Question for jtupper or other training pace gurus about determining VDOT

nepoks wrote:

wellnow,

Maybe you should follow Jack Daniels' Formula if you only managed 2:29:50 for a Marathon at 40, buddy.

It's my weakest event.

plastic rubber wrote:

I would add to this that the 'generic efficiency curve' does and would not apply to runners who are under 13 minutes for 5K - wellnow is making the erroneous assumption that this balance is a given. It's not - it's an estimate. I'm sure Jack could draw an elite efficiency curve for world-class runners, but what's the point? Someone running under 13 minutes isn't looking at tables. They're not looking at benchmarks - they ARE the benchmark.

I agree mostly, but what about those sub elite runners who are looking at the chart. There must be over 1000 American runners who could make the grade to elite if they weren't so much in awe of those at the top.

You may be one of the very very few who is smart enough to know that the fastest distance runners are better trained rather than better physically equipped, but shouldn't that be reflected in a pace chart in a book which puports to explain these things in numbers?

It wouldn't change much - the VDOT would still be the same, with some potential adjustment to the relationship between different events based on projected efficiency. I don't understand how you figure the Daniels tables are intimidating...world records are intimidating, period. Obviously at 85 nobody has run 2:01 for a marathon (I'm going by memory for the tables) but I'd argue that's not necessarily a fault of the tables. It's just that nobody has yet run that time. It's possible, though. A 40-odd year old Ethiopian has run under 2:04, after all.

Once again, VDOT is not a mean value as you said earlier. It does not imply that there must be individuals with VO2max values of 100 or more for these tables to work. When you get to the very best, they are obviously very efficient at very high V02max values. I'd still say that the Daniels tables are not far off. But for the super-elite THESE TABLES ARE NOT FOR THEM. They're predictive, practical tables to assess performance for the 99% of people out there - and that includes elite runners.

To amplify what plastic rubber is saying, think of this in terms of statistics. Hypothetically, if you rounded up a large number of well-trained athletes (both elite and sub-elite) and had them train for and run every distance from 800m to the marathon, then you'd get a bunch of points on a graph. What the VDOT formula does, as I understand it, is create a "best-fit" line relating the velocity of those races to one another, so that we can say than a 5min mile is equivalent to a 16min 5k, or whatever. You then use those velocities to help plan your workouts, depending on current shape and goal race distances. What's so hard about that?

I don't think you understand what I am saying. The top guys could have a high VO2max or a relatively low one and still break World Records, but this is not reflected in the VDOT chart, which is an extrapolation of the figures for less well trained runners.

One of the reasons why World Records are intimidating to Americans is because they have been brainwashed into thinking that they are genetically inferior to East Africans. And the VDOT table reinforces this mythology.

Also, Gebreselassie was 35 when he ran 2.03.59 not 40, there is a big difference. But his record at 35 does show another reason why the highest VDOT is unfeasible.

You're looking at it the wrong way. You saying that someone could have a relatively low V02max and still break world records. Evidence please. As we've been saying, these tables are not perfect, but they're also not reinforcing anything other than relative times. You don't seem to get it through your head that the relationship between V02max and running economy is used to predict times here - and that is a generic line of best fit based on comparisons of lots of data. IT DOES NOT PREDICT OUTLIERS. Outliers are those guys who are breaking world records.

Show me a world-record holder with a low VO2max value. Show me a westerner who has run a world record at a distance race lately. Please. Offer up some hard data. It's not good enough to say that they haven't because they're intimidated by these tables. That's just something you've made up in your head. You're reading way too much into this.

These tables reflect reality amongst observable data. How do you know that westerners are genetically the same? Clearly there are some differences. Science isn't about hope or bullshit feel-good sentiment. It's about observations, hypotheses, experiments and conclusions.

Stop adding all your strange, irrelevant and incorrect demands on these tables, because you know not what you're talking about.

PS - Gebrselassie's age is highly suspect. East African birth dates are guesses at best. There are some people who say he's closer to 40 than 36, as he's listed now.

wellnow wrote:

One of the reasons why World Records are intimidating to Americans is because they have been brainwashed into thinking that they are genetically inferior to East Africans. And the VDOT table reinforces this mythology.

Bull.

World records are intimidating to Americans because they are so much faster than Americans can run. Not because of anything Jack Daniels said.

Yours is a completely nonsensical argument. Most runners, even elites, do not even know what their VO2 max in the first place. Of that small group, even fewer know anything about Daniels or his coaching methodologies. Finally of those who meet the first two criteria, none think that VDOT is an "average, halfway between economy and VO2Max".

That last bit is purely your own invention. You are not protecting anyone for being "discouraged".

You also owe Jack Daniels an apology.

Clayton had a low VO2max and he was a World Record Holder. Wilson Kipketer is alleged to have a low VO2max, I've read 70 on these boards, and why not? He fits the mould of what is suggested in the research paper I posted, why don't you read it sometime.

You are preaching at me that: "the relationship between V02max and running economy is used to predict times here - and that is a generic line of best fit based on comparisons of lots of data. IT DOES NOT PREDICT OUTLIERS. Outliers are those guys who are breaking world records."

They are only outliers because they have superior fitness, which cannot be extrapolated from the VDOT tables, so the numbers are an average of averages, how do they help you how to improve fitness?

Stop preaching at me, you are the one who doesn't know what you are talking about, you don't believe that a top runner can have a low VO2max, you are brainwashed by dogma, you can tell me black is white all you like, but it doesn't make you right.

VDOT-er wrote:

wellnow wrote:

One of the reasons why World Records are intimidating to Americans is because they have been brainwashed into thinking that they are genetically inferior to East Africans. And the VDOT table reinforces this mythology.

Bull.

World records are intimidating to Americans because they are so much faster than Americans can run. Not because of anything Jack Daniels said.

Yours is a completely nonsensical argument. Most runners, even elites, do not even know what their VO2 max in the first place. Of that small group, even fewer know anything about Daniels or his coaching methodologies. Finally of those who meet the first two criteria, none think that VDOT is an "average, halfway between economy and VO2Max".

That last bit is purely your own invention. You are not protecting anyone for being "discouraged".

You also owe Jack Daniels an apology.

*********************************************

I don't owe Jack Daniels an apology, don't be so ridiculous. You are putting him on a pedestal. He doesn't have the belief or the conviction to say that Americans can beat the Africans and neither do you.

wellnow wrote:

I don't think you understand what I am saying. The top guys could have a high VO2max or a relatively low one and still break World Records, but this is not reflected in the VDOT chart, which is an extrapolation of the figures for less well trained runners.

You are right, the VDOT charts to not give a value for VO2max.

You are right, neither do they reflect the relationship between oxygen uptake and oxygen economy in the best athletes.

wellnow wrote:

You are right, neither do they reflect the relationship between oxygen uptake and oxygen economy in the best athletes.

They are not designed to do that.

Your're right. It's a design flaw. The VDOT tables give you no clue about how good you could be by improving your speed endurance. But they are very good at making it look like you have limited potential.

wellnow wrote:

Your're right. It's a design flaw. The VDOT tables give you no clue about how good you could be by improving your speed endurance. But they are very good at making it look like you have limited potential.

It's not a design flaw. You are trying to use these tables for a purpose they were not designed for.

They do not help you determine potential in any way.

wellnow wrote:

Your're right. It's a design flaw. The VDOT tables give you no clue about how good you could be by improving your speed endurance. But they are very good at making it look like you have limited potential.

This is going nowhere. You don't understand what the tables are for, where the numbers come from, or what aggregate data can and can't predict.

You're either very stupid, or a determined troll. I'm out.

Well I certainly don't expect them to any time soon but don't lump Daniels in with me. His book says nothing about the potential of American runners one way or the other That is completely outside of its purpose

The reason you owe Jack Daniels an apology is your snotty treatment of him based upon your own fundamental misunderstanding of what VDOT is all about. Here is a sample, from the first page of this thread:

It has not been clearly shown - even by your own email from him - that VDOT is NOT supposed to be a "mean value". It is NOT halfway between VO2 max and economy. That this assertion was purely your invention. Therefore your entire criticism of Daniels was fallacious. It was based upon an error by you.

He didn't "get the numbers wrong". You got the definitions wrong.

VDOT-er wrote:

It has now been clearly shown

Corrected

wellnow wrote:

I don't think you understand what I am saying. The top guys could have a high VO2max or a relatively low one and still break World Records, but this is not reflected in the VDOT chart, which is an extrapolation of the figures for less well trained runners.

Okay this is so hard for you to get but here goes again a please pay CAREFUL attention to the use of VDOT vs V02MAX:

VDOT is not V02max. If 2:04 marathon indicates a VDOT of 84 (or whatever) that means that the athlete COULD have a high or low V02max because VDOT is based on velocity which takes into account V02max and efficiency. It is not an average of V02max so a VDOT of 84 does NOT imply that there must be people with a V02max of 88 and low efficiency and people with a V02max of 82 with high efficiency running the same times.

VDOT is a manufactured number meant to help people with pacing not define the limits of human potential. It is an index like CPI, it only has meaning in relation to other VDOT values. It can't be used to make conclusions about V02max.