Mr. Jean-Yves Terreault who participated Oxfam Trailwalker Japan 2007 introduced a basic training tips for beginners.

■Introduction
Before starting the Oxfam Trailwalker Japan 2007, my first by the way, I had visions of cramped muscles, fatigue-induced fights with teammates, and a finish crawling like a hurt reptile. Although there was some pain, not at all unbearable, my teammates and I actually finished the course smiling, running, and best of all, with an increased affinity for each other.

We finished 19th overall, third in the mix-team category, with a time of 25 hours 48 minutes. Not bad for a team that had two members who had never completed a full marathon. I am just telling you this to show where we were coming from. What we accomplished is no miracle but it did demand some sacrifices prior to the event. The key to our success was training, especially team training. The following guide is based on our experience: take some and leave some to suit your needs and conditions.

If you are in a team that is actually going out there to win or to push yourselves to the max the whole event, this guide will probably be of little use to you. However, if like the great majority of teams you are looking just to finish the event, I think you will find some helpful tips in here. When our team decided to join, our sole objective was to finish. We trained quite a bit because we wanted to make sure we could finish.

As our training continued and we established the so-important team pace, we realized we could probably finish in between 24 and 30 hours. And in the days preceding the start, this became our new unofficial target as one of the members wished to come back home to Kansai on the Saturday in order to finish some preparations and spend some time with his wife before a business trip on Monday.

But whatever your time objective is, directly related to the members’ condition and the amount of time you will spend at the checkpoints (including sleep should you choose to do so), preparation will be related to your enjoyment of the event. Unless you have known your teammates VERY well or you are all ultra-marathoners, my teammates and I truly believe that team training is essential. The more you get to prepare together (including for the fund raising), the better your team spirit will be.

It goes without saying that you should not start the trail in a bad physical condition. However, you do not need to be the athlete of the year, either. On a personal level, you should start from now to lead a more active life. It is important not increase your physical activities too quickly as it increases the chance of injuries. At first your body may not be ready for all the exercise and it will need more time to recover.

There are tons of options for training: playing more sports, jogging, going to the gym, swimming, using stairs instead of elevators and escalators (you will be doing a lot of up and downs on the trail), getting off one or two stations before your home to walk a little bit more, and so on. Remember that according to doctors, any exercise under 20 minutes is of little use for your heart and muscles. As for running, it is recommended not to increase by more than 10 or 20% your weekly mileage. If you are new to jogging, include one-minute walking breaks at short and regular intervals, slowly lengthening your running segments as your fitness level increases.

Your focus should be on building stamina, not speed or power. If possible, on your active days, try to combine many different activities or do them for a longer time. For instance, if you go play soccer with friends, cycle or jog to the field to improve your endurance. Doing some core muscle training will give you some extra energy in the second half of the course. You might also consider stretching, like yoga, to balance your body and reduce muscle wear. A massage here and then can also provide relief.

When training with your team, your focus should be to build stamina and establish a team pace. At first, you will probably all have different paces, with some better at climbing and others at descending. It is preferable to hike on mountain trails, as they will mimic the conditions of the event. Training on the actual course will give you an idea of what you are up against. In our case, only one member had done part of the trail. It caused us to shortly look for the course once or twice (it is very well marked), but then, everything was new to us, perhaps keeping our interest higher.

If you plan not to sleep during the event, it is a good idea to hold at least one overnight training session. This serves two purposes. One, it will acclimatize your body to staying up all night while doing exercise. Drink some caffeinated liquids but remember that too much will cause more urination, leading to dehydration. Second, you will get used to hiking at night, using a lamp. Doing it on a Friday night is very convenient, as it will give you two nights to recover before work. Try not to sleep before to recreate the event’s conditions.

