How to Train Like an Olympic Athlete

Every four years the best athletes in the world convene at the Olympic Games to test themselves and to determine the ultimate champions. The motto of the games, “faster, stronger, higher – together,” perfectly sums up what it takes to end up on that podium with a gold medal around your neck.

But not everyone can be an Olympic champion. Few of us can even dream of competing in the Summer Games – and many people harbor no serious intentions of trying to represent their country on the highest stage. You may not ever feature on the sports pages or have people bet online on your events, but being the best that you can be is something that you can definitely identify with.

Whatever your level of running, wanting to better your personal best and push yourself to the limit is a common ideal and training will help you with that. But what if you tried to train like an Olympian? We are not saying that you will ever get anywhere near the games, but training as if you were would surely help.

Every discipline requires different training methods, of course. But here are a few general ideas to consider.

Set Your Own Clear Goals

It may initially sound a little defeatist but your goals should, more than anything, be attainable. Olympic athletes will set goals to make it to the games or to win a medal. Yours should probably be a little lower. But they should be difficult enough that they will push you on to succeed.

Beating a personal best is the obvious goal to set. It can work for just about any event or discipline and achieving that goal will mean that you are definitely getting better at what you do. These goals are meant to motivate you to push harder and put the work in when you least want to and when you want to quit. Even when you are at your lowest, you should be thinking about not letting yourself down.

Performance Not Physique

All runners will know that building up muscle mass is not going to help you on the track, road, or cross-country trail. But weights work should be part of your training regime to build strength and endurance. But, in this age of social media photos, just don’t get carried away with achieving an Instagram body.

Olympic athletes don’t care about whether they look good when they are lifting weights as part of their training. They are lifting weights in the knowledge that it will help them with their discipline. Focusing on your training, rather than the way your body looks, will already set you apart from most of the people at the gym – and will improve your times as well.

Make it Tough

Deliberately making your training routine harder than it needs to be is a good way of pushing yourself and improving. Olympians might train with weights in bags to make what is probably already a punishing run into even more of an ordeal. The idea is that when the race comes along, the distance will feel easier to complete without the weights.

Giving yourself extra work to do – and the stress and exhaustion that comes along with that – obviously needs to be closely monitored. But intentionally making your training even more difficult and tougher is one way that you can improve without even realizing it.

Do it Again

To make it to the Olympics you will need some innate talent. But talent alone will not do it. You also need to put in the hard work – and if that means doing double training sessions or working for twice as long, then that is what needs to be done. You may not be going to the Olympics but this is another great way to push yourself as if you are.

Having a varied training routine in the first place, including strength work and non-running exercises, will give you an all-round level of fitness. So doubling the reps in each sub-section of the routine is going to have some positive effects. Give it everything you’ve got – and then do it again.

Want It

There are two elements of wanting it when it comes to running and training – and one of them is arguably more difficult for us normal runners compared to Olympians. Their goal is simple and ends at the Summer Games. But you will need to find your own goals and work towards achieving them.

But the other aspect of wanting it is to just actually enjoy what you are doing. You have to want to get up in the morning and go on that run. You need to enjoy working out and conditioning your body if you are to keep it up. Goals are all very well but you also need to enjoy the journey towards them.

Focus on the Long Term

When we talk about goals, we don’t mean something that you could easily achieve in a matter of weeks. Olympic hopefuls obviously have a four-year cycle to focus on. But everyday runners also need to think about what they want to happen down the track – not the short term.

It is a good idea to have a set of goals that can be checked off on the way. But think long term and you will find that you are in it for the long haul. If it is good enough for Olympic athletes, it should be good enough for you.

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Jay Stallings

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