no interval work success?

Jeez mate use the spell check !! Sorry team I am not a good typist.

Ron Clarke ran many of his 10 milers around a grass field that was about a mile around, clicking off 5:00 pace, normally. He did run a lot of fast mileage (about 80% of VO2 max). Hence, he probably had a very good clearance of lactate.

Tinman I'm new to this thread and didn't read every post so forgive me if someone has already mentioned this but I live in the same town as Ric Sayre (ashland, OR) and he was rather famous (infamous maybe) for doing mega mileage with absoultely no interval work.

We do live in a town with a ton of hills. It's at least a minimum of a 1/2 mile climb to any trail and then, even the trails are very up and down. There are many runs (which Ric did)that are steady 4-6 mile climbs with pretty good changes in elevation. He did not run these slow either and I believe at his peak he was in the 120-140 mpw range. He had a pretty good career as a marathoner too.

There's my two cents worth.

I posted this question on another thread on the front page, but I'll post it again here:

Can anyone be trained in this manner (ie, all of a run, or portions of each daily run, at AT [5k+60's/mile]) or is this only for a specific physiological "breed"?

I worked in Medford, OR which is not far from Ashland. I visted and ran in Ashland a few times, so I do know what you mean. Hills are the norm and the altitude (elevation) is there too, so the air is a bit thin. Ric, I believe, like many runners who stall out with fast reps, prospered on steady, strong distance work with mostly races for speedwork. I do know that Ric ran some 880 yard intervals about once a week when preparing to race, but it wasn't too fast (about 10k pace, I recall).

I estimate 35-40% of all distance runners should use this strategy (less reps and intervals and more moderate to strong distance runs).

jman1 wrote:

I posted this question on another thread on the front page, but I'll post it again here:

Can anyone be trained in this manner (ie, all of a run, or portions of each daily run, at AT [5k+60's/mile]) or is this only for a specific physiological "breed"?

To clarify, I meant running EVERYDAY at this pace for at least some, if not all, of one's runs.

bbump

Tinman,

I've got a bread and butter run that I've evolved by accident over the past couple of months. My longest run weekly was about 90min-1:40 and done at a slow recovery pace as I was building my mileage. However after a bout of the flu and a week off to recover I tucked into my weekly 16-18km run and belted off the first 14km easy and the final 3km at 5km-10km race pace and felt great! I guess having fresh legs after a week off helped. Now I'm doing this workout every week on various courses, anout 14-15km easy and then 3km hard at the end at about 10km pace.

My question is am I getting enough stimulus from the final 3km hard to replace a typical 5-6km stand-alone tempo run? Or am I better off splitting the workout and doing a 90min easy day + a hard 5-6km tempo day? I find my recovery from the harder long run is about 2 days, the same as I need after a 6km tempo run at HM pace.

Run the last 30-45 minutes of a 90 minute run at "marathon effort". Repeat for 6 days. On the 7th day run 2-2.5 hours with the last 30-60 minutes at "marathon effort". Every now and then drop the hammer in the last 10-15 minutes. "Dropping the hammer" means run faster till you are nearly sprinting the last minute. Run over hilly terrain if you can. It's really fun if you run on the flats for half the run then hit the hills for the second half. Of all the training I've tried the above always felt "right" to me.

Alan

What is weird is that I switched to this type of running recently. I rarely run anything faster than 10k pace, just on strides. I find I have a better clearance of lactate now vs. when I was doing 3k paced repeats on the track, such once/week sessions of 5 x 1k at 3k pace. Now, I run strong aerobic miles, MP at the fastest on longer, harder efforts. I still run once/weekly critical velocity/lactate threshold workouts, but that's as intense as I get and I'm running more consistently and improving back to where I was in college. I think I fit in the 35-40% like Tinman said and just never knew it. Mueller would always get mad at me why I wasn't doing a 10 miler at MP pace when I would go run 1k's on the track. I guess, in my personal case, he was correct. Go Mueller, haha.

