Scientific study: Kenyan pro average 106 miles per week and the men run at 7:40 per mile pace, women 8:30!!!

rojo wrote:

From Amby Burfoot's most recent column.

https://www.podiumrunner.com/culture/run-long-run-healthy-weekly-roundup-february-10-2022/

How Kenyan runners train

Kenyan distance runners train hard and race fast. We all know that. Apparently, they also have a high incidence of Achilles tendon injury—13.9%. I was more interested in the training data since we rarely see hard data of this sort from Kenya. Runners “in high altitude training camps” ran an average of 170 km/week (about 106 miles). They had an average pace of 8:07 per mile, which means the men likely ran at about 7:40 pace and the women at 8:30 pace. That’s at altitude of course, but amazingly slower than their race paces. More at African J for Physical Activity & Health Sciences.

https://journals.co.za/doi/pdf/10.37597/ajphes.2021.27.4.8

From the journal:

“The mean weekly training mileage was 170.0 km with an average pace of 3.3 minutes per kilometer.”

That’s not anywhere close to 8:07 per mile so I don’t understand.

They are copying wejo training in Flagstaff. LRC - where dreams become reality!

It averages out to that because they do the 12:00 min/mile Kenyan Jog in between their 20 x 1000m @ 2:30

The abstract says they were doing 170km/week at 3.3 mins/km. That has them running 520 miles which seems very fast. Someone with access to the paper would need to read it and tell us what is actually being measured and if there was a math error somewhere.

fkkfkfkfkf wrote:

The abstract says they were doing 170km/week at 3.3 mins/km. That has them running 520 miles which seems very fast. Someone with access to the paper would need to read it and tell us what is actually being measured and if there was a math error somewhere.

Apparently running 106 miles @ 5:19 pace yields lots of Achilles tendon issues

I don't get it either. Here is what the abstract says word for word:

"The prevalence of AT among the long-distance runners was 13.9% (n=57), comprising 42 men (73.7%) and 15 women (26.3%), with a median age of 27 years. A total of 61.4% (n=35) of the runners covered on average 151- 200 km per week. The mean weekly training mileage was 170.0 km with an average pace of 3.3 minutes per kilometer."

Apparently female athletes were also factored in. The group in the study averaged 5:18 per mile for an average of 170 kilometers! 3.3/1000*1609 = 5.3097 or 5:18.582 per mile.

All due respect to Amby for his Boston Marathon victory years ago, but he has been beating the slow runner drum for Runners World too long now.

Elite runners from Kenya are known to start their first kilometer slow but they are renown for running under control but fast paces on regular runs after a slow start. 5:18 pace for 170 Km per week seems fast when female athletes are factored in but that should be the conversation not that they run 7:40 / 8:30 pace.

I was not able to open the whole study so maybe there is more to this story that makes what I am saying not true? Maybe they are talking about the remaining 38% of the runners not analyzed? But, I don't think so because the article says and average of 170 km per week.

fkkfkfkfkf wrote:

The abstract says they were doing 170km/week at 3.3 mins/km. That has them running 520 miles which seems very fast. Someone with access to the paper would need to read it and tell us what is actually being measured and if there was a math error somewhere.

Agreed. I find that even harder to believe than the 8:07 the article claimed, especially when you factor in the women.

Sounds slow.. but when altitude is factored in a bit more believable

Sorry, I don't want to be brutal, but this "study" is a total stipidity.

First thing : what does it mean "kenyan runners" ? Runners for 800m or for Marathon ?

Second thing : what does it mean "average" when we speak of running ? If athletes run 50% of their mileage at a high intensity level, and the other 50% is "regeneration", or "warm-up", or "cool-down", speaking about the "average" is the best way for creating confusion and explain a "fake" type of training.

Last Wednesday, for example, I had a "special block" with marathon runners, including top kenyans like Erick Kiptanui, but also European such as Julien Wanders and Amanal Petros. Erick's training was, in the morning, 3 km warm-up, + 10 km in 31'41" (all together), + (after 5' rest for changing shoes) 12 km in 35'53" (for Julien and Amanal 8 km in 24'02").

In the afternoon, 3 km warm-up + 10 km in 31'21" (all together), then on track in Kipchoge stadium, 10 x 1200m with 1'30" recovery for Erick at the average of 3'23" with the last in 3'18", while Julien and Amanal ran 10 x 1000m with 2' recovery in 2'50", the last 2'45". Make the calculation of total km, the percentage of easy mileage, the percentage of "special training" for Marathon (between 90% and 105% of the Marathon Pace), and then compare with what is written in the article.... and have your own conclusions !

trojo wrote:

rojo wrote:which means the men likely ran at about 7:40 pace and the women at 8:30 pace. That’s at altitude of course

They are copying wejo training in Flagstaff. LRC - where dreams become reality!

Yeah, except they substitute potato farming for lattes. Wink, wink.

I read only the abstract, however, this paper is about Achilles Tendinopathy and the conclusion of the author is, that the impaired balance between dominant and non-dominant leg could be responsible (higher probable) for that.

If true that is of importance for any professional runner, including yours.

Thank you, Coach Canova. Another thing, there are so many foreigners now training in Kenyan doing VLOGS that you get a complete picture of daily life and training of many Kenyan groups. There are no more "secrets" just runners working hard and being dedicated to their craft.

The 3.3 km speed looks like workout paces from the article. Trained for two weeks with end of career kenyans at a camp, they laughed and said 5 min km was normal for easy days and that we were going too fast, so I believe the paces they mention.

I can’t wait to read the article, thank you!

That's the average, but what does the bell curve look like and the outliers? Now that data would be fun to dig into. But thanks rojo for the info as I'm trying to get to the elite women standard for marathon running.

Yeah, I'd be kind of interested in seeing some kind of breakdown of time in various pace buckets rather than a simple global average.

lexel wrote:

I read only the abstract, however, this paper is about Achilles Tendinopathy and the conclusion of the author is, that the impaired balance between dominant and non-dominant leg could be responsible (higher probable) for that.

If true that is of importance for any professional runner, including yours.

This^

The salient points aren't the speed of the training, but the effects on tendinopathy of strength imbalances and length differences, also looking at gender ("cisgender"?) correlations:

The mean composite SEBT scores for the dominant and non-dominant legs were 81.85 and 82.42%, respectively. The average normalised reach distances on SEBT were 72.9%, 84.3%, and 89.2% for anterior, posterolateral, and posteromedial directions, respectively. There were statistically significant mean differences in scores between male and female runners, with these being higher in males compared to females (p < 0.05). A total of 91.23% (n=52) and 82% (n=47) of the runners with AT respectively had impaired balance on dominant and non-dominant legs of below 94%, and were therefore at risk of re-injury. There appear to be gender-based differences in the Kenyan athletes’ SEBT scores, hence the need for gender specific SEBT scores.

Thank you, Coach Canova.

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