This revolutionary training method has been embraced by elite runners-with extraordinary results-and now you can do it, too.
Respected running and fitness expert Matt Fitzgerald explains how the 80/20 running program-in which you do 80 percent of runs at a lower intensity and just 20 percent at a higher intensity-is the best change runners of all abilities can make to improve their performance. With a thorough examination of the science and research behind this training method, 80/20 Running is a hands-on guide for runners of all levels with training programs for 5K, 10K, half-marathon, and marathon distances.
In 80/20 Running, you’ll discover how to transform your workouts to avoid burnout.
– Runs will become more pleasant and less draining
– You’ll carry less fatigue from one run to the next
– Your performance will improve in the few high-intensity runs
– Your fitness levels will reach new heights

A breakthrough program for triathletes — beginner, intermediate, and advanced — showing how to balance training intensity to maximize performance — from a fitness expert and elite coach.

From the national bestselling author of Racing Weight, Matt Fitzgerald exposes the irrationality, half-truths, and downright impossibility of a “single right way” to eat and reveals how to develop rational, healthy eating habits.

From “the Four-Hour Body” to “Atkins,” there are diet cults to match seemingly any mood and personality type. Everywhere we turn, someone is preaching the “one true way” to eat for maximum health. Paleo Diet advocates tell us that all foods less than twelve thousand years old are the enemy. Low-carb gurus demonize carbs, and then there are the low-fat prophets. But they agree on one thing: there is only one true way to eat for maximum health. The first clue that this is a fallacy is the sheer variety of diets advocated. Indeed, while all of these competing views claim to be backed by science, a good look at actual nutritional science suggests it is impossible to identify a single best way to eat. Fitzgerald advocates an agnostic, rational approach to eating habits based on one’s own habits, lifestyle, and genetics and body type. Many professional athletes already practice this “Good Enough” diet, and now we can too—and ditch the brainwashing of these diet cults for good.

The greatest athletic performances spring from the mind, not the body. Elite athletes have known this for decades and now science is learning why it’s true. In his fascinating new book How Bad Do You Want It?, coach Matt Fitzgerald examines more than a dozen pivotal races to discover the surprising ways elite athletes strengthen their mental toughness. Fitzgerald puts you into the pulse-pounding action of more than a dozen epic races from running, cycling, triathlon, XTERRA, and rowing with thrilling race reports and revealing post-race interviews with the elites. Their own words reinforce what the research has found: strong mental fitness lets us approach our true physical limits, giving us an edge over physically stronger competitors. Each chapter explores the how and why of an elite athlete’s transformative moment, revealing powerful new psychobiological principles you can practice to flex your own mental fitness. The new psychobiological model of endurance performance shows that the most important question in endurance sports is: how bad do you want it? Fitzgerald’s fascinating book will forever change how you answer this question and show you how to master the psychology of mind over muscle. These lessons will help you push back your limits and uncover your full potential. How Bad Do You Want It? reveals new psychobiological findings including: Mental toughness determines how close you can get to your physical limit. Bracing yourself for a tough race or workout can boost performance by 15% or more. Champions have learned how to give more of what they have. The only way to improve performance is by altering how you perceive effort. Choking under pressure is a form of self-consciousness. Your attitude in daily life is the same one you bring to sports. There’s no such thing as going as fast as you canonly going faster than before. The fastest racecourse is the one with the loudest spectators. Faith in your training is as important as the training itself.

Every runner knows pacing is critical. It can be the difference between a PR and a DNF. In On Pace, acclaimed running coach and author Matt Fitzgerald reveals how conventional training and device overdependence keep runners from accessing the full power of pacing.With a mix of fascinating science and compelling stories from every corner of the sport, Fitzgerald shows that pacing is the art of finding your limit—running at a pace to finish the workout or cross the finish line completely out of gas. This quintessential running skill unlocks hidden potential and transforms the sport, enabling runners of all experience and ability levels to “run free.”Training plans for 5K, 10K, half-marathon, and marathon events will hone your pacing skill through improved body awareness, judgment, and toughness. Choose from four plans, novice to expert, for each distance. On Pace equips you mentally and physically to become a better runner, capable of knowing and executing your best effort on any given day.This audiobook contains a supplemental PDF with 5K, 10K, half-marathon, and marathon training plans.

Cutting-edge advice on how to achieve your personal best, for everyone from casual runners to ultramarathoners.

