Gjert Ingebrigtsen shares the secret to his sons' success - high mileage - and claims "they don’t have any natural speed."

Compare Halberg after the Rome 5000 to Jakob after his efforts.

You should give Halberg some credit for the tracks he ran on and the bowling shoes he wore though

We know Lydiard's name thanks to the Olympic success in the '60s with many athletes. 100 miles per week was one part of it. Periodization and peaking and hill training, and a keen observation to change training based on feedback were also important elements.

Armstronglivs wrote:

We wouldn't know Lydiard's name unless he had revolutionised the sport with his principles of aerobic conditioning. His "100 miles per week" was at the core of it. Runners have since varied his programme but aerobic conditioning has never completely fallen from favour.

Well the dentist is for the hgh abuse, the cardiologist & the lab is for the other stuff. As for Durianrider, lmao!

Somethings that need to be debated here. I wouldn't say that westerners like Jazy or Dixon running for 3 hrs at a slower pace is useless. From my observation westerners living at sea level disastrously moved away from this in the late 80s-00s period, couple with a birth rate collapse, was how many stayed on a par with the Africans (probably stimulated altitude like blood benefit). Interestingly I actually agree with Gary on this one. There has also been an endurance explosion over recent decades which just seems to be unexplainable except for one answer.

Interestingly, Tergat was around 2:05 but had bests of 12:48 & 26:29, he was faster than Kipchoge over 10,000m yet Eliud would destroy the former WR holder by well over 1km in a marathon race. This is hard to digest.

Do you have any reference articles on actn3? I coach an athlete with the gene and a high VO2max. Would love to read some articles concerning proper training modalities and this gene, in order to get the best gene expression. Thanks for your time and thoughts.

Samona wrote:

People here are so stupid. His 51 400 and 1:49 800 are from 2017, where his 1500 PR was a 3:40 flat.

From 16-17 he experienced a growth spurt, like many young kids (girls usually a few years earlier). His 1500 improved in just a year from 3:40 flat to 3:31 low. He did not race a 400 and 800 since 2017, but it is very likely he would be at 48 and 1:46ish. Lewandowski also went from 1:52 at age 16 to 1:48 at age 17.

His 1500 improved from 3.40 to 3.31 in a year? I wonder who else that sounds like. Oh, yeah - Rashid Ramzi.

You think he's likely improved to a 48sec 400? And in a year. All of a sudden he's Snell-speed over the distance - and Snell was a 1.44 man over the 800. And this from a runner whose father/coach says "doesn't have any natural speed". And Gert is talking about Jakob today. I think I'll go with his assessment rather than your fanciful imaginings, that include a "growth spurt" for a runner who appeared no taller or bigger than he was a year previously.

You have missed the point. I am not saying elite training hasn't changed significantly since Lydiard. I am saying that long-distance training is not a new innovation in the sport, when distance-training is offered as an explanation for the unusual successes of the Ingebrigtsens. In terms of training they would have no advantage over any other top athlete today. We might need to find another reason for what explains their significant improvements.

Well, yes, no one tires these days, do they? And that is rather the point.

rekrunner wrote:

We know Lydiard's name thanks to the Olympic success in the '60s with many athletes.

100 miles per week was one part of it. Periodization and peaking and hill training, and a keen observation to change training based on feedback were also important elements.

Armstronglivs wrote:

We wouldn't know Lydiard's name unless he had revolutionised the sport with his principles of aerobic conditioning. His "100 miles per week" was at the core of it. Runners have since varied his programme but aerobic conditioning has never completely fallen from favour.

You've have made a detour, as usual. Of course, aerobic conditioning was not the entirety of the Lydiard programme, but it was an essential part and was significantly different by degree to anything that went before him. He virtually single-handedly created a nation of world-beaters in the '60's by his methods. The point at issue is that it is a little late in the day to offer distance-running as a latter-day explanation for the highly unusual achievements of a family of Norwegian runners.

