Modifying the Norwegian approach to lower mileage

Is muscle tone the same as Klas Lok refers to “pop in the legs” in the EIM?

Yes, it gives me woo woo pseudoscience vibes. I'm failing to see anyone else give it much weight, it but it appears to be at the center of everything Bakken.

My muscles feel the same everyday.

After I lowered the easy days HR a bit and made some small modifications to my sub-T sessions a few weeks ago (based on what he wrote in "Løping!"), I sense a huge difference in tone. Each morning, the muscles feel relaxed. The muscles also looks more relaxed. The sub-T sessions feel more consistent and predictable (it now feels very easy to lock to a specific tempo for all reps). And strangely enough, it's easier to keep a faster easy pace at a lower HR.

Muscle tone is the physiological/medical term. Perhaps it's the same as Klas Lok refers to, I don't know.

Bakken talks about the changes of it based on what you do and when you do it, and to me it becomes very logical why he want days to be structured the way he plan them. For example, if you do strength training (which raises the tone of the muscles) on an easy day (which should lower the tone), the day after the easy day will be affected by that. But if you do the strength training on the sub-T day, the easy day can still lower the muscle tone.

You're not the only one.

That said, leg spring stiffness 1) is trainable but 2) is reduced by fatigue, so perhaps that's what he's intuitively sensing?

In any case, muscle "tone" isn't as bad as "aerobically underdeveloped". <gag>

<snort>

One of the things I’m still wrapping my head around reading Bakkens book (and NSM to a certain extent) is that he makes it sound like tipping the line into overtraining is so perilously close that any little foray into slightly too fast easy runs or imprecisely managed anaerobic efforts should surely end in disaster in no time.
But obviously just about every generation of runners other than this current one trained just fine without this level of precision and obsession with intensity control. is it just that in previous generations people weeded themselves out when they got injured and only the lucky few stuck around? This is not intended to be a critique of Bakken/NSM I’m just “clueless” how so many runners manage without realizing they’re walking this tightrope that Bakken/NSM says we’re on.

This is exactly it, in my opinion. Let's look at collegiate runners, a small population that is a combination of genetic talent and good HS coaching and development. Then, when they're shipped off to college, they either integrate into the top 7 XC or become Conference, Regional, or even National competitors. But that's only some. What about the rest? Burned out from the high mileage and high intensity. Injured. Overtrained. Left in the shadows of ones who could handle the stress. The "good results". What if a team could guarantee success for all of their athletes, but were told they have to sacrifice a year or two of competitiveness to allow for development, consequently risking competiviness at championships because of the non-periodized, low intensity approach that doesn't drag folks to high fitness by their scruff.

What NSM does is drastically increase the success rate for everyone who tried other training and burnt out. It's for those who think they aren't coachable, their body isn't "working " anymore or have accepted progress won't happen for them when it's really just the same cycle of build and burnout that leads to a plateau.

NSM distributes load in such a digestible, scalable way unlike any other modern training modalities. That's why so many success stories are around. It's quite literally the "everyone else" of folks who are just as intrinsically motivated as their successful peers but need a different "flavor" of training. It's for the weeded, not the already grown weeds... unless those weeds happen to be uncharacteristically open-minded.

From reading the Reddit sub in particular it seems a lot of people have bought the Bakken book and are changing the way they train based on it.

If NSM "vanilla" is working and I am seeing monthly progress, do I want to risk that by adding in 45/15? It seems people are desperate to get those legs turning over an Bakken has given them the "excuse".

I've not read the book and it may well provide more context but honestly it feels like people are looking for a change for changes sake.

I remember Sirpoc posting "The core is the three 30 minutes subt workouts and then you fill in the gaps with easy".

But a lot of people like to keep the 75/25 distribution sacred .. especially on Reddit without thinking of context.

It was nice to have Bakken actually elaborate on the Sirpoc quote and have his starting point being 4 days out of which 3 are subt days. He even comments underneath that table that many will still see improvement, if they only do 3 subt days with no easy.

