LYDIARD OR DANIELS?

Guys, too much hostility. Let's have a decent discussion here.

As a college athlete I was heavy, heavy Lydiard. The work discipline came up here. What I believe is that the coach working with the athlete(s)using the Lydiard system needs that discipline. The Lydiard system requires the athlete to dance with that fine edge where aerobic strength turns into crushing mileage. Distance runners like to head out and pound out the miles; I know in college that 12 mile aerobic strength sessions turned into mini road races. And it left many of us injured, or exhausted. The coach needs to emphasize the need for restraint .... to gain aerobic strength by knowing your current fitness, and understanding your limitations. I love Colorado and Mark Wetmore, but I think the # of injuries comes from exceeding that fine line .... I read "Running with the Buffs" and sometimes feel like I'm reading my college experience. Lydiard in the hands of the wrong coach is .... dangerous.

Whereas Daniels .... harnesses the athlete. Makes the athlete understand what their fitness level is, to live in that zone until they can prove they are better. I think it's a great system. In college I trained Lydiard and found it ineffective for most of the guys on the team. As a coach I have found Daniels to be effective for almost everyone on the team that I work with. I prefer Daniels ... but let's face it. Without Lydiard, where would our sport be? Tiger Woods would be no where without Nicklaus.

And comparing athletes coached by the two is just dumb. Anyone who has coached knows that the coach is only as good as the athlete they are working with. I'm sure that Cerutty could have done great things with Snell ... and that includes gold medals.

I'm not sure if you're saying that Daniels's system requires more discipline than Lydiard's or not. I'd argue that each requires discipline. In the Lydiard system you have to discipline yourself to run at a level of effort that is neither too hard nor too easy.

I did look at Daniels's book a few times. My reaction was that it was way too formulaic for me. On every run I'd be checking times at mile markers and thinking "Got to speed up," or "Got to slow down." Everything seemed so analytical and prescribed. On the other hand, the title of the first chapter in "Run to the Top" is, "The First Step; Enjoyment."

I think that's why I was so drawn to the Lydiard system. It is an extremely enjoyable way to train and proven effective time and again. Having spoken with a number of geezers who either trained with Arthur or used the system, I'd say the most impressive thing about the system is how much we've all enjoyed our running. I think that the enjoyment, more than anything, motivated me to do enough running so that I improved more than I'd ever thought possible.

Which leads to the second difference I see between the approaches. I honestly believe that mileage is king. Arthur used to say "Miles make champions." That's not to say that all there is to training is piling on the miles. But I think it's fairly clear that getting a goodly number of training miles in is one of the things that most successful runners have in common and that the decline in western running performances essentially followed the decline in overall training volume done in the west.

Well, for me Daniel's system required far more discipline than Lydiard's system. Far more.

I just think that the discipline, regardless of the system sets apart champions. This is why there is a wide variety of top competitors in the marathon outside of Africa. Because, disciplined, systematic training can beat talent in the marathon.

My suspicion is that Lydiard was extremely strict with his athletes in private, but more "go by feel" attitude to the public. I have heard the stories of Peter Snell finishing workouts in tears because, Arthur wouldn't let him stop. Whether the story is true or not, I think this was actually a good thing.

Have a plan and stick to the plan. Have rules and follow them 99% of the time (within reason.barring injury).

More than any other system the Lydiard method has been abused and twisted to become "anything that I do is okay" as long as there is a mountain of mileage behind it, and I would argue that this is the fastest road to create injury and destroy talent.

HAS ARTHUR COACHED JIM HE'D HAVE WON THE GOLD AND RUN 3:47.

Speed Kills wrote:

[quote]Clarke wrote:

Lydiard without a doubt. Compare the records...

OK, here is the US top 10 list for the marathon:

2:05:38 .. Khalid Khannouchi (NBal) 02

AH, USING EPO BY KHALID DOESN'T PROVE ANYTHING ABOUT THE DANIELS SYSTEM.

JACK KNEW A LOT OF OLYMPIC MEDAL WINNERS, BUT ARTHUR ACTUALLY COACHED THE ONES HE KNEW......

