Why isn't Igloi training used more often today?

Athletics Illustrated wrote:

Antonio,

You let me interview you and you exposed your training methodologies to resemble the genius of the great, great Arthur Lydiard.

I just now read the interview and Antonio stated nothing of the sort. Also the training he speaks of in the interview is nothing at all like Lydiard.

The only thing good about Lydiard training was his claims that other types of training were Lydiard, but they weren't.

I remember him making a big deal out of Carlos Lopes using Lydiard training, but Lopes was running intervals twice a week all through the year, nothing like Lydiard training.

I think Lydiard people think that as soon as you do a single high end aerobic effort you become a Lydiard disciple.

Because Mihály Iglói is dead.

Arthur Lydiard created a teachable, organized, easy to explain training system which could be used by anyone who cared to learn it.

Mihály Iglói's methods were improvisational and dependent entirely upon his daily judgments of the individual athlete's abilities, recovery status, needs, etc.

Because if you use it your running career will last about two years. Maybe.

tired of a-holes wrote:

Athletics Illustrated and Antonio Cabral are both disgusting personalities. Cabral has previously contributed a lot to letsrun though. Can't say that about Mr Kelsall.

I've found Cabral's postings to be quite interesting. HIs discussion of the training of Carlos Lopes and Fernando Mamede

is one of my favorite LR threads.

And I don't mind it when he twists the tail of the Lydiardites. Arthur Lydiard was a brilliant and influential coach. But his methods are not the end of training theory.

Didnt read this whole thread but Igloi training was based on theories of training from swimmers.

I coach as the HS that Bob went to. I have spent hours talking to Bob about training. Spent years coaching with a coach that used his system.

My opinion is that the training the Schul did does not work for 90% of HS age kids.

The training does not create permanent physiological changes that HS kids need to create a good aerobic profile. If you have a good aerobic capacity naturally this type of training can make you great.

I'd like to point out I think many people are confused on what those early season Lydiard runs were like. From my understanding Lydiard had his athletes run long runs over hilly terrain early in the year. From a biological standpoint, the heart doesn't recognize that you are running up a hill or doing an interval on the track (your specific muscle groups might), it will react the same way: increased heart rate. Your heart rate may go up in exactly the same manner running a hill of certain height and incline at 7 minute pace as you would running cruise intervals at 6 minute pace. This is lost on so many people. Base training on hills is so similar to doing aerobic intervals on the track and not many are really connecting the dots!

Spot on.

That's fine if you live where there are hills. What did Lydiard recommend for flatlanders? Cruise intervals?

Captain Oblivious wrote:

That's fine if you live where there are hills. What did Lydiard recommend for flatlanders? Cruise intervals?

Aerobic fartlek.

HRE wrote:

Captain Oblivious wrote:

That's fine if you live where there are hills. What did Lydiard recommend for flatlanders? Cruise intervals?

Aerobic fartlek.

This is so crucial in understanding how climate and geography affect training. As a young(er) coach I looked to the training methods of several NY programs like Northshore and Manlius and tried to understand their training methodology. It all came together one day when I was listening to a clip of Northshore's head coach talking about how they rarely did track work, but they often ran hilly long runs with some strides after. The hills were the intervals! I was looking at the hills as the answer to how the girls were so good, but the truth was it wasn't the hills, it was the extended aerobic/anaerobic fitness the girls were gaining (and strength I might add) from doing training that induced higher heart rates. I then understood why so many runners who did high mileage in flat areas like I live in didn't achieve the same success doing similar mileage as our hilly friends in NY. We never got our heart rate up like they did. Runners in flatter areas have got to run cruise intervals, tempos, fartleks, etc., in order to achieve anything like a Lydiard "base" because you miss out on it if you don't.

HRE wrote:

Captain Oblivious wrote:

That's fine if you live where there are hills. What did Lydiard recommend for flatlanders? Cruise intervals?

Aerobic fartlek.

How is one able to exercise restraint with aerobic fartlek and yet not be able to do aerobic intervals instead?

Actually during the hill phase in a very flat American city....can't remember which, he found a very tall building and it was stairs! Every so slightly different muscular stimuli, but it was as close as he could get - you work with what you got.

AI, perhaps you would know, but was there truly a "hill phase" for athletes Lydiard personally coached, or was there always hilly runs from the start of their training? It seemed if the area where Lydiard trained his athletes was hilly (and it may not have been, I am unsure) then truly everything before track work was the hill phase.

vpathletics.com wrote:

Base training on hills is so similar to doing aerobic intervals on the track and not many are really connecting the dots!

Square pegs don't fit in round holes.

There was a hill phase. He changed things over the years though. And of course he stopped coaching athletes directly and coached coaches like with Athletics Finland and in about five other countries.

