"The general effect [of altitude training] is no effect" Tim Noakes

Seems like he's saying that some people benefit, some people don't, so if you take the AVERAGE, the two results negate each-other, and therefore altitude training doesn't make a difference. Is that what he means???

Seems to me (not a scientist, just a thought) that altitude would only be good for someone who grew up at altitude because your body has had years to adapt to it. So when you train at altitude, for them it's normal, they don't notice there's less oxygen because their bodies have adapted to compensate.

But someone who grew up at sea level, who goes to altitude, it's a shock to their body. It may try to adapt, but it won't be able to adapt as good as it would have if it had years and years growing up there.

I think us sea(level) creatures are going to have to find other ways to beat the Africans. Perhaps we start running with 22 pound vests.

SteamboatKeg wrote:

That's my experience too. After living in the Houston area and running marathons for years, I moved to Colorado. After living here for 3 years, with the same training I did in Houston, I ran a sea-level marathon and cut 9 minutes off my "normal" marathon time. Other factors played a part, but I think I got at least 5 minutes from the elevation difference. I'm female, 5'2" and ~100 lbs. Maybe those factors also affect respiratory capacity/oxygen transport?

Did you do precisely the same workouts - speed & distance - as you did when living in Houston?

It is pretty established that it takes about 5 years to see real sustained improvements from altitude. I am not talking about increases in red blood cells. For some people the stress of training at altitude pushes them over the edge into something akin to overtraining. This is why some improve and others don't.

madd0ct0r wrote:

hmmm. What altitude are you at?

There's obviously a point where the thin air would impact training more then benefit it. And clearly the benefit of 'altitude' training at sea level compared to training at sea level is zero.

Perhaps somewhere in between there's an optimum?

Our beds are at 6800ft. The mileage is done between 6800-8200ft.

You're being too simplistic. How many great runners come from the region of the Andes? the Himalayas? the Mexican highlands? the Gobi Desert?[/quote]

Good point but recent studies have shown that these people evolved and adapted to altitude differently than those from Africa.[/quote]

So what you are saying is that if you didn't evolve and adapt to altitude like an East African, altitude doesn't help. Is that correct?[/quote]

No that is not what I am saying. I am merely responding to the question as to why the Andean population has not produced great distance runners. I happen to believe that altitude training works for the majority of those that use it correctly and