no interval work success?

I ran really fast only doing 25 mpw in intervals. If it'll work for a no talent like me, then everyone else should be doing it.

if you can dodge traffic, you can dodge a ball

thats a great approach, thanks for the input.

I'm a average dude with two kids and a wife and here is what I did a couple of years ago to get in to racing shape. I did this when the kids were young and I had alot of time on my hands to train.

Going in I was running 16:45 for 5k, 34:30 for 10k, 27:50 for 5 miles, and 58:50 for 10 miles. Rough times here.

Here's what I started doing:

Monday and Wednesday's: 9.8 mile loop starting slow to warmup and ending in low 6's.

Tuesday and Thursday: slow 7 miles.

Friday: off

Saturday: 13 miles EZ with the last few miles upbeat. Sometimes the whole thing was upbeat!

Sunday: EZ slow run of 3-5 miles or 35 mile bike ride EZ.

I progressed down to 16:07, 33:18, 51:30 for 15k, 1:14 for the half, and 2:47 for the marathon.

Non-intervals work.

Tinman,

Filling in for Kim here, I believe you're thinking of Tony Rogers. He was, I think, one of the guys in the 4xmile WR relay team along with Quax and I'm not sure if Walker and Dixon were the other guys. I also think that Rogers ran the 1500 for NZ in the Munich Olympics and was later head of Athletics New Zealand.

HRE:

Yep, Tony Rogers is who I was thinking trying to name. I have a video of him running in a Crystal Palace race with Scott, Walker, O'Sullivan, Abascal and others.

Can you tell me more about his story?

Sorry Rich, Wrong Tony. You are thinking of Tony Polhill, Olympic Finalist in '72 along with Rod Dixon.

Tony Rogers was a Finalist in '84 (Ran 3:36.48). He was until recently, Head of High Performance for Athletics NZ. Resigned a few months ago.

I happened to speak with him just last weekend. Still pretty fit. Doing contract work for various agencies .

Tony R was Coached in his early days by Alan Middleton who was a big advocate of Arthur Lydiard. Around 1982 Tony went to another Coach (Barry Roberts) as he seemed to sit on 3:39's everytime he went out.

Under Barry he got down to the 3:36 and 3:55 for a mile.

Also cranked a good 3k but I cannot recall his best time.

Good thing Kim got here to sort out the Tonies. Or is the plural of Tony Tonys?

I ran across some research in Medicine & Science in Sports journal and it reveals research on maximum steady state lacate training of runners (their definition would place MSSL at about what I would call aerobic threshold). They concluded that regular running at an average of 2.2 mmols (about 85-87% of 5k race velocity) improved performance from the 600m to the 10k, progressively more so. When I have a chance, I will state the exact percentages. But, the good news is doing moderate to somewhat strong paced distance runs (doesn't even have to be very far) can improve performance quite a bit, especially as the race length improves.

Improvements in endurance performance from training at MSSL - 2.2 mmols +/-.1 mmol or approximately 75-80% of max VO2)(about marathon race pace or slightly slower) for 7 weeks (12 male runners):

15m time: 1.8%

600m time: 4.4%

3.22km time: 9.6%

10km time: 12.1%

Correlation between 10km race performance and MSSL = .98 pre-test and .95 post-test.

Conclusion by authors Priest and Hagan:

"Our findings indicate that training at MSS pace is an effective method to increase maximal aerobic and aanaerobic power, and decrease performance times for short-and middle-distance running events. British Journal of Sports Medicine, Vol 21, Issue 1: 18-21. 1987

My comment: tempo running at a moderate pace, done regularly, can improve performance over a variety of event distances. Voila!

I sat out earlier for 6 weeks straight pretty much. For 8 weeks, I ran an AT run and an LT run once/week. I did no VO2 max intervals, or 400's, or anything fast at all. In fact, I adjusted my LT time to be about 5:35 per mile. I entered a 5k on June 18 and ran 16:15. I know my PR is nearly a minute quicker, but still, the fastest I ran was 5:35 pace before that. I think from personal experience it is overlooked as a very effective training aspect.

