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Winter isn’t about sitting back and waiting. Winter is when you stack up the chips that will let you go all-in and bet on yourself for years to come.

There is a temptation to treat winter as a hibernation period. Curl up in front of the metaphorical fire. Sip your figurative hot cocoa. Put your allegorical feet up and recover for spring. I’m not sure what an “allegory” is off the top of my head, and the dictionary is on the other side of the room, so I’m keeping it in for the parallel structure. Hey, we’re talking about winter, and it’s not the time to work too hard.

You know what, though? Screw all that. Sure, if you are feeling run-down or had a big year, take an extended offseason. But in my book (which may or may not be full of allegories), winter isn’t about sitting back and waiting. Winter is when you stack up the chips that will let you go all-in and bet on yourself for years to come.

When I look back at athletes I coach that became “overnight successes,” one thing becomes clear: an overnight success is usually earned with year-over-year, all-caps WORK. It only seems like it happened overnight to people that weren’t paying attention.

Winter is when breakthroughs happen. The rest of the world often just doesn’t see them until later. So pour a cup of hot cocoa–the carbs, fat, and protein will help fuel this discussion of how to go all-in on the surest bet of all: your own future.

Health Building

I talked a big game in the intro, but all that swagtastic talk about betting on yourself requires you to be healthy and feeling fresh. If you only take one thing away from this article, make it this: adaptation happens when an athlete feels good.

In training discussions, fatigue is often celebrated as a sign of hard work. But the body rarely adapts through persistent fatigue. During training, athletes introduce substantial stressors from the cellular level on up to the entire musculoskeletal, neuromuscular and endocrine systems. That stress manifests itself in the stress hormone cortisol, muscle breakdown that can be measured via creatine kinase levels, thyroid and sex hormone variation, changing red-blood-cell production and numerous other biomarkers.

The musculoskeletal system is under load, and microtrauma from activities like running can cause deformities even before they become full-blown overstress injuries. All of those stress-related perturbations combine with mental health and lifestyle to create an immensely complex stress equation.

That stress is good in moderation—it’s what leads to adaptation. But go a bit too far, and injury and stagnation await. Think of those biomarkers mentioned above. All of them have long tails, where they’ll often be out of whack for longer than you’d expect based on the usual assumptions that recovery happens in a couple days. And when those biomarkers are not in the optimal range, it will be difficult to perform with the efficiency needed to make running outputs take less energy. So training in a fatigued state can actually create a more inefficient athlete that does more work but gets slower and more tired.

One of my favorite studies was published in 2016 in the journal Physiology Reports. The authors had elite middle-distance runners at a training camp do blood tests each day. If any of the biomarkers measured were negatively moving from baseline, the athletes reduced intensity and volume. After the camp, all of the athletes improved their running economy, and there were no injuries. In other words, feeling good is a proxy for the physiological context to actually adapt to the work being completed.

Unlike those athletes, we can’t get blood tests each day. That’s why it’s key to be dialed into how you are feeling. The first priority of winter is making sure that you have the adaptation time needed to create the physiological context where the work you are doing can translate into long-term, sustainable progress.

Stress Management

Training stress is the first variable in the equation. If it has been a long season, leading to persistent fatigue for more than a day or two at a time, take an off-season. Many pros I coach will take two to six weeks fully off. However, the response rate to time off is highly variable. A pro whose genetics seem designed to create speed may just get faster in that time. Someone with a different genetic context may find themselves playing catch-up for months, delaying progress.

Takeaway: Start with a reset of a few days, increasing the true offseason time if needed physically or mentally. You can still be active, just avoid structured training. And don’t take time off for its own sake unless you need the mental reset.

Next, consider all the non-training stress in your life. Winter is a good time for reflection and reevaluation, particularly given the helpful restart of the New Year. What’s adding to your life, either in joy or uplifting challenges or giving you life through all the millions of ways you may find meaning? All that stuff can stay in, even if it takes away from your running.

What is dragging you down? Maybe consider streamlining those parts of life, going full Marie Kondo on your negative stresses that are not necessary for being a good and fulfilled human.

