The Single Voice of Reason wrote:
real old guy wrote:Johnny Gray also coaches Vessey, a 400/800 runner.
When did she leave Rose Monday? Vessey is proving to be another athlete who can't stay put with a coach.
As much is I like Rose, her program is not a good fit for Vessey. Vessey did not run well under Rose, and it was obvious she needed to move on.
The best wrote:
dan_cooley wrote:I've been thinking about ordering that -- you should let us know how it is. But Nick Symmonds has long been frank about the fact that he is NOT a 400/800 type athlete. He is an 800/1500 athlete, and so not really the type I'm talking about here.
I mean, Symmonds was running somewhere in the range of 1:45/4:00 (or maybe he'd broken 4 already, I don't remember) right out of d3 college, where he was also reasonably OK at xc. I realize he's not a "distance runner," but you can see that he's a far different athlete from someone like Jock, who has run 1:44, split very fast 400s, and has lingered right around 3:50 for the 1500 as his best overdistance mark.
Symmonds is the type I already understand how to train (or at least relatively speaking).
Seb Coe's training was the best though- mid 46 speed, 1:41 mid speed, 3:29 1500 speed, as well as winning some titles in the longer XC races. That is a pretty remarkable range- his 400m would indicate him on the edge of a speed based athlete- but his endurance was insane. I think for training an 800m athlete we should look to Peter Coe.
Agree. Only thing I'd like to add to that is that Coe certainly had sub 46 400 speed in 81, the year he ran his 1:41.
He ran a 45.6 relay leg in which he stumbled at the takeover and was practically stationary as he went through the start line.
Bump
coach d wrote:
But what is really different for true 400/800 athletes is where the endurance comes from. For these people, the endurance comes from special endurance, NOT mileage/endurance/jogging or whatever you call it (I would not call this "strength").
A 400/800 athlete (Juantorena in this case) might be doing special endurance like:
3X(3X300) at race pace with long set breaks; or
5X600 5% slower than 800 pace with 10 min or so.
A number of athletes/coaches on letsrun seem to be confused about this, as I've seen plans with multiple days of short sprinting and some long distance (up to 1 hour), but NO race-pace sustained runs. And if you are a sprinter, THE SPECIAL ENDURANCE RUNS ARE WHERE THE ENDURANCE REALLY COMES FROM. You need a bunch of sustained fast runs in the 300-600m range, and that's what you're seeing from Johnny Gray with Solomon.
This is interesting. Most of the 800 plans I have seen tend to have three workouts per week: one race-pace workout like 2x(3x300), one VO2 max type workout like 4x1000, and a "long" run.
Would you drop the long run and add in something like those fast 600s?
I admired Johnny Gray a lot because he would just go to the front every 800 he ran and still often blow away the entire field! What would he have done had he had a reasonable racing plan?
I do not think we can say that he did not have great speed. The problem was the way he raced. Everyone thinks Dave Wottle had great speed. He did but he was injured when he ran in the 1972 Olympic final. He ran 26, 26, 26, 26.
That is not speed. I encourage people to watch that race a few times. Talk it over with your friends.
Much of what we read about distance racing is just not true. Often the man who is running the fastest at the end of the race has the most endurance, not the most speed. (This does depend on the speed of the entire race of course, but in high school...bet on coming from behind.)
I'd like to concur with others that 400-800 guys should not get their endurance from long runs. They can benefit from doing some progressive runs on their longer aerobic day (let's call it Sunday, the distance runner's long run day) during the start of base, but this moves into either 4-5 x a mile with 2 min recovery, or 6-7 x 1km on 90 secs recovery, all at 5-8km pace, and ideally in a park. This continues to be their weekly aerobic session right through the season.
Another aerobic day with some anaerobic can be something like 6-8 x 2 mins with 2 min recovery, basically training at 1500-2km speed. Ask JRinaldi about this session. It's another staple that stays throughout the year.
Another at 800-1km speed with rps of 300-500, and another at 100-200 speed. These are long sprinters remember. They need this.
Add lifting 1-2 times a week, and one or two easy runs which to this type can be a 10-15 min tempo after decent warm-up. Enough to get aerobic benefit, not too much to stop a quality workout the day after.
This is more of an 800 program, but the sprint work, lifting and absence of longer runs would mean a sprinter type 800 runner could still run a good 400.
Two of the lesser-known coaches that are excellent at $400 800 combination runners are Al Jennings and Lisa Morgan
Jennings was Athing mu's coach from your up to 18. Currently head of Trenton track club ... Remember when she was still in high school Mu ran 2:01 , sub 52, and broke the American record for 600 m indoor. But she wasn't the only good athlete he's had on both the boys and girls side. Some of his teams won the Penn relays championship of America in both relays.
Lisa Morgan is currently a college coach at New Jersey tech, and she was also at TCU. She coached Olivia Baker (52, 2:05 in hs) and many others before at Columbia hs in nj. Multiple Penn champ of America relays in 4x800 and her 4x400 teams were perennial state champs.
These are not household name coaches but the progress that their athletes have made in the 400 800 combo is quite impressive