The spirit of this tread, and the launching point for this entire Norwegian “singles” method, was CTL/TSS.
It seems we are now getting into more of the minutiae of physiology and getting away from what inspired sirpoc to train in this manner.
Would running sub-LT every other day (keep everything the same except substitute long run for normal easy run) yield a higher TSS? Like I said, the cruise intervals don’t take that much out of me. The 90 min long run, even below 70% of MHR, depletes me.
Wouldn’t I as a 5K runner get a bigger bang for my buck (and feel better, recover easier, higher overall TSS) doing a 60 min run instead, and coming back the next day with another sub-T session?
The 30 minute continuous runs at around MP was brought up earlier in the thread but we never got a follow-up on that. I got the impression it was dismissed as experimental, the hypothesis being that it would not create the same amount of load per unit time.
You can do whatever you want, but you will be wrong.
I mean I really did and was fooled into thinking this was really Coggan dropping into our thread for the last week. But cmon now, this is clear troll attempt. Maybe it lexel? But damn we have many trolls on LRC but I applaud this account. Very good work and hooked me in .
Rofl. Normally i do not respond to such posts, but this comment is extremely entertaining and mad me laugh out loud. Thank you for that. So just for the records, i am neither JS nor A.Coggan. :)
There is little evidence that "stamina" (as, e.g., Riegel's exponent attempts to quantify) is a separate parameter. Any variation between individuals in the extent to which they must slow down over time/distance could be entirely due to imprecision in quantifying "threshold". (Think about the slope of the intensity-duration relationship, and how this impacts the sensitivity of measurements.)
The opposite seems to be true. There seems to be another dimension to the 3 parameters (VO2max, CR and LT%), which is fatigue. You have missed the 'fatigue' train.
Conclusion These results demonstrate the external work output at the moderate-to-heavy intensity transition decreases during prolonged exercise due to decreased efficiency and rates of metabolic energy expenditure, but the associated heart rate increases. Therefore, individual assessments of athlete ‘durability’ are warranted.
The spirit of this tread, and the launching point for this entire Norwegian “singles” method, was CTL/TSS.
It seems we are now getting into more of the minutiae of physiology and getting away from what inspired sirpoc to train in this manner.
Would running sub-LT every other day (keep everything the same except substitute long run for normal easy run) yield a higher TSS? Like I said, the cruise intervals don’t take that much out of me. The 90 min long run, even below 70% of MHR, depletes me.
Wouldn’t I as a 5K runner get a bigger bang for my buck (and feel better, recover easier, higher overall TSS) doing a 60 min run instead, and coming back the next day with another sub-T session?
The 30 minute continuous runs at around MP was brought up earlier in the thread but we never got a follow-up on that. I got the impression it was dismissed as experimental, the hypothesis being that it would not create the same amount of load per unit time.
I've no idea what Andrew would even make of my interpretation of how I would use CTL to guage progress or use running TSS per session. But it doesn't really matter. For me, this method has helped me improve. I didn't really even think one other person would be interested when I posted, let alone a year down the line I would be running times that have helped me qualify to run as an international master for my country. That's not a brag, it's just that even if someone came a long and said "the science says you're an idiot". I don't really care. FWIW I agree with Coggan in the sense that this training method is essentially sweetspot. I even said this sometime right near the start. I would also do more if I thought my body could handle it. But I don't think it can swing towards what I can handle on the bike. I still think 75/25 is the absolute most before you stray into injury territory.
I don't think it's new in any real way, as Andrew will know it's a pretty common bang for buck approach for the UK time trial crew. A lot of what I picked up was originally shared by guys like Tarmacexpert on the TT forums, who I am sure Andrew is familiar with. Even old aged debates like 4x8mins versus 4x4, I've tried it all. This is just how I see the best risk free approach for cycling and running. I doubt I'll ever change or really mix it up. I think I've had half decent results for average talent in both sports. I just laid something out that I thought (I think has shown it does?) work for a large percentage of people who don't have a huge amount of time to train. That's not everyone by the way. There is no magic training etc . I also completely agree with AC on that.
Is this the best way to train? ON 5-8 hours a week as runner? Maybe. Maybe not. If someone came along with another 100 page thread with even more success stories and someone who could show me the sustainability of being able to run day in, day out and not break down AND to get faster - I would just switch to that training system. Again, I really don't think there is anything magic about subthreshold or sweetspot, or literally whatever you want to call it. But I am as far away from a scientist or even someone who remotely understands what is going on under the hood.
The spirit of this thread can be whatever people want it to be. For me, I just get up, go to work and do my own thing within the rough parameters I set out and hour a day and 90 mins on a Sunday. For others it's testing lactate. For others, the spirit of the thread might be just to try a slightly different training method to what a lot of running coaches might prescribe. To others, it might just be to strive to understand or get to the bottom of the science of it.
The 30 min MP idea was kind of thrown around in the spirit of the thread, not to be taken seriously (when I posted it for instance) but then it might work. Who knows? I've tried to make Hard2find do it but he's doing some other madcap experiment of his instead 😂
No, I haven't missed a thing. As I said, there is little scientific support for the common belief that individuals differ in terms of their stamina (i.e., resistance to fatigue during prolonged exercise). Once you account for "threshold", what little variation that exists between individuals (<10%, even when analyzing training, not racing, data from cyclists in the "real world", thus including additional noise from non-maximal, non-constant efforts) may very well just be due to measurement error, such that even just a 1% error in determining "threshold" will result in nearly a 10% difference in the duration that intensity can be maintained.
Anyway, as the saying goes, claims require evidence, and extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence. So, it's now up to you to demonstrate that 1) once you account for "threshold", stamina does indeed differ between individuals, and 2) explain the physiological mechanisms.
