Lydiard Imitations

Antonio Cabral wrote:

What you say take us to the question of the meaning of similarity and difference on the training method.

Which post are you referring to Antonio? I don't have a frame of reference.

Yeah you explained things well enough. Sorry I guess I wanted to re-emphasize the point that the right training choices depends on the athlete's situation, and that it crossed my mind the idea that modern training is in part a result of specializing.

I don't see how we get past philosophy, except by analyzing training and results, and one piece at a time with scientific studies.

As far as experiments go, I already mentioned a few:

- a long term large sample survey of groups of runners, to sort out questions like to periodize or not to periodize; to specify or not to specify; to complicate or simplify; to add furniture, or add floors; etc.

- someone should set up a Lydiard training camp in Iten, to train some of these low hanging fruits, so we can compare apples to apples

- or someone should set up a "modern" training camp in the US, or in Europe, or in Australia/New Zealand

Maybe "vague" is a bad word. The training is well described in terms of desired effects, but just not in the terms and variables people are comfortable with. I don't think the vagueness is as bad as you describe once you understand the intent and training goals, but if the vagueness is a problem for the coach, or for the athlete, there are ways and solutions around that.

For the self-trained masses, there are tables like Jack Daniels, that gives recommended training paces. You mentioned McMillan before. He has a website which calculates a rich set of all of your training paces, including separate speed paces for the "fast" athlete and the "resistant" athlete, based on a relevant race performance as input.

A good coach, who knows his own athlete, will be able to produce better paces than generic tables for the masses.

You also mentioned heart rate monitors. This is also a good way to limit and control efforts, especially on surfaces and terrains where you may not know the distance, and times may be slower if you did. A good coach/athlete will be able to define relevant training zones.

I have the same advice for intervals. If the coach isn't comfortable with "run as many (or few) as you want as fast (or slow) as you want, and stop when you want" approach, then he is certainly free to replace it with an approach that specifies all the training variables. Again, while it may be more difficult to put this in a 6 month plan ahead of time, or produce generic tables, a good coach who knows his athlete will be able to have an accurate expectation, and will also be able to tell when it's not working on that day.

Gipsy, I travelled yesterday to Nederland from US, where I was speaker to US coaches in St. Louis, and now, waiting for a competition of 15 km tomorrow, I use the fact I cant sleep for the jet-lag for reading posts in letsrun, too.

So, I read everything. I don't want to go in the debate pro or against Lydiard, since I think this is a stupidity.

But I see I was named many times, as coach "against" Lydiard. This is not true. My origin was with Lydiard, very simply I developed Lydiard's phylosophy according to the new needs of the World in 2011.

So, I want to clarify some point (for your info, I was from 1975 till 1985 the Italian National responsible of Decathlon, and the first Italian athlete overtaking 8000 points was a my athlete, so we can have something in common).

1) Were not Soviets to invent interval-training. They went to copy from Gerschler and Reindell, and when you speak about periodisation for middle and long distance, absolutely you cant have any good example from soviet methodologists. Matveyev was the one codifying the principles of periodisation, but Anatoliy Bondarchuk, understanding a too long period without "specific

training" could be a limit for reaching the best possible performance, promoted the idea of "multiple periodisations". For that reason, Soviet Union was the first Country looking at Winter Championships in long throws. The multiple periodisation of Bondarchuk, very much more advanced than Matveyev, included cycles of 3 weeks of "general" training (for example, targetting a long phase of strengthening with high volume of weight lifting) followed by 3 weeks of "spèecific" (where throwers used to have a ,lot of technical sessions, in order to "transform" their strength in technique, with a continue alternance between "general" and "specific" training). So, if you look at sovietic periodisation, you have to look at the more advanced format of it, not at something the same sovietic methodologists consider obsolete.

Of course, the principles of Zachorskiy and Verchosanskiy are still valid, as the principles of Lydiard. But principles are at the basis of the development, and the development, STARTING FROM THOSE PRINCIPLES, is exactly what happens in all the sports, all the human activity, in every field (otherwise we couldn't be still able to know the FIRE....).

2) Methodologists and Scientists from URSS and from Finland (Komi, Vikho, the Italian Carmelo Bosco that was my teammate in the University) were the best researchers about the phenomens connected with the development of strength, in all the aspects of muscles, including particular studies about the nervous system. All these studies had essentially involved the FAST FIBERS, where the values of reactivity and explosivity can find their explanation.

But nobody of them had the specialisation and the interest for studying the processes of ENDURANCE. This can find the scientific base in the mythocondria, that are located in the Slow Fibers.

So, all the plan of the periodisation doesn't have anything to do with long distances. Because of this transfer from the periodisation good for all the disciplines based on speed, strength, explosivity, reactivity and skill to the same periodisation applied to long distances, the results of Soviet athletes dramatically decreased in the '80 years. After Vladimir Kuts (28'30" and 13'35" in 1956/57, winning OG in 1956), Pyotr Bolotinikov (winning OG in 1960, running 28'18") that didn't use any periodisation, the athletes of URSS practically disappeared from the World of middle and long distance, and this because coaches wanted to follow a model not valid for those events.

3) African athletes must use the possibility offered by the athletic of today for changing their life. They don't have anything : no job, no money, no opportunities. This situation is very much different from the situation of western people of the past and of the present.

Herb Elliot won OG when 22, with the WR, and that was the last competition of his career. For going Rome he had to use holidays from his job, because he already had a job. And, in 1960, also winning Olympic didn't give athletes money, but only glory. They had their life, their evolution in education, their job.

I think that if Elliot can be an athlete of 2011, and goes to win OG in London while 22, also for himself this can be the beginning of a career lasting 10 years, with 1 million dollars òper year, big contracts with Companies, and his activity could be completely different, because he had to compete frequently for giving visibility. And, what is more important, USING THIS SYSTEM (that is a must for every top athlete today) HE COUL RUN FASTER THAN BEFORE.

