If Tim Noakes "Central Governor" Model is Correct AND there is NO Lactate Threshold, HOW should this effect my train

In order to cause an adaptation, a muscle must be overloaded. Overload is a basic principle of training.

What applies to a muscle also applies to individual muscle fibers. For a muscle fiber to adapt it must be overloaded. No overload = no adaptation. Insufficient overload = small adaptation.

How do you overload Slow Twitch fibers? You overload them in relation to their individual contractile properties. Because the contractile properties of Slow Twitch fibers are different from those of Fast Twitch A and B fibers, the training to overload Slow Twitch fibers is different than the training that overloads other fiber types.

Would that help explain why training at a relatively slow pace over a long distance is sometimes better than training at a moderately fast pace over the same distance?

Richard_ wrote:

stuff

2006 Chuy's hot trot 5k:

61 Richard Gibbens Austin TX 44 383 32:04.5 35:16.0 3:11.4

10:17/M

If your theories are sound, maybe you should try them yourself and improve that 5k time of yours.

Quote from Richard:

Because of the way muscle fibers are recruited during exercise and because of the individual contractile properties each fiber possesses, any normal training run such as a tempo run only trains a subset of the muscle fibers. In the case of the tempo run, it generally trains the Fast Twitch A fibers. The Slow Twitch and Fast Twitch B are undertrained or untrained during a tempo run.

End quote

Richard, you do not understand muscle fiber recruitment. Let's say a tempo run is at about 10K pace (or 15K pace if one prefers). That intensity is such that slow twitch muscle fibers are being used and type II fibers are also being recruited. The type I's are being trained and additional fibers are being recruited in addition. Most exercise science text books will have a graph showing recruitment. At 80% or more of VO2max (which is where I would place tempo runs) you are close to maximizing the number of type IIa fibers and getting some IIb's as well.

This training makes the type II's more oxidative which is good for an endurance athlete.

[quote]Living in the Past wrote:

You may have very good ST, A type, B type, BII or C type but if your aerobic condition is poor and you don’t train in an easy to moderate pace and your aerobic power is poor because you don’t do adequate tempo runs or your cardiovascular system is poor because you neglect the proper fast training you are a poor performer already. Every training pace follows the same overload training principle than every ST or FT. You need to train at that adequate intensity to enhance that quality. The ST if are prevalent that allows you to take minutes out of your PB but good FT allows you to take out merely some few seconds in a eventually finish sprint with the condition that you have a poor aerobic condition and in that case may be you have good FT that you will finish your run in despair or in exhaustion and no fast pace is possible.

I realise i go a bit trippy and it's outside of your normal mode of thinking so i will try and make it more common sensical.Once an athlete is at their limit in any given training situation there is only one option to keep going, dig deeper to find more. More what? Arthur Lydiard would be saying that when you are pushing your own limits and attempting to continue the body is forced to recruit more muscle fibres, open up previously unused capillary beds and increase the density of both capillaries and mitochondria. In order to recruit more of ourselves we have to use the will to do it. The stronger the will the more likely to recruit more and therefore to keep going.

Richard_ wrote:

In order to cause an adaptation, a muscle must be overloaded. Overload is a basic principle of training.

What applies to a muscle also applies to individual muscle fibers. For a muscle fiber to adapt it must be overloaded. No overload = no adaptation. Insufficient overload = small adaptation.

How do you overload Slow Twitch fibers? You overload them in relation to their individual contractile properties. Because the contractile properties of Slow Twitch fibers are different from those of Fast Twitch A and B fibers, the training to overload Slow Twitch fibers is different than the training that overloads other fiber types.

Firstly, it is fine to say the training for slow twitch is different from the training for fast twitch as you are correct. What is missing is an example of each.

Secondly, the training principle is actually progressive overload. Overload is nowhere near as descriptive and leads to all sorts of incorrect training ideas such as those you have displayed.

In conclusion, it is good you are now making the attempt to practicalise. I applaud you on this, truly. What is almost intolerable is that you are continuing to speak like you know everything, are the expert and are never wrong, perhaps you could take more of the student role at times. We would all appreciate it, be more friendly, and probably listen to you more. And you really need to play the student now that you are bridging over to pratical matters. It just looks silly to claim things as absolutes in an authoritative manner when they clearly contain simple mistakes.

Good on you for pushing this angle though. Most MD coaches in Australia don't go near strength training. They need your message. My agreement in no way supports the central governor theory though.

sim wrote:

wellnow i just have a couple of queries. Firstly, how is Hill wrong? Secondly, i don't understand why the arousal affecting lactate oxidation is an issue. The more aroused one is the more oxygenated they are. Thirdly, i don't know about your definition as it defines itself by what it excludes. Can you Provide something that is inclusive instead?

