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How non-running work counts
Cycling, swimming, lifting and yoga all belong in your plan — but they are counted in different ways, and some are not counted at all.
Your plan can hold more than running. Cycling, swimming, rowing, climbing, lifting and mobility work all have a place in it, and activities you record for any of them will line up against what was planned.
How they are counted, though, differs — and the differences are deliberate rather than gaps.
Running volume means running
Your weekly mileage counts running. A two-hour ride is real training and it is recorded as such, but it does not become miles in your running total. Mixing them would make the number meaningless for judging running load.
Aerobic cross-training is tracked by time
Aerobic work that is not running — cycling, swimming, rowing, climbing — is rolled up by duration rather than distance, and totalled across your training block. It is the cross-training counterpart to mileage: a way to see that the aerobic work happened even though it was not a run.
Lifting and mobility are marked, not measured
Strength and mobility sessions are tracked as done or not done, and nothing more. They contribute no aerobic total at all.
This one is on purpose
Folding a lifting session or a yoga class into an aerobic load number would misrepresent what your body did that day. Strength and mobility are non-running and non-aerobic, so they stay mark-only rather than inflating a total that is meant to mean something.
Scoring works differently too
A run gets scored against the session that was planned — how close you were to the prescribed paces, and whether you covered the work. A cross-training day has no equivalent prescription to be measured against, so it is recorded as completed rather than scored out of a hundred.
That is not your bike ride counting for less. It is the difference between a session with targets to hit and a session whose job was to get aerobic time in.
Building a mixed week
Ask for what you want and it goes into the plan:
Ask your coach
- “Add a bike session on Wednesday instead of the easy run.”
- “Put two strength sessions a week into my plan, Tuesday and Friday.”
- “I swim on Mondays — build around that.”
Your plan then shows those days as planned work, and the activities you record pair up with them.
Ask your coach
“Add a bike session on Wednesday instead of the easy run.”
“I lifted twice this week — does that show up anywhere?”
“Put two strength sessions a week into my plan.”
Related
- What a session is made of — Every run in your plan is built from steps — each with a job, a length, and sometimes a pace to hold.
- Cross-training in your plan — Add cycling, swimming, rowing, climbing and other aerobic work to your plan, then see what you completed without turning it into running mileage.
- Strength and mobility — Schedule lifting, yoga, Pilates, stretching and mobility work while keeping them separate from aerobic load and running scores.
- Building a hybrid week — Combine running, aerobic cross-training, strength and mobility in one week while keeping each kind of work visible on its own terms.
- How a run is scored — See how your completed run is compared with its planned session and why some runs correctly have no score at all.
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