4) Different is the situation of Marathon. When you are Emmanuel Mutai, winning in NY about 700,000 USD (so, including the victory in London, he won this year almost 1 million dollars with 2 major marathons), do you think the most important goal is to last 10 years at good level, or to have for 3 years this type pof level ? And, in any case, how long was able to last Haile, or Kenenisa, or Paula Radcliffe, or Ezekiel Kemboi (silver behind Shaheen in WCh 2003, and still WCh in 2011) ? Why do you want to generalize looking at 1000 Kenyan runners, 950 of whom don't have any market after one year ?

I think you speak about something absolutely theorical. I think you are from NZ or Australia. You speak about coaches using "feeling". I'm one of them, and I want to give you a suggestion. Use the same feeling for knowing the reality of other Countries, too. The basis of your convinctions are not valid when you look at African life and all the problems we have to face every day in those Countries. Don't analyse their decisions starting from your reality, but from their reality.

Remember : Training is everything can change in some direction your personal attitudes. And training depends on the choices of your life, not on a theorical phylosophy valid in some place but not in another.

At the end, I give some principles of my training :

1) Use what you have : if you are Borzakovskiy, you train for 4 months in winter on an indoor track because outside there are 25° negative and the snow, not because this is absolutely the best way. If you are Ingrid Kristiansen, you run 160 km per week on treadmill, because around there is only ice, not because this is the best way. But these are the only possible ways for athletes living in Russia or Finland in Winter.

2) Don't lose what you already have. So, don't use long blocks of some type of training, because your body can go out of balance between all the qualities you need to use for your performance. Of course, you must change the percentage of every type of training, but you need to try to maintain a high percentage of what you have, when mainly you train for improving some other quality.

3) Try to distinguish the period during which the most important thing is to understand your INTERNAL LOAD (that is exactly the theory of Lydiard, also if really I'm not able to understand what 1/4, 1/3, 1/2 of effort can mean), and the period when you have to look at the EXTERNAL LOAD. In the second case, we call this "specific", and this is very different from the Lydiard's training.

4) Try to use big variations in your training. Only with high modulation you can make effective the supercompensation, that is the base for every type of improvement.

5) Don't repeat every time what worked very well before. Training is the ANSWER to one attack to the body (STIMULUS), and without stimuli there is no answer. This is exactly the reason because the most part of African cant last long time : BECAUSE THEY CONTINUE TO USE THE SAME PROGRAM ALL THEIR LIFE. For that reason, to continue with long run at the same speed for all the life is something not only not able to produce positive effects after some year, but also to bring the body in a state of Adaptation that is the main enemy for future improvements.

And at the end some data, because it seems I don't believe in aerobic training. I believe so much in aerobic training that my athletes of track ran long distances already in July, BUT VERY FAST : in 2005, for example, Shaheen ran (6 days after winning Golden Gala in Rome in steeple with 7'56") 37 km in 2 hr 01', and Dorcus Inzikuru 32 km in 1 hr 58'. After one month, both won WCh in Helsinki. I laugh when I read about "high mileage" speaking of 100 miles per week : my athletes run between 180 and 200 km per week if are 1500m runners (Silas Kiplagat 3'29", Collins Cheboi 3'32", Caleb Ndkiku 3'32" and winner of World Cross Junior), more than 200 km always if they are specialist of 5000m (Thomas Longosiwa 12'52", Edwin Soi 7'27"), 220/250 if Marathon runners.

But the big difference is when we move to the Specific Period. During the last 2/3 months, WE INCREASE THE VOLUME OF INTENSITY, decreasing the general volume, also for Marathon. So, looking at the marathon (that is the only distance UNDER the threshold), WE PREFER TO GO FOR SPEED BEFORE, EXTENDING THE DURATION AT THE SAME HIGH SPEED LATER.

Under this point of view, this is the exact contrary of Lydiard's training. And, if we have now a lot of athletes under 2:06 (and 4 under 2:04), may be that this system is better that the old one.... or not ?

Hi Renato, i'm located in the mountains somewhere quite isolated. It is a good place to find focus.This is going to take a few posts, because you have provoked so many issues and thoughts i will need to say something on a number of points. However, i am hesitant to post long now so perhaps a multiple posts is the solution.Before i start I just want to say that I don't see you as a person 'against' Lydiard, not in the active sense that Antonio appears to. Whether this is different in the past i don't know. Moreso i see your system as opposing his in various ways. Some of the fundamentals he specifically mentions differ from yours. One of theses is that you have more focus on aerobic power and he has more on aerobic capacity. Other fundamental differences like the specific form of periodisation you use and the intuitive approach Lydiard uses compared with your more rational approach can be found. Lydiard specifically warns against the negative effect of too much interval type training and eliminates it from preparatory training, which is counter to your own approach. Lydiard has a specific focus on steady pressure on the aerobic system, which can only be achieved by continuous steady efforts, whereas you replace much of this training with alternating efforts. So there are differences just training methodology differences. There are of course many similarities as well. It is good to keep the analysis methodological otherwise we get into the emotional argument that seems to be present in this forum. I will respond to your first point here.

I'm sorry i don't know what i was saying. I should have said something like for Gerschler intervals was everything and the Soviets made it a 'part' of their periodisation.

I have to remind you here that Gerschler didn't invent the interval concept. Outside of the argument whether the Greeks utilised this princple, in the modern sense we find it was the Fins who first seem to experiment with alternating work and rest efforts. Nurmi and coach Pikhala were probably the first to apply scientific principles to training methodology. Their system was known as terrace training with each effort being built on the previous one. This terrace idea fits with the Matveyev idea of progressive development that forms the basis of linear periodisation as well as the principle of progressive overload.

