Who here has done Maffetone Method (180BPM HR minus your age) for base?

No.

You might be confusing a situation where one runner can draft off of another runner.

Pacemakers run a very specific pace for the benefit of another runner to guide them/pull them along - and yes do some drafting.

One is randomly there...and up to the runner to draft him. The other is specifically there and is paid to do so.

Geoff Smith in no way was a paid pacer. Dixon hunted him down because he wanted to beat him. Simple. Smith went out too fast. Dixon went out just right.

S. Canaday wrote:

from what I've seen Phil is a chiropractor and a "holistic healer" (not a medical doctor).

His "method" is nothing new.... you have to run slow and relaxed on your easy days so you don't get hurt (And so you can stay consistent) for beneficial aerobic adaptations. If the average runner increases their Easy paced mileage from 30-40mpw to 50-60mpw they usually get quite a bit better!

It's really a fancy way of packaging (and reselling) what Lydiard had preached about aerobic base building (and periodization) decades ago. !!

I am not sure about this. The Maffetone formula of 180- age as a target for training heart heart rate seems to be giving very different levels of intensities for different people. My personal feeling is that that this formula results in running at a pretty hard pace for a daily training run. In my 20s running at 150 to 160 bpm would have been pretty tough - it would have been a threshold run every day. Even now in my 40s running at ~140 bpm is not an easy run at all, and while it would not be a threshold run, I would definitely be pushing the pace to run at that heart rate. I am open to the possibilty that maybe running like this without adding on hard interval workouts is a way of improving running fitness effectively for some people.

I don't know Maffetone but some people may be being a bit harsh on him and his healthcare qualifications. I have seen many MDs to try and solve running injuries over the years and in some cases the advice and treatment from some MDs (who are specialist sports medicine physicians) has been nothing better than apalling resulting sometimes in quite debilitating problems until I worked out the cause myself. I don't think that only chiropractors can be accused of giving out bad healthcare advice or treatment to patients. I would imagine that like MDs there are some very good and some very bad chiropractors.

Maf this wrote:

Maffetone often points out that he does not use the 180 rule with anyone he coaches. It's a starting point if you have no other information.

1. That's what he's trying to capture with the adjustments.

2. The basic idea is to keep the intensity low, just below where you'd flirt with anaerobic.

I've edited the above comment so my questions will be clearer.

1. What are these adjustments? If it's, oh add 5-10 points, then it's just a guess.

2. Isn't the HR at which you "flirt with anaerobic" the upper level of tempo pace? I think it is. I think this is an inaccurate description of the energy production that it taking place when running really slow. I'm barely in the aerobic zone after adding +5 to my Maffetone number.

Therefore, isn't the Maffetone method really: Staying at the very lowest level at which you are just out of the non-aerobic zone.

He's a chiropractor and he hasn't coached any Olympic runners.

Why not just do Gallowwalking

Yeah, that's it.

Level 1 - Gallowalking

Level 2 - McMafflebabbling

Level 3 - Taking it to the barn

Level 4 - Serious running.

fisky wrote:

I've edited the above comment so my questions will be clearer.

2. Isn't the HR at which you "flirt with anaerobic" the upper level of tempo pace? I think it is. I think this is an inaccurate description of the energy production that it taking place when running really slow. I'm barely in the aerobic zone after adding +5 to my Maffetone number.

Therefore, isn't the Maffetone method really: Staying at the very lowest level at which you are just out of the non-aerobic zone.

Even very easy running has some degree of an anaerobic component to it (in fact walking does, too), and a very fast race like a mile is most aerobic. The level where Maffetone is trying to keep you is a rather arbitrary line.

Athletics Illustrated wrote:

Dixon did not run the 10,000 - we have no idea how fast he could have been....well....faster than 27:51....but we don't know, like we don't know Shorter's potential....Dixon only ran two maras, one to see what it was like in Auckland, the other NY.

Sure he ran the 10k and also the '84 Olympic Marathon where he was 10th.

HRE wrote:

Dixon Hurbut wrote:

I watched it. A pacemaker is anyone in front of you that you think you can catch.

That's not how pacemaker is defined. Pacemakers, as the term is commonly used, are brought into a race specifically to get other runners to a particular time. They are not supposed to try to win the race and they don't, aside from a couple notable exceptions. Smith was not trying to set Dixon up to run 2:09. He was trying to get away from Dixon and win the race. That's not pace making and you know it but using the term correctly doesn't suit the point you want to make so you're redefining the term.

Oh, OK.

fisky wrote:

Therefore, isn't the Maffetone method really: Staying at the ... level at which you are just out of the non-aerobic zone.

Yes. And the 180 formula is a first guess at that if you don't have any other information. He himself says that he does not use the 180 formula for any athlete he works with.

How should I interpret this?

Every time I begin to run, the heart rate jumps to 80-85% of max, for around 10-15 minutes.

Then drops to 65-70% and stays there for 10-20 minutes, at the same pace.

Then the pace increases by 30-40 seconds per mile and the heart rate is still 65-70%. And I can run like that for hours.

This happens everyday.

You run for hours ever day?

hourglass figures wrote:

You run for hours ever day?

Doesn't everybody

hourglass figures wrote:

You run for hours ever day?

I said "I can", because I'm never tired when I finish.

George Ilie wrote:

hourglass figures wrote:

You run for hours ever day?

I said "I can", because I'm never tired when I finish.

So you don't actually know.

hourglass figures wrote:

George Ilie wrote:

I said "I can", because I'm never tired when I finish.

So you don't actually know.

Yes, he knows

I Run for Hours wrote:

hourglass figures wrote:

So you don't actually know.

Yes, he knows

I knew I wouldn't get tired in the Marathon because I wasn't tired after 16 mile runs.

Gwen Knowsthethon wrote:

I Run for Hours wrote:

Yes, he knows

I knew I wouldn't get tired in the Marathon because I wasn't tired after 16 mile runs.

Exactly, Gwen, but you blowed up anyway.

She blowed up real good.

Yeah, not like Conley, who trained properly for the distance.

Maffetonia del Bigliosa wrote:

Gwen Knowsthethon wrote:

I knew I wouldn't get tired in the Marathon because I wasn't tired after 16 mile runs.

Exactly, Gwen, but you blowed up anyway.

She blowed up real good.

Thumb and Forefinger wrote:

Yeah, not like Conley, who trained properly for the distance.

Maffetonia del Bigliosa wrote:

Exactly, Gwen, but you blowed up anyway.

She blowed up real good.

She blowed up real good too, hanging with the big girls.