Takeaway: Try to support a life context that lets you get the most joy out of your time on Earth, optimizing sleep and relaxation time, remembering that life isn’t just about athletics or work.

Nutrition

We are what we eat. That’s why I am a mix of Cinnamon Toast Crunch and chocolate milk. When it comes to nutrition, I am not an expert, but I don’t want you to ever worry about the specifics of it too much. Instead, just make sure you are eating enough. My main guideline for athletes is to ensure they are getting plenty of protein to adapt and recover, and winter is a great time to dial in nutrition for your physiology and background.

Mental Health

Rates of mental health issues go up significantly in winter. Researchers theorize that the correlation is partially related to physiological responses to reduced sunlight, along with context-specific issues unique to winter. And on a broader scale, this whole being-human thing is hard. If the goal of winter training is to get the tools to bet on yourself, the most important tool is taking actions that support the mental health that allows you to say “I am enough” and truly mean it. Because as every study in the Journal Of Incontrovertible Facts says, you are amazing just as you are, including (especially!) the parts of yourself that you might not always love.

Takeaway: Winter is a great time to start going to therapy, as is every other season. If you have long-term mental-health issues, consider talking to a psychiatrist and discussing medication if that is warranted. Open up with friends and supporters and friendly dogs and patient trees too.

Base Building

Breakthroughs don’t come from big, hard workouts. That seems counterintuitive, but it’s the most important realization to have about the methodology of running training. Big, hard workouts provide neuromuscular, musculoskeletal and biomechanical stimuli that lead to adaptations relatively rapidly. However, to perform close to your genetic potential and stay healthy, those adaptations require an aerobic foundation that is constantly developing over many years. Without that consistent focus on aerobic development, an athlete gets good at going hard, and eventually, that means going hard—and slow—compared to what they are truly capable of.

Base building is all about developing the building blocks that raise the adaptations from the harder stimuli way higher. Most of your training should be easier than aerobic threshold, the intensity where the body switches from relying primarily on lipid oxidation for fuel to glycogen. By avoiding excessive intensity, the body increases the density of capillaries around working muscles, increases the recruitment of Type I slow-twitch muscle fibers that are more resistant to fatigue, and improves oxygen processing via a number of other variables from mitochondria biogenesis to metabolic efficiency.

However, we are not just an aerobic system. The classic formulation of “MAF” Training relying on a strict heart rate cap to make sure all base building is easy essentially views athletes as closed loop systems, lungs with legs. During base periods, it’s also essential to develop the neuromuscular, biomechanical and musculoskeletal systems via higher-output training in order to create positive feedback cycles where aerobic development actually leads to improved running economy. That is why Lydiard base periods or Canova intro periods deviate from strict easy running to add more intense training elements in moderation.

The hard part about developing a solid base is that it takes time. Aerobic adaptations are a slow burn, the tortoise that wins the race over the intensity-focused hare, but only when you zoom out and see the whole picture. Winter is when there is time to zoom out and contextualize growth across multiple training cycles. Later on, athletes can learn to apply base principles throughout the year to let them continually adapt to new training interventions without having to go through a dedicated base period.

Increase Easy Volume

More easy running leads to faster running with time. Aerobic energy sources are dominant in all events longer than track sprints, even ones that feel hard like the mile or 5K. Think of easy running as gathering fuel for the fire. Yeah, it’s not super sexy to be out there chopping wood.

Why can’t I just light up these few sticks and have a party? The answer is that there is almost no limit to the amount of fuel we can gather during winter because the aerobic system can continue to adapt long after intensity-focused training adaptations are maximized. Any athlete can light a match with a hard workout. I want athletes to be putting that match to a few tons of kindling that is ready to burn.

Takeaway: If you have time and stress to spare, increase the volume of easy running each week. Start by increasing the frequency of your runs until you are running four to six times per week, then add volume to each run, a longer run and even doubles where you run twice in one day (for advanced athletes). Back off at the first sign of excess stress, since increasing volume can be risky. Make sure your legs stay warm during winter runs, which some studies show may reduce injury rates and improve muscle performance. Don’t be the athlete wearing shorts in freezing temperatures.