Then we find the Swedish Coach Holmer studying The Finnish example and produced fartlek in the 1930s. Interesting point with Holmer in when describing the faster segments of the fartlek run he used the word 'bursts'. So whilst fartlek means 'speed play' and the word speed is right there and everyone thinks about fartlek as having speed, but he also uses the word 'bursts' to describe the energy of the speed and not many people focus on this element. So they miss out on the explosive aspect to fartlek whilst probably gaining more speed endurance effect, which was not its intended focus.

And THEN we get to Gerschler, who studied both of these guys and decided not enough speed was present. So he invented intervals and made a great 800m runner. But intervals were his only training stimulus and so came the next step thanks to the Soviets and most specifically Leonid Matveyev, founder of Soviet Periodisation.

Matveyev's work is interesting because as a scientist the entire development of periodisation began with a real life observation. He looked closely at the national athletes up to and including Helsinki '52. And from starting the process in 1952 through to publishing his work 13 years later in 1965, he tested it quite thoroughly and came up with what he called biological 'legalities'. And these are the basis of the principles of training. Because he stated they are immutable laws and because i have found these same laws in my own experience i trust them and have been applying them for some time now. I should make a point that these legalities of Matveyev and their reflection in the science of Metaphysics are fundamentally the same.

Next you mention Bondarchuk and i will get to him soon. I wish to give special time to him because i truly place him highly in the pantheon of greats. But first i will jump to this to continue this Matveyev line.

I'm not sure which Soviet methodologists consider it obselete. If you mean Bondarchuk then i heavily disagree with you but i will have to come to that in a moment as i said. If you mean Verchosanskiy then you pick a poor choice as his refutation of Matveyev's approach was never met with wide acceptance. He even developed a different form of periodisation that also has not met with wide acceptance. Since his paper more recent studies have gone against his conclusions in favour of Matveyev such as Zheljazkov. The fact that the training principles or legalities that Matveyev expounded in his practically led experimentation are still universally accepted speaks volumes. The fact the Verchosansky's purely theoretical analysis hasn't, speaks just as loudly. Perhaps you like Verchosanky because his is more like 'pure' science. One of Verchosankskiy's main criticisms of Matveyev is that his theory was only applied to a few sports of which track and field was one. I think we can be thankful that our sport was one he analysed when developing his theory. Verch. Doesn't like Matveyev because it lacks complete objective reasoning and he is a pure scientist. I like Matveyev not only because i see him as fundamentally correct, but because there is an element of feel to his work.

So we move on to Analtoliy Bondarchuk. The greatest throws coach in the history of our sport, uncontested. One of his athletes still holds the world record 25 years after he set it. This deserves special investigation in itself and i will include some observations in what i'm about to say next.

I'm not sure how you can say much more advanced or even more advanced. Bondarchuk split a year in half and created two training periods. This was what he did. Whether in response to needing to compete in the middle of Winter or prior to this need is a debatable point i grant you, however, why else do this if not for a need. The need to compete midyear meant an adaption to a double periodised year. Matveyev was not the coach of course. He was the scientist and we are just lucky he accelerated the process of understanding in methodology and probably did so effectively because his whole theory was rooted in a analysis of practical observation.

Anyway, Bondarchuk visits my country and conducts a lecture in the gym we trained at three/four times a week. I was introduced, but not speaking a common language had nothing to say of course, plus i was just another young athlete. So he conducts this seminar and my coach translates. When my coach comes back to the training session i ask him what Bondarchuk is saying. The reply is 'Anatoliy is frustrated and wondering why everyone is asking him about the little finger, and the little toe, when there are much bigger concerns for them.' So all the time my coach was drawing my mind to the holistic view, to make sure i didn't make the mistake of being distracted by a singular focus. I thought i would add that as my own personal anecdote regarding Bondarchuk.

Now Bondarchuk you say didn't follow Matveyev but he most certainly did, not in its originally published form i grant you because he started using double periodised year, but according to the principles yes. Now you might hate me here because i am about to draw a parallel between Bondarchuk and Lydiard :) I hope you trust my understanding of this sport and my academic interest in it enough to know i will attempt to provide very sound reasoning.

Bondarchuk went into specificity moreso than Matveyev recommended. He never went close to rejecting the General Training idea, but he definitely emphasised the Specific Training idea, more than it appears Matveyev would have suggested. He did this because he was translating theoretical concepts into practical reality. So he found that the more specific the strength training was the better translation to the event. Bondarchuk took specificity and generality and combined them to produce an interesting end result. Sedykh, Bondarchuk's greatest disciple abandoned weight training at some point. His levels were 130kg 1RM Bench Press and 250kg 6RM parallel squat at the time (from memory as this was a story translated by a long time friend who spent some time with Sedykh and Bondarchuk on one of their visits to my country.) So he abandons weight training in favour of the most specific of all training for hammer throw. He threw hammers. Overweight hammers are the most specific resistance tool for the event and this was a big part of the training. As the story goes he would throw for 'hours'. His only companion the crows that lined the fence at the end of the field. They would caw as they leaped off the fence every time he hit it. It was at 80m. So if this isn't Lydiard style base training for hammer throw i don't know what else could be. Now i'm obviously not saying Lydiard had any influence on this. I only know that Lydiard's periodisation was developed during the 50s and perfected by the early 60s and Matveyev was developing his theory of periodisation in the 50s and perfected by 1965 and Cerutty was in the same time period. How they and Bondarchuk could have crossed over i have no idea. At the time it would have been print news reports i guess. I don't think they crossed over but my coach did shake hands with Lydiard whilst Lydiard was in the northern hemisphere at one point. I'm sure he said it was somewhere in Russia but i don't know if that is correct. Anyway the coincidental timing of it all bears some thought.

