Why don't people train at the highest altitude?

There is more to running than just aerobic benefits. Neuromuscular adaptations are important, too, especially if you are training for shorter races like 800m/1500m. If you get too high in altitude, you simply can't run fast enough in training to gain these benefits.

Imagine a 1500m runner training at 10,000 feet. A 4:00 mile at sea level is about a 4:23 in Leadville. That is 6 seconds (10%) slower per 400m, a huge difference in velocity. If the runner is doing his intervals at this much slower speed, his neuromuscular system won't be ready to run 60-second 400s.

Marius bakken experimented with altitude training at extreme altitude. His threshold/performance declined.

He gave up too soon.

The higher a sea level person goes up in elevation, more likely altitude sickness will occur, acute or chronic altitude sickness. Higher elevation for sea level citizens is correlated with higher rates of injuries due to lack of oxygen. Lack of oxygen means healing from minor strains and minor injuries will be more difficult. We don't see world class endurance athletes from towns over 15,000 feet elevation. Maybe no one really adapts to higher elevation at very high altitude.

Source: Bakken's former blog: from memory....I no longer have the specifics.

Yes, in La Paz, Bolivia, over 3000m altitude, around 2001-2006. He was able to run fast 400 intervals, around 60 secs, in La Paz, but his longer intervals were compromised. His sleep schedule was also difficult there.

He had better success training in Eldoret, Kenya, 1800m above sea level.

Courtney Dauwalter lives and trains in Leadville (she was raised at low altitude at 1000 feet). Of course what she does is very different than 1500 but doesn’t it show that for some people at least that height is beneficial to aerobic development?

La Paz is at 3600m of altitude so really high and Eldoret is higher btw 2200m and Iten where all athletes train there is at 2450

There was actually a guy who tried training at Everest base camp ~ 17,000ft. His plan was to do 4 weeks of it but just found he wasn’t recovering and just got run down and sick after 10 days or so.

I’ve trained in Leadville and had a great time! My runner friends who tried to train there all got sick, though. It depends on the person I guess, but it’s too high for some people.

Yes but a lot of her races are in that sort of environment so it makes a lot of sense for her body to be trained/acclimated at altitude

I'd like to see a study on the train low sleep high model taken to extreme. Helicopter a few athletes to sleep on a mountain then bring them back down each day to train for a few weeks. It would be expensive but we could get some good data.

Data? We already have data. How many elite Nordic skiers, elite swimmers, elite cyclists and elite runners are from towns greater than 10000ft. elevation? How many from towns greater than 12500ft. elevation and how many are from towns greater than 15000ft. elevation? The vast majority of citizens of the world are from cities and towns below 10000ft. elevation but if extreme elevations were healthy, we would have some elite endurance athletes who were born and raised about 10000ft. elevation. Regarding athletes training at Leadville or similar elevation towns: Can athletes who train at 10000ft. prove they are faster at sea level compared to athletes who live and train in 5000ft. to 7000ft. range?

As somebody who has actually trained in Leadville sometimes, I can tell you that this is not the place you want to be for a long time.

People who live in that high of altitude have all kinds of problems. Older people who live in Breckenridge, not much lower than Leadville, sleep with oxygen every night.

I personally lived just under 7000ft and I could never sleep well in all off these mountain years.

Regarding your training, you run much slower because of the lack of oxygen so your turnover rate is much lower.

For world class athletes a high altitude training camp with medical supervision before a big event can be helpful to squeeze the last 0.5% out of your performance. For everybody else it will be just an inspirational experience to run that high up in the mountains.

All the research shows that it's live high train low is the best strategy. As someone pointed out, there's more to running than just aerobic capacity. Add the fact that people respond differently to various stimuli. Some people respond well to running lots of sub maximal mileage with little speed training. Others struggle with higher mileage but respond well to lots of fast intervals.

At the fact that people can't just move wherever, especially most professional runners. And add the social aspect that some more like Leadville offers. It's not going to be the same as Park City or Flagstaff. Some people may like Leadville. I would argue probably most wouldn't. Somebody brought up Laramie Wyoming in the past and it's the same thing. Also imagine the winters in Leadville. Probably not a great place to train unless you like the treadmill.

Diminshing returns is probably a factor. Obviously there will come an altitude where ability to perform and physical health is adversely affected and probably an altitude lower than that where you need to run so slowly that you'd be better off at a lower altitiude. I've never seen any studies comparing effects of running at 6,000-8,000 feet with running at 10,000 feet.

But altitiude is not the only thing that makes a place I desirable training location. Boulder became the first altitude mecca partl because Shorter brought it to our attention but also because of its proximity to Denver and Stapleton Airport. Most of the big races in the country were not within driving distance of Boulder. And most of us weren't making a living from our running. We needed some sort of job, even a crappy one. The presence of a big university in town meant you could almost always find a job delivering pizza, resoling shoes, etc. And if you couldn't find something in Boulder the commute to Denver was tolerable.

I've been to Leadville. It doesn't seem like a place you'd have an easy time making a living if you didn't have a shoe contract and it's not the easiest place to get into and out of. There are places in the Rockies that are higher than Boulder where you'd be able to find work and get to a major airport fairly easily as well. But a lot of the really places come with some drawbacks.

Sentence in bold is too strong and not necessarily correct. A lot of athletes suffer injuries at a significantly higher rate due to High Low Training. Most citizens of the world are not from cities and towns above 5000ft. elevation. What data shows: Disproportionate number of elite 3000mSC athletes to elite Marathoners born & raised between 5000ft to 9500ft. elevation.

Hoka- Sponsored trail / ultra runner Tyler Andrews was living and training up in the Andes, but he also has had the best success at getting very high FKTs (for instance up and down Kilimanjaro). Probably not the best training approach if you want to win the US Olympic Marathon trials, though.