Oh jees:

Completely agree with your comment on discipline. When things are tough (i.e.; injured), it is easier to be disciplined because we are desperate. But “discipline” is more often than not needed when things are going well. You are lucky to be directly coached by Dr. Daniels. It is from actual conversation or one-on-one interaction that you learn 100 times more than just reading books. Again, I have tremendous admiration for Dr. Daniels and his accomplishment and contribution to the sport. When I visited Jeff Johnson, I remember his desk was full of charts and formulas from Dr. Daniels program. I respect Jeff that much to trust his judgment as well! Also right on about Lopes as well. The word to describe the man was “control.”

I would, however, like to clarify one “misleading” comment that has always come up ever since the Lydiard program had arrived this country. When comparing the Lydiard program with any other program that emphasize more on speed, intervals, or any other form of shorter faster training; too many people classify “Lydiard (=quantity) vs. Quality”. This is VERY wrong. Lydiard was always annoyed that people labeled him as a “100-mile-a-week” man. It is, as HRE pointed out (“miles make champions”), an integral part of the Lydiard program but it still is only a part of a whole program. It involves a lot of hard quality work such as repetitions (his runners were doing 20×400 in 60 seconds on grass track) or, one of the topics of this thread, 50/50 sharpeners. Many runners and coaches today consider Lydiard’s original hill training “too demanding (too much quality?)” and inviting injuries and completely omit it. What enabled Arthur’s runners to be able to handle such high quality workouts is his marathon conditioning. It was a lot of running and it was a lot of high level aerobic running as well for a long period of time (approximately 3 months). But they didn’t stay there forever. In fact, Lydiard was against doing too much conditioning. When he had a clinic tour in Japan in 1991, he criticized Japanese to be doing too much conditioning and not enough speed, or technique, work.

I think, and it’s because I was one of those people as well, way too many people consider Lydiard JUST as a “100-mile-a-week” man and don’t complete the entire program and label it a failure. I have seen it many many times; runners try to run 100 miles a week for months and years and never got anywhere; so they started doing some intervals or some quality training and BOOM, they improve so much. “Ah, the key to improvement is high quality intervals; not those stupid long slow distance!” Well, how can we say that all those months and years of long slow distance actually provided them adequate aerobic base to handle those interval training? Lydiard has stated many many times; that “the purpose of his marathon conditioning phase is to enable the athlete to perform more race-simulating workouts.” One will not make you a complete athlete without the other. To me, the difference between the Lydiard program and many others is the former “develops” athletes so they can handle those tough workouts. If you grab someone who’s been running nothing but many slow miles for a few years, it is relatively easy to sharpen him/her to run fast. But where will he/she be in two years? I can name several coaches in college or high school whose runners perform really well under them but I’m more interested in where they will be in 4 or 5 or 6 years later. I actually trained under one of those coaches before. I got injured in less than two months. Everybody on the team was saying that “those who survive his training would do very well; but for every one good runner, there always had been 5 or 6 quitting due to injuries or burnt-out.” I don’t care how much you improve in a short-term; I will not call such program a good training program. I am NOT calling the Daniels formula as such. I’m merely suggesting that you’d have to be careful how you analyze effective training program.

I don't think this message is going to come out funky this time...

Nobby and HRE have said it far better than I.

Nobby is correct when he said Arthur did not like being labled the "100 mile a week man".

This country is littered with athletes who ran weeks, months and years of 100 miles a week. I saw Training Diary totals of Clubmates that had at least 5000 miles a year in them. Did they run well ? Not really.

Many athletes find it easy to just get out and run miles, they don't want to do the Hill Sessions or the Track work.( Too Hard !)

Nobby has already eluded to that.

Arthur found that really frustrating as his name got attached to their efforts.(They thought they were doing "Lydiard work")

I Coached a Masters runner 20 years ago who had limited time on his hands. We managed every year to put together 75 to 90 miles a week for 10 to 12 weeks and than we basically ran Hill work and Track schedules. I deviated somewhat in the actual workouts but that was tied in with his workload.

One year, In an Auckland Championship he ran 50:10 for 10 miles. Just ahead of him up the road was a Club mate who ran 49:50. People were elated that this guy had run 49:50 and asked me if I was disappointed that my athlete was beaten.