Now i take this fact about Sedykh to mean that Bondarchuk went where Lydiard went, into long-duration low-intensity training. But we can find more examples of people of the calibre of Lydiard and Bondarchuk and Cerutty. If we go to the greatest ever weight lifting coach Vasiliy Alexeyev. this is a guy who was a revolutionary in his field. In the midst of a worldwide trend in always lifting maximally, he went his own way of developing through volumes of submaximal lifting. Sound familiar? He says this "You see, the question is not one of strength, not one of talent. It’s a matter of what’s in the head. In the physical sense you should, you need to work very hard, but with the

nerves – less.” So he identifies the need to work less into the nervous system extremes. Just like Bondarchuk and just like Lydiard and Cerutty. The trend is very strong.

This is what i am saying. The princples are laws, unchanging. How well they are applied leads to how effective a program will be. So when Matveyev says periodisation is progressively developed because this is how the principle of progressive development operates, then we can't restrict the application of this principle just to this the stimulus-response mechanism which is behind your STIMULUS>TRAINING terminology. We also have to apply it to the progressive development of the training program as a whole. The principle is universal so it can be found in every element of a training program, not just selective elements.

It is interesting you use the word ADAPTION a lot and i like it too. STIMULUS>TRAINING ADAPTION. This is functional but this is not what Matveyev called his process. He called it a process of DEVELOPMENT and not limited to ADAPTION. He was very clear on this distinction and for me this works better as well. Matveyev looked at the principles of growth

and development and those natural laws led to his own understanding. We can liken the prize winning rose gardener with the elite track coach. Both are growing their respective lifeforms to peak in as grand an end result as possible. The athlete wants to have a large peak in performance and the rose gardener wants all his efforts to result in a lot of energy for flowering. One peaks into a massive PR and the other peaks into a prize winning rose. The similarities are many. If we take Matveyev's line of thinking that development is progressive we are in line with the rose gardener. There are different methods of treatment for each stage of the rose bushes growth. The better the gardener is the more effectively he deals with each stage and in the end he gets bigger and better flowers. I have to be honest in saying i don't understand why this method of yours doesn't take this simple fact of growth and development into account.

I am very interested in this. Could you tell me who this person was and what your involvement with him involved? Decathlon is still closest to my heart no matter the passion i have developed for the 800m.

Gipsy, I think what you know about Bondarchuk is not completely ok.

When I was the responsible of the Italian Training Center in Tirrenia, every year we had all the best Soviet hammer throwers (Syedikh, Litvinov, Nikulin and Tamm) together with Anatoliy Bondarchuk, for long time (may be two months in December and February), because of our sweet weather.

During all these periods, the athletes ALWAYS used special training (for example, throwing with 8 kg hammer for special strengthening, and after 30-40 throws, a second set of throws with 6 kg hammer for training the speed of the execution). These happened for long time, and was a normal praxis in their training. So, it's not correct to speak about a DOUBLE periodisation : we need to speak about a SINGLE periodisation, made of continue alternance between the BASIC training of strength, and the quick transformation (through technical SPECIFIC exercises) in SPECIFIC training.

This is not Lydiard, instead can be approached to the modern system of training we use in middle distances.

And I repeat : NOBODY among the best methodologists was able to study the effects of periodisation for endurance. Before 1970-1980, really there were not infos about the effects of different types of training on the mythocondria. Only in that period (so, AFTER Lydiard, Cerutty, Gerschler, Igloi and all the other coaches changing the history of methodologies) scientists started to look INSIDE the body, and the roles of the enzymes (such as CPK, LDH and SDH) was investigated.

That's the reason because now we know that the process of capillarisation is not something effective during all an athletic life, but, when the NUMBER of vessels reaches the top, THE NEXT STEP OF THE AEROBIC EVOLUTION IS THE AEROBIC INTENSITY. That's the reason because, when Lydiard speaks about Aerobic Resistance, I speak about Aerobic Power. I try to avoid, in training, all the part that doesn't have any bulding-up effect (apart regeneration).

Do you think that, for an athlete able running 42 km at a pace of 2'55" per km (4'40" per mile), a long run at 3'30" or slower can have some physiological effect, other than regeneration ? But which is the NEGATIVE impact on the body, with this level of mileage ?

So, in training we need to be able to distinguish between TRAINING HAVING BIOENERGETIC AND METABOLIC EFFECTS, and TRAINING HAVING BIOMECHANIC EFFECTS. A high slow mileage DOESN'T HAVE ANY POSITIVE METABOLIC EFFECT, but can have SOME NEGATIVE BIOMECHANIC EFFECT.

I wait your next considerations for some other answer.

You might be right, i have no intimate knowledge of Bondarchuk, only what i have gathered second hand from ymy colleague/friend and my coach mainly. My colleague, the ont who spent days with Anatoliy and Yuri did contrast for me what he perceived as the differences better the system he trained under and Bondarchuk system. My friend was coached by a German who emigrated in the early 70s. He was coached by one of the renowned German coaches Clement. From what i understand the systems of cycling the hammers were similar enough. They both used the range of hammer from 15kg down to 3kg. They both follow ascending or descending ladders and pyramids. So you would see sessions like 15kg, 11, 8 with a finishing set on 4 or 5. Or 10,9,8 with a finishing set on 6. Or 5,6,6.5 with a finished set on competition weight. When the range narrowed to only include 8 and 6kg then competition phase was almost starting or had already started. So i assume the 8s and 6s were used moreso in February than December. Also if only two weights were used then competition must already be upon them. So i would say for sure this example you use is from February. Do you remember what they used in December?

