Aerobic Threshhold Training

hhhg wrote:

You are just digging yourself in a deeper and deeper hole.

24.45/10k is a "LOGICAL progression"? In your dreams maybe, you are not living in a reality, this is the truth. Tell me where is the "considerable room for improvement in training"? The claims you are making are so ridiculous that I just can´t take those seriously, I am not "just reacting negatively"...

As a distance runner gets fitter, they can run closer and closer to their 200m times, repeated many times with short recovery. This extends to longer distances too.

This is a basic training concept that has been around a long time, and within this training there is considerable room for any athlete to improve.

Have you ever noticed how every so often someone new comes along and knocks a chunk off an existing record?

In the 800m this hasn't happened since Seb Coe. But the 800 record is waiting for a 44 second runner to move up and knock a chunk of time off, and later a 43 second runner to do the same again. These will be runners who realize that their times will no longer win medals in major Championships.

Roger Bannister was asked how low can the Mile record go and he reckoned about 3.30

That's in line with 24.45 for 100000.

Are you going to call Roger Bannister a retard too?

rekrunner wrote:

Cheers

You're welcome.

Forgive my ignorance, but exactly what are the limits to improving running efficiency?Considering that running is generally not a very energy efficient task (most of generated energy turns into heat loss), it seems that the full potential for efficiency improvements is still undiscovered.It also seems to me that, since efficiency improvements occur for decades, typically athletes start suffering the effects of old-age, before the limitations of efficiency have been reached.I'm curious to hear more details about the known limitations of efficiency.

hhhg wrote:

Neuromuscular coordination or running efficiency does improve a long long time, much longer than metabolic capacities can even with perfect training progression but it has it´s limits.

welInow wrote:

Have you ever noticed how every so often someone new comes along and knocks a chunk off an existing record?

Those 'chunks' get smaller all the time.

Marathon world record progression:

1960 : 2:15:17

1970 : 2:09:28 (-5:49)

1980 : 2:09:01 (-0:27)

1990 : 2:06:50 (-2:11)

2000 : 2:05:42 (-1:08)

2010 : 2:03:59 (-1:43)

Sub 2 *might* be broken within 30 years, as the rate of progress has slowed considerably since the 1960's. The bigger chunks themselves are getting smaller...from 5:49, to 2:11, to 1:43.

The main issue is the quality of talent that's now exposed to the sport. This was pretty limited 50+ years ago, not the case today.

I'm not sure what "logical progression" means, exactly. I don't think it's a question of logic. You might say "mathematical progression", but I think we lack enough data to make a 50 year prediction. Nevertheless, the best (let's be diplomatic) word I can find to describe your predictions is bold.I don't believe there's any foundation for debate, so I won't attempt to conclude what times are realistic, leaving that subject to mathematicians and dreamers.Besides a few outliers like Nostradamus, no one can reliably predict, with any degree of confidence, what 50 years will look like.In the last 50 years, a lot of the improvement comes from non-human sources, like the track, and lightweight spikes, and compression socks, and breathe right strips. Maybe there are more "legal" advancements to come, like caffeine patches, or air-conditioned clothes, which will give us new edges.I don't have a problem believing times will come down. It's just hard for me to believe that you hold some kind of handle on a mathematical calculation that can accurately quantify the time improvements over the next 50 years.All we can say, is time will tell.

welInow wrote:

The claims aren't stupid at all, but a logical progression.

It's just very hard for people to accept that times will get much faster. Just look at how many people find the current World Records impossible to accept without doping allegations.

For the men. the 10000m time in 2060 will be about 24.45

There is considerable room for improvement in training and if you look at this logically instead of just reacting negatively you will see what I mean.

No human will naturally ever run 3:30 for the mile. No one has ran below 3:30 for 1500m in a while, I don't see how someone is going to run a 3:30 mile. I just don't see 1:45 800s back to back happening.

I guess it is more likely than 7:25 pace/3000m for more than 3x as long. I'm guessing you're predicting a 9 flat 100m and a 1:35 800m as well?

There´s no way that this neuromuscular/efficiency BS will lead some male/female to 1.53/2.03 in a marathon. Or if it has no limits, why only 1.53/2.03?

[quote]rekrunner wrote:

Forgive my ignorance, but exactly what are the limits to improving running efficiency?

Considering that running is generally not a very energy efficient task (most of generated energy turns into heat loss), it seems that the full potential for efficiency improvements is still undiscovered.

It also seems to me that, since efficiency improvements occur for decades, typically athletes start suffering the effects of old-age, before the limitations of efficiency have been reached.

I'm curious to hear more details about the known limitations of efficiency.

[quote]

welInow wrote:

As a distance runner gets fitter, they can run closer and closer to their 200m times, repeated many times with short recovery. This extends to longer distances too.

This is a basic training concept that has been around a long time, and within this training there is considerable room for any athlete to improve.

What you mean by saying "within this training"? What is "this training"? 1.53/2.03, no way.

Disregard any words on the graph, obviously.

1:53... good gracious. The current non-downhill 10k record pace would barely break 1:54. I wonder if wellnow has ever run a marathon before.