In 80/20 Running, respected running and fitness expert Matt Fitzgerald introduced his revolutionary training program and explained why doing 80 percent of runs at a lower intensity and just 20 percent at a higher intensity is the best way for runners at all levels–as well as cyclists, triathletes, and even weight-loss seekers–to improve their performance.

Now, in this eye-opening follow-up, Fitzgerald teams with Olympic coach Ben Rosario to expand and update the 80/20 program to include ultramarathon training and such popular developments as the use of power meters.

New research has bolstered the case that the 80/20 method is in fact that most effective way to train for distance running and other endurance sports. Run Like a Pro (Even If You’re Slow) shows readers how to take the best practices in elite running and adopt them within the limits of their own ability, lifestyle, and budget.

* This audiobook contains a downloadable bonus PDF of useful exercise images and includes all training plans from the book.

The bestselling author of 80/20 Running and How Bad Do You Want It?
reveals his inspiring and surprising journey to see just how fast he can go.

Matt Fitzgerald has been running (and writing about running) for most of his
adult life. But, like many passionate amateur runners, he never felt he was quite
fulfilling his potential. If he follows the training, nutrition, and lifestyle of an elite
runner, just how fast could he go?

In his mid-forties, Matt at last has the freedom to do nothing but train, if only
for the span of one summer. The time is now. He convinces the coach of Northern
Arizona Elite, one of the country’s premier professional running teams, to let him
train with a roster of national champions and Olympic hopefuls in the running
mecca of Flagstaff, Arizona, leading into the Chicago Marathon. The results will
completely redefine Matt’s notion of what is possible, not only for himself but for
any runner.

Filled with a vibrant cast of characters, rigorous and quad-torching training,
and a large dose of self-deprecating humor, Matt’s gripping account of his “fake
pro-runner” experience allows us to partake in the dream of having the chance to go
all the way. Yet for the gifted young runners Matt trains with, it’s not a dream but
concrete reality, and their individual stories enrich this inspiring narrative.

Running the Dream pulls us into the rarified world of professional running in
a way we can all relate to, regardless of speed, and inspires us to try to achieve our
own potential.

Every sports fan loves a great comeback. Is there a special quality shared by top athletes who triumph over great challenges? And can anyone acquire it? In The Comeback Quotient, celebrated sports writer Matt Fitzgerald supplies the answer to both questions. He identifies these mega-achievers of astounding athletic comebacks as “ultrarealists,” men and women who succeed where others fail by fully accepting, embracing, and addressing the reality of their situations. From ultrarunners like Rob Krar to triathletes like Mirinda Carfrae to rowers, skiers, cyclists, and runners all over the world, Fitzgerald highlights and speculates on just what makes these comebacks so compelling. As for whether anyone can stage his or her own great comeback, the answer is a resounding yes: Anyone can become an ultrarealist to some degree. In the tradition of his bestselling How Bad Do You Want It?, The Comeback Quotient combines gripping sports stories with mind-blowing science to deliver a book that will forever change how you perceive the challenges you face, giving you the inspiration and the tools to make the next great comeback you witness your own.

Sports nutritionist Matt Fitzgerald has spent nearly twenty years studying the
diets of top professional endurance athletes, who are among the fittest and
healthiest people in the world. As a result, he has identified five core habits—
most of which are contrary to what popular diets advise—that are essential to
maximizing workout benefits. The Endurance Diet shares key strategies for
optimal health and performance: eat everything, eat quality, eat carbohydrate,
eat enough, and eat individually. Whether you want to lose weight, win a race, or
look a little more like an elite athlete, this plan is for you.
This audiobook includes a supplemental PDF with recipes and tables.

From basic tenets of training to nutrition guidelines, this is the first resource for runners to fully integrate nutrition with training for a complete and systematic pre-race plan. “A must for marathoners”(Library Journal).
Every year, roughly 2 million people participate in marathons and half marathons in the United States, and, no matter what level they are, every one of these runners has likely hit “The Wall,” running out of muscle fuel in the final miles and slowing down precipitously. This setback and
other common running disappointments are nutritional (or metabolic) in nature. In The New Rules, renowned fitness journalist and training coach Matt Fitzgerald cuts through the myths, distilling the most up-to-date science to help runners overcome the universally experienced nutritional
barriers that prevent success in the marathon and half marathon.
Fitzgerald’s powerful and easy-to-use tools will enable runners of all levels to attain their ideal racing weight, calculate their precise daily energy needs, and formulate a custom nutrition plan.
This audiobook contains a supplemental PDF.