We held 5 or 6 team training sessions, including one overnight. We started with relatively short distances, under 20 kilometers, and increased with almost every session. On our second-to-last session we hiked over 50 kilometers, which proved sufficient for us. Our last session was held a week or two before the event, and it was one of shortest. It is not a good idea to do a long distance less than three weeks before the event, as our bodies need more time to fully recover than we think, unless you are Dean Karnazes. We used the last training session to discuss some of the last points of our preparation.

The psychological aspect of the event is as important as the physical one. That is why my teammates and I feel we had the best team. We can honestly say that we enjoyed ourselves, and the key to our success was preparing as team. You may think you know your teammates, but there is a difference between working with them or having a beer with them, and spending between 20 and 48 continuous hours with them on a tough mountain trail. In our case the Trailwalker strengthened our friendship and respect for each other, but I have some friends who lost friendships on the course. Team preparation can reduce the chances of that happening to you.

The single-most important role of team training is to learn about your teammates: when can you push them, when should you back off, when can you joke with them, when should you keep them awake. This will prove important, especially in the later stages of the event. It will also give you things to talk about, as 30 hours is a long time to spend with the same people, and will also provide you with some running jokes, pun intended, that boost team morale throughout the course.

But you should not limit team bonding to training alone. Organize lunches or diners together, hold fund raising events together (we held a fund raising party with a raffle of presents given by restaurants, bars, hotels and other companies, while a friend from another team hosted a barbecue at his home), and exchange regular e-mails regarding training and other things. In our case, we were lucky in that we are all members of a common social and running club called the Hash House Harriers (which also meant with were not the most serious people and we could all take a joke).

The bottom line is that the more you know each other before the event, the more chances you will actually enjoy the event. And expect to hurt, but remember that no one likes a whiner. And I can say this honestly as after the event, I realized I was that person during the event. My teammates were kind enough not to tell me to shut up! Bless them.

Many things will be discussed here, from equipment to sleeping.

■Your team
Let’s start with the most important, your team. The Oxfam Trailwalker is a team event, the ‘Greatest Team Challenge’. At each checkpoint, you will all need to be present before moving on to the next section. It is therefore counter-productive for faster members to leave the others behind, as they will need to wait at the next aid station; during that time, the fast members’ muscles will get colder and the slower members may not get enough rest, leading to an even slower pace further down (and up!) the course. I hate clichés but it is true that there is no “I” in team. The event seeks to help people in need and you should the same with your teammates. If you are joining only to beat some sort of record, I recommend you to race a different event; Japan has many ultra-marathons, both individual and in teams.

■Food
Concerning food, most of the checkpoints have food, in some quantity. This is especially important to remember if your team plans to have a slower pace because by the time you get to the aid station, there may be little (i.e. not your favorite flavor of onigiri or pastry Danish) or no food left. Do not blame the volunteers, though. They are not paid; they do it for the cause, and the blame rests on the teams ahead of you who ate too much. It is therefore a good idea to prepare for the worst. Bring some food on trail and have some more either with your support team or in separate bags if you will use the luggage transportation service.

The food you bring should satisfy (to provide you with the energy required) and taste good (to keep you spirits high). Do not be afraid to have high calorie snacks, like triple-cream choux à la crème or chocolate almonds (a personal favorite), as you will burn it. But make sure that you are used to those of foods to decrease the chances of stomach problems.

■Drinks
Drinks are also important. All aid stations have one form of drink or another. Again, be careful about drinking too much caffeine that can cause dehydration. I drank some energizing sport drink (available in powder packs) and it worked well for me. Others prefer to drink water only. It is up to you to determine which works better for you. In all case, you should drink regularly to stay well hydrated. Try to drink more in the days preceding the event to make sure you are fully hydrated at the start.

This brings me to the matter of equipment. It is absolutely essential to have a backpack. In the first stage my teammates and I were horrified to see a participant walk with a plastic bag in his hand (he was also wearing jeans, perhaps the worst fabric for this sort of endeavor). If you like the outdoors, I recommend buying a bag that has an integrated hydration pack with a tube; they are so convenient and can be used while doing a large variety of activities. But a regular backpack will do just fine.

