faster time out on course.
Grip strength obstacles (rigs, monkey bars, etc) – If your max duration static hang time improves while dealing with a race level heart rate, your grip strength endurance has improved, and this will translate out on course. If you can get to where you can do a weighted pull-up and/or increase the amount of weight you add to your weighted pull-up, this will absolutely translate out on course for certain obstacles.
I could provide easily a hundred + examples, but you probably get my point. If my dead lift is 375lb & I take it to 400lb, I’ve improved my current ceiling. I like to say current” ceiling because we can take the word ceiling as that’s as high as we can go, and that’s almost never the case. Where you are now is your current ceiling and with proper training that challenges current ceilings and consistency, we can build a new floor or to go with a commonly used term when we step in to a dull party, let’s “raise the roof”. Spending most and in some cases, all of your time at a comfortable run pace, lifting comfortable weights, and never progressing workouts, is a recipe for hanging out at your current ceiling for a long time or until you get to an age where your ceiling height starts dropping. I’ll use myself as an example. At 46 years old I can still break a 5min mile because I practice what I preach. I’m not always able to get the training weeks in that I want (all the workouts I program for you), but I make sure I get enough short versions of the workouts in almost every week that challenge my threshold. I don’t have a lot of time to train but I make sure the workouts (usually a portion of the same ones I provide for your) I get in have great purpose. At my age, if I stop challenging my ceiling, things start to drop, and I’m just not ready for that to happen.

In reference to some of the points I mention above, I’m going to be launching a new training cycle for awhile as we work on improving our ceilings this off season. Some of the workouts will seem a little different and maybe a little boring when compared to the norm, but trust me, it’ll all pay off and we’ll “raise the roof”. *We had soooo many people raise their roof this year and it’s time to continue improving performances and lifestyles. Much love – Yancy

Workout 537
Phase 1:
Run x 5min at low end aerobic effort

Phase 2:
400m run at low end zone 3 aerobic effort
400m run at zone 4 threshold effort
This completes 1 round.
Continue repeating for a total of 6 rounds (total distance 4800m/3 miles)

*When I do this workout, I hit my zone 4 runs right at about my 1600m/mile race pace.
*I prefer to do this workout on a flat crushed granite trail that’s close to my house. You can complete it on a flat section of road, trail, on a 400m track, or indoors on the treadmill.
*At no time do I want you pushing your pace to a point where your running mechanics fall a part and you feel like you’re racing the zone 4 400m sections. Think about it like this, you’re just hitting 25% of your 1600m/mile race pace so even though it’s above your threshold in zone 4, the distance is short enough to where you shouldn’t be struggling to hold the effort/pace.
*One of the key benefits of this fartlek type workout is the fact that by running during your “rest” period, you’re keeping your HR up, and almost immediately after starting the zone 4 400m run sections, you’re HR is quickly back up above your threshold. We don’t want to over prescribe it, but time spent above threshold is very productive time.

Bonus:
15% incline or tire drag x 20min at low end aerobic effort.

*I know some of you still have World’s Toughest Mudder or Spartan Iceland Ultra coming up. If this is the case, I want you delaying what I have provided above in 537 and do the following (for everyone else, I want you doing 537 as listed above):

WTM & Iceland athletes:
15% incline or tire drag at low end aerobic effort x 10min
Bodyweight step-ups x 40 (20 each leg)
Push-ups x 20
Rope or towel assisted pull-ups x 20
This completes 1 round.
Continue repeating for a total of 6 rounds.