Richard, it really seems like you're passive-aggressively trying to pick a fight here. The vast majority of your site is good science, but you seem to have drawn the line in the sand around your most ridiculous positions. that's no way to reach a meaningful consensus here.
pissing into the ocean wrote:
The reason nobody harped on the muscles is because it was so dadburn obvious running muscles were being used to run
One would think that if muscles were so dadburn important that our conversations would center around how to make those muscles perform better, faster, more powerfully. People focus on what is important to them. They don't say "xyz is really important but I'm not going to talk about it, think about it, discuss it, debate it, or focus on improving it. In fact, I'm pretty much going to ignore it and talk about, focus on, discuss, debate, and work on improving other things that aren't so dadburn important"
Richard,
We always talk about how to make our muscles run faster, occasionally with the idea of getting more oxygen to them. Again, your lack of understanding of the sport is showing.
Pete,
Feel free to speak for me. Never a problem.
Richard_ wrote:One would think that if muscles were so dadburn important that our conversations would center around how to make those muscles perform better, faster, more powerfully.
Well, dadgummitheckshootratscrudfiddlesticksdarn, you'd think that if you didn't realize this entire topic is one of many Ex. Phys. equivalents of punching the clown. It matters not one bronze farthing in a practical sense because, lo and behold, when we run to make our cardiovascular and pulmonary systems stronger and more extensive and more efficient, we ***are*** making our running muscles perform better, faster, more powerfully. Rest assured thousands of runners have been testing and refining any techniques these "new" findings might imply for a long enough time to have already determined how to best fit them into an overall running routine.
Guys,
I love how you are arguing for the role of muscle in performance. Keep up the good work.
mmmm wrote:
I see physiology and the rise of the physiologist as a major harming influence in our sport. Unfortunately they talk in the same language as the administrators whereas coaches are talking a somewhat different langauge. So they have gained power in the systems around the world. No good i think. I really like Renato as he appears to be able to us your language to describe what he does in a training sense. Cabral is also along similar lines. I'm sure there are others.
My own coach was Soviet trained. This meant that he went to university and studied coaching for 4 years and coached in that system for 15. Then he came to Australia in his 40s and has been coaching here for the last 25 years. He knows how the physiology fits as he was taught it directly and has applied it for 40 years. The science is not what he uses to understand the sport. He uses coaching theory or as Cabral would put it coaching technique. Different field of knowledge to physiology. Very very different.
An example of this crap relates to the guy that used to work in the same office as Efim. Both worked for the Ais (Australian Institute of Sport). Norm Osbourne is the guy i'm talking about. Basically he coached an athlete to 7 consecutive Olympics before Sydney. he coacher rick mitchell to a silver medal in Mexico, coached Mike Hillardt who some of you might know of and more recently coached Marg Leaney to 5th in the 1500m at Atlanta. Before Atlanta he had a revieew of his position. A panel decided to re-interview him and was made up of administartors, sports scientists and one coach who was of the wrong mind already. they said how are you going to use the physiologists from now on. He said i don;t need them as i have my own system of testing and analysis. He didn't have his position renewed. A very unjust situation led about by having the wrong people making the decisions.
But i think phsyiology is a great peripheral science. I just think we need some of you guys to know the practical side as well. Possibly this is why Peter Snell who has some serious credentials says differently to most physiologists. he was saying run slower to race faster all along. Now it's in vogue because 'the central governor theory supports it? Not on the front line where the coaches are interacting with the athletes. There it's about self honesty more than anything else really. In a schema of relative importance i would say that self honesty is number one from a coaching perspective. If you can encourage the athlete to start being truly honest with themselves half the job is already done. do we need to get some psychologists to speak to us about this self honesty. I really don't think so.
Let me just create a little sidebar here from the main discussion; I would like to comment on the issues of coaches versus physiologists, and what I see as the role of each one.
Without doubt, physiology and indeed all sports sciences are the "in" thing right now; the very latest craze. Loaded with seductive terminology and sophisticated scientific concepts. The growing influence of academic studies, combined with the ready availability of testing apparatus has made this possible. Yet if you take some time and go deeply into analyzing the way that many of them use science, you will realize that much of that science can be termed "copy and paste" science.