To get back to the Ron Clarke situation. From what I picked up from Bill Baillie is he did Train with others. John Coyle is a name that springs to mind.

But to get back to his racing. Bill said Ron loved to race and ran "everything". Possibly that was a problem as he tended to race himself into shape.

However, Both Bill and Arthur both said that if Ron could have thrown in a few sessions of 2 mile ... 50 yd dash / float, he would have run even better.

John Walker and Rod Dixon would cut one of those workouts out in 8:40.

Arthur also made the comment, because of the huge schedule of racing that Clarke took on in a European season he really never "peaked" or aimed at a particular event.

Bottom line from both men was that Ron was extremely "aerobically" fit whenever ventured out on his European tours. All he did was Race and run easily between.

Ron was an aerobic beast. Jack Daniels may be able to share his data with you readers here. He tested Ron in Los Angeles and said to me he has never tested anyone higher (VO2 max). I know the numbers but Jack should be the one to share it.

Tinman wrote:

Improvements in endurance performance from training at MSSL - 2.2 mmols +/-.1 mmol or approximately 75-80% of max VO2)(about marathon race pace or slightly slower) for 7 weeks (12 male runners):

15m time: 1.8%

600m time: 4.4%

3.22km time: 9.6%

10km time: 12.1%

Correlation between 10km race performance and MSSL = .98 pre-test and .95 post-test.

Conclusion by authors Priest and Hagan:

"Our findings indicate that training at MSS pace is an effective method to increase maximal aerobic and aanaerobic power, and decrease performance times for short-and middle-distance running events. British Journal of Sports Medicine, Vol 21, Issue 1: 18-21. 1987

My comment: tempo running at a moderate pace, done regularly, can improve performance over a variety of event distances. Voila!

The addition of this running would take a 17:30 5k'er down to 15:45 (assuming a 10% improvement), a 10:30 2 miler down to a 9:30, and a 36:30 10k'er down to a low 32 minute 10k over the course of 3 months!!!

Unless I'm doing something wrong.....WOWZERS!!

If one is already doing fast reps, tempos, etc, then the improvements would be far less. In the study mentioned, the runners had beend doing just easy, steady distance running prior to adding moderate to somewhat strong paced distance runs to their training schedules.

It is worth noting that that VO2 max improvements tend to halt after two years of very serious training, so improvements beyond that are primarily due to clearance of lactate (hydrogen ions) and economy. Lactate threshold, for instance, can be improved for several years and it is directly related to intermediate paced training. That is, for serious runners, training often at about 80-90% of maxium aerobic power is a smart thing to do. Continuing to hammer the fast reps is useless after awhile. Simply put, no improvements occur.

Runners who have great genetic potential to have high VO2 max may benfit a bit longer from faster reps, but eventually they halt in progress too unless they focus on doing more intermediate paced running. Runners who have limited VO2 max capacity will halt even sooner when doing fast reps and they will surely benefit from switching to lots of tempo type running.

Runners who are still elite by time they are past age 25 need to do plenty of tempo type running (15k pace to marathon pace, bascially) if they want to continue improving. For example, Adam Goucher, at his age, needs to be doing some solid tempo running regularly. He isn't going to improve a lot if he does just fast reps. He needs the intermediate stuff in volume to get to his current potential. I am guessing that he is doing the tempos. Ryan Hall probably can do another couple of years of fast, long reps and then he will have to get in lots of long tempos or longer reps at 10k pace or a little slower if he wants to keep improving. The window for max VO2 improvements closes by time someon is in their mid 20s.

Training over a runner's lifetime must change, must alter to provide benefits. Evolution is not just in speed but in type of training that creates results.

tinman said: The window for max VO2 improvements closes by time someon is in their mid 20s

for someone just getting into running in their mid-20s, what would you suggest doing before that window closes?

thanks,

hrm

Tinman:

I emailed you

I would suggest fast 3-4 minute reps with plenty of recovery jogging between to develop VO2 max to the fullest.

tinman keep it up