If we can take Jakob's best times in the 400 and 800 as a reliable indicator of his basic speed I would still be interested in hearing why he slows so much less than previous generations of top 1500/miler men over the longer distance. As I said, most would slow between 8-12secs per half-split over the longer distance compared to their best time for the 800. For Jakob the differential is nearly half that - at around 5 secs. Distance-training as an explanation doesn't cut it. They all did it - and before him.

Armstronglivs wrote:

If we can take Jakob's best times in the 400 and 800 as a reliable indicator of his basic speed I would still be interested in hearing why he slows so much less than previous generations of top 1500/miler men over the longer distance. As I said, most would slow between 8-12secs per half-split over the longer distance compared to their best time for the 800. For Jakob the differential is nearly half that - at around 5 secs. Distance-training as an explanation doesn't cut it. They all did it - and before him.

Why couldn't his distance training be a good explanation? In their build up they often do four (4!) threshold sessions a week and it is highly controlled with testing of the lactate build up with some sort of apparatus in between reps. They do this week in and week out for months and months. I know a ton of programs have focused on longer intervals/continuous fast distance running.....but to this extent? That is a an absolute crazy amount that all of the brothers have worked up to. I can't recall THAT many examples of people doing that. Whether people may think its detrimental or not, that is one major key difference I can think of in their training if you are looking for anything.

Four (4) threshold sessions per week? Wow!...I didn't know that...unbelievable (I don't think even the Kenyans do anything like that?).

You might have a good point there. We will have to wait & see what Armstronglivs' take on that will be.

It is distance-training that is being claimed as the reason for the brothers' success. On that topic we see that Lydiard worked out that the optimal amount of conditioning running was approximately 100 miles per week. Lees than that and the benefits were not as great. More than that - and he experimented with up to nearly double that mileage - and the body couldn't recover and risked breakdown.

What he didn't include as a factor was drugs, because the technological developments in drugs we see today had not occurred in the late fifties (and certainly not that a self-experimental amateur runner would have known then in a country well off the beaten track). Drugs today can significantly aid recovery. A well-established feature of doping now is that runners can train much harder, without risk of injury or breakdown, and can recover much more quickly - just as we regularly see them do at the end of gruelling races.

If a teenager today - however talented - is able to train much harder and longer than adult former Olympic champions and world record holders over his distances then it raises interesting questions about how this is achievable. How are the Ingebrigtsens able to do more threshold sessions than anyone else - including the Kenyans?

You don't understand that the difference is not i the mileage, but in the INTENSITY, and this is the key for understanding the improvement in long distances today.

With Lydiard, the long run was ALWAYS slow. This means that the aerobic construction, after the first two-three years of training, was practically over, when instead was possible to improve still a lot, running long distances faster, and long intervals on track faster.

Emiel Zatopek, who was the only winner of 3 gold medals in the same Olympics (5000, 10000 and Marathon), when already able running under 14' and under 29', won Marathon in 2:23:03, last year time beated by 34 women in the world, the most part of whom are not able to run under 32'.

So, only some blind nostalgic can think nothing changed in training from the time of Lydiard.

Another factor, when we look at Jakob, is that he started REAL AEROBIC TRAINING when was 11 years old, having time for building a great Aerobic House, when the other boys are still playing without any precise goal. If it's true that young age is the best age for absorbing specific ability (this means is the best age for building coordination, mobility, reactivity, elasticity, proper technique), it's also true that young age is the best age for increasing the Aerobic ability, putting the bases (also mental) for working very hard, without fearing volume, intensity and fatigue.

You continue to use Peter Snell as parameter with the athletes of today. What do you think he (and Herb Elliot) could have done, if in the professional athletics of today ?