I stated "On the Contrary, I feel our effort was far better".

I was looked at as though I was an alien.

I then said "We have averaged 50 miles a week in actual mileage over the last 10 weeks. To beat us Pete has averaged 140 miles a week for the last 10 weeks"

"Which athlete got the better return for the time and training investment ??"

When Arthur heard about that he laughed ( He knew the Guy I coached very well)and said "It is all about balancing the Training, you got it right they got it wrong. The man should not have been running that sort of mileage at that time. He needed to be fresh to race.!!"

Some may say : But your athlete was beaten. True, But then he was 10 years older than the other guy and had opted to run against the "young guys" rather than fellow masters. He was happy with the result as was I.

Apologies for the ramble !!!

Keep this thread going !!!!

I'm not quite sure why Daniels is being labeled "low mileage". I'm fairly certain that what Daniels is looking for athletes to avoid is garbage miles. I've known plenty of guys who brag about high mileage but so many of those are doing nothing in terms of getting you to race faster. I know that Daniels has said not to load on junk mileage, and for many that has been interpreted to mean low mileage. If a guy can effectively handle 100 mile weeks, while including all his prescribed intensities, I've never heard Dr. Daniels discourage that. I think he was trying to let people recognize that "100 miles" is not a magic number.

So I guess that kind of reflects what Kim Stev was saying up above about Lydiard. That without the whole program, volume means nothing. And I'll tell you this; if you don't systematically build your mileage up on a yearly basis using a Daniels system, YOU WILL NOT IMPROVE! But Daniels has, in my experience, been crucial in developing HS athletes.

I see some tempers flaring. Nothing like a false dichotomy to get people going...

Fortunately, no one has to CHOOSE between Lydiard and Daniels today. Anyone can study their body of work and apply it to their own training and racing. I don't have to decide whether I prefer pie or ice cream, I can have pie a la mode.

This may be one of the best threads on Let's Run in quite some time. I have really enjoyed being a fly on the wall durring it.

After reading this though, I realize that my understanding of the Lydiard system might not be as accurate as I thought that it was. Since you people seem to truely understand it, could you please provide me with a place to go (web or book) where I can get a clear picture as to his program?

I'll step out of the way of the conversation now.

I don't see a lot of differences in the programs. If you were to put the two men side-by-side to discuss their programs, you would find more similarities than differences.

Lydiard appears to stress "feel" more than actual paces. Kim can tell me if I'm wrong here. Daniels uses "science" to come up with appropriate paces for runs of varying intensity. Both work if used properly. Although my best years are behind me, I went back and compared my workouts to the VDOT tables and found that my workout times were very comparable to what Daniels prescribes.

Daniels does not necessarily mean low mileage. He states that mileage should be determined based on a variety of factors. He stresses the point of not running 'quality junk' miles. In other words, he believes that runs at VO2Max pace have benefits as do runs at R pace. However, running in between those paces could be time better spent running at one or the other pace.

I personally think that Lydiard got his reputation as a "100-mile man" because someone wanted to know how many miles a runner should strive for, and he gave them an answer. If a runner broke down at 80 mpw, I doubt Lydiard would force them to run 100; he would put together the best program possible for those 80 miles.

Both of them actually stress running for time as stress is based on the amount of time performing an exercise, not how far you go. If people read Lydiard closely, they would see that it wasn't LSD. In his book, it says to run out 5K and come back. If you come back faster than you went out, you should increase the pace on the outbound portion. If you slowed on the way back in, you should start slower. Thus, the running was at a good aerobic clip.

Who would I want to coach me? In terms of the actual running programs, it probably doesn't matter. I would go with the man with whom I felt the most comfortable.

I have a copy of Lydiard's book that my dad gave me in high school. I probably have a better understanding of it now than I did back then. I couldn't get past the "big" numbers of 2-runs and the like as I was 20-30 mpw runner in high school. It also has taken me several years to realize that the schedules in the book were really a "template" to be adjusted by the individual athlete.

Ultimately, I believe that you will run better on the worst program out there if you truly believe in it than you would on the best program that you don't feel so good about.