I see how this approach as evidenced the use of light and heavy hammers which enable to competition weight to be approach from both 'ends'. This is fundamental to your approach. I also agree with this approach. As a decathlete you simply can't get away from a certain pace when training a technical event. You can only go so slow and still perform the event. So all of this stuff, even at the drill level, has to have a certain pace close to competition pace. So this covers that end of the spectrum. And yes after technical gains have solidified you want to extend this over time. So this is where your intensive>extensive system is covered in decathlon because it is a high skill event. A lot of technical work is done almost daily and all of this is within a certain functional range of normal pace. How Lydiard appears to ensure at least retention of 'normal' pace feeling in running appears to be with the strides every few days. Personally i like to beef this up with circuit training. I guess if you are Cerutty, a naturally weak man, you would look at weight training to address this balance. And if you had Herb as an athlete this reinforced. With Lydiard you had a nuggety rugby player who worked with his hands. He had good natural strength levels and this wasn't a weakness in him. HIs aerobic was the bigger perceived weakness. Then he had a monster like Snell, so as Cerutty's experience was strengthened by the presence of Elliot, so Lydiard's was with the presence of Snell.

Are we talking about the same thing i'm not sure. I refer to it as to mean a double peak. for me a double peak say in Feb and August would mean one peak is the minor peak and the other the major one. It seems to difficult to try for two main peaks.

This alternation between this basic/general strength macrocycle followed by a specific strength macrocycle is new to me. I have never heard of it. Is this what Bondarchuk was doing? If so i would defintely like to know more. I don't feel it was though. Perhaps what you were observing was the changing cycles of the overweighted hammers instead of a change in phasic intention from one macro to the next? I query because if it is the latter it appears counter to the foundations of methodology Bondarchuk is otherwise following.

Again here i must mention the Sedykh late career process. When he evolved from the weight room into only specific strength training with the crows in the field. he didn't go through this general period anymore. In this sense that we are using, this movement specific sense, he had become very specific. But this is where we can see how each principle of training is a double edged knife, or a two sided coin. We see this in how, in this Sedykh example, he has taken the specificity of the movement pattern and the generality of the type of training and mixed them. Thus we have Specific Generalised training or you could call it Generalised Specific training as well. This is where it connects to Alexeyev, Cerutty, Petrov, Lydiard, my own coach, me. Long periods of submaximal but movement specific training. The movement specific keeps it in contact with the competitive side for the event for me. The submaximal and volume aspect actually allow for a greater change in movement capacity, in movement skill; as we become more efficient at the specific skill we apply the forces of powers (aerobic, long anaerobic, short anaerobic) more efficiently and gain a greater result. When i think along that line i come up to what Noakes is talking and find agreement with him. I would like to talk more with contemporary sports physiologists on this now. Jon Orange are you thinking along this line at all?

I agree that the Soviets failed in MD and LD. For what reasons it is up for debate. If we take Lydiard as a comparative tool with Sovietism, whilst we see a similarity in periodisation principles we see a difference in certain emphasis. Basically Lydiard overemphasises the general training in relation to the Soviets more equalised approach. Lydiard has more general preparation even that the Soviets. I contend this is to address this weakness the human race has i categorise as 'lifestyle' fitness. Without this weakness, as we can see in animal populations especially obvious in racehorse training, but also with the Kenyans, and this is why i believe your system is so successful with them even though i contend it is out of balance in this general training way. Because the Kenyans are highly conditioned already in this general way, through basic lifestyle. So your mastery at tuning an athlete up into a high competitive state is your mastery. I just feel with regular periods of low intensity high volume training their basic lifestyle fitness will be reconditioned, leading to longer careers and therefore potentially higher peaks. Possibly it is within your capacity to fund a training camp so athletes can at times rely on this funding to continue training and so relax this pressure on needing to compete so often. I'm just thinking about someone at your level of coaching. Where do you go next? Will it be satisfactory to have all of your medal winners on your resume at the end or do you want a 'breakthrough' athlete. A Snell or Elliot. I think with your mastery of the upper ends of the training methodology spectrum, if you added this one idea, of submaximal high volume training, you may well achieve it with more than one of these Kenyans you have access to. Just my thoughts on it.

What do you say?

I guess philosophers who are viewing metaphysics could have a crack at it but even then they would still need something concrete to bounce it off. So i agree with you that it can't develop if methodolody doesn't develop. The other way to analyse it is through experience, but again experience alone with higher thinking isn't going to develop it either. So a combo is required.

I would be into this and even assist in organising it.

again excellent but who would fund such an enterprise?

This again could be set up but again funding is the issue.

From my perspective i will be embarking on some sort of system development. With a base of 100+ schools to provide coaching income and a steady stream of new talent, i'm going to see what can be done with this system of mine.

Sure, we rely on statistics over personal experience as a rule, so without clear guidelines for what to feel, people will just get lost on their own.

This word rich you use i've only ever heard it from Antonio in this context.

You know how athletes are in one of two categories: those who overdo things and those who underdo. For me HRM works as a limiter for the first group and a baseline for the second. So it helps me correct both mentalities. Still there comes a point when they have to leave it behind and that often is a small crisis point, when they discover their newly developed dependence. I might have to look at that in future so it doesn't even get started.

Gipsy,I choose tobe a coach whenI was 12years old, because I had passion for athletics (all athletics,not only running).I was myself an athlete of medium level, but with the motivation to try every event because Iwantedto have personal feelings with any discipline (from 5,966 point of decathlon to 2:53 in Marathon...).

I am not interested in being considered the number oneor two or three in the world. I am interested in helping people for their life,and I use my passion and my knowledge about athletics for trying to change the lives of more people I can. I plan for every athlete according to their needsin their life, not only looking at technical results. So for somebody I plan a career for lasting, for somebody else some result in short time. For the most part of Kenyans running is a job,not a passion, and I need to have a different approach about their training, depending on their basic motivation (job or passion).