I have come to term such protagonists "copy and paste" scientists. They read and study some subject somewhere, and then "copy and paste" it as their own. When they present it, their findings are lauded as "the very latest study" or "the ultimate study" or the "new research". In fact, many experiments and lab tests are done far away from the reality of the running world — often with rats instead of human beings. They rarely test real athletes, often never going near any runners at all. They formulate conclusions based upon "unreal" experiments (in the sense of "divorced from running reality"). At best, it might be the case that testing protocols are conducted on 3:30 marathon runners, or 5k runners who can only manage 18:00 minutes. Such low case profiles are very common and yet is is based on them that general principles are drawn. These are what I refer to as "copy and paste" physiologists.
I feel very sure that among the other reasons for the drop in the quality of non-African performances in distance running since the 1980s, one of them has to do with adopting a style of training built upon a foundation of scientific data.
The rise of the Africans themselves has also contributed to the drop in quality of non-Africans. But the fact that some scientists and physiologists and experts from others areas have muscled in to take over and lead the coaching process, instead of leaving it in the hands of the coach, has in my opinion contributed negatively in the design and definition of training programs.
In our modern Western civilization we appear to have forgotten the simple value of effort for its own sake, and yet Africans everyday demonstrate to us that it is important/vital to exercise as a fundamental part of daily life.
At the same time I also criticize those young apprentice coaches who feel they have to learn physiology first, instead of learning basic training principles, as also contributing to the rise of poorly designed training programs.
Understanding training methodology must be the fundamental primary discipline if you expect to be a coach. It is vitally important for those who study to be running coaches, as well as physiologists and other scientists who intend to work with runners, that they all first study and learn training methodology.
The curriculum of such training methodology must include (among other subjects); running history (including the facts and figures); training systems down through history; training technique and the training schedules of top runners of every era. Doing so will increase the knowledge of the sports scientists and all other students that hope to deal with runners, and expect to interact with, and influence middle and long-distance training. This is where they need to get grounded in "running culture". They need to understand the sport from a runner's perspective and not merely from an academic one.
Now when I say the coach should lead the management of the coaching process, and not "outsource" or defer that leadership and responsibility to the scientist, or doctor or physiologist, I believe that some coaches are not really coaches in my sense of the word. While it might be important to be accepted and accorded the status of a coach, each one must be careful not to become a "copy and paste" coach, like there are "copy and paste" scientists.
We hear it said that each runner is an individual case, and that not everyone can do the same training, even if they are all training for the same distance event. In the same way, we need coaches who are individuals, and not "copy and paste" coaches.
What I would refer to as a "real" coach, is someone with his own individual opinion about training; someone who has constructed his own individual training method. Someone who considers himself a coach, and then names another coach, or another's training method to describe the training method he uses, is not a real coach in my mind. He is simply a "copy and paste" coach, like the aforementioned scientists.
Of course this is not to deny that a true coach cannot have influences; but being influenced by the work of another coach does not mean merely copying him, or his system, word for word. Being influenced suggests studying and analyzing the work of another coach and drawing from it your own proper conclusions; it has nothing to do with "copy and paste". To my mind, each real coach, each bona fide genuine coach is a unique case with his own individual and unique training method, in exactly the same way that there are often runners who are quite unique and like no-one else.
Post on “Cabral & Hadd thread” - 2 kinds of runners. Which are you? Subject: "More than one approach to running and racing"
http://www.letsrun.com/forum/flat_read.php?thread=2375989Damn Antonio, you beat me to it. As soon as I read this post on the other thread, I copied a bit of it to paste over here for discussion.
Very interesting and provocative words in there.... I like it!
Of course, the irony of this whole idiotic thread is that while Richard claims his "findings" are so revolutionary, at the same time he admits that they do not suggest changes in the way we train.
So, in the real world, they are not revolutionary but completely useless.
Even if there was any actual fact buried in there and he had the ability to understand and interpret science over the 5th grade level.
Pete wrote:
Damn Antonio, you beat me to it. As soon as I read this post on the other thread, I copied a bit of it to paste over here for discussion.
Very interesting and provocative words in there.... I like it!
Agreed. If Antonio's post weren't so long it would have to be the quote of the day.
