Authentic Training Log - Seb Coe

Martin,

But this is the four weeks leading up to LA. No one disputes to low volume there. It's in his offseason training that's in dispute.

wow way to pull that one out of better training for distance runners second edition pg. 376. But like trackhead said that is before the olympics so obviously he wouldn't be running his max volume. However, on pg. 211 of the same book the suggested mileage for middle distance runners (800m-3000m) is between 70-80 miles a week during phase X2. So I think seb coe likely ran 70-80 miles a week during his build up phase.

That was a very bad stunt there Martin.

"Week 2 ? 36 miles

Mon 16 July: The first of the harder tempos runs: AM after warm-up, 6x800 m @ 2:00 with 3 min recovery; cool-down of 2 laps @90 sec pace followed by easy jogging; PM 4 miles easy

Tue 17 July: The first cadence session: AM 5 miles easy; PM after warm-up, 10x100 m steady acceleration to 60m, maximum speed to 80m, then float to 100m, walk back to start position and repeat.

Wed 18 July: Progressing from the Saturday 300m session but run 2 sec slower and as a single set ? AM after warm-up, 6x300m @41 sec, with 2 min recover; cool-down of 2 laps @90-sec pace followed by easy jogging; PM 4 miles easy.

Thu 19 July: Short intervals to sharpen speed and still maintain a good heart/lung stimulus but keeping mileage low ? AM after warm-up, 20x200m @27/28 sec; cool-down of 2 laps @90-sec pace followed by easy jogging. PM 5 miles easy

Fri 20 July: Adjusting to increasing speed with increasing distance ? 11 sprints, progressing in distance from 100m to 200m in 10m increments, @14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25 sec, with jog-back recovery to the start position.

Sat 21 July: Maintained endurance run, but without locking into a set pace ? 6-7 miles including mixed accelerations (mini-fartlek).

Sun 22 July: Complete rest from running ? traveled to LA and processed into Olympic Village."

I'm not being funny here, but I've just added up the mileage from that week. Each speed session, I've added a 2M warm up and cool down, and I come up with close to 60M.

How can this be logged in as 38? It's a ridiculous claim.

Martin, sit down and add them up, then tell me what you find.

Now bear in mind this is well into his racing season, and you can see why people doubt Seb Coe's claims of low mileage...

mon AM: 2M warm up + 6x800m (3min recovery, which I assumed he jogged) approx 4M + 2 laps 1/2M + 2M warm down

Total= 8 1/2M

mon PM: 4M

etc...

The words "shoot" and "foot" come to mind... ;-)

Note also Martin that Coe's 4M easy runs would merely have taken him 25mins, which sounds a bit on the short side for a session. I have taken these at face value, but you could speculate whether again warm ups and warm downs should be included, which would -again- bump Coe's mileage up...

I readily admit to being buyest on the issue, and there are a couple of reasons why it is so:

- I consider claiming you did a lower mileage than actually was the case is a form of self-promotion... 'Look at what I achieved, and I wasn't even training that much'; as I've said it all amounts to creating a mystique of the prodigy runner, and denying the amount of hard work it takes to get there.

- However, I don't particularly consider Coe and his dad are the main perpetuators of that mystique... but it all breaks down when other people start using Coe's training as an example of the 'less is more' approach. Horwill is frequently guilty of that: he'll try to translate Coe's low-mileage approach to long-distance running and will start making outrageous claims (i.e. you can run a world class marathon on 70/80 miles a week!!!). Now this really gets up my nose. To compensate for the low-mileage, Horwill will have his athletes doing outrageously hard sessions: he often mentions a 10M at half-marathon pace session... Well if I could do 10M at half-marathon pace in the course of a week's training, assuming that I am training to set a half-marathon pb, I would quite gladly carry on for the extra 3M and set that pb there and then!

There's no denying Coe was a great athlete, but when you get quoted weeks of 36M, you have to start asking yourself questions... And when other coaches start to use this example to promote their own low-mileage approaches to long-distance running, you can't help but feel this is doing more harm to distance running than good. Kids think (on a very basic level): I'm doing the same mileage as Seb Coe, yet he's world class and I'm nowehere... He must be a prodigy, and I'm not. Then they give up...

flamboyant I totally agree with everything you say here

Martin I just added up week 3 which is supposedly 31 miles.

including warm ups and cool downs it's more like 45-50

Martin wrote:

Sun: 15 July: Easy run of 6 miles for recovery, rest rehabilitation and ?charging the battery?.

Sat 12 August: AM easy jogging as desired; race 1,500m final.

Never mind the mileage totals, what's this, "Easy run of 6 miles for recovery, rest rehabilitation and ?charging the battery?." How friggin' British gay can you get? Why can't the guy just go for an easy 6 and leave it at that?

Back to the mileage totals: I've always thought this supposed 4-week schedule is what Daddy Coe wrote out, not what actually happened. If it's a true log, why are there things like "easy jogging as desired"? Why wouldn't it say whether that easy jogging actually occurred?

flamboyant -

If you possess bias (on any issue) you would be biased, not "buyest".

I agree with what you say, but maybe run your stuff through a spell-checker before posting and we will take you even more seriously.

Swell speller,

Thanks for pointing this out... But then English is not my native tongue... What's your French like?

Even if you add up ONLY the stated miles of training (i.e. no warmup miles), the mileage doesn't add up to the stated totals. This is one of the many discrepancies which render the Coe-Martin book as marginal at best, basically a waste of cellulose.

I also dislike how the more extensive seasonal training schedules provided are for when Seb was a teen. How about showing us the big picture of how the MAN trained, not the BOY.

I have a hard time with the idea of S.Coe only run low miles, and got to the top. But regrdless I also have problems with the idea that Lassie V. ran 200miles a week with a lot of them at a pace of 8min a mile or slower and will able to race at near 4min a mile pace. It would seem to me that the if there is one rule in running that has been proven time and time again it is that diffrent things work for diffrent people and what really counts is that one makes the choice to get to the top. I did not want to start up the milage post, in an atempt to say that Coe was being disshonest. All's what I wanted to do was see if anyone had any idea how he was able to do what he did useing the training that he did. The question to me is not did he train the way he sead he trained. But what aspects of that trainng made hem so good.

Unlike most people I think that Snell's 1:44 on a wet grass track, was at least as good as Coe's 1:41. They both obtained about the peak level of fitness that a humanbeing can. The real qustion in my mind and what I ment to ask, is what overall aspect of there training that where stressed where simmalor. Looking at what aspect of there training was simmlor, should give ups a good idea of what are the key aspects of he human body that need to be trained. In the late 1900s there was a gent who ran 4:12 with almost no training, and what little he did was walking. So I think it is not hard to imagen that doing training of 50 miles a week that was done in the right manner someone would be able to run a little over 20 sec faster.

I for one would like it if someone who some real info on the theory behind how they trained would speek up so that we can start to figure out with systems are the most essentil for middle distince. I am not sure of most of the the theory's in the that are accepted at this point are really on target. No runners are coached better useing science the american runners. And as is the sad fact of the matter we are not running at the level that we can.

seb coe was one of the original epo frauds...the real mile record is still big john walker's 3:49.....

What proof have you.

Lets stayway from the hole doper doper bit. The hole idea that just cus guy x run faster then you. Is not proof they dopod is a lot of bunk.

Martin, so what are you telling us, that Peter and Seb Coe are really bad at math?

This stuff comes from the pre-Olympic weeks. God only knows how sloppy the Coe family is at math during base training months? And if they are this sloppy at math, it goes to reason they could be just as sloppy at reporting everything they really did?

Let us say that he did do 70 miles a week. That is still a lot less then what most people who run up to his level do. And I don't really see how that changes the gole of looking at the key theory he used as a runner to get to the top. I don't know much about running but I do know that the main thing is what you are setting out to do with your training. And I wonder what he was setteing out to do, the precise number of how he did it do not seem like much of an issue as the over all theory used in training. That is just my viue.

Malmo,

Don't you get the impression you are full of contradictions... only yesterday you were supporting Martin and telling me to do my research!

flamboyant wrote:

Malmo,

Don't you get the impression you are full of contradictions... only yesterday you were supporting Martin and telling me to do my research!

I really don't pay much attention to your posts, kid. And your point?