I already had some World Record holder (Shaheen in steeple, Paul Kosgei in 25 kmon road,Moses Mosopin 25000m and 30000m on track) and 33 different medalsin World Championships. This year I had 2 World Champions (cross withImane Merga and Marathon with Abel Kirui), 2 silver medals (Silas Kiplagatin 1500m and Sylvia Kibet in 5000m), 2 bronze medals (Sharon Cherop in Marathon and Merga again in 10000), and this didnt change my life.

So, I continue to learn and at the same time to teach. Athletics is not something outside of the normal life, and I need to push every athlete to his best considering his problems of life and his real situation at home. Life is real, theory can be different, and always I lived in the real life.

I think to be a coach using big flexibility and big psychological effort in order to build for every athlete his individual cloth,andthe cloth of an athlete is his training. Physiological principles are like a big road : beginning and end of the road are the same for everybody, but if I'm in Italy or US I drive on the right side, if I'm in UK, Australia or JapanI drive on the left side.

I recognize that Kenyans and Ethiopians have a natural training due to their lifestyle that can give them good aerobic base BEFORE starting official training, and I explained in other threads that I can start my training with athletes already at 90% of their potentiality (percentage that many EuropeanandAmericans never areable to reach at the end of their career).

But do you think the situationin Australia or New Zealand 50 years ago was different ? Do you know that the basic mileage of Ron Clarke was run going to the site of his job ? And do you think the young life of the top Italians of 30 years ago (Bordin, Panetta, Cova, Antibo, Mei) was very different from the lifestyle of Kenyans of today ?

I'm the first recognizing that the new generation from Western Countries don't have any basic preparation under the aerobic point of view,so they need (more than in the past) a long period of aerobic building up because for them to increase their capillarization is a fundamental point.

However,I disagree with the idea that this process has to continue for years, and that you need to grow a lot under this side BEFORE starting a preparation with some anaerobic workout.

I never can look at any trainingin negative way, so I strongly refuse the idea that some lactic workout can be negative or contrary for the aerobic quality of the athletes. There are many graduations in what is aerobic and what is anaerobic : the same training can start UNDER the level of threshold for finishing OVER that level,and this is the way for increasing the threshold itself.

So, when we speak about the effects of every kind of training, WE ALWAYS MUST IDENTIFY THE DOSAGE OF THIS TRAINING INSIDE THE FULL PERIOD. Thinking that ONE SESSION of Anaerobic / Lactic training can ruin a period of Aerobic Training is something completely out of reality. And this also if Lydiard said something else. Lydiard was probably the coach producing the greatest impact on the way of training for middledistances in the history of athletics, but was not a physiologist, knew very little about scientific approaches, and is not as God : his words don't represent the full truth, but only his convinctions.

Antonio, i meant no disrespect. I guess i am just looking at all of this from my perspective, as you are from yours. I thought i would throw the idea out there. This is a solid decathlon score. What were your individual performances if you don't mind?

12 is very early. When i was 12 i wanted to be an airforce officer and pilot. This didn't last longer than a few months though. I never thought about athletics i just liked it and went and did it. Probably the success made it easy to continue. I definitely didn't know what a coach was at 12. My first coach came along when i was 15 and the year after i changed to a respected hurdles coach because that was probably the event i did best in relative to others. Three times a week for two years before i changed to my decathlon coach at 18. I started coaching immediately at the school level for part time money. This continued as i competed and started coaching more seriously when i stopped competing. So i guess i have been coaching for over 20 years already. I feel fortunate as i believe i was always going to be a better coach than athlete. Time will show whether this is true or not.

When i started coaching seriously i soon discovered plenty of athletes didn't really 'get' what i was saying. I realised i couldn't communicate what i wanted on their level, at their capacity of understanding. And since i wanted to be able to reach anyone, anywhere - this kind of mentality - i began to work the problem out. I could explain to the talented and intelligent ones no problem but outside of them it became increasingly more difficult as talent levels, intelligence and age all decreased. So i began to coach more in primary and with special olympic development squads and i looked into education information of the population groups. Once i was there i discovered i couldn't even use words. Now it was at the level of grab their attention, show something you wanted them to notice, and then encourage them to try it. On the scale of coaching this is where the letter A sits. But it is very difficult, like communicating to someone in another language. Yet through persistence i came to the point where i could get across something to everyone i met. Now i feel i can communicate most things i need to, to most people, in everyday language. So i am glad you talk about 'helping' because this is central to my personal ethos as well.

Maybe i am giving myself away there. Possibly i haven't let go of my athlete mentality fully and still desire personal success.

Here we have a contradiction. You say many Euro and US athletes can never reach this potential, yet elsewhere you say that it is reached in around 3 years of formal training. Perhaps to jump your answer, i am wondering one thing about the relationship between aerobic capacity and aerobic power. Does it or does it not determine potential of aerobic power?

I'm not sure if it continues for years as i have no direct experience, yet if you say these Euros and US in many cases cannot even bridge this gap of capacity, then is there just no hope? Does these people just say well i'm never going to get to their capacity no matter how long i train? I just don't like the idea that there is no hope.

On this point again, i can't say for certain, however, along my line of thinking, there is some truth to what Arthur has said on this issue. I don't think we can go as far as to say we will ruin our aerobic training for some time because of an anaerobic session. This is certainly possible to do but it's hard to imagine an athlete forcing themselves through an anaerobic session to such a violent degree as to miss any real time from the normal training program. From what i gather from Arthur it was more about it cutting into your training time for developing aerobic capacity. A solid interval session may mean only two hardout capacity sessions could be done that week. I thought it meant a loss of available time, as much as a warning that it will damage your system for up to 48 hours and during this time no appreciable gains can be made in the main focus - capacity.