It's not just science, Richard lacks reading skills. A fine example of his deficiency can be seen earlier in this thread in an exchange with HRE. HRE laid out why posters on Letrun have blasted Richard in the past, and Richard takes HRE's opinion out of context and welcomes HRE to the 'muscle camp' or some such bull shit. It's amazing anyone has ever taken Richard seriously in spite of the man's inexistent comprehension skills.
Just to be clear - I wasn't trying to take "sides" in this discussion - I just thought Antonio's comments were particularly interesting in the context of this thread.
I'll admit I personally think Richard's training philosophy for distance running is ridiculous, at least in the context of non-beginners (as I understand it - again, through the fog of a bad memory). But I enjoy reading ideas that are a little (or a lot) "out there," as they can often stimulate interesting debate. And part of me likes to cheer for the little guy with the radical new idea facing the onslaught of opposition trying to crush him. Even if he deserves to be crushed. Because I'm in the same boat in my chosen profession, swimming upstream against the strong current of accepted wisdom. So I can relate, to some degree.
Apologies for the interruption. Back to the argument...
obscured by clouds wrote:
wellnow wrote:Richard_, last night after training I came to the conclusion that I don\'t accept the Hill/Noakes central governor hypothesis.
My reason was that, the heart outperforms all other muscles by a huge margin, because it is constantly excercised and therefore has vastly superior contractility to the skeletal muscles.
Isn´t the heart a muscle also indeed ?
Maybe your vision is cloudy, or maybe you should learn to read.
Richard_ wrote:
wellnow wrote:Richard_, last night after training I came to the conclusion that I don't accept the Hill/Noakes central governor hypothesis.
My reason was that, the heart outperforms all other muscles by a huge margin, because it is constantly excercised and therefore has vastly superior contractility to the skeletal muscles. And thus, a healthy heart is never in danger of failure in athletic competition since the performance of the skeletal muscles are much more limiting.
Only in an extreme case such as life threatening dehydration, poisoning, or viral attack, does the heart's performance become compromised.
wellnow,
My understanding of the central govenor was that it applied to all parts of the body, not just the heart. Anytime any part of the body reaches some critical level, the central governor responds to protect the body from irrepairable harm or death. If my understanding is correct, then the belief that the heart is never at risk doesn't negate the central governor model.
Richard, Hill/Noakes' central governor hypothesis relates mostly to the protection of the heart:
Evidence that a central governor regulates exercise performance during acute hypoxia and hyperoxia
Timothy D. Noakes1,*, Juha E. Peltonen2 and Heikki K. Rusko3
Accepted July 10, 2001
An enduring hypothesis in exercise physiology holds that a limiting cardiorespiratory function determines maximal exercise performance as a result of specific metabolic changes in the exercising skeletal muscle, so-called peripheral fatigue. The origins of this classical hypothesis can be traced to work undertaken by Nobel Laureate A. V. Hill and his colleagues in London between 1923 and 1925. According to their classical model, peripheral fatigue occurs only after the onset of heart fatigue or failure. Thus, correctly interpreted, the Hill hypothesis predicts that it is the heart, not the skeletal muscle, that is at risk of anaerobiosis or ischaemia during maximal exercise. To prevent myocardial damage during maximal exercise, Hill proposed the existence of a ‘governor’ in either the heart or brain to limit heart work when myocardial ischaemia developed. Cardiorespiratory function during maximal exercise at different altitudes or at different oxygen fractions of inspired air provides a definitive test for the presence of a governor and its function. If skeletal muscle anaerobiosis is the protected variable then, under conditions in which arterial oxygen content is reduced, maximal exercise should terminate with peak cardiovascular function to ensure maximum delivery of oxygen to the active muscle. In contrast, if the function of the heart or some other oxygen-sensitive organ is to be protected, then peak cardiovascular function will be higher during hyperoxia and reduced during hypoxia compared with normoxia. This paper reviews the evidence that peak cardiovascular function is reduced during maximal exercise in both acute and chronic hypoxia with no evidence for any primary alterations in myocardial function. Since peak skeletal muscle electromyographic activity is also reduced during hypoxia, these data support a model in which a central, neural governor constrains the cardiac output by regulating the mass of skeletal muscle that can be activated during maximal exercise in both acute and chronic hypoxia.
So, in light of the above, I restate my point that I have changed my mind and no longer accept the Hill/Noakes central governor hypothesis, becasue I believe that the heart outperforms all other muscles by a huge margin, because it is constantly excercised and therefore has vastly superior contractility to the skeletal muscles. And thus, a healthy heart is never in danger of failure in athletic competition since the performance of the skeletal muscles are much more limiting.