For winning 1500m in OG in Rome (1960), Elliot, at that time 22 years old, needed to ask holidays from his job, and, after winning in 3'35"6 running the last 700m alone (WR), decided to stop running, because had to look at his future profession. Do you think he could not run well under 3'28" in the professional athletics of today, and with all the opportunities we have in 2019 ?

And about Peter Snell : he won in Tokyo with 38"1 the last 300m, and ran the WR of Mile in 3'54" in Wanganui in 1962 on a track of grass. He never competed in the odd years, because there were not Championships. What do you think he could have run today ? 1'42" ? 3'28" ?

So, really, don't look at doping, but at changes in the following direction :

1- Different continuity in training, year after year, month after month, day after day

2- Different motivation for the continuity, because athletics can offer today important goals in every season

3- Different level of the intensity, connected with the point 1

4- Different mental approach about the intensity, because today is a normal situation in everry top athlete, who never lets his shape going under the 85% of the specific top shape (while in 1960 athletes rested many months because there were no competitions, and every time resumed training from a very low level)

The fact that today doping allows to recover quickly is not correct. Athletes who want to train with more intensity can recover quickly BECAUSE OF THE CONTINUITY OF TRAINING AT HIGH INTENSITY. Some, who thinks not possible to increase his training in natural way, DOESN'T TRY, and finally tries after taking some illegal support only. But, I repeat, BEFORE REFUSED TO TRY, being MENTAL WEAK.

Some other, instead, tries without any support, and in 2-3 years time is able to reach this result thanks to the different physiological level he is able to build, with continuity and graduality.

When finally you, and all the obsessed of doping that post in LR, understand what is possible to do with training, maybe athletes can improve again, and can again enjoy what they do, instead living in continuous suspicions about the integrity of the other competitors.

Subway, do you understand we continue to speak about Mathew Kisorio, when the argument is the Kenyan doping of Marathon runners ? So, for the "obsessed" of Kenyan doping, what Mathew said is like the Bible.

But you forgot to say that, in spite of his doping, his PB before the ban was 2:10:58 in NY (6.11.2011) and his 2nd Marathon was 2:18:15 in Boston (16.04.2012). You forgot to say that his antidoping test was in competition, during the National Championships 2012 (14.06.2012), when he ran one of the worst 10000m on track of his life (28:05.60, when already he had a PB in Nairobi of 27:28.13 on 26.06.2010, and a PB at sea level in Eugene (3.06.2011 in the Kenyan Trials) of 26:54.25.

You also forgot to say that, after coming back from the ban, he was able running the following marathons :

2:06:33 in Valencia (15 Nov 2015)

2:07:32 in Daegu (2 Apr 2017)

2:06:36 in Paris (8 Apr 2018)

2:04:53 in Valencia (2 Dec 2018)

You don't know he started to dope (not only EPO) after struggling in the last km of Boston 2012, thinking he was not able to increase his endurance in natural way. This means ALL THE PREVIOUS RESULTS WERE CLEAN.

And you don't consider the fact that doped athletes, when come back from the ban, are monitored through the Biological Passport very much more than the other athletes : therefore, we have to suppose all his results after the ban are clean.

Or you believe in what Kisorio says, only when can support your ideas ?

"Somethings that need to be debated here. I wouldn't say that westerners like Jazy or Dixon running for 3 hrs at a slower pace is useless. From my observation westerners living at sea level disastrously moved away from this in the late 80s-00s period, couple with a birth rate collapse, was how many stayed on a par with the Africans (probably stimulated altitude like blood benefit)"

Yes, we can debate this here, better than to continue to speak of doping.

But the fact you wouldn't say westerners like Jazy or Dixon running for 3 hrs at a slower pace is useless, it's not important, because the reality is that this activity can be used like regeneration, but after 2-3 years of continuous training can't have any physiological effect.

The problem of Westerners living and training at sea level was not they didn't do long and slow run anymore, but is they cut the FAST RUN on middle distances (between 3 and 10 km), and removed LONG REPETITIONS at high intensity from the track. In simply words, THEY DIDN'T TRAIN for endurance, but for an extension of the speed, without any specific aerobic support.