(Note that I say all of the above despite having devised a mathematical model that includes stamina as one of the parameters. To quote Albert Korzybski: "The map is not the territory.")
I am curious what training sirpoc did before and what worked / what didn't work.
Sirpoc, it’s not super clear to me from your last post, but I think you’re suggesting that sub-LT every other day would be too much / not sustainable. I think you’re probably right.
In my case, anything over 60 min breaks me down but I’ve got a lot of miles in my legs over 20+ years of competitive running. It sounds like, for you, the 90 min run on Sunday isn’t something you dread doing every week.
I know you used Daniels training before your current training, but what I may have missed is how long you tried Daniels? Was it 1 year? 2 years or more before plateauing? Did your mileage go up or down when you initially made the switch to sweetspot and broke through?
Sirpoc, it’s not super clear to me from your last post, but I think you’re suggesting that sub-LT every other day would be too much / not sustainable. I think you’re probably right.
In my case, anything over 60 min breaks me down but I’ve got a lot of miles in my legs over 20+ years of competitive running. It sounds like, for you, the 90 min run on Sunday isn’t something you dread doing every week.
I know you used Daniels training before your current training, but what I may have missed is how long you tried Daniels? Was it 1 year? 2 years or more before plateauing? Did your mileage go up or down when you initially made the switch to sweetspot and broke through?
I just ran (and sucked really bad) for the first 2-3 months. Then I bought a Daniel's book and pretty much trained that way for a good year or so. Progressed nicely really quicky at first, but just got to the point where the hard stuff was meaning I could never actually increase time on feet/ load. I just felt so beat up. I actually got a bit worse at the back end of 2022 as i was needing days off and was actually being able to run less. Absolutely just hit a brick wall. Nothing I could do would improve me. Running just because a chore. Didn't really think much into it, other than "why don't I just try and train how I used to on the bike?" With some of the obvious adaptations to running. I used to dread the long run, the easy runs, everything. A lot of it was just too fast looking back, comical in fact. No wonder I was so tired.
When I switched to this, almost instantly I could increase my minutes slowly week by week, absolutely straight away. The brick wall I hit was knocked down. I then started to improve after about 6-8 weeks of the new regime and it's been a pretty steady increase chipping away month my month since. I was pretty annoyed with myself that I didn't go with my gut and just train this way from day 1. I wouldn't say I love running now, but it's no problem to get out there. I'm never so tired I think "wow I can't run today" as often happened, especially after the really hard days Daniels sometimes prescribes. There's always something in the tank for the next day now. I'm never running on fumes. IMO a Daniel's plan, if you have 6-10 weeks to get fit for something is a fantastic way to roll the dice and it'll likely work out, not worrying about what comes after. Past that or longer term goals, I don't think it's sustainable in the way that I have trained. Again, I'm not saying this is the only way to train or even the best. But it's probably the most likely way to get most people the consistency they need with enough work on limited hours, without falling apart, especially say if you have a goal 6+ months out. Most of the thread is filled with the same range of comments, not a lot happened then progressively after a couple of months they started to really build into some good fitness, a lot they haven't seen before. I might have improved and found a way to adapt Daniels, but there is no way I would be sitting at 15:40/32:23 at 40 years old. This consistency has absolutely scraped every ounce of the average talent I have out. Much as it did on the bike. I was also way over achieving there for the average talent I had. But found a way to squeeze every last drop. But, as easy as it sounds, it's been a long, long grind and quite boring at times.
The feedback I can give and the feedback so many others have told me, is that you can sustain this. No peaks, no ups and downs, just a slow burn in a pretty safe and manageable manner. The other thing, whilst injury's obviously still occur but the general feeling is this reduces the risk of injury to the lower end of the spectrum for runners. I think that's also a big factor in why this is a good idea, especially for us older runners.
Yes, there seems that there is a fourth dimension, “fatigue resistance”. Alex Hutchinson wrote a bit about it recently IIRC.
What you're recalling are recent articles by Hutchinson (and others) on "durability", which is now all the rage in #sportsscience.
For anyone with a reasonably deep understanding of exercise physiology, though, it is clear that this is just muscular metabolic fitness/fatigue resistance masquerading under another term.
They own the text - what makes you think you have a right to steal it?
Do you also have your Internet or cable connection to avoid having to pay for it? Cheat on your taxes? Rob the donation basket at church? Where do you draw your line?
They own the text - what makes you think you have a right to steal it?
Do you also have your Internet or cable connection to avoid having to pay for it? Cheat on your taxes? Rob the donation basket at church? Where do you draw your line?
Well given that the NIH now requires Open Access after a certain point for any funded work (which you should know based on all your claims about your grant writing success), one could argue that ethically all of this research should be publicly available. That, and the predatory nature of pretty much all journals at this point...
And yet...and yet, I would be the first to tell people to stop confusing/distracting themselves by worrying about physiological minutiae, putative mechanisms, etc., and just get on with their friggin' training. Exactly what you do during a single workout means almost nothing in the big scheme of things - instead, the key to forward progress lies in cogent application of principles such as specificity and overload in the context of the overall training plan. Instead of constantly biting off more than one can chew, jumping from one plan to another, obsessing over just how hard you do your long runs, etc., just ignore the noise, keep the faith, be consistent, and (for runners) avoid injury. Beyond that, there's really not anything more that you can do.
TL,DR: There is no such thing as the perfect training plan (wisdom from a brilliant - and beautiful - former national champion in the IP).
This is a great summary of exactly what the training method described in this thread is attempting to do -- to attempt to apply this philosophy in a way that is feasible for runners (who will have different limitations to consistency/progress due to risk of injury than will cyclists)