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With regards to including rest days .. I don't recall rest days as part of a system.

They where there for non-advanced runners that had yet to train up to the full 7 program. Runners that had no intent to go all-in and runners that by life circumstances are prevented to run 7 days.

The latter explains non-seven days programs with doubles.

I've only read the Norwegian version, but I suspect that you're indeed reading too much into it.

I would largely agree with this. The sirpoc boom and bust describrd cycle is why a lot of us are here. Usually, burnout from too much intensity is the cause of it, see your referenced college system. Some guys come out of it strong, but the majority are broken. I know many people who tick this box.

The simplicity of NSM over time is why it works. It's got enough of everything you need that over a period, you'll out train yourself more than via any other method. It's simplicity is also it's genius, and how well sirpoc has communicated it, for it to be idiot proof once you have read his book.

I would say, myself included, most people's training was likely worse than this before, or at least not as optimal. So anyone who has stuck with it has simply out trained their past self. Which is probably why there are now thousands of testimonials littered over the internet.

One other thing, RE: muscle tone. Not sure. I probably sit near where RAC is with this, which is uncomfortable itself. My main worry, it's people are going to become fixated with something that is going to be very hard to define and incredibly difficult to make sense or a measure person to person. Some sort of holy grail of muscle tone balance training. You can already see it happening in front of your eyes. When probably this thread has already shown, keep it simple, run 7 days a week if you can and over X amount of time it'll pay off and get on with your day.

I did something like adding in this intensity. I posted a bit about it. In retrospect, I shouldn't have bothered. The gains were marginal in the very short events and it caught up to my legs in the end and I actually got worse overall after I had some down time post short racing season. I was still improving massively at the time, so it was a silly move, really. I had the balance down perfectly with vanilla NSM and was making nice linear progress. Absolutely just my personal view but can only report back on what I experienced.

Fun part is that I suspect you'd be spamming this thread with PubMed search result providing articles on muscle tone, if one of us had dared to state "Muscle tone" is a made up concept :D

C'mon RAC .. Show off your superior PubMed search engine skills and give yourself a taste of your own medicine :)

I've always seen 75/25 as the anchor. Obviously, if you run near the end of the 4-5 hour a week range, you are going to be probably be near 65/35. If you run 10 hour weeks at the stretched end of MSM, you might be running 85/15. I think I'm paraphrasing but that's covered in sirpoc's book.

Having played around with the easy running I'm firmly off the belief it's main role is a buffer between workouts, but also does provide some stimulus, even as easy as it can be. But it's core is it's just a gateway to get you with some activity to the next workout.

Doubt.

I tried 45/15 as laid out on Saturday. I found it very hard on the legs the next day. It's definitely not a weekly workout for my body, anyway. I firmly put this in the 'x-factor' category box. I might use it to sharpen the week before a mile-3k range kind of race. I'm seeing good improvement with vanilla so it just doesn't make sense for me to rock the boat and make this a regular thing.

Yeah people love to get obsessed with things that matter very little and it will probably happen here too.

Bakkens book is great, but the thing with it is that he doesn't limit it to just hobby joggers, but more has decided to give an account of his entire "system", so it goes far beyond hobby joggers.

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Apart from talking about muscle tone, another fixation you can already see happening in front of your eyes you can already see people immediately taking on doubles. Both here and on reddit

Which makes me smile as NSM specifically originated as the "How to run Norwegian style without the doubles" system :D

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I suspect some just have heard "MSN" gives great results and started doing it, but always are looking for something that given even greater results.

The fact that it's a lower risk way of training for people with lives outside of running sometimes overlooked/forgotten.

What if you're just started running and are at the 2 hour a week range? :)

And that is why professor clueless is in academia, teaching the next generation of academics to be unable to function in the real world.

The practical people on the other hand don’t necessarily care about the technical term but instead describe what they feel, and what works or doesn’t work in simple concepts so as many people as possible can understand their point, who are willing to listen, and benefit from it.

basically I don’t want my legs shafted so I can still run the prescribed workout easily