And i don't take anyones word anymore as the 'gospel' truth, because everything is but degrees of it. Absolute truth isn't something for humans to be claiming i feel.

But we try. And to further my own efforts i'm hoping you can tell me of the relationship between aerobic capacity and power.

It seems others have answered, but I'll address the question:

From "Run To The Top", 2nd Ed, 1967:

Pg. 22:

"When you can run a hundred miles a week comfortably, the progressive subsequent improvement is not secured by running greater distances but by aiming to run the same distance a week, faster."

Pg. 48

"On the assumption that our learner is a man who runs the marathon (26 miles 385 yards) in about three hours, we establish that he runs about a seven-minute mile. For ten-mile training, his racing pace will be six-minute miles. Therefore, his three-quarter effort over ten miles would be 6 min 15 sec miles, his half-effort 6 min 30 sec miles and his quarter-effort 7 min miles."

From "Running The Lydiard Way", 1978

Pg. 21

"You may have been under the impression that marathon training involves slow running. Apart from supplementary work, this isn't so. World-class runners don't jog around in this phase of their preparation, bur run at speeds of from 3.75 minutes to 3.25 minutes per kilometer. There are still some long-distance runners who believe they should run only at 4.25-minute pace, and that to run faster wastes effort and produces poorer results. Again, this isn't so."

I would suggest a careful reading of the above shows AL did, in fact, propose long, fast running. He just didn't think it wise to go at it initially. A runner must work up to it. Look at the example of the 3-hour marathoner. He's capable, on a good day, of hitting 6:52 per mile in the marathon. Lydiard has him doing "3/4 effort" work at 6:15/mile. On Pg. 19 of Running The Lydiard Way, he proposes a schedule for the more advanced runner and one day per week he suggests 15 kilometers at 3/4 effort. That would be long and fast for the 3-hour marathoner. He'd find that quite challenging. Daniels VDOT gives this runner a threshold pace of 6:32.

Done.

SmithStn wrote:I would suggest a careful reading of the above shows AL did, in fact, propose long, fast running. He just didn't think it wise to go at it initially. A runner must work up to it. Look at the example of the 3-hour marathoner. He's capable, on a good day, of hitting 6:52 per mile in the marathon. Lydiard has him doing "3/4 effort" work at 6:15/mile.

That would be long and fast for the 3-hour marathoner. He'd find that quite challenging. Daniels VDOT gives this runner a threshold pace of 6:32.

That is not long and fast like we use it in modern training. "Long and fast" for a 3-hour marathoner in modern specific marathon traing would be 25-30km at marathon pace or 35km a bit slower (maybe aroound 7'10/mile)

Your 15km run at 6'15/mile is something like a hard tempo run, even more like a time trial. And this is NOT what someone with common sense would call 3/4 effort, because it ist veryx close to a 100% effort. A lot of 3h marathon runners wont be able to run 15km that fast in practice.

And if maybe at the beginning of the general period, 15km would qualify a s long enough for long and fast, which is possible, than the 3h marathoner would run it much slower, maybe about 7 min/mile ode rslower

You just documented another evidence of how problematic Lydiards efforts are. Or maybe you did not interpret that efforts right.

C

You cant interpret Lydiards example using a Daniels runner.

Lydiards efforts are very simple and not something you need to wonder a whole lot about.

Lydiard uses an example of a 3 hour marathon runner able to

run 10-miles at 6.00/mile.

So he can run 1 hour at 6.00.

This means that the threshold pace of this particular runner is very close to 6.00 (and that his marathon is relatively slow, maybe because he is a beginning runner).

15km at 6.15 is therefore a sub threshold effort.

This runner will go on to run about 100miles or more at paces between 6.15 and 7.00, maybe slower on morning runs.

This is Lydiard training, high milage at aerobic paces.

Renato Canova wrote:

Do you think that, for an athlete able running 42 km at a pace of 2'55" per km (4'40" per mile), a long run at 3'30" or slower can have some physiological effect, other than regeneration ? But which is the NEGATIVE impact on the body, with this level of mileage ?

So, in training we need to be able to distinguish between TRAINING HAVING BIOENERGETIC AND METABOLIC EFFECTS, and TRAINING HAVING BIOMECHANIC EFFECTS. A high slow mileage DOESN'T HAVE ANY POSITIVE METABOLIC EFFECT, but can have SOME NEGATIVE BIOMECHANIC EFFECT.

Renato, you keep saying this again and again. Do you really think that Sammy Wanjiru didn't know how to train for the Marathon?

Very long slow runs train the ability to concentrate for long periods. Something that you don't seem to understand.

Agree with Renato but i want to say something of detail about Soviet ex-East German periodisation.

Of course that Renato knows all this because he did start as a coach of short distance events (speed ones) and technical events as weight, hammer, etc.and only later he did specialized in distance run events.

The original Gershler-Reindel Freiburg interval training was build up to fulfill the needs of distance run events, and only later is adjust to different training events, from short-speed distance events (400m; and also 200m; and 100m) and later to a large spectrum of sport training as football (soccer); swim, cycling, etc. Therefore since the first days of the creation of interval training the periodisation that is the background of the interval training method is tailed for middle and long distance run events and while uses the interval workouts as the main training format, on every phase of the year periodisation uses non-linear stimulus or multi/complex zones of efforts during the same phase, cycle etc. Therefore, the aerobic training and the anaerobic training, on different percents of course is part constitutive of the interval training in every period of the annual cycle training process. Therefore the intervals (and some aerobic and anaerobic training combo) is done since the early season. Ther´s not a highly change of training zones or stumulus or the absence (miss) of every energetic or biomechanics stimulus as it got the linear periodisation or what the concept of “aerobic first” and then “anaerobic late” that the linear training does. The original interval training periodisation progresses from an introductory early season of lower stimulus (lower but not just aerobic) to a SWEET training modulation-change to higher stimulus on late-peak season. On Freiburg interval training, every training phase does multi-energetic stimulus aerobic and anaerobic combined/together, and since the early-generic phase, to the special phase to the late specific phase, in every phase all kind of efforts in different percents were done at the same cycle, meso-cycle or micro-cycle. The first world top class runner to be coached by Waldemar Gersheler was the 800m runner Roger Moens.