In middle and long distances, the mental approach is fundamental, and if there is not knowledge and mental concentration in the kind of sufference and fatigue athletes have to face during the race, every exercise is useless.

Britons were always considered example of aggressiveness in training and in competition. Speaking about Marathon, they had examples like Ron Hill and Ian Thompson, able running 2:09 already in the period between 1969 and 1974, and had Steve Jones, who changed the idea of Marathon (but all the coaches, myself included, at that time didn't believe in his attitude, thinking he was crazy). How can we combine this history with the FACT that in 2003 the best Marathon Runner in UK was a women (no male athletes were able running faster than 2:15:25 of Paula Radcliffe) ?

So, the system used in Europe after 1990, till about 2010, was to move the main goal in training from ENDURANCE (in all the aspects : physiological and mental) to BIOMECHANICS. European athletes started to reduce dramatically the volume of running, replacing with a big increase in the volume of exercises, and the first effect was they were no more able to sustain the physical pain and the fatigue at the base of every endurance event

"There has also been an endurance explosion over recent decades which just seems to be unexplainable except for one answer."

The answer is not what you think : is the growing number of African runners, bringing to a growing competitivity in long races, with the effect to cancel the fright of suffering during training and competition, while in the same time in Europe and America that fright became bigger. And the motivation of the African runners, because it was possible to win good money in a lot of races (something 30 years ago not existing), and they could change the lives of their families.

"Interestingly, Tergat was around 2:05 but had bests of 12:48 & 26:29, he was faster than Kipchoge over 10,000m yet Eliud would destroy the former WR holder by well over 1km in a marathon race. This is hard to digest."

This is absolutely NOT HARD to digest, instead it's the clearest example of the change of training system.

Paul Tergat ran his PB in 1997 (12'49"87 and 26'27"85), 6 years before his WR in Marathon, and step by step reduced the workouts of speed, losing that quality. He ended running on track in 2000, and arguably when bettered the WR of Marathon in 2003 was no more able running under 27'30".

If you compare with Haile Gebrselassie, you can see how in the methodology of the Ethiopian always there was speed training, and his speed didn't decrease too much, in spite of the long runs.

In 2004 (already after running his first Marathon), Haile still ran 12'55"51 and 26'41"58.

In 2007 (when beated for the first time the WR of Tergat with 2:04:26) ran 26'52"81.

In 2008, since he wanted to partecipate to another Olympics but didn't want to run the Marathon fearing the pollution, he ran in racing shoes in Hengelo in 26'51"20, was 6th in Beijing in 27'06"68 on 17th August, and 40 days later (28th September) ran the first minus 2:04 in Berlin (2:03:59).

This is the big change in methodology, and Patrick Sang was able to understand, and to apply to Eliud this new strategy.

Probably, Eliud could be better today than in the past in a competition of 10000m, distance that in any case never prepared when was a track runner. He was more a specialist of 3000 and 5000m, anf his PB of 10000m doesn't show his real potential.

Today, the most part of Kenyans use high speed in their preparation for the marathon. They use track sessions, and somebody (not all, but the best) continuous runs near the Marathon speed, with variations between the Marathon speed and the speed of 85-90% of the race speed (for example, 5 times 5 km at Marathon speed alternated with 1 km at 85%, that for an athlete who wants to run in 2:05 (2'58" per km) means 5 km in 14'50" alternated with 1 km in about 3'20".

This is something very different from the past, and is the technical explanation of the explosion of African runners.

When we are able to use the same system with some European (see Sondre Moen and Julian Wanders), the results are very much better than the results of European athletes of the past.

Believe in training, not in doping.

Renato Canova wrote:

You don't understand that the difference is not i the mileage, but in the INTENSITY, and this is the key for understanding the improvement in long distances today.

