Japanese Training Philosophy?

Seyta wrote:

HRE wrote:

Why do Africans who use the Japanese system do so well if there are flaws in the system?

How many Japan-raised Africans dyou actually see dominating the international circuit?

Wanjiru was one but what about the others?

To date, every Kenyan man to win an Olympic medal in the marathon had been a product of the Japanese system.

question of words wrote:

lhfdsahfdaa wrote:

Well I think a popular American idea is that running too much as a kid can lead to burn out or long term injury or growth stunts or whatever. That does not seem to be the case in Africa, and it might not be the case in Japan either. That could be a significant difference in training philosophy.

What makes you think thats a popular American idea? Where did you hear that?

HRE wrote:

Why do Africans who use the Japanese system do so well if there are flaws in the system?

Why do so many Africans do so well in American, European, African, or Japanese systems?

What would you need for supercompensation to take hold? Frequent down weeks? Reduced number of quality sessions? More easy days following hard workouts?

I think it's safe to say, and canova agress, that high mileage works. But when you say "global structure of training" that isn't nearly as transparent.

Other Africans that have been through the Japanese system: how about Ibrahim Jeilan, the current world champion at 10,000 m?

Japan has a long marathon and ultrarunning tradition. Here is just one example.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marathon_world_record_progression

They do??

HRE wrote:

Why do Africans who use the Japanese system do so well if there are flaws in the system?

HRE wrote:

Why do Africans who use the Japanese system do so well if there are flaws in the system?

Your question appears to imply that there are NO flaws in their system.

Whilst it's true that Japanese coaches claim to have been "influenced" by Lydiard, what most do is NOT Lydiard.

The published training of Soh (earlier in this thread) has frequent mention of "jog" .... Lydiard never suggested that aerobic conditioning should be done @ jogging paces. Likewise, I'm sure that he would not have approved of (extreme) long runs (e.g. 60K) well in excess of marathon distance.

Lydiard frequently commented on how the Japanese got stuck on basic conditioning, & never progressed in a periodised fashion towards race preparation (through hill circuits, anaerobic intervals, co-ordination runs, & sharpening)... which is why they underperform @ distances below the marathon.

So, HRE, even from a Lydiard point of view, there ARE clearly flaws in the Japanese training methodoloogy.

There are flaws in everything. The question is which flawed approach you're going to use. I really can't help what you think my question implies.

Renato is saying that the flaws in the Japanese system have prevented Japanese runners from having the kinds of international successes the Africans have had. But when Africans have used the Japanese system they've been tremendously successful.

HRE wrote:

There are flaws in everything. The question is which flawed approach you're going to use. I really can't help what you think my question implies.

Renato is saying that the flaws in the Japanese system have prevented Japanese runners from having the kinds of international successes the Africans have had. But when Africans have used the Japanese system they've been tremendously successful.

Why the defensiveness? ....

I was only trying to clarify the clear difference between the Japanese System & classical Lydiardism. Why modern-day Lydiard followers hold up the Japanese system in such high esteem is difficult to fathom.

Now, I'm intrigued by the "tremendous" success of Kenyan runners developed under the Japanese System .... other than Douglas Wakiihuri (1980s), Erick Wainaina (1990s), & of course Sammy Wanjuri, I'm rather at a loss to identify others.

Of course, 2011 saw 5 Kenyan athletes (allowing for Boston) ... using the modern Kenyan/Canova training methods better Sammy Wanjiru's personal best time.

I've heard that dozens of times, and from 3-4 coaches too. There's this idea of "If he's doing 70/80/100 miles per week now, where will he go from here?", which just goes to show you that college coaches are just looking for talented, undertrained kids most of the time.

I'm not sure what you're reading as defensive. And I haven't mentioned any connection between what the Japanese are doing and what Lydiard did, though there is a strong one, as you note.

Obviously, more Japanese have used their system than Africans have. The number of Kenyans who have gone to Japan is relatively small so no, you aren't going to have droves of Kenyan names on he list.

I'm not comparing what Canova does with what the Japanese do. I'm just not buying the idea that this "failure" that some are seeing in Japan's international performances are attributable to an inferior training method. Renato has done extremely well with his athletes but he works with different athletes than the Japanese coaches do. On the rare occasions when the sort of athletes Renato works with have used the Japanese system they've done very, very, well so maybe there's another reason why Japanese athletes using the system aren't always doing as well as some think they should.

Does this now go to that nagging "talent" conversation we have going on 'round these here parts?

Jackanory wrote:

Now, I'm intrigued by the "tremendous" success of Kenyan runners developed under the Japanese System .... other than Douglas Wakiihuri (1980s), Erick Wainaina (1990s), & of course Sammy Wanjuri, I'm rather at a loss to identify others.

Of course, 2011 saw 5 Kenyan athletes (allowing for Boston) ... using the modern Kenyan/Canova training methods better Sammy Wanjiru's personal best time.

Yeah, all those Kenyans dominating road races around the globe but, somehow, not Olympics.... Wake up and check the needle marks, buddy!

shis nasty yo wrote:

Does this now go to that nagging "talent" conversation we have going on 'round these here parts?

It probably does but I try to avoid "talent" discussions because I have no idea of what it really is or how to quantify it.

But let's try this. We can look at the Japanese performances and believe that because they run almost but not quite as fast as East Africans it means that they're talent isn't fully developed because of a training system that's inferior to what East Africans do despite being as physically gifted. Or we can believe that Japanese generally are not as gifted physically as East Africans but because of a superior or at least comparable training system they consistently perform nearly as well.

I don't think there is anyway to prove either viewpoint. I'm inclined toward the latter one because I think Japanese kids live more like western kids and don't benefit from the sort of active upbringing that we hear Africans get. But that's just an assumption and neither more nor less provable than Renato's contention that Japanese training is flawed.

Check out the top 12 guys from the top 4 teams at Hakone this year. How do the top 4 teams in the NCAA compare? 12 guys from one college averaging sub-14, sub-29 and sub-1:04 is pretty ridiculous.

http://bit.ly/s8p25f

colinphillips wrote:

Other Africans that have been through the Japanese system: how about Ibrahim Jeilan, the current world champion at 10,000 m?

And Paul Tanui, this year's World XC silver medalist.

Bump

If he averaged 80 mpw and also did 220 km weks, then a number of weeks must have been substantially lower than 80 miles.