Only in an extreme case such as life threatening dehydration, poisoning, or viral attack, does the heart's performance become compromised.
Richard_ wrote:
Pete,
I guess since I've encountered so many people over the years arguing that it was all about oxygen and with no chapters in any running books on the role of muscle in performance but multiple chapters devoted to topics like VO2max & lactate threshold that I just didn't realize that the running community already recognized the full importance of muscle in performance and that it was a small but vocal minority that was arguing against the muscle power model and writing books focused on the cardiovascular/anaerobic model.
I guess we really can officially declare the debate to be over. Muscle power is now officially recognized as being at least as important as any other physiological factor in performance (and, for some of us, more important than other factors that were previously preached as being most important before the debate ended).
Now that it is official, I vote we change some names:
from "aerobic base building" to "slow twitch fiber training"
from "aerobic" to "fast twitch A"
from "anaerobic" to "fast twitch B"
from "tempo runs" to "power runs"
We can start with those and make other changes later.
I agree that the initial improvements of "aerobic base training" pertain mostly to improving the mitochondrial denstiy of slow twitch fibers, (which takes 3-6 weeks) but after that, aerobic base building involves making fast twitch fibers more oxidative (aerobic) Also, the muscle fiber classifications cannot be simplistically labelled since their are many variabilities.
Anyway Richard, you shouldn't be lecturing us on training, because your lack of coaching knowledge and training experience is obvious to all of us.
Let me put it this way, if you trained like me, you would become a very fast runner, but the fact that you don't believe that makes you predjudiced against the good training methods that so many here espouse.
Antonio Cabral wrote:
.
I feel very sure that among the other reasons for the drop in the quality of non-African performances in distance running since the 1980s, one of them has to do with adopting a style of training built upon a foundation of scientific data.
]
I suggest that some of you ex phys geeks read this over and
over again.
spaniel wrote:
Of course, the irony of this whole idiotic thread is that while Richard claims his "findings" are so revolutionary, at the same time he admits that they do not suggest changes in the way we train.
So, in the real world, they are not revolutionary but completely useless.
You might want to review what I said since your description of what I said is not accurate.
Richard wrote earlier in this thread:
Ever notice how many different training methods there are out there? It's probably safe to say that pretty much every reasonably distinct training method has been tried at some point by some number of people. There isn't much new under the sun, as the saying goes.
And, all over the world right now different groups are using different training programs. While all training methods have some components in common they all also have real differences.
So, there are probably no training methods that haven't been tried at some point, but there also isn't any real consensus on which particular training method works best.
In light of these facts it shouldn't come as any surprise that new physiological facts don't produce new training methods. How could they when basically every distinct training method has been tried?
What physiology and training research does, though, is help determine which training methods work better than others. And it can help explain why one method works better than another. In other words, physiology is unlikely to produce some radical new training method; instead it is likely to help refine training methods - to help eliminate less effective methods and focus training on those methods proven to better than other methods.
I agree, and that's why I argue with the ex phys geeks.
Wellnow,
I recommend you look at Noakes later work on the Central Governor to ensure you have a full understanding of it. You might start with his 2004 review paper, Complex systems model of fatigue.
wellnow wrote:
I agree that the initial improvements of "aerobic base training" pertain mostly to improving the mitochondrial denstiy of slow twitch fibers, (which takes 3-6 weeks) but after that, aerobic base building involves making fast twitch fibers more oxidative (aerobic)
wellnow,
It appears you have fallen behind the times. Your description of the adaptations that occur during base building are completely focused on changes in aerobic energy production - i.e. changes in mitochondrial density and changes in oxidative capabilities of fast twitch fibers. It is a fairly typical response from the small minority who still believe in the primacy of the cardiovascular/anerobic model.
This thread has shown that the majority of the running community now believes that changes within the muscle fibers ability to contract are at least as important as any changes in other bodily systems. So, while there are changes in aerobic energy production as you have pointed out, changes in muscle fiber force capacity, speed of contraction, muscle protein content & makeup, change in CSA, power output, etc are at least as important if not more so and, necessarily, should be listed when talking about important physiological adaptations that lead to improvement.