With Lydiard, the long run was ALWAYS slow. This means that the aerobic construction, after the first two-three years of training, was practically over, when instead was possible to improve still a lot, running long distances faster, and long intervals on track faster.

Emiel Zatopek, who was the only winner of 3 gold medals in the same Olympics (5000, 10000 and Marathon), when already able running under 14' and under 29', won Marathon in 2:23:03, last year time beated by 34 women in the world, the most part of whom are not able to run under 32'.

So, only some blind nostalgic can think nothing changed in training from the time of Lydiard.

I have not read every book by Lydiard but in the one I did read (published in the 1990s with Dieter Baumann on the front cover) he did not see to be saying this at all. In the book Lydiard did write about running "big initial mileage" but he also said that a lot of this running should be "fast aerobic running" the type of running where you are pulling you legs up high and pushing the pace but staying "relaxed". In another book Lydiard wrote about Ron Clarke and how Clarke kept on increasing the speed of his distance runs and pushing the pace higher and higher whereas some other Australian runners kept running at a relatively "slow" pace but they did not improve as much as Clarke did. And Clarke himself talked about running a lot of fast runs pushing the pace around a horse racing track towards 5 mins per mile then going faster over the last few miles -down to the 4-40s. From what I have been able to read about John Walker (whose coach was Lydiard influenced) he was also running a lot of fast distance runs up to 10-12 miles.

Maybe there are other interpretations of Lydiard but from what I can understand, Lydiard was about running a lot of fast aerobic mileage including the long run over hilly terrain. I agree that many European and American distance runners seemed to go away from this type of training in the 1990s focusing more on shorter intense intervals. Maybe the longer distance intervals are more of a recent training development compared with Lydiard's approach to training.

When talking about coaches of the past who contrasted with Lydiard, I would say that Van Aaken (who coached 1964 Olympic silver medalist Harold Norpoth) was all about running slow mileage, he even wrote about the heart rate not going over 130 bpm on distance runs.

Everyone has the gene, but different combinations of alleles (different genotypes).

XX (T;T)

This genotype is under-represented in elite strength and sprint athletes, but more common in endurance athletes. This genotype makes fast-twitch muscle fibers completely unable to produce alpha-actinin-3. (Alpha-actinin primarily influences the cohesiveness and mechanics of the cytoskeleton by cross-linking actin filaments and other cytoskeleton components to create a scaffold that imparts stability and forms a bridge between the cytoskeleton and signaling pathways.)

RR (C;C)

This genotype makes fast-twitch muscle fibers able to produce alpha-actinin-3, and indicates better performing muscles, particularly for sprinting and power sports. Fast-twitch muscle fibres fire more rapidly and generates more power, but they're less oxygen efficient than slow twitch fibers. XX is also associated with improved protection from eccentric training-induced muscle damage, and sports injury, which is relevant for the personalization of training programmes.

RX (C;T)

One working and one defective copy of the gene for alpha-actinin-3 in fast-twitch muscle fibers. May indicate somewhat impaired muscle performance (relative to the RR genotype), but many elite sprinters / power athletes have this version.

There are big differences in the distributions of the genotypes among different populations.

Fewer than 11% of Ethiopians and 1% of Kenyans have the XX genotype, despite their extraordinary endurance capabilities. It shows that although the gene is very influential, it's only one of a variety of factors that determines how good you can become.

The gene tells more about what you can or can't do within sprint and power sports, than it says anything about endurance. If you're XX you'll have bad odds going for the 100, 200, javelin, shot put, clean, snatch, etc. If you're RR there's nothing wrong with going for the marathon.

Nice inputs from Canova!

I Jakob tested vo2 max and velocity at vo2max as a 11 years old and the results was going through the roof.

II His 400 and 800 meter results are from 2017 (so not comparable).

III The Ingebrigtsen' doubles a lot and spend a lot of time at threshold, but do no speedwork off sesason.