... if so why?
... if so why?
What the hell does this mean? Too fast is too fast for SOME reason. Stick to the Daniels pace.
The point of a true tempo-run is to help your body deal with lactic acid. You run them @, or just below your LT to work on this. If you run them faster, you defeat the purpose. It's still a workout, but it's no longer a tempo-run.
It's not harmful to training. It's harmful to racing.
If you run tempos too fast, they become intervals...
Same reason as running every other workout too fast: It impairs the ability to recover and run the next workout hard enough.
Any physiology geeks want to get even more technical about it?
I guess I would argue that you are still providing a substantial stimulus for your body interms of dealing with lactic acid. I don't think that slightly below or slightly above LT makes much of a difference. If you have ever perfomed the test, as a researcher, and analyzed the data you know there is quite a bit of grey area and subjectivity in determining the lactate threshold.
The idea is that it's an intensity that is moderate to difficult and can be sustained for a reasonable amount of time 20-30 minutes, maybe longer and it is correlated with endurance running performance.
Of course there is a pretty good argument that there really is no such thing as a lactate threshold and it just appears to be a threshold based on the protocols used, see Brooks Fahey and White textbook.
eraserhead wrote:
Any physiology geeks want to get even more technical about it?
The idea of a tempo run is to run at a pace that is as fast as possible without making your muscles weak. The blood acidity is what makes your muscles weak. Using the aerobic energy system does NOT make your muscles weak at all. It's the acidity which is a result of using the anaerobic energy system which makes your muscles weak.
You are training both systems with a tempo run. You are getting the maximum aerobic training possible while using the anaerobic system at a point where your ability to maintain a blood PH level that does not make you noticeably weak.
If you exceed this pace, you risk overtraining and possible overuse issues due to the increasing blood acidity. We always used to say that "You only get injured when you get weak or really tired".
If you run a tempo run too fast, you are nearly racing which will leave you too tired to train properly over the next couple days.
As I understand it, you can improve your lactate threshold by working both above and below it.
The nice thing about working just below your LT is that it doesn't fatigue you that much, and you're then ready to go for another workout sooner. Working just faster than your LT can be a great stimulus too though, so don't feel like you've ruined anything if you run a little faster than you planned. Just make sure you're recovered before your next significant effort.
Had Some Myself wrote:
As I understand it, you can improve your lactate threshold by working both above and below it.
Working just faster than your LT can be a great stimulus too though, so don't feel like you've ruined anything if you run a little faster than you planned. Just make sure you're recovered before your next significant effort.
You actually might end up ruining something if you keep pushing too hard in your tempo runs. Your cell membranes and red blood cell formation can actually sustain damage with continual highly acidic blood conditions. Since it's necessary to put yourself into that state with speedwork and interval training, so you are really risking too much time in the acid if you go too fast with your tempo runs.
You are far better off pushing your distance runs and intervals (higher intensity and less reps) than your tempo pace. Your short term recovery is far less important than the potential for long term damage from too much time in the acid.
You should clarify what you mean by "tempo":
Aerobic threshold?
or
Anaerobic threshold ?
It depends on a lot of things you didn't say. How long and how often are you running these "fast" tempos? How much faster are you going? What else are you doing the rest of the week? Are you recovered enough for your next planned workout?
Daniels talks about "cruise intervals" which are like fast tempos.
Tinman talks about "critical velocity" pace, which I recall is like a 45-minute race pace (or is it 5K pace/0.93), which is just a bit faster than tempo.
"Fast" tempos can have a place, in a multi-paced training plan. The question goes beyond a single workout being too fast, but how it balances the rest of your training.
Hmmm, then he will also have to clarify what he means by "Aerobic threshold" and "Anaerobic Threshold"?I've always thought of "tempo" as in "rhythm". Seems like linking it to any thresholds just generates too much useless discussion.The training goal for tempo runs is to build stamina.Regards,
777 wrote:
You should clarify what you mean by "tempo":
Aerobic threshold?
or
Anaerobic threshold ?
777 wrote:
You should clarify what you mean by "tempo":
"Tempo" is associated with Anaerobic Threshold, aka Lactate Threshold (LT).
It can be defined as the maximum sustained pace where your production of blood acidity = your ability to "buffer" or neutralize that acid.
It is not maximal aerobic level or max heartrate. That is really the purpose of interval training and you don't get up to that level if tempo runs are done correctly or incorrectly.
However, if you push past your LT, you continue to increase your blood acidity, which makes your muscles less efficient, which makes them work harder, which creates more acid, which makes them less efficient, etc....spiral.
Your tempo run just became an acid bath.
And consider another factor - when you do an interval, say 800m, you become quite acidic for about the last minute of that interval, then might take another full minute to bring your blood PH back below where you might sustain it during your tempo run. Not really that long. But if you push a 20 minute tempo run, you might have very acidic blood for a full 15 minutes or more. Highly acidic blood is not a healthy state, especially when sustained for many minutes. At least in an actual race you get a good VO2 workout.
I really don't think this is an issue. The blood really doesn't get very acidic because it has a huge buffering capacity, thankfully.
And, furthermore it is more an issue with more recently formed red blood cells as mature red blood cells are less fragile. Well to a point as it does seem to be the case that red blood cells become more fragile near the end or their life cycle for lack of a better term.
Physio,
Go with how you feel, if you can, go faster.
Like one of the fastest milers ever told me, 'when you can see stars, then you are training'.
If you run a tempo run too fast, you are nearly racing which will leave you too tired to train properly over the next couple days.best answer so far.
I suggest the best way to train is to lock yourself in a closet so you never run. I mean if running too fast or too long will make you worse, then not running EVER must have the opposite effect!
Brilliant!
The answer is none of the above. A tempo run that is too fast is just that...a fast run. Sure it will take some time to recover from. Do you get anything from that training? Of course. You receive benefits from any sort of training. You have basically run a time trial. It's not something you'd do every day or even every week but every now and then a blacked out 3 miler will do you some good because you feel what racing should feel like. I have a degree in exercise science, I could tell you all sorts of enlightening details about what is happening inside your body but would that matter? Exercise phys guys aren't coaches, they aren't trained to coach, they are trained to explain what is happening at the metabolic level.
Effective training is found on the road and the track and the field, not in a lab. Start with that. Finish or back up with ex. phys.
Let's say you are training for a 5k. So you run "Vo2max intervals", 800s-1600s. You also run "tempo runs" at the exact effort all the geeks say to do them. Then you get into a race and the pace feels great...for about a mile. You want to train to run a fast race...then run fast. Go run a 5k time trial, once a month, maybe once every two weeks. All alone, no pacers. Go out too hard? Work on pacing, work on overdistance intervals and miles and hard runs (tempos). Don't finish hard enough or just an even but slow pace? Work on speed, shorter "vo2max intervals". Use your brain, not a text book.
Alan