Hill knew that lactate could be oxidized after intense excercise but he didn't realize that this also happens during excercise, so his O2 debt model was flawed. He thought that above a speed of about 8mph all runners went from an aerobic state into an anaerobic state. We know now that this doesnt happen, and that in a race such as an 800m for example, the further you are into the race, the more energy is coming from aerobic sources.

Living in the Past wrote:

Would that help explain why training at a relatively slow pace over a long distance is sometimes better than training at a moderately fast pace over the same distance?

Not really, but you are on the right path.

There is an inverse relationship between the force a muscle fiber can produce and its level of endurance - the stronger a muscle fiber is the less endurance it has; the weaker a fiber is the more endurance it has.

The body recruits muscle fibers based on the amount of force required to perform the task at hand. Fibers are recruited from weakest to strongest in a cumulative manner as the amount of force needed to produced increases. High and low force task both recruite weaker fibers but the higher force task also recruits stronger fibers that aren't recruited during lower force tasks.

Slow running requires relatively little force so fewer muscle fibers are recruited than during faster paced running. The weaker fibers that are recruited during slow paced training have significant endurance so to train them to overload requires a greater training duration than when training stronger fibers with lesser endurance.

Steve, I agree that there is what could be termed an oxygen debt incurred from the depletion of creatine phosphate, since it requires oxygen for re-sythesis.

To me, the true anaerobic capacity for any runner is more or less maximum speed, or how fast they can run a 60m sprint. Olbrecht measures what he terms anaerobic capacity by lactate testing, but according to him, anaerobci capacity is the maximum production of lactate.

He and Mader say that lactate is produced by the anaerobic system and used by the aerobic system, but I don't agree with this definition, they are simply saying that because glycolysis occurs in the cytosol, that it is part of "the anaerobic system" I think that this confuses the issue.

I posted a lot of stuff a few weeks ago, on these issues, in a sort of random order you may find it interesting or unreadable:

I don't believe that MLSS is really a steady state, becasue I don't believe there is such a thing as a running steady state, because fatigue at any pace increases exponentially. So a 5k is not steady state, but a relative steady state of blood lactate concentration can be observed. Also, in an hour long race, lactate levels can remain more or less constant, or rise or fall even at constant pace, becasue there are several variables affecting BLC.

In order to overload any fiber, you have to fatigue that fiber. But, fibers don't all fatigue at the same time. For example, one study measured a range of fatigue in fast twitch fibers of 16 seconds to 34 minutes. Some of the fibers fatigued as rapidly as 16 seconds. Some contracted more than 30 minutes before they fatigued. (Of course, the 16 second fibers were stronger than the 30+ minute fibers.) If you only exercised for 16 seconds how much overload did you place on those fibers that could exercise for more than 30 minutes before they fatigued? The answer is very little and because of that those fibers won't adapt.

In your muscles right now you have fibers that fatigue in seconds to 10s of seconds (Fast B). Fibers that fatigue in 10s of seconds to 10s of minutes (Fast A). And fibers that fatigue in 10s of minutes to 100s of minutes (Slow Twitch).

The endurance of a fiber strongly influences how long you have to exercise that fiber before it is overloaded and will adapt. Fibers that take 100s of minutes to fatigue are not overloaded much by exercise that lasts 10s of minutes. Fibers that take 10s of minutes to fatigue are not overloaded much by exercise that last less than 10 minutes.

lmt wrote:

I am interested in knowing what you mean by "it's an increase in muscle tone" & "Muscle tone and its influence on running economy, that's what we should be discussing"?

As a massage therapist I am in the business of muscle tone. Too much tone leads to a decrease in movement & pain or constriction of blood , oxygen & nutrients.

Are looking for more or less tone? Thanks.

With that particual quote of mine, I was refering to the fact that fast paced running can have a negative effect on running economy at sub maximal paces, so if you do several all our sprints today, you might find that you are struggling with your longer session tomorrow. This happens because the muslce tone becomes too tense, and your stride is less economical at longer distances. It is a temporary problem though, it does not mean you have lost fitness or overtrained, it just means that you have to be careful with the sequence and timing of different paces to get best results.

Are you looking for more or less tone? Neither really, you are trying to stress the muscles in such a way that when you race, you can adapt to every change of pace and terrain during the race. If the muslce tone is too low, you will lack pace from the beginning and never reall get into the race, if it is too high, you will start fast and then tighten up early and breathing will become laboured too early.