Add Steady Running or Tempo Running in Moderation

Purely easy running all the time risks reinforcing bad habits. Slog enough, and you may get good at slogging at the expense of all else. Coaches like Lydiard and Canova emphasize some higher-quality aerobic work in moderation to overcome that concern, while consistently developing all energy systems that are important for running.

Takeaway: After a few weeks of easy running and strides (see next section), add relaxed up-tempo runs of 15 to 40 minutes one or two times per week. This doesn’t need to be incredibly structured, but can just be natural progression runs that finish slightly faster on days you feel good.

Consider Cross-Training

Running is just one path to aerobic development. At the cellular level, the body doesn’t consider aerobic stresses too differently, so activities like biking or elliptical or swimming or hiking are great additions too. I like every athlete I coach to have a cross-training option they enjoy since it can support long-term growth and give a back-up option for the inevitable setbacks that will happen along the running journey.

Takeaway: Add one or two cross-training sessions each week. It can be as simple as 20 minutes on the spin bike in the afternoons or a hike with your dog.

Speed And Strength Building

During winter training, start by prioritizing your mental and physical health, even if that means less exercise. When you have a solid health foundation, work on improving your aerobic base through easy running and cross training at least four to six days a week. And now comes the really good stuff. Put that health and aerobic base in a speed and strength context that allows gains to compound over time.

Easy running gets reinforced by speed, making future easy runs more economical. The strength work adds to the economy bucket too, backing up those adaptations. That improved easy running creates a stronger base that makes the speed more efficient. And a positive feedback loop can get rolling.

Your fitness can be like a snowball going down a hill, picking up mass as it goes until it’s a massive fitness snow mountain by the end of winter. The coolest thing of all? That positive feedback cycle between aerobic development from easy running and neuromuscular, biomechanical and musculoskeletal development from speed and strength can continue for many years. So this winter may lay the long-term groundwork for seeing that your true limits are far beyond where you thought they were.

Do Strides

Short bursts of faster running provide a power and strength stimulus, almost like plyometrics, and that power improvement distributes to every effort you do. Every major training approach for elite athletes in the last century has at least some focus on this element, and it’s key to train like the elite, boss-mode athlete you are. There are some fascinating studies that back up the real-world approaches, showing that improving maximum output can enhance running economy at all efforts even with no underlying aerobic changes. Best of all: the adaptations can get rolling in just a few weeks.

While it’s uncertain where that physiological change is coming from, it’s most likely related to how the neuromuscular system interacts with the musculoskeletal system, with the body increasing power output and efficiency per step. If you think of running as a bunch of small forward leaps strung together, improving maximum smooth output may make each of those little leaps cover more ground and happen more quickly. And those gains can accrue over many years, making the easy running-strides feedback cycle one that you can lean on throughout a running career.

Takeaway: After two to four weeks of easy running, add 4 to 8 x 15- to 30-second uphill strides sometime in the second half of one to three normal easy runs each week. These hill strides are just controlled efforts at the fastest pace you can go without sprinting. Google “power hill strides” for a full video tutorial. Later on in winter, you can add flat-ground strides for a heavier neuromuscular stimulus, since turnover will be higher. But flat strides come with greater injury risk, so be careful and only do them if you are 100-percent healthy.

Develop a Consistent Strength and Mobility Routine

Many studies show that strength work can improve running economy and decrease injury risk. Plus, the goal of running training is to find your strong, embracing your full athletic self. Strength work is indispensable, but you don’t necessarily need to do a progressive overload routine that gets harder as you go or requires a gym. Instead, find sustainable routines that you repeat over and over throughout your running life.

Reinforce good patterns

Every runner is different, and there is no set way you have to run and train. However, you want to make sure that you aren’t developing habits that are undercutting your growth. If you have had lots of injuries or feel like you have room to improve your form, consider a gait analysis, working with a PT or strength coach, and/or partnering with a running coach.

Takeaway: We can all use some help sometimes. For example, even though I am a running coach, I have a coach. She is also my wife, so I think I get a discounted monthly rate.

