NorthStar Endurance Training Approach

A carefully crafted training plan can make all the difference for an athlete. NorthStar Endurance takes the time to understand your previous training history, short and long term goals, and activities the athlete enjoys doing to develop the perfect training plan for the individual.

Simple Approach To Training

Injury Prevention

For most athletes, small tweaks or pains is bound to occur throughout the training season and competition season. Our goal is to help minimize those chances and reduce the risk of a major injury through a measured approach. This means closely monitoring increases in training volume and miles, proper focus on the small things (ie warmups, cool downs) and strength/mobility training.

An injury can lead to a few days off or even much longer, which directly impacts the athlete's fitness growth. We'd rather build a plan and give you the tools to keep you available to train vs ramping up too fast and risking having you out for an extended period of time due to injury.

Build the Engine

Everything starts with having a strong aerobic engine, otherwise known as aerobic capacity. This is the building block that allows your body to efficiently use oxygen during a sustained effort. If your muscles are able to effectively utilize oxygen, you'll be able to maintain speed during a race effort (like a 5k).

We do this a number of ways but think of every workout as putting money in the bank and it builds up over time. Most of your workouts will be base building workouts with a threshold/tempo type workout to build the upper end of your base, and a few harder, max effort type workouts sprinkled in.

A solid aerobic base allows you to handle higher training volumes with more intense workouts like intervals and LT workouts, which are crucial for improving race pace. The larger the engine, the more efficient you body will be and the more solid your foundation is for near term and long term gains.

Do Not Go Hard on Easy Days

You will not impress us by going hard on your easy days! Easy days have a very important purpose. These days build your aerobic compacity while allowing your body some recovery at the same time. Going hard on easy days is the surest way to get injured and takes away from your hard scheduled days

Periodization Training

Often I will break up the training plan into multi-week segments. A few weeks of solid training followed by a week of recovery. The recovery week is not "off" but rather a reduction in training volume and miles. See below for and example of an athlete's training load during a 15 week off season training plan.