Specificity

An interesting topic today (well in my view anyway). Specificity.

What do I mean by specificity? Well in this context I mean training specifically for your race. This might mean simulating race conditions and weather, it might be simulating race distances or paces, it might mean using race equipment etc.

Now obviously all training is aimed at preparing you for your event. All your sessions are aimed at making you fitter, stronger, faster etc, it all has race day in mind. However, specific training is a bit more focused than that, it is aimed squarely at your particular event.

So, let me just get this out there from the outset, specific training is important. Every race preparation should have sessions which are focused on specific preparation. For a lot of people these race specific training sessions occur towards race day, often in the last block or two of training (6 to 8 weeks), although I don't think that is a particularly hard and fast rule. The idea of race specific sessions occurring towards the end comes from the fact that race specific training is often done around race pace, which may not fit too well at the beginning of a training block when you are building base. That isn't always the case though, so in my view race specific training can fit anywhere in the preparation cycle that makes sense, particularly if it is to practice new skills which take time to perfect. In the case of skills development it would be fair to say that the more time the better.

So, very important, no argument there. However, while these sessions are crucially important, in my view they also shouldn't monopolize your training. As I have said many, many times, in my view, every session should have a point. The point of some sessions should be to develop race specific skills and abilities. However, the point of other sessions might be to build strength, it might be to build anaerobic threshold, build fitness, resilience etc. Sometimes these sessions align with race specific training, but sometimes it doesn't, and one should not be prioritised over another. There is no point getting to race day full of race specific practice, but with insufficient strength, fitness or capacity to do well in the race. A successful race is built on many bricks of training and you can't build that race if you haven't spent appropriate time making each of those bricks.

This all reminds me of a couple of examples which I hope illustrates both sides of my point.

When I rowed I spent time at a particular club that had a lot of rough water. We spent a lot of time training in poor conditions which was unpleasant, however, we told ourselves it was good because we often raced in rough conditions and this was good preparation for us. You could say we were getting lots of race specific training. Sure enough, as we got into the season and we got rough water, but to our surprise we got a little bit thumped. In the end those crews that were the fittest and best rowers still won, even though they spent most of their time training in flat water. Our rough water practice wasn't enough to overcome the fact that they had spent more time getting in better quality training and as a result they were simply better than us. Turns out we would have been better off spending less time in rough water and more time in good conditions so that we could work on our technique and general fitness.

An alternative view of this situation can be seen by looking at the triathlon swim leg. If you are new to swimming I would highly encourage you to do a lot of race specific training, get out into the open water a lot and definitely spend some time in rough open water and among other people if possible. Open water swimming can be quite daunting for people and this is uncertainty is reduced with familiarity. This is a situation where you would want to build a lot of specific training into your program, I would say once a week. You will get some fitness benefit from the sessions, but more importantly you will get confidence and improved open water technique which will be of great benefit to you on race day.

So in summary, race specific work - very important, absolutely no argument, should be included in every program. How much race specific work is required probably depends a bit on yourself, the race and the purpose of the specific training. Getting that balance right, that is the tricky bit.