I would like to thank Tinman for the workout ideas that he has given to me personally. It's going to be time to start racing soon, so an email is in store, haha.

ninetonite wrote:

Tinman,

My question is am I getting enough stimulus from the final 3km hard to replace a typical 5-6km stand-alone tempo run? Or am I better off splitting the workout and doing a 90min easy day + a hard 5-6km tempo day? I find my recovery from the harder long run is about 2 days, the same as I need after a 6km tempo run at HM pace.

I think you do get a wonderful stimulus by running the last portion of a longer or somewhat long run at a good clip. As to whether it should replace separate tempo run, that depends upon what you respond to and need. If you respond to tempo runs (10k pace to a little slower than MP), then you may in fact need another one or two of them during the week instead of fast reps. If you respond to fast reps, then you need them, so you may not have enough energy to do a separate tempo run in addition to the faster tempo portion of your longer run.

As a general rule, if you are a responder tempo paced training (I call you a stamina runner), then doing stamina workouts need to be the core of your training while faster rep stuff should either be valued as support training or not even included. I do notice that a "stamina" runner needs one or two races to sharpen up or one or two somewhat faster reps sessions to sharpen. The caveat, however, I believe, is one helps sharpen a stamina runner will hurt them if done too often or too much in a given workout. A stamina runner, once they start racing weekly, need not run any fast stuff other than short striders. If a stamina runner combines frequent racing and rep sessions (faster speeds) they soon will feel awfully tired and performance degrades. I once coached a 5k-10k runner who

could you tell more about his leg problems, I heard he had compartment syndrome, is this true?

Tinman wrote:

I once coached a 5k-10k runner who

Bumping so Tinman will finish his post

I once coached a 5k-10k runner who had done all the normal training (about 60 miles per week, sessions of 16 x 400m at 3k pace, jog 100, etc, 8 x 800m fast, etc.). I determined he was a stamina runner and took away all 400m type reps when I started coaching him. I gave him regular 8 mile tempo runs at marathon pace or a tad slower, workouts like 5 x 1 mile at estimated 10 mile race pace, and striders(6-8 x 100m on grass at about 75% speed three times weekly). He ran everything, other than striders, at slower than 10k pace, but his race time dropped by over a minute (he was a 15:40 5k runner when I started coaching him when he was age 23) in about 4 months of "no fast rep" training. The point is, he felt great, improved his aerobic condition a lot, yet he never ran race pace or faster reps. I didn't coach him after that because I moved to Oregon, but I know he enjoyed a couple more years of steady racing at a sub 15 minute level, despite not running over 60-65 miles per week. He had little 400m speed, by the way. I think the fast reps were holding him back from progressing to a higher level.

I really had a solid idea about the need for doing less fast work for some runners when I talked to Craig Young one time at a 5 mile road race. Craig won that race, as he did many other races, with ease in 24:10 while wearing heavy training shoes (he had run about 140 miles that week, by the way). Craig described his own training and it dawned on me that he fit the mold of a person who did not have much natural speed, but he made the most of his ability by doing moderate paced distance in volume consistently. He repeat mile workout times were not that impressive relative to his race times, yet he consistently competed skillfully and we apparent ease. This coincided with what Phil Coppess had told me to.

Tinman,

When do you arrive in Boise? And I know that the "mileage" theory of training works, i.e. you will get better if you just run long runs and do pretty good tempos and steady states, but at what point does it stall out. At what level of racing do you need to do 3x 1 mile in 4:12 with 2:30rec or 3 x 3200m in 8:50 with 5:00rec, or 16 x 400m in :61-:62 with :35 rec? At some point if you've only ever experienced at the max 4:40 pace, how will you hang in there in a race that goes out in 4:15?

He had something called Popliteal Entrapment. It could occur at any time but evidently more common during down hill running.

Also suffered from a stomach ailment which ould see him doubled over at times he was in so much pain.