So ideally we need to practice all running paces, but in such a way that we can use those different paces at the right time.

luv2run wrote:

Richard, you do not understand muscle fiber recruitment. Let's say a tempo run is at about 10K pace (or 15K pace if one prefers). That intensity is such that slow twitch muscle fibers are being used and type II fibers are also being recruited. The type I's are being trained and additional fibers are being recruited in addition. Most exercise science text books will have a graph showing recruitment. At 80% or more of VO2max (which is where I would place tempo runs) you are close to maximizing the number of type IIa fibers and getting some IIb's as well.

This training makes the type II's more oxidative which is good for an endurance athlete.

Type I's are active during your example tempo run and are producing force. Type I's also take up to 100s of minutes before they fatigue - in other words many of them can contract at their current rate for 2 hours or more. Let's say the tempo run lasts 40 minutes. How much overload did you place on those Type I's when you stopped exercising them long before they fatigued?

Here's an example most can relate to - you load up a bar with a weight you can lift 20 times. You lift the bar for one rep only and then terminate the exercise. How much overload have you placed on your muscles from that 1 rep? Not much because you stopped long before you fatigued your muscle. And you won't grow from that 1 rep either.

The same thing applies to your individual muscle fibers. They don't all fatigue at the same time and stopping long before a fiber is fatigued doesn't overload that fiber and it won't adapt.

Do you want to try responding to me Richard?

Wellnow

quote

So ideally we need to practice all running paces, but in such a way that we can use those different paces at the right time.

unquote

This is pretty much it for me. Add a little resistance training with enough racing and the picture is quite complete.

I don't think that a lot knowledge of physiology is really compatible with most of the verbal communication between a coach and an athlete, at least not the type of physiology knowledge that I have been cramming over the past few years.

So in that respect, I agree with those who say that we should discuss physiology only in a way that most people can understand. In this respect, my optimum muscle tone approach is very simple and yet related to everything we have discussed on this thread.

Surely everyone understands the concept of improvements in the cardiovascular system that are gained through training. We all understand this on an intuitive level, so we don't really need to explain it in detail to a runner, but changes in muscle tone are very obvious when our legs tighten up, but very subtle in terms of the adaptation of an elite runners huge amount of training and racing. But not too subtle for the layman to want to learn more about.

wellnow wrote:

I don't believe that MLSS is really a steady state, becasue I don't believe there is such a thing as a running steady state, because fatigue at any pace increases exponentially. So a 5k is not steady state, but a relative steady state of blood lactate concentration can be observed. Also, in an hour long race, lactate levels can remain more or less constant, or rise or fall even at constant pace, becasue there are several variables affecting BLC.

How are you defining "a relative steady state of blood lactate concentration"?

Earlier in this thread I mentioned one definition used by researchers measuring MLSS work level, that is, "the highest constant work level over which blood lactate rises no more than 1 mmol between 10 and 30 minutes into the session." Clearly a precise definition of "steady state" must include the amount of variation allowed in the parameter and the observation period over which the parameter must stay within that range.

I don't understand how, if you grasp this concept, you can make the statement highlighted above.

quote

I don't think that a lot knowledge of physiology is really compatible with most of the verbal communication between a coach and an athlete, at least not the type of physiology knowledge that I have been cramming over the past few years.

So in that respect, I agree with those who say that we should discuss physiology only in a way that most people can understand.

unquote

YAY

3 consecutive responses from page 1 of this thread

dumb answer

Why do tempos work? I dunno. You're not really asking me for the answer but if I had to make a very uneducated guess, well, some mechanism for lactate metabolism or whatever the hell probably gets better with practice, whether or not there's a "threshold" per se. Maybe there's also some element of mental toughness, pain tolerance, even "central governor" getting trained at the same time. Maybe it's 3 or 4 or 12 distinct things, chemical, neurological, muscular.

What I do know is, it's well and good to be a physiology hobbyist or professional if that floats your boat, but it probably doesn't give half an iota of advantage over the next guy in terms of knowing how best to train. I'd even suggest it's more likely to hurt since it seems almost impossible for people to avoid overreaching for prescriptive training advice from very specific and very limited descriptive research data... and trusting this unwarranted extrapolation over the solid time-tested knowledge of coaches and athletes for whatever perverse reason.

