PETER COE- 'Five kilometre pace running is golden. It eradicates the need for big mileage'

no it's vo2max work not base work

Not so. Coe ran 70-100mi/wk.

the real mobile9 wrote:

Not so. Coe ran 70-100mi/wk.

The thread that decided upon Coe's total mileage got figures of 70-80 as an absolute maximum during base training, 50-60 during racing and 40-50 during peaking. Lets face it, Coe was an very well aerobically conditioned but he also had a LOT of speed-probably something approaching 21.5/45.5 to go along with his 1:41 800m speed and his 3:29 1500m. He definitely came at things from the speed side of things.

Where the hell are you getting "70-100mi/wk a week? I am sure Coe ran more then the 80k/week he often states, as on at least 3 occasions on film he spoke of "hard 10 milers" like they were fairly common, and he didn't count some warmups/cooldowns, but 100 miles per week just doesn't add up.

fUrCeOsNhN wrote:

the real mobile9 wrote:

Not so. Coe ran 70-100mi/wk.

The thread that decided upon Coe's total mileage got figures of 70-80 as an absolute maximum during base training, 50-60 during racing and 40-50 during peaking. Lets face it, Coe was an very well aerobically conditioned but he also had a LOT of speed-probably something approaching 21.5/45.5 to go along with his 1:41 800m speed and his 3:29 1500m. He definitely came at things from the speed side of things.

Where the hell are you getting "70-100mi/wk a week? I am sure Coe ran more then the 80k/week he often states, as on at least 3 occasions on film he spoke of "hard 10 milers" like they were fairly common, and he didn't count some warmups/cooldowns, but 100 miles per week just doesn't add up.

A reply from some guy in that thread:

"i think as much he was talking his mileage down during his career he is now exaggerating "oh i did so and so much and was such a beast", the truth is probably somewhere in between, my guess:60-80mpw during base and 40-60 during track like most other middle-distance cracks."

another one:

"The catch is that there are those logbooks in Coe's own handwriting that Marius and others have seen, the comments by Peter Coe, along with Horwill, in the various BMC Journals saying that 70 mpw was tops, and some of the comments that Seb himself has written--for attribution that say otherwise.

And against this we have the word of a single letsrun poster the Lord Coe to HIM something different.

Unless there's independent corroboration, I have to call the whole thing bullshit"

This kind of stuff is why, when the same "discussion" occurred in the monster Renato thread, I tried to encourage Marius to lay the facts out there, because Marius was coached by Peter Coe and has actually seen the logbooks. And the number Marius came out with was 45 mpw, NOT counting warmups and cooldowns, so the total number comes to 70 mpw max--and this is a number that Peter has mentioned a number of times in the British Milers Club Journal.

More:

"Anybody who coaches the Horwill system (I do for track only) knows that the volume that can be tolerated is less than for other methods because of all the training close to race pace. Mortals can't normally handle much more than 40 mpw while hitting all five paces, and Coe getting in 60-70 plus all the weight work puts him in the El Guerrouj "superman" (to use Antonio's word) level. 100 mpw would be more like the steroid-enhanced level."

I think Coe certainly was not the 40-50 mpw man he claimed to be, but probably more of a 70-80 mpw man on average. Maybe a high week would be in the 90s.

One thing is for certain, in that thread either the Coe from the 80s (40-50) lied about his training or the Coe from now (100)is lying about his training. Personally I think neither of them are completely truthfull and the real figure is somewhere in the middle.

What is apparent for Coe, is not the idea of mileage, but that the strength factor (weights, Plyos, circuits, etc.) in combination with steady running - nothing was slow (not unlike El G either)- is the basis of his development. His 800m time at 19 (1.53.8) and after 5 years of training, isn't very fast for someone known for "speed" and who runs 1.42.3 four years later. Thanks to George Gandy (Loughborough), the basic endurance that was developed (3.45 1500/8.14 3000) at that point was consolidated with strength to produce a world record-holder. I have always felt that Cram had a better training format - some of the Coe stuff wasn't as developmental to that time than perhaps it might (the mistakes of a learning curve for a coach - Peter Coe - not previously involved in the sport) - but didn't do the extra stuff (weights, etc.) that the Coes incorporated. The "no stones unturned" philosophy, that was the main benefit that Peter Coe brought to his coaching.

As to Webb, he has been trying to be "all things" too much instead of identifying himself primarily as an 800/1500m guy. There is no reason for him to "move up", but time is running out as he is getting older if he wants to make a greater mark as a middle-distance runner. The difficulty seems to be his decision as to "type" - is he an 800m/1500m runner (like Coe, Cram, Elliott, etc.), and it's difficult as there are fewer people who double at these two events these days, or is he a 1500/5000m runner (like El G.) This is where the lack of planning (managing a career) has been apparent in that there has been almost a flip-flop back and forth at times. Having got to the 3.46 Mile level, it's a matter of what to do with it, and where to go from there. Hopefully 2009 provides some answers, which might relegate 2008 to an unfortunate "blip" in a still developing career.

