LYDIARD OR DANIELS?

Beware of Dogma:

Bill Baillie, whom Kim Stevenson knows really well, got to know Zatopek personally. He told me a story that, when he was doing all those intervals, he was doing them because he had nowhere else to train but on track and, just to counter boredom, he would run one lap fast, change direction and run slow... I don't know how structured his "interval" training they were; I heard a story also that he would start his 400s fairly fast (hard) in the beginning and slowed down as he piled up all those quarters. Basically he was doing a lot of running at change-of-pace speed. His 200s were more of his speed source.

Next great guy, as we've looked in to much earlier, was Kuts. His intervals were a lot more structured. The trend back then was, "why run those quarters in 80 seconds and do them 50 or 70 times when you can do them in 70 seconds and do them 20 times--it will be much closer to the actual race pace and distance?" I think this is the dirction WE are heading now also and I personally feel it's a mistake. A beauty of Lydiard program and how he put it is the fact intervals or repetitions are for anaerobic capacity development. Fot that, all you need to do is to "make yourself tired with volume of speed." In order to develop your anaerobic capacity, I don't know much much more specific you need to be...

I concur with Nobby on backing off if you are tired. Bill Baillie was a big advocate of this if things were not going right. A few days of 'easy' running can make huge difference.

I (and others) have mentioned this before. Arthur used this for beginners and experienced runners. If you feel bad and tired still get out and run. Aim at getting down the road for 10 minutes, if you still feel lousy at 10 minutes turn around and go home. At the end of the day you have completed a 20 minute run. Chances are though you may feel OK so push on for a little more.

I can remember Arthur saying (in that context): Any run is better than no run.

For Nobby's other post on Zatopek. He was the original "Arthurs's Boys" Role Model. When they got to meet him they tried to understand everything he did. As I have mentioned before. Bill spoke of him often but I cannot remember all the detail.

Nobby and Kim,

Thanks for settling my mind. I thought you would consider it okay, I just wanted to be safe. I never ran track or cross country so it's not always easy to believe I can run that fast.

As far as "hitting the wall," I'm not concerned with hitting a "bad patch" so far. I did that quite a few times during my first cycle of Lydiard training, so I'm more experienced in what to look for and more realistic in what my abilities are.

Nobby,

Are you planning any talks this year (FYI: St. Louis is having great weather so far this year)?

Thanks

Equal and opposite question of backing off when you are tired. How about in the speed phase (not there just yet) if you feel really good, is there a time when AL would say feel free to go as fast and as hard as you possibly can during this interval, make yourself sick if you feel like it?

Go primal.

Primal speed thereapy?

What I 'feel' like doing often, when everyhting seems healthy is to do whatever interval w/o I have planned, but do extras if I am feeling like it or if there isn't much time left, run the last one as hard as I can...I don't why...I just enjoy that.

Perhaps cooling down I pat myself on the back after a good workout. ...I don't know.

Question is, there must be some good in that.

As everyone has picked up I am of the "Bill Baillie school of Lydiard".

As far as fast work goes, we would never run 'as hard as possible". WE would always be "under control".

Bill also felt you should finish a workout with that feeling that you could have done a little more. Arthur refers to that as being "pleasantly tired".

We also 'bagged' workouts that were not going well and just ran easily until the "body" felt right before we tried anything hard again. (Mentioned, jus a few posts ago)

Just 2 days ago I was helping a young athlete with his session and he completed it really well. He felt really good, and said "I want to do more and faster!". I said "No ! We have accomplished what we set out to do, what you can do is run the 3 miles home as the warmdown"

He was happy with that.

I did not see the pont in him pushing more 200's just for the sake of feeling you need to run faster.

More athletes have left great runing on the training track than ever left it on the race track.

Remember: We train to race, not race to train.

Kim,

Okay gotcha.

However, I am not talking 200s or shorter stuff. More like miles.

ie;

10km race pace 6:00 per mile - for example.

Marathon training.

3 x 1 mile at 5:50 ...then feeling great pull off a 5:45.

Same deal: run the 5:50's knowing you could run 5:45. leave something in the tank !

Baill Baillie is a guy who really knew how to peak for track events and, as Barry Magee said, knows how to control anaerobic training really well. He (Baillie) was known as the original ironman (not the one you swim, run and ride) because he would come down to race 800, then road champ 10-mile, back on track to race 5000, then turned out to run a marathon... He was, as Kim knows, very good at "sharpening" himself for specific event. His take, a HUGE part, was "you have certian amount of competitive juice in you; and NEVER ever use it in your training."

