Thank you, Meredith Holland, for writing this wonderful post for us!
Making time for accessory work is critical for injury prevention and to help improve running. Most of us know WHAT to do, but we find it hard to actually DO the exercises. While there is no magic solution, I have a few ideas to share.
Use your group for accountability.
Pick a buddy or a few buddies you can check in with regularly to help you stay accountable. Even better, text them directly in the week saying, "I'm doing my exercises this Tuesday." This will help you and gently peer pressure them to do the exercises.
Set timers.
Most of us have 10 minutes in the day at least 2xs a week that we can commit to doing accessory work. Ten minutes two times a week is better than 0 times a week. When you are watching TV or sitting by a fire on a cold day, or when you first wake up, set a 10-minute timer and do your exercises in that time frame, then text your buddy and say you did it!
Do an EMOM.
This stands for Every Minute on the Minute. This means that in 60 seconds, you will do any exercise, and then, at the start of the next minute, you move to the next exercise. You can do this as many times as needed. I prefer to pick four movements and go through them four times. So that means a total of 16 minutes of accessory work.
We did a version of this on the freezing cold Saturday.
We did 4 movements with a 1-minute "rest." So it was five movements, four times through.
Single leg backward lunge into stork (this is one of the quick eight movements)
Woodpeckers or sipping bird
Air squats
"Jane Fondas" (lying flat single leg abduction)
Rest by standing on one leg
This is the same method I use for doing an ab workout. On Saturday, we did the following four movements three times.
Plank
Regular sit up
Supine single-leg march
Dead Bug
These are super quick workouts that can get a good burn going. The nice thing about an EMOM is that you move between each exercise, which is much more fun mentally than doing three sets of 10. The end result is that you get in 3 sets of 10 but in a much more fun way.
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