The most amusing incident (I may have already mentioned it here) was during a 15 mile run across the eastern ridges of Aucklands suburbs. The run then droped onto the waterfront and then headed back to Cornwall Park.

The group running were all very good runners.

A buddy of mine was one (A 2:14 marathoner). At around 4 miles John was suddenly sticken with the Stomach Cramp. Rather than wait the group lifted the pace and literally took off, leaving John alone.

From that point on the group maintained their pace but proceeded to nervously look over their shoulders for any sign of John. There was none.

Suddenly at around 11 miles this figure appeared on my Buddy's shoulder and said "So you Bastasds want a race". It was John. Then he just ran away from them.

When the Group arrived back at Cornwall Park John's car was gone. They had run the 15 miles around 1:20. They estimate John had run it in 1:15 to 1:17.

Such was the class of the man.

Boise? August we will be there. Moving plans are forming as I write this.

I think it is common to think that one must run fast in training run fast in races. Reality shows there is no direct correlation. Many runners can do 100 miles per week or more at slow to moderate runs, no fast reps, etc, jump into a couple of races to sharpen up and they are running 2 minutes per mile faster in the races than they have done in training. A great deal of performance is related, I believe, is a combination of high numbers of mitochondria, enzymes, capillaries, blood volume, heart stroke volume, and neural coordination (reduced inhibition).

As it relates to improved race times, I think running a bunch of quick 400m reps improves neural coordination and provides for reduction of inhibitory malaise than anything else. If a runner is doing a lot of aerobic conditioning at modest speeds (lots of distance work), then simply doing a handful of quick reps (say 5 x 300m) on the track with complete recovery is just as good, if not better, for them as running 12-20 x 400m, I posit.

I recall having a discussion with a coach in 1989 who was exclaiming that fast intervals were the reason his xcountry teams' peformances were so good. It was the 4th week of September and his gals had been doing fast 800s, 1200s, and 400s twice per week plus a race on the weekend during the past 3-4 weeks. They had dropped a minute or more on their 5k times already. He planned to keep doing fast reps and then taper for nationals in the last 2-3 weeks. I told him the reason that his gals were improving so much was because they neural coordination was improving a lot since they had done mostly distance work in the summer, and they would not continue improving much longer unless more aerobic conditioning of slower variety was included in the schedule. I told him that if he expected a linear increase in performance throughout the season by doing fast reps he was in for a disappointing finale. He ignored me because I was young and he had enough "experience" to know that to run fast in races you have to run fast in practice sessions.

Anyway, his gals peaked in mid-October, then became slower and slower over the last 4 weeks progressed. His team was rated #1 in October and ended up 5th at Nationals. He couldn't figure out why. Answer: His gals continued doing fast reps week after week and dropped their mileage. It won't work for a 5k runner. Sorry, I don't care what the fancy exercise physiology articles say. I am an exercise physiologist and I think those research conclusions are erroneous. The methods are not close enough to reality in most cases.

It has been my observation and opinion that avoiding distance running at "moderate to somewhat strong" speeds is a serious mistake. The idea that the middle ground between slow distance runs and fast reps is useless is both nonsense and foolish, in my opinion. I have said often over the years that the best runners in history have included fast continous runs in the their training schedules; structured or unstructured it matters not. Why do we not have more marathoners running sub 2:15 in America now? Simple, not enough runs that fill the middle territory of paces, I think.

I have said often over the years that the best runners in history have included fast continous runs in the their training schedules; structured or unstructured it matters not. Why do we not have more marathoners running sub 2:15 in America now? Simple, not enough runs that fill the middle territory of paces, I think.[/quote]

I think so too.

Tinman, you say that:

"Craig described his own training and it dawned on me that he fit the mold of a person who did not have much natural speed, but he made the most of his ability by doing moderate paced distance in volume consistently."

Are you implying that individuals who have a moderate to low amount of natural speed are potentially more likely to benefit from this type of training?

That is, would you post that a "stamina" runner is more likely an individual who enjoys greater success at longer distance events, such as the 10k on up?