I was in the same boat as many of you; I was so hooked with "conditioning" and running a lot and didn't race much. Lydiard's guys raced actually quite a bit. They were very competitive. Those were the place where they were competitive. In a way, they didn't need to be competitive in their training. "Always finish your workout knowing you could have run more, could have run faster, could have run further..."

Now, this is not to defy Kim at all... There was a time when Arthur would tell you, "Okay, I want you to get out and run 3/4 mile as hard as you can..." in training. It is because that runner need to do so. But you know, you won't really knock yourself around by running 3/4 mile or so. Also it is the "art" of coaching with Lydiard--you've GOT to be there, watching the runner, knowing what the heck is going on with him/her, psychology and all... He had told me to get out and run as hard as I could at times but it's simply because he knew I was a chicken when it came to races and I didn't race much at all (and he always made fun of it). For someone like that, he/she will not kill himself/herself running 3/4 mile or a mile or whatever but instead, perhaps good for them to run hard once in a while.

Secretariat is still dead. Let's go beat him

Telegraphing your humour is weak and can be seen coming from a mile awhile. Someone said that 'pun' is the lowest form of humour however, I disagree.

Obvious weak sarcasm is the lowest and poorest form of humour.

If you don't like the questions...don't read the thread.

There is nothing here that relates to beating a dead horse. Unless of course you prefer vague information....no need to answer - but thanks.

I've come from culture where people respect the dead; be it famous or not. We have a few days period in the summer to "respect the ancestors". We are where we are because of people in the past; who they were and what they had done--both good and bad things. It is sad to live in the sociey where people cannot respect the dead and learn from the past. They are the ones who would most likely to keep making the same mistakes over and over. Let's hope we would not repeat things like world war.

Here's a late echo to Nobby and Kim. In college, interval work always ended up being a racelike effort for me as we were always given sessions that really were beyond me and I always killed myself hanging on to those paces for as long as I could and then dying.

To this day, I do not benefit from interval work and I think it's because I am still not able to do it in a way that leaves some of that gas in the tank. I think one of the huge mistakes we make in the US is in thinking that a session that was faster than planned and than leaves your lunch in the infield is a "great" session.

Well Nobby in this case it is a horse that was referred to. Secretariat was a champion.

The comment in English, "beating a dead horse". Is a metaphor for not discussing a subject beyond it's usefullness.

The poster was suggesting that I was re-asking a question. So he did a metaphor-cum-simile on a figure of speech or colloqialism? with sarcasm.

Someone earlier in this thread commented that it was nice the crazies haven't spoiled by interceding...

...just when you think it is safe.

The Irish, there are more Irish descendents in North America (I'm in Canada) than there are in Ireland. The Irish have a thing about only remembering the good parts and times when someone was alive, therefore the Irish have wakes to celebrate the life. To some cultures it seems sacrilidge to do this. I know the Indian culture (India not North American Natives) greive so demonstratively for the social acceptance for greiving, that they cry when there is no true feeling of sadness. They will even hire people to greive too. Then they have anniversaries to mourn further. THis is their way.

The Irish would look at it as sad and perhaps too much.

The Indian would look at the Irish as not caring.

Fortunately or unfortunately in North America there is a melting pot of cultures as you well know.

Oh... You know, we have quite a few American cartoons in Japan while I was growing up (just like here now with all the Japanese animes!). Remember in Bugs Bunny when, say, someone runs off the cliff and stops in the air and notices there's nothing underneath; they turn into a sucker. Of course, we don't call "stupid" a sucker so I never quite figured out why! Now I feel like one...

Aw there there pesky wabbit.

Hey Nobby, did your hill training video come out yet.

The big news of the weekend is Heili Gebrselassie's world record half marathon. Another news is that Mike Salkowski, who has been following the Lydiard program, ran the marathon by 7 minutes (2:39:58, 27th place, 3rd Arizonan, 2nd in age group). Pretty good improvement, I'd say.

You know, even Lydaird himself had said that it's easy to coach or give advice; it's the athlete who has to get out and pile up all the mileage and, anybody who followed Mike's blog can see all the story, go through life's struggle to train. He has done a marvelous job following the Lydiard program and even better job expressing it for all of us to live it. Our heartfelt CONGRATULATIONS to Mike. You've done good.

http://championseverywhere.blogspot.com/

Sorry, real response to you, Jesse. No, not yet. I'm the man with words and no action... A piece of it WILl be on the website but we are looking at the real video for the end of 2006. Sorry!