You see this all the freaking time, here and elsewhere: some stoopid study shows a group of previously untrained subjects who do some arbitrary interval workout get faster than another group who doesn't, and next thing you know everyone things "we gotta do that workout" regardless of whether it makes sense for them and their level of fitness and race goals and what else it displaces in their week et cetera. You have books written (and slavishly followed) based on what some physiologists have concluded most efficiently raises some lab test numbers which in turn tend to correlate fairly well to race performance most of the time, rather than *what freaking works in the real world*.

Take it out of the realm of running for a second. You want to improve your bench press. How do you do that? (Rhetorical question.) Now what exactly does that do for you physiologically? If you can give an expert-level answer to that, does it help you with your lifting? If you can't, does it hurt? Yeah, that's why all the best scientists are the hugest dudes at the gym...

Sorry for the rant. No offense intended toward you specifically; just felt like ranting. Feel free to ignore: I have no special credentials or insight, just an acquired cynicism in this regard. In running, in my own professional field, and all over the map.

dsrunner

Too late here to get into the central governor hypothesis. Some value or impact on training? Of course.

As for the tempo work:

Daniels is one physiologist out of many, and he is a fine one. He likes that 4mmol pace which of course turned out not to be anaerobic, turned out not to be a threshold, turned out not to be 4mmol, turned out not to be a maximal steady state, turned out you could go longer than 20', and turned out to be no better at producing a training effect than other medium to hard training paces. All those fixed blood lactate parameters of old have intercorrelations over .96; though all are reasonably good predictors of performance, that means little in regards to setting up optimal training. Just as one person might need 50 miles/week and one might need 90-100/week, the same sort of individual variation goes for training paces, rep choices, work rest patterns, and diet.

Velocity predicts velocity. That there is no threshold should free you a bit from fixating on a single pace, or doing magical thinking about HR or HR training zones, and altitude. Should pull you away from steady paced work, and help you understand that lactate is not so much the enemy as you've been lead to believe. Hopefully it will help you look at other aspects of training with an open mind.

Lord Kinbote

What "dumb answer" said.

Similar question: If the Sun and all the stars aren't really revolving about a stationary Earth, why did the ancients rely on the motions of the Sun and stars (relative to the Earth) to help them with agriculture?

Answer: Their conceptual model wasn't entirely accurate, but their results were exactly the same as they would have been with today's model, since practical (and amazingly accurate) calculations for timekeeping and for the cycles of seasons - based on many generations of real-world observation, mind you - were the guidelines they followed. Their limited (or total lack of) understanding of the mechanics of the solar system and of the universe in general didn't render the measurements which affected their lives any less accurate.

As with farming, it's practicality that takes center stage in running. Finding a single physical process which pinpoints the exact "threshold" may be an exercise in futitily, but that doesn't matter in the workaday world of running. Whether or not there is a distinct LT, lactate levels do rise with increasing exercise intensity, and correctly executed "tempo" runs will improve your ability to process that lactate for use in energy production, reduce the negative effects of the associated positive ions (or whatever the fudge it is that creates fatigue), accumulate more time in a steady state of unbroken rhythm and harmony, and provide a host of other benefits that you will only come to learn and appreciate when you do enough running.

So if Noakes wants to call some hitherto unidentified exercise gremlin "Central Governor," let him. They might have thought it was strictly a lactate accumulation issue in Ye Olde Days (ah, I shall slay the evil lactate monster - I call him "Lactor"), but it doesn't change the effectiveness of "threshold" running (or the way you should approach it or how often you should use it) one iota.

They might have called the Earth the center of everything and the Sun a "god" a few thousand years ago, while today they see gravity as a property of how matter acts on space, which produces all those celestial motions we see. But none of those motions are changed by our (still limited) understanding of what is behind them. The ancients could have believed the Sun to be a huge flaming booger that got flicked off the end of the finger of some giant nosepicking nerd, who was lurking beneath the horizon of the flat Earth, to blaze a slow path across the sky every new day, and that theory wouldn't have made their tedious calculations of its motions (and the practical application to farming techniques) any less accurate or effective.

sim wrote:

Do you want to try responding to me Richard?

I took it that your comments about me such as "you need to be a student" and "intolerable" meant you weren't actually asking me a question or really expecting a response.

You're right. The knowledge that there's nothing magical about running for 20 minutes at an intesity that produces a blood lactate concentration of 4 millimoles is very liberating.

Richard_ wrote:

Speaking of muscle, today I introduced a new model of how muscles work during and adapt to exercise. I call it the muscle factor model and believe it answers many of the training questions that have been posted on this thread.

Anyone interested in knowing more?

NO, that's about as useful as asking a kindergartener to do calculus.