For a counter example look at the mens 5k (or 10k). in 1966 the WR was 13:16. in 1993 it was 12:58. Or about 18 seconds over 27 years. Then over the next 4 years, 18 seconds were tank off the record. Then for the next 10 years only 2 more seconds. I can assure you that in 1991 the idea of running sub 12:50 in the next 5 years was not considered realistic. Then Komen and Geb went nuts.Maybe we are at the end of the line where every additional improvement is going to be in .1s of a second. But it is also possible that something will come along and we get another big improvement in performance.

chunky cheese wrote:

welInow wrote:

Have you ever noticed how every so often someone new comes along and knocks a chunk off an existing record?

Those 'chunks' get smaller all the time.

Marathon world record progression:

1960 : 2:15:17

1970 : 2:09:28 (-5:49)

1980 : 2:09:01 (-0:27)

1990 : 2:06:50 (-2:11)

2000 : 2:05:42 (-1:08)

2010 : 2:03:59 (-1:43)

Sub 2 *might* be broken within 30 years, as the rate of progress has slowed considerably since the 1960's. The bigger chunks themselves are getting smaller...from 5:49, to 2:11, to 1:43.

The main issue is the quality of talent that's now exposed to the sport. This was pretty limited 50+ years ago, not the case today.

a wrote:

For a counter example look at the mens 5k (or 10k). in 1966 the WR was 13:16. in 1993 it was 12:58. Or about 18 seconds over 27 years. Then over the next 4 years, 18 seconds were tank off the record. Then for the next 10 years only 2 more seconds. I can assure you that in 1991 the idea of running sub 12:50 in the next 5 years was not considered realistic. Then Komen and Geb went nuts.

Maybe we are at the end of the line where every additional improvement is going to be in .1s of a second. But it is also possible that something will come along and we get another big improvement in performance.

Not quite sure why these are 'counter' examples. You're bound to find variations in performances when you break it down into odd chunks like 4 years, 2 years, 5 years, etc. Geb and Komen bumped the 5k a bit, but it's only moved 2 seconds in the last 12 years. Similar to 10k, 90's saw a good bump but only 5 seconds improvement since 98. The trend is still towards reduction, even for both of these events. And all of this revolves around the exposure of one significant region that's dominated running over the last 20-30 years, which was part of my point. It's not like there's areas in the world so sheltered from the venues that they'll suddenly jump up and smash all the records to pieces like there was in the past. The 5k record is now almost 7 years old, the 10k record is almost 5, and none of the runners over the last several years are even approaching those numbers, let alone threatening to break them.

So beyond the more or less 'maturing' of the N African region, where exactly are the next big threats supposed to form out of?

chunky cheese wrote:

The 5k record is now almost 7 years old

Meant to type '6', not '7' before I get jumped on.

You also get random effects when you round things at decade marks. The point is that over the last 20 (1990-2010) years the 5k has dropped more time than it did between the previous 20 (1970-1990). Does that mean the rate of improvement is increasing? Probably not. Records have stagnated for long periods of time and then drop a significant amount.There is a chance we are at the end of the line in big performance improvements. But there is also a chance that we have another couple big drops left. Where will the come from? I have no clue. Maybe they can tweak the track or the shoes to get 1%, maybe some training tweaks will allow better training adaptation, maybe we will learn a way to speed recovery, or maybe there is just some really super genetic freak around the corner.Now 1:53 is still a crazy predication.

fdgsgfsdgdf wrote:

The trend is still towards reduction, even for both of these events.

Obviously. Records can't increase. Except with occasional retroactive drug busts ;-)

And there's the pink elephant....it's hard to judge the progression of WRs when big chunks could easily come off with better PED cycling.

Alan

fdgsgfsdgdf wrote:

You also get random effects when you round things at decade marks. The point is that over the last 20 (1990-2010) years the 5k has dropped more time than it did between the previous 20 (1970-1990).

and the gains in the 20 years before that was more than the last 40 years combined (this is true for several distances).

Let's add another perspective to reaching 1:53/2:03 in 50 years.

For the men, in the last 50 years, the marathon record fell 11 minutes. To expect another drop of 11 minutes in the next 50 years, is to expect a linear progression in the drop in times.

For the women, since marathon times are only just maturing, we can not realistically go back 50 years. Going back to 1985, in 18 years the women's marathon time dropped about 5 minutes. Expecting a drop to 2:03, say in 54 years, is another 12 minute drop, averaging 4 minutes per 18 year period. This is also a fairly linear progression.

Now at some point in the future, the "linear" model breaks down. If not, after 550 years, the record marathon will have finished before it's even started, and man will most certainly be constrained by relativity. Most statisticians, and runners, believe that some sort of exponential decay better represents the trend, as men and women asymptotically approach the limits of the human body.

And we know there must be some human limits: the muscles and liver can only store so much energy; outside energy can only be ingested at a maximum rate; the efficiency of energy creation, even for the most efficient athletes, is poor (most of it is lost as heat); some minimum amount of energy must be used to propel a substantial body mass over the whole distance; energy creation, from all sources, occurs at some maximum rates; energy creation produces heat, which can only be dissipated at some maximum rate; their is a maximum temperature the human body can sustain and still live.

Although I don't want to doom any future athletes with negative thinking, given the maturity of the sports now, how realistic is it to claim that a linear progression will last 50 more years for men or women?

We do know that future generations change subtly. The trend is that man is getting taller. Perhaps other subtle changes or mutations will push some of these limits further than ever before, allowing previously unbelievable improvements. If we compare Geb's hand-picked, rabbited time trialed world record attempts to Sergai Popov's 1958 world record, we must ask ourselves, will the next 50 years see the same magnitude of changes that these two performances have?