That is correct! There is not much difference in the programs. Daniels has stated Lydiard laid the foundation. He simply put science into the principles. Daniels even does encourage drills to strengthen yourself, especially the core region. It is not the extent of Lydiard. Daniels focus is on being fit, which society does not have the regiment as in the past when he grew up. Daniels and Lydiard both agree it is important for a runner to be fit and build that capacity before getting into serious work. Daniels will train any person at any mileage to make it work for them. He will find that range and apply the principles. Remember Lydiard had 100 miles as a baseline but you do need to add in the drills (some you are running), short sprints, and other stressors he included into the program. He states that put runners on average near 120 mpw. Lydiard would adjust if absolutuely necessary that baseline for a runner. He better much stuck to theory if you wanted to be world class. You are always going to have injuries regardless if Daniels or Lydiard. A person should know their limits and what does work. When it becomes too much you back down to right amount for you. When it is too less you increase to right amount you can handle. All simple!

I doubt that either system requires more discipline than the other. The thing about Arthur's system is that he assigns very specific kinds of training, but allows you discretion as to how to go about that training to a degree. For example, he was never fussed as to whether "trackwork" was really done on a track, road, golf course, whatever. And he wouldn't say to do that trackwork at Pace X, or the distance work at Pace Y. Someone not familiar with the system might look at that and see it as "do what you want." But that would be a misinterpretation.

But there is considerable discipline required here as the athlete needs to discipline himself to find the proper level of effort for these sessions and keep himself to them. That's perhaps a different kind of discipline than what's required to run at a pace specified by someone else.

it's also worth noting here that while Arthur said that miles make champions, he put that into the context of what an athlete could handle beneficially. When Joan Ullyot was training to become the oldest woman ever (at the time) to run under 2:50 for the maarthon, she started training under Arthur. He out her onto a "beginner's schedule" with mileage considerably lower than the 100 that's associated with him. He had her at a max of 60 or so, I think.

She asked why she was on a beginner's schedule as she run diozens of marathons and Arthur's answer was that until you've broken 2:45, you're a beginner.

Those two systems require two different types of "discipline" practices. When I was coaching Hitachi team, one of my job was to pace the athletes. One time we did 35 minutes 10k on track. That's about 84 seconds per lap. I was supposed to lead at 85 per lap then pick it up to something like 82 at the end. It was pretty hard to keep it to that pace (I was about 32-10k then), not too fast, not too slow. That's probably more or less a type of discipline necessary for the Daniels program. On the other hand, if you're completely on your own and figure out what you need to do by yourself and stick to it; now that requires hell of a discipline to do. That's Lydiard. When you're supposed to jog, you're supposed to jog. When you're supposed to "take it easy", you're supposed to take it easy. When you're supposed to push the pace, you're supposed to push the pace. You have to figure that out for yourself and excute it. That ain't easy.

This is probably the first time HRE and I hadn't killed the thread yet...

By the way, it was a girls team and I was pacing an 18-year-old girl who ran 4:30 for 1500m and a 22-year-old who later ran 2:42 marathon.

You said it all.

"That without the whole program, volume means nothing. And I'll tell you this; if you don't systematically build your mileage up on a yearly basis using a Daniels system".

Really we are starting to look at how similar the 2 guys are.

Interestingly, I too struggled with Arthur's "Run to the Top" that I was given when I was 13. I don't believe I understood things until I was about 25 !!!.

I am still learning !!!.

I think 'hanging around' Bill Baillie and meeting with Arthur on various occasions is what gave me the understanding. I re read the book again just recently and can see where people misconstrue.

As I have said here before Arthur never really wanted to put schedules in the books as people would take them literally.

Regarding the "feel"of pace. Arthur once told me when I was having difficulty with athletes on Time trials (They raced them) to find a course where the athlete could run 'resonably comfortably' in 20 to 25 minutes.

They should be able to finish the run feeling frustrated that they could go a lot faster. Once you have that 'feeling' then work on taking say a minute a week off the time you ran the week before.

This is the 'discipline' of pacing.

I founfd this method quite helpful and when we got onto 'measured courses then the athltetes did them at the appropriate pace.

i think that's the problem with Lydiard, unless you trained under him or spoke to him directly about his theories, his books are "difficult" to understand or not very clear. i hope his disciples can write something that will supplement his books.