■Shoes and clothes
More importantly, of course, is a comfortable pair of shoes. Again, personal preferences and budget vary. Most of my team used trail running shoes while our ultra-marathoner member used regular running shoes (unless you have very tough feet, it is not recommended). But whether you use hiking boots or jogging shoes, make sure you have broken them in properly. I made this mistake but luckily had another pair waiting at the 4th checkpoint, by which time the damage was already done. Have a second pair ready. Remember that if your first pair gives you trouble, it will probably happen in the first half of the event so pack accordingly.

Dress in light layers to be able to add or shed some easily as the weather changes. Your first layer should ideally wick away perspiration. Avoid cotton, as it turns cold when wet and takes a long time to dry. Carry a wind and waterproof layer to keep your body warm and dry in case of rain. It gets pretty cold and windy at night in the mountains so a fleece is a good idea. A new pair of socks can work wonders to refresh you during the course.

As for walking poles, again personal choice will dictate if you use them or not. They do help carry you weight, but you need to train with them to be effective; the way you walk with and without poles is fairly different. This applies to all equipment actually; use them before the event to adjust them and get comfortable with them.

■Sleeping
Whether you sleep or not, you will probably need to do part of the trail in the dark, and so a lamp is highly recommended. Headlamps, which can come handy at home in the case of an emergency by the way, are fairly inexpensive and very convenient, keeping your hands free. A flashlight can also do the trick. Unless you are using new batteries (and even then), make sure to have an extra set. Last year we met a lone participant (abandoned by his team because of an injury; that is not the spirit of the event we feel) whose batteries had just died, minutes before full darkness fell down upon us! One of our members was kind enough to give him an extra set. Make sure you know how to use your lamp, unlike the teammate of a friend whose headlamp was still in the unopened package two hours before nightfall.

On the question of sleep, opinions are divided. Should you sleep, it will of course allow your body to recover, provided you can sleep well. Checkpoint 4 is a campground and if you like camping, it can be a fun interlude, while checkpoint 7 has indoor sleeping quarters. But with teams arriving, preparing food, discussing and leaving at different times, your sleep might not be very peaceful. Also, your muscles will get cold from inactivity and the spring temperatures, so muscle ache might worsen during sleep. If you sleep, put your legs up a little to drain excess blood from your feet. This applies to naps and regular breaks as well.

My team decided not to sleep. This decision was taken early on for many reasons. Perhaps the first reason was for the challenge of doing it. Then all the considerations given above were weighed in and pushed the balance. We did plan to allow team members to call for a nap, and two of us did take a 5-15 minute nap at checkpoint 7. Recent research shows that one-minute, five-minute and 15-18 minute naps are most effective for the brain. More than 20 minutes and your brain will enter a sleep phase that is detrimental to interrupt. How long you sleep and rest at the checkpoints will largely influence your finish time.

■ Support crew
Then, there is the question of a support team. Inevitably it should help you, allowing you to carry less equipment and food on trail, as well as boosting morale. Finding the members can be hard though, especially if like us, you do not live in the area. We did not have one and in way, it might have helped us finish earlier as we might have spent more time at each checkpoint, not that we were trying to set a team record or anything. However, we did retain the service of the luggage transportation service, which proved very useful and efficient. It added to our costs, but probably less than a car rental that would have been needed had friends acted as our support team.

Also, to keep you going, have special rewards waiting for you at different checkpoints and at the finish. In our case, with no support team, meals waited for us at checkpoint 4 and 7, while a delicious Australian micro-brewed beer was sitting in a cooler at the finish line.

Finally, remember why you are joining the Oxfam Trailwalker. For most, I think, the desire to rise to the challenges of both fund raising and completing a tough trail is the greatest source of motivation. Even if you are professional athlete, focus on enjoying the event instead of finishing quickly. If the view is nice, do not hesitate to stop to admire the sights and take some pictures. And stop to smell the flowers: the people who will benefit from your efforts do not always have that luxury.