Going All-In On Your Future

As winter comes to a close, you should have a big stack of chips at the ready. You’re working on your health, mentally and physically. Your aerobic base is bigger than ever, and your speed endurance is high too. You’re strong and stable, fast and fresh. As winter progresses, you can add a more traditional weekly workout or tempo run, but there’s no rush. That high-octane aerobic engine you are building will be ready when it’s time.

And when you are ready to crank it up? Start to lay some of those chips down with hard workouts, focused long runs or training races. Bet wisely, but don’t be scared either. You have a big pile, and you can afford to lose a few if you have some setbacks.

Most likely, though, those harder efforts will just give you more chips to put down. Spring will come around, and you’ll be unable to see the dealer from behind your big stack. You’ll be the power player at the table, ready to dictate the action. You wait for the right moment, playing it smart, and then it’s time.

Time to go ALL-IN.

After years of battling injury and uncertainty, Jake Heyward is proving that resilience can be just as powerful as raw talent. The Welsh middle-distance star has announced his return to the sport in emphatic fashion, producing the performance of his career and emerging as one of the athletes to watch in the men's mile at the upcoming Commonwealth Games.

At the London Diamond League, Heyward delivered a sensational run, finishing as the second-fastest British athlete behind mile world record-holder Josh Kerr. His time of 3:46.73 not only established a new Welsh record but also elevated him to third on the United Kingdom's all-time mile rankings, trailing only Kerr and British legend Steve Cram.

For many athletes, such a breakthrough would simply mark another career milestone. For Heyward, however, it represents the culmination of an extraordinary journey back from one of the toughest periods of his life.

The 26-year-old revealed that before undergoing surgery, he had been competing while suffering from Haglund's deformity, a painful condition affecting the heel that placed constant strain on both Achilles tendons. The problem eventually led to a devastating double Achilles injury, forcing him away from competition for an astonishing 20 months.

Rather than allowing the setback to define him, Heyward used the prolonged rehabilitation to rebuild both physically and mentally. Reflecting on that difficult chapter, he believes the experience has transformed his outlook on the sport.

"I truly believe that, because I've gone through this experience and I've had to ask myself certain questions, I actually understand the sport more. In terms of expectations and times, I'm super excited. I think there's no limit on what I can achieve. Running for Wales once again is a huge motivation."

Those words now carry even greater weight after his record-breaking performance in London.

Heyward's resurgence has injected fresh excitement into British middle-distance running and has positioned him as a genuine contender heading into Glasgow. With renewed confidence, a healthier body, and a deeper appreciation of the sport forged through adversity, he appears ready to challenge the world's best once again.

His journey from nearly two years on the sidelines to becoming Wales' fastest-ever miler is a powerful reminder that some of the greatest victories are earned long before the finish line. If his recent form is any indication, Jake Heyward's comeback story may only be just beginning, and the Commonwealth Games could provide the perfect stage for its next unforgettable chapter.

Australian sprint sensation Torrie Lewis continues to redefine the limits of her remarkable young career after storming to a stunning 11.04 seconds in the women's 100 metres at the TIPOS P-T-S Meeting in Slovakia, setting a new Australian record in breathtaking fashion.

Lewis sliced 0.04 seconds off her own previous national record of 11.08, producing the fastest performance ever by an Australian woman over the distance. Her blistering run confirmed that her rise is no fleeting moment—it is the arrival of one of the world's most exciting sprint talents.

The race itself was a spectacle from start to finish. Lewis exploded from the blocks, held her composure through the drive phase, and unleashed a powerful finish to edge one of the greatest sprinters in history, Elaine Thompson-Herah of Jamaica, who crossed the line in 11.06. Austria's Christania Williams also clocked 11.06, making it one of the most fiercely contested 100-metre races of the meeting.

Beyond the victory, the performance carries even greater significance. Lowering a national record is never easy, especially after already establishing yourself as the country's fastest woman. Yet Lewis demonstrated that she is still finding new levels, delivering a performance that signals she is becoming an increasingly serious contender on the international stage.

The 11.04 clocking is another milestone in a season that continues to gather momentum. With every race, Lewis is proving she possesses not only exceptional speed but also the consistency and composure needed to challenge the world's elite when the stakes are highest.

