By Jason Koop, Head Coach of CTS Ultrarunning Intermittent fasting and time restricted eating have gotten a lot of attention lately. It pops up on podcasts, with social media influencers and in an array of apps that will tell you when and for how long your ideal fast should be. I have even written about …
By Jason Koop, Head Coach of CTS Ultrarunning In the very early part of my coaching career, far before I was working with elite athletes, caffeine was considered a controlled substance per the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA). Meaning, if an athlete had too much caffeine in his or her system, they would be subject …
By Jason Koop, Head Coach of CTS Ultrarunning Oh 2020… what can we say about you? You were a year we’d like for forget, but likely will not. A year of cancelled events, but chock full of twists and turns nearly every week. You brought out the best in us by bringing us the …
By Jason Koop, Head Coach of CTS Ultrarunning It’s Christmas week and that means your inboxes are likely filled with newsletters and advertorials trying to cajole you into buying more of the ‘the best gifts for runners’ and ’must haves for the trail runner’. Fortunately for you, I have some better more whimsical content lined …
By Jason Koop, Head Coach of CTS Ultrarunning Earlier this year CTS Athlete Coree Woltering set the Fastest Known Time (FKT) on the 1,200-mile Ice Age Trail. He decided to take up the endeavor with relatively little specific preparation, allowing himself just several weeks to pull all the logistics together, as well as get in …
By Jason Koop, Head Coach of CTS Ultrarunning Before getting to today’s post, I would like to extend my heartfelt condolences to the family friends and colleagues of Andrea Huser, who passed away recently in a training accident. As a fixture in US and international races for many years, Andrea was a fierce competitor and one of the nicest people you …
By Jason Koop, Head Coach of CTS Ultrarunning Earlier this year as the pandemic locked down athletes around the world, CTS released our entire DVD workout library for free. The contents were a treasure trove of indoor cycling, strength training and stretching workouts, all produced well over a decade ago, far before athleisure was …
By Jason Koop, Head Coach of CTS Ultrarunning If you stay in the ultramarathon game long enough, it’s a near certainty that you will have at least one DNF at some point along that journey. Additionally, while some of these DNFs are unavoidable, I will make the argument that many are caused, in whole or …
By Jason Koop, Head Coach of CTS Ultrarunning One of the challenges to writing about training is that every subject could legitimately expand into a book unto itself. My shelves are full them; entire books on physiology, biomechanics, nutrition, periodization, performance assessment and analysis, sports psychology, stress relief, and yes, recovery. Arguably, what you do …
By Jason Koop, Head Coach of CTS Ultrarunning Races will be back in 2021. They might be different and maybe not all races will return, but mark my words now, ultramarathons will be back. Many runners with rollover entries from 2020 have copious amounts of time–now that they don’t have to wait for lottery …