Did my first double threshold day. AMA

LearnFromTheBest wrote:

Loppas wrote:

In a recent interview on a podcast, Jakob said that they just run threshold intervals because the high mileage of the training. If someone run "only" 130-140 km, they should have 10 in lactate! Meaningless to run on 3-4 in lactate combined with low mileage...

Yes...I would not heed that advice. They themselves have trained after those principles when they were doing 130-150km and did absolutely not run long intervals with 10 in lactate as Jakob advised. When Henrik had his big breakthrough (same podcast, earlier episode) he talked about the reason for it being a full year of this regime, only with 150km a week. Every week. Not a day lost.

I heard the same and agree with you. It would not be a good advice for anyone even if they had very low milage. Even with plenty of recovery I would advice never more than one workout a week with high lactate.

LearnFromTheBest:

good call, i remember Bakken saying what his ideal sessions looked like back in the day (5x10:00, lactate: 2.4/2.5/2.6/2.7/2.8, which is ridiculous precision but makes a lot of sense). Also, definitely to your point about the double, the Threshold proponents i've heard (M Osullivan) use 3.5 mmol as the upper limit, but to your point, they are working in a traditional model that focuses on the Tuesday Tempo run/Friday standard Threshold workout.

The 3.0 mmol standard is fascinating and seems to make a lot more sense when you start to adhere to it as your target, but the testing in Norway seems to have a better protocol for finding it (the 5x5min test, wish there was more info or similar testing here in the USA vs just the standard VO2 max protocols)

Another couple of things you might have insight into:

1. J Ingeb was taking lactate readings during his recent hill workout. What do you think he's targeting there? 3.0 mmol? or something in the 4-6 range with that type of work?

2. Bakken used to talk about his model allowing for higher # mmol during the racing season (assuming here 3.5-6.0, for your more traditional VO2 type intervals). Is that the typical periodization for the Norwegians? Assuming the logic here is after you have built this massive aerobic gas tank and pushed your AT/LT thresholds to a huge percentage of your VO2, you have to give yourself some more room to grow with these type of intervals, before you go right back to filling the gas tank again. I noticed from some of H Ingeb training, even in the competition phase, he was only doing the currently advocated 'polarized' model during race weeks, with the off weeks being right back to their normal 75/25 ish model for Threshold.

What i thought was really interesting about the periodization of H Ingeb's training back in the day was how much they kept returning to a high percentage of Threshold work, even during competition.

There cycles seemed to be something like: (zone 2 here being threshold between 2.0-4.0 mmol for reference, zone 3 being traditional aerobic power interval, zone 1 being your easy 65-74% HR Max type running)

Build Up 1 (Nov/Dec):

Zone 1: 70%

Zone 2: 25%

Zone 3: 4%

Zone 4: 1%

Zone 5: ?%

Build Up 2 (Jan to Mid-Mar):

Zone 1: 70%

Zone 2: 25%

Zone 3: 4%

Zone 4: 1%

Zone 5: ?%

Pre Competition (Mid-Mar through May):

Zone 1: 75%

Zone 2: ?%

Zone 3: ?%

Zone 4: ?%

Zone 5: ?%

Competition Phase (June to ???):

Competition Week

Zone 1: 80%

Zone 2: 10%

Zone 3: 5%

Zone 4: 5%

Zone 5: 1%

Non-Competition Week:

Zone 1: 75%

Zone 2: 19%

Zone 3: 5%

Zone 4: 1%

Zone 5: 1%

Again LearnFromtheBest, correct anything you know from a Norway model understanding

Does anyone have anything comprehensive from M Bakken btw? Probably the most interesting insights into training of anyone ive followed in the last 20 years.

His whole premise for the double thresholds and the timing between them being shorter (5 hours) to keep the hormones in check and have the double act almost as one long session (thus to keep the AM session in check and build it into a priming for the PM sessions)

Reading his old stuff on Letsrun, his take on continually building the Aerobic Threshold and side of the house in a scientific and methodical way has probably been some of the most underappreciated training suggestions ever offered

Update - Got injured and overtrained. C'est la vie.

Healthy again and decided to change it up by training for the 400m and lifting weights for a few months. Will run 20-40 miles per week.

Seppo. I don’t mean to accost you with the same advice over and over again but I can’t help myself. You ran a 1:08:xx HM in your first try at the distance having seemingly never seriously raced at anything over 1500 meters seriously. You obviously have a LOT of talent for the longer stuff. I really think if you play your cards right you could eclipse the marathon OTQ by a good margin for 2024. Moreover marathon training may temper some of your worst tendencies around blasting LT workouts and so forth. I know that may not be what interests you (which is fair) but if I was in your shoes that is the direction I would be heading.

I know there have been some frustrations along the way for you but if you look back at when you started posting on RR&T you have made an almost comical amount of progress in a relatively short time. I would anchor to that and keep moving forward vs. spending a couple months trying to get your 400 time down.

So you destroyed yourself after 5 or 6 weeks double threshold training?

Now, I know why the Ingebritsens prepared several years for this kind of training ;)

You have my respect because you do not disappear after failure (which we all have from time to time). Keep on going with whatever brings you joy.

Reply:

1. 6-8

2. It varies in Norway, I wouldn't say there is one typical model during the summer. The thing is, everyone is trying to copy bakken/the ingebrigtsens, but few really know the actual structure of the ingebrigtsens May-August training plan. Theres assumptions that probably are mostly correct though.

A combination of harder track workouts instead of hills, less treshold before competitions and treshold after cool down of the competition. Interesting point regarding M. Bakken, can't say I remember reading about that.

Honestly, most are doing basically the same weeks from fall to early spring. Also keeping the treshold work going during the summer, resulting in fall training starting at a pretty high level, never really letting their shape go that much.

Norwegian Training wrote:

Does anyone have anything comprehensive from M Bakken btw? Probably the most interesting insights into training of anyone ive followed in the last 20 years.

His whole premise for the double thresholds and the timing between them being shorter (5 hours) to keep the hormones in check and have the double act almost as one long session (thus to keep the AM session in check and build it into a priming for the PM sessions)

Reading his old stuff on Letsrun, his take on continually building the Aerobic Threshold and side of the house in a scientific and methodical way has probably been some of the most underappreciated training suggestions ever offered

Google his homepage.

Thanks guys. To Worm, by no means am I quitting distance running forever, just taking a hiatus and trying to enjoy myself for now. I will probably be back up to 80 mpw by the fall.

Update:

I took a few months of very lax training and lifestyle and have put on some weight. But the last two weeks I ran 46 and 50 miles and am plotting a comeback. I won't do double threshold again for at least a year, if ever. For now I am planning to build to 70 mpw with one session per week at mile pace, and the other session either a threshold or fartlek. I hope to race the mile once or twice in January.

This training block will be 12 or 13 weeks. The next training block will be 18 weeks, hopefully culminating in the Portland Track Festival in June. Goal is to PR in the 1,500 and 5,000 by April-June.

This is a very interesting thread, and (sadly for OP) a good demonstration that some of the hurdles of threshold is to not overdo it. You were most def. overdoing it, and increasing your pace way to early.

did the 400 come down bro?

I managed to hurt myself pretty quickly again after restarting. That's frustrating. Nearly three weeks off and I'm almost ready to run again.

Plans have had to change... 2022 will be a year of process over product, preparing the body for hard training, then building up mileage, then getting back used to a huge volume of threshold (at the CORRECT effort), and only then doing any race-specific work. I will race if healthy and fit but have no concrete time goals for the year. I'll update this thread now and then, follow along if you're still interested.