As global championship season approaches, Australia's sprint star has sent a powerful message to her rivals. If this latest record-breaking performance is any indication, Torrie Lewis is only beginning to reveal the full extent of her potential, and the fastest chapters of her career may still lie ahead.

Some moments in sport transcend generations. They remind us that while records may fall, the spirit of greatness never fades. One such moment unfolded when legendary New Zealand coach Arch Jelley watched Josh Kerr produce a breathtaking 3:42.66 mile world record—not from the stands, but from his bed, sharing the historic occasion with his former athlete, 1988 Olympian Christine Pfitzinger, herself once New Zealand's mile and 1500m record holder.

For most fans, Kerr's astonishing performance was simply another unforgettable chapter in the evolution of middle-distance running. For Jelley, however, it was something far more profound. It was a bridge between two eras separated by more than half a century, connecting the glorious past he helped shape with the remarkable future he lived long enough to witness.

As he approaches his 104th birthday on August 13, Jelley has seen the mile transformed in ways few people ever will. Long before modern technology, advanced sports science and super shoes reshaped the event, he guided one of athletics' greatest pioneers.

On August 12, 1975, in Gothenburg, Sweden, Jelley coached Sir John Walker to a revolutionary 3:49.4, making him the first man in history to break the seemingly impossible 3:50 barrier for the mile. It was a performance that changed the sport forever and cemented Walker's place among the all-time greats. Less than a year later, Walker crowned that success by winning the Olympic 1500m gold medal at the 1976 Montreal Games, fulfilling the promise of one of the finest coach-athlete partnerships athletics has ever known.

Yet Walker was only one chapter in Jelley's extraordinary coaching legacy.

Across more than six decades, the master coach nurtured and inspired countless elite middle- and long-distance runners, earning a reputation for developing athletes through patience, wisdom and an unwavering belief in their potential. Even retirement could not keep him away from the sport he loved. At the remarkable age of 93, Jelley returned to coaching to help Hamish Carson qualify for the 2016 Rio Olympic Games, proving that passion for excellence has no expiration date.

Now, more than fifty years after witnessing Walker redefine what was possible, Jelley has watched another runner push the boundaries of human performance. Josh Kerr's magnificent 3:42.66 was not merely a new world record—it was another milestone in the endless pursuit of greatness, one observed by a man who has devoted almost an entire lifetime to that very journey.

There is something beautifully symbolic about the scene: a coach who once stood trackside guiding history now watching a new generation rewrite it through the lens of modern technology. The setting may have changed, but the emotion remains the same.

Few people in athletics can claim to have witnessed the evolution of the mile from the dawn of the sub-3:50 era to today's astonishing world-record performances. Arch Jelley can.

His life is more than a coaching story—it is a living timeline of the mile itself. From John Walker's historic breakthrough in 1975 to Josh Kerr's record-shattering masterpiece in 2026, Jelley has remained a constant witness to the relentless pursuit of human excellence, proving that while champions come and go, the love of the sport endures across every generation.

When Sir Roger Bannister crossed the finish line in Oxford on May 6, 1954, in 3:59.4, he did far more than become the first man to run a sub-four-minute mile. He demolished one of sport's greatest psychological barriers, proving that what had long been considered impossible was simply waiting for someone bold enough to achieve it.

More than seven decades later, that historic run remains the most famous mile ever raced—not because it is still the fastest, but because it transformed athletics forever. Bannister's achievement inspired generations of runners to dream bigger, train harder and believe that seemingly unreachable barriers could be broken.

Today, however, the mile has entered an entirely different dimension.

Josh Kerr's sensational 3:42.66 world record has redefined the limits of middle-distance running. In one unforgettable race, the Scottish star erased Hicham El Guerrouj's legendary 3:43.13 mark that had stood untouched since 1999, proving once again that every era has its athlete capable of rewriting history.

The numbers tell a remarkable story of progress. If Bannister's iconic 3:59.4 were placed in the same race as Kerr's 3:42.66, the man who first conquered the sub-four-minute barrier would finish almost 17 seconds behind. At the pace Kerr sustained, that deficit would amount to well over 100 metres—an extraordinary margin in an event where the world's best are often separated by hundredths of a second.

Yet those statistics should never be mistaken for a comparison of greatness. Bannister and Kerr competed in vastly different eras, under different conditions and with entirely different levels of sports science, training knowledge, footwear technology and track surfaces. Bannister raced on a cinder track wearing heavy leather spikes, balancing elite athletics with his demanding medical studies. Kerr benefits from decades of scientific advancement, world-class support systems and cutting-edge equipment that have helped athletes push the boundaries of human performance.

Every generation has added another chapter to the mile's extraordinary story. Just weeks after Bannister's breakthrough, Australia's John Landy lowered the record to 3:57.9. The baton then passed through legendary names including Derek Ibbotson, Herb Elliott, Peter Snell, Michel Jazy, Jim Ryun, Filbert Bayi, John Walker, Sebastian Coe, Steve Ovett, Steve Cram, Noureddine Morceli and Hicham El Guerrouj. Each champion dared to believe the record could fall again, leaving the event stronger than they found it.

Josh Kerr is now the latest custodian of that legacy. His world record is not simply another fast time—it is the culmination of more than 80 years of relentless progress. Every stride he took was built upon the courage, ambition and achievements of those who came before him.

Perhaps the most fascinating aspect of the mile is how dramatically its meaning has changed. In 1954, the world was captivated by one question: Could anyone ever run under four minutes? Today, the conversation has shifted to how much further the event can evolve. With Kerr already under 3:43, the now-unthinkable prospect of a sub 3:42 mile no longer feels like fantasy but a genuine possibility for the future.

That is the enduring beauty of athletics. Every world record eventually falls, but the performances that redefine belief never fade. Bannister's sub-four-minute mile remains the sport's most iconic breakthrough because it changed the way humanity viewed its own limits. Kerr's 3:42.66 is the newest benchmark of excellence, standing as proof that the impossible is never permanent—it is simply the starting point for the next generation.

Josh Kerr has already etched his name into athletics history with a breathtaking world mile record of 3:42.66, but the numbers hidden within that extraordinary performance suggest an even greater achievement could be just around the corner.

While the world celebrated the fastest mile ever run, another remarkable statistic quietly emerged. On his way to that historic finish, Kerr passed the 1,500m mark in an astonishing 3:27.62—the seventh-fastest performance ever recorded over the distance and just 1.62 seconds outside Hicham El Guerrouj's iconic world record of 3:26.00, which has stood as one of athletics' greatest benchmarks for more than a quarter of a century.

What makes Kerr's split so extraordinary is the context in which it was achieved.

Unlike a dedicated 1,500m race, Kerr wasn't running to the finish line when he reached 1,500 metres. He still had another 109 metres remaining before completing the mile. Throughout the race, he had to carefully distribute his effort, knowing there was still significant work left after crossing the traditional 1,500m distance.

His world-record mile required approximately 724 strides, each averaging about 2.22 metres in length. By the time he reached the 1,500m split, he still had enough energy reserved to launch one final charge toward the mile finish, meaning he could not afford to completely exhaust himself at that point.

That reality has fuelled growing excitement across the athletics community.

Imagine Kerr lining up for a race built solely around the 1,500m. With elite pacemakers setting the perfect rhythm from the gun, competitors pushing the pace all the way to the finish, and no need to save anything for an additional 109 metres, the conditions would be dramatically different. Every stride, every surge and every ounce of energy could be devoted exclusively to chasing one target—the world record.

Many athletics experts believe that under those ideal circumstances, bridging the remaining 1.62 seconds is far from impossible. In fact, they see it as a realistic challenge for an athlete who has consistently demonstrated remarkable finishing speed, tactical intelligence and the ability to perform under immense pressure.

Hicham El Guerrouj's 3:26.00 has long been regarded as one of the most untouchable records in middle-distance running. Yet every era eventually produces an athlete capable of redefining what was once thought impossible.

After witnessing Kerr's astonishing mile masterpiece, the conversation has shifted dramatically. The question is no longer whether he belongs among the greatest milers in history—it is whether he can become the man who finally brings down one of the sport's most enduring world records.

If his latest performance is any indication, the countdown to another historic assault may already have begun.