However the Soviet-East German built by Matveiev and others , isn´t built with focus for the run events, but is built thinking about athletic events that doesn´t include running as prime interest. That are the technical athletic events (vault, weight, jump, hammer, discus etc). All that disciplines out of distance running do need as training the need of strength-force as generic , high technical biomechanics, and of course the anaerobic alactic energetic is the important one, not the aerobic one as on the distance events. That distance from what´s to build one season periodisation tailed for distance run events (the interval training) and to build one season periodisation built to technical non-run non-aerobic events did results that the Soviet-East German method tends to use one linear-single kind of periodisation because that fits quite efficient for the athletics technical events. That range of athletics events tries that the athlete trains and progresses his strength potential first and then trains his bio-mechanics and only late season the athlete deals with the specific training that´s to train like a competition. Imagine that you are a weight specialist. You start with some exercises and train you strength with weightlifting or other strength training and exercises, and then when the “strength house” is built up, you move to train the complex movement of the weight and while that your peak top shape lasts only the 6-8 week annual period that the Soviet-Matveiev and others did define as ideal as season periodisation. Later on the attempt to fit this kind of linear periodisation into middle and long distance run events was done, but from the methodology perspective the distance coach experts and methodologists did realize that this doesn´t fit quite perfect on run events, but mostly on sprint events. It´s not by change that among the runners, the coaches and the countries that did adopt the Soviet-Matveiev and all periodisation, they got more success on non-run athletic events, or speed run distance, and for example Valerie Borzov it´s a quite good example of the application of the Soviet-Matveiev method ion the 100m and 200m run events.

It´s here that Lydiard enters on scene ! He did built his training by the rich method of trial-and-error and experience, but as he did pay attention to all aspects that could benefit the run progress, he learns about the Soviet method, and taught that it could fit on his main target, one target goal by annual season. I guess that you all know that he said that he got some influence from the East-German periodisation to adjust to his own method. By the reason that I said, he tries to preserve the main format of that soviet – east German periodisation, that is linear-periodisation, high change-modulation stimulus on each period, the kind of 6-8 original weeks of anaerobic training and peak by year and… very curious, the prescribe of hill training, to get strength and coordination during one phase of the process. The hill training of course is justified by the absence of weight training on the Lydiard training, but it´s also a influence of the interest and importance that the Soviet-East German does to strength as the system of crucial importance to able shape progress, and very paradigmatic that he uses one single period dedicate to hills training in the middle of the aerobic and anaerobic block, but also before the anaerobic or “strength first” and linear training of strength that is what the Soviet-East German do trust.

Also with very significate it´s the Lydioard little-short phase length of the specific training, not specific as it´s defined but specific relate high intensity. This is also very German-Soviet periodisation influenced. See that the Soviet perioduisation does the same, the specifics are just done late on the season.

The premises and logic of distance training events, by the all kind of reason that Renato Canova says, doesn´t fit quite perfect on that kind of training periodisation, what in my interpretation, if it´s correct that the aerobic training and progress does crucial interest on every method of distance training approach, the linear-periodisation as well as the “aerobic first” doesn´t fit on the best distance training approach.

here we go again wrote:

[quote]Renato Canova wrote:

Renato, you keep saying this again and again. Do you really think that Sammy Wanjiru didn't know how to train for the Marathon?

Very long slow runs train the ability to concentrate for long periods. Something that you don't seem to understand.

For a while Sammy Wanjiru, did train on the Renato group, and follows Renato method. Do you think that Renato doesn´t know how he did train ?

But Lydiard also had time trials at something like 30k to a full marathon (full marathon in the original models, generally shortened in later years to something like 25-30 km) at near marathon pace.

To Renato:

You state that only high intensity can have a effect of training.

Say i can run 1 hour at a speed of 3.10/km.

And 5000m in a pace of 2.45/km.

Dont you think running twice a day 1 hour at 4.0/km or slower (very far from race pace) for a week will be a stimulus resulting in a training response in the body? Then after some weeks the body have adapted/responded, and doing the same again will give a little less response, but not zero. To get the same response as the first week one might have to run a little faster or longer and get the same response as before.

Isnt it important to look at the whole picture, rather than single workouts? Of course you can get a good response by running 1hour very fast (at 3.20/km in my example).

But running three times in a row 1hour in a pace of 3.50/km you can get an equally large response (although not in the same direction).

Doesnt it make sense to do the latter first, until your body adapts, and then increase the speed later, for a new stimulus?

This is, as far as i have understood, the basic principle of lydiard training.

First, get as much adaptation as possible from low intensity stimulus, then when the body is saturated from this kind of stimuli move to higher intensities for new adaptations.

training by lydiard method is simply outdated. good for his era, perhaps, but to be competitive in todays athletics you must use a more evolved method of training from that of 50 years ago. training by lydiard without having the man himself next you is nearly impossible. why waste your time trying to decipher what he meant through his generic training books when you could be out on your own experimenting on what works better for you or the runners that you coach? sure he coached some good runners, but do you think these same good or great runners could not have been any better with a modern training program? don't kid yourself.