Most athletes are aware of the term ‘cellular respiration’ without really understanding what it is and how important it is to their performance levels. So what exactly does this term mean, and what relevance has it to a runner’s fitness, stamina and explosive power?

Cellular respiration involves the intake and use of oxygen by your body cells in order to generate energy called Adenosine Triphosphate (ATP). To understand the process, consider a very common energy source – fire.

Immediately after the race I was feeling pretty bad, but after a few hours I went out to eat with my family and then got in my car and drove back to NYC. The next day I worked a full day and was a little rough, but by Tuesday I was feeling great and today [Wednesday – 3 days after the marathon] I went for a bike ride and felt like I was completely recovered from the marathon, I had an amazing amount of energy.

Energy level is pretty high. Normally yesterday would have been the end of the 2nd week in a 3 week cycle (2 weeks of build/1 recovery…”normal” protocol for an athlete my age), but I actually feel well enough to see what it would be like to try a 4 week cycle of 3 weeks of build/1 recovery, just like the good old days. I’ll know more after my tempo run tomorrow, but so far, I’m really impressed with my recovery.

I’m currently training for my 7th marathon and the most remarkable change has been in the recovery after hard runs. It allows me to keep up with a young Peruvian girl that I’d normally be trailing behind at this point in our training!