Running- Good For Sport Player

I do some of my best thinking in the shower. And during my shower this morning, I thought a lot about running — where I am with it right now, what my goals are for running exercise this year, and how I’ve evolved as a runner since I started in 2008. (I’ve been a runner for almost 10 years now!
I wonder how many sticks of Body Glide I’ve gone through in that amount of time…)
I was able to enjoy a few bathroom-stop-free runs before I went on my trip, and those felt super victorious. Then, I had a bunch of stop-free runs! Some days I ran and I didn’t even think about my stomach — I just ran.
I think a lot of that is mental. Yes, of course it’s in part because I’m feeling better. But I know that when I’m home and I run along the waterfront, I know where every bathroom is along my route.

I plan for it, I expect it, and sometimes I’ll even stop just because the bathroom is there.
I didn’t know where the bathrooms would be, and I was mostly on trails, so I wasn’t super concerned about having a mid-run emergency.
Getting out of my routine, for once, seemed to really help me and do my body good.
Since I’m not officially training for anything — and I still very much see myself as in recovery / comeback mode — I’m keeping my mileage fairly low, or at least low compared to what I’ve done in the past.
I haven’t gone over 30 miles per week since last year, and I’m not really tracking my mileage beyond just seeing it show up on Strave.
I’m not concerned with my pace, and any efforts I put forth are based more on, well, effort than what my watch says.
It’s still too early in the comeback to care about numbers.
You probably think you’re pretty fit. But, then again, it’s likely you also know plenty of runners who couldn’t lift a dumbbell or survive a game of tennis if their life actually depended on it.

Exactly how does running fitness translate to other sports? And, how does what we do in other sports translate back to running?
“Running, in a way, is a very specialized sport,” says Jeff Horowitz, a running coach and author of the book. Running only moves in one direction.
That doesn’t necessarily prepare you for other types of movement. What running sport does do is build your engine, “which is why you hear about professional athletes of all types having a base of ruid.
Horowitz saw that in action when he played some pick-up basketball with friends. He isn’t an amazing basketball player, but he has great endurance and could last longer than the other guys on the court. “I wasn’t great, but they were huffing and puffing,” he says.
A study done by storm, from the Department of Sport and Outdoor Life Studies at Telemark University College in Norway, found that a cyclist improved his cycling performance in a time trial test, even when his cycling training was reduced and high-intensity running was substituted instead.
This is, Storen said, because running is one of the activities that most improves VO2 max.

VO2 max, he said, is one of the main things that determines a person’s aerobic endurance and VO2 max is most affected by the heart’s stroke volume. So, improving your heart’s stroke volume can ultimately help improve your endurance.
“The activities that are best suited to improve stroke volume are those who put the most stress on cardiac output.

These are activities that involves large muscle mass from several muscle groups, and activities performed in a vertical position,” Storen says. “So, swimming or rowing will not translate very well to running, because of position.
Cycling will not translate as well to running as running marathon translates to cycling—more muscle mass in running—and so on.
Most runners could, after being used to the new techniques, perform well in cycling, triathlon, or cross-country skiing.”

Sport and fitness