If you take Coe's 60mi week and adding 2x2mi for four days a week for his warm ups and cool downs, you're up to a 76mi week. Then, add in the morning 8km easy jog he'd run (but not record, because part of the specific workout), all you need is three jobs to get over a 90mi week.

When people like Snell and Ian Stewart who've spoken with Coe on the subject say he's run this much, I tend to believe them.

the real mobile9 = trackhead

Peter Coe coached one athlete. He's never tailored his theories to anyone other than Seb.

the real mobile9 wrote:

If you take Coe's 60mi week and adding 2x2mi for four days a week for his warm ups and cool downs, you're up to a 76mi week. Then, add in the morning 8km easy jog he'd run (but not record, because part of the specific workout), all you need is three jobs to get over a 90mi week.

When people like Snell and Ian Stewart who've spoken with Coe on the subject say he's run this much, I tend to believe them.

When someone like Bakken, who has read Seb´s logs, say´s he didn´t, I tend to believe him.

Coe did a lot of miles - too much to suggest that he didn't. the golden 5 k sessions were late winter / early spring. During winter he was packing in the miles like the rest of them.

This is sort of a repeat of the other thread on Seb Coe mileage.

I 1996 when I was coached by Peter as a young 800/1500m meter runner I stayed in the house of Peter Coe for 2 weeks in the summer. In his office, right accross my room there, he had on all the training diaries of Seb and I was allowed to look at it.

In addition to this I have parts of the training diary of Seb (in his hand-writing) at home here in Norway + was myself coached by Peter Coe from 1996 to 1998 - with day-to-day training sessions from him.

So I have a very good idea of the mileage he was doing. And it wasn't as high as some people want it to be. But the quality of each and every run usually (not always in the summer though) much more aerobic quality than most are used to.

Marius

Marius,

How much do you believe Seb was doing in the middle of Winter - total miles?

How many 14 milers did he do - was it weekly? 10 milers - were they regular in winter? How far were the morning runs? Did he train twice a day reguarly?

Your last post doesn't really tell us a lot.

to actually reply to your question a great 5k session would be:-

6/8 X 1200 with 3 mins rec.

10/12 X 800 with 2 mins rec.

to start with you may want to break them into two. with a 5/6 min rest in the middle.

but the general rule is for a 5k session or any pace session is to cover twice the distance and give yourself 30 seconds rest for every 200 metres covered. This will be hard to cover twice the distance. but start out just covering the 5k and then add each week.

hope this actually answers your question. GL

Just because it wasn't in the log doesn't mean he didn't do it. Going just from the log without full explanation from Peter or Seb is simplistic.

High School Musical on Ice wrote:

Just because it wasn't in the log doesn't mean he didn't do it. Going just from the log without full explanation from Peter or Seb is simplistic.

You are stupid.

brit coach wrote:

to actually reply to your question a great 5k session would be:-

6/8 X 1200 with 3 mins rec.

10/12 X 800 with 2 mins rec.

. . .

the general rule is for a 5k session or any pace session is to cover twice the distance and give yourself 30 seconds rest for every 200 metres covered. This will be hard to cover twice the distance. but start out just covering the 5k and then add each week.

I agree with you that it is very difficult to cover 2x the 5k distance at 5k-pace. In fact, I would say it's so difficult as to render the workout less useful than it could be (recovery could take so long as to hurt the week/cycle's other quality sessions).

Especially for an 800/1500 guy, I think 6k-8k of running at 5k pace is fine. 8 x 800 w/ 2 mins-to-equal rest and 5-6 x 1200 w/ 3 mins-to-equal rest are both staple 5k-paced workouts that can be done every week during the pre-comp and early-comp phases for mid-d guys.

Also, I really like workouts that work on fast, easy running: 20 x 400 @ goal 5k pace w/ 60s recovery is a great, high-volume and high-quality VO2 workout. It's a good one to do every few weeks towards the end of your base phase as a transition to tougher 5k-paced workouts.

I would either do 20X400 @ 5k pace with 30 seconds recovery instead or do 20X400 @3k pace with the 60 seconds. Getting a 60s break after what should be a relatively easy 400m is too much.

High School Musical on Ice wrote:

Just because it wasn't in the log doesn't mean he didn't do it. Going just from the log without full explanation from Peter or Seb is simplistic.

I you cared to read Marius post he said that he actually stayed at Peter´s house and that he was coached by him, so I think that it is safe to assume that he knows at lot more about Seb´s mileage than the LetsRun crowd.