So at first the hill phase was four to six weeks with a lot of hill bounding, hill circuits and various drills etc. I believe and I may be a little off here, but he designed the hill phase more for middle-distance runners than say marathoners or 10,000 et al. The purpose was to build explosive power in the lower leg area, feet and ankles, so that the runner can take their aerobic development and general muscular and nuero-muscular coordination and really take advantage of it with a complete package, leading into the anaerobic phase, which most people incorrectly call "speed work".

There is a lot of power that can be developed in the ankle, foot and lower leg that many athletes neglect and it is/was especially true during the big comfy/controlling shoe hysteria that went on: "protecting" the feet: weak feet at the end of very powerful legs = less execution of the whole mechanical aspect and worse, injuries.

He scaled back the hill phase as it was very daunting.

Now I know someone will come on here and say, "if there was a change, then it wasn't "Lydiard"". Which of course is dumb. The principle was to develop the lower leg, foot, ankle area like a ballet dancer - if you watch a ballet dancer and try that action out, you will then realise the incredible power that can be developed.

Purpose: Power development in the lower extremeties, hidden speed/anaerobic work and form work. Some quad development and development of the lifting muscles. Total muscular coordination. Turnover and stride lengthening exercise on the downhill portion of the hill circuits.

Now saying this, there are sworn "Lydiard coaches" who don't use a hill phase. I have interviewed a few world-class coaches who have coached gold medallists who didn't use a specific hill phase.

Rod Dixon is an example of a guy who grew up in a hilly area, Nelson, New Zealand. Did he atrophy when he moved away? I don't think so, he ran a ton of hills regardless. Did he need a specific hill phase? Probably not as much as a flatlander. So what is good for John Davies or Barry Magee or Lasse Viren, may not have been appropriate for Lorraine Moller or Dick Quax etc etc.

We can't just look at a Lydiard schedule and say,....TIME FOR HILLS NOW FOR FIVE WEEKS! Because that is the time to do it....the method is based on a set of principles and yes a timeline that is well documented out there, something to the effect:

Aerobic Development (as long as necessary: 8 weeks to however long it takes to create the desired effect)

Hill phase 4 to 6 weeks (continue mileage levels)

Anaerobic phase 4 to 6 weeks (new can of worms, right here)

Coordination phase 2 to 4 weeks.

Taper if and where and when necessary 2 weeks

Race.

Continuation.

I am a lousy runner, but within my own paradigm really saw a big change when I realised what I needed was a tonne of regular hilly running and the classic Lydiard 2 x 90:00 (Tues/Thurs) and 1 x 3:00:00-plus added to my running....worked! That was what I needed. Next guy might require different stimuli. The art is to recognise it.

Sorry.

To better answer your question. Hilly running was just fairly normal, like you say, in that environment. Also, there is not light switch-like changing from non-hilly to hill phase. When it is time to do the hill phase, there should be some acclimatization to hills. Just as the next transition to the anaerobic phase happened by the bridge of the hill phase....

Everything (ala Steven R. Covey, 7 Habits of Highly Successful...)....was directed with the end in mind.

Personally, when I coach I like to tell the athlete take your goal racing period, where it begins and work back 12 weeks, now how much time do we have? You work with you got given to ya.

Quite often I do more of a blend because I coach working stiffs, with less time on their hands....

Longshanks wrote:

With the incredible results that Bob Schul and others had using this training method, curious why it is not widely used today?

As for the original question. It's widely used in largely non-impact endurance sport such as swimming and cycling. In those sports a mature elite athlete can handle about 200 minutes of volume per day averaged over 48 weeks of the year. Mature elite runners can handle about 110 minutes per day over 48 weeks of the year.

The primary difference of that 90 minutes, and why you don't see as much Igloi style training, is that a stigma has been created that has demonized walking.

Athletes want to be tough. They want to feel as though they did all the work and through much pain came much gain. This sort of mindset makes walking for total pxxxies. I'm not talking about race walking either, cause that monstrosity is a joke. When the rare runner or coach is ok with walking and can use it as a form of mastering one's control of the body, then Igloi style training and higher volume can be had.

As others have pointed out on this thread, there does not seem to be anything that is widely available in the English language that explained Igloi's training principles.

In addition, although Igloi-trained Bob Schul is the only American to have won the Olympic 5000m, he never seemed to gain the same long-term celebrity as other champion distance runners. Bob Schul went on to become a successful coach and has himself written up Igloi’s training principles but this publication it not easily obtainable:

http://www.bobschul.net/#MANUAL

Laszlo Tabori was a great Hungarian runner who trained under Igloi, and he emigrated to America eventually becoming a coach. Unfortunately, a synthesis of his training principles is also not widely available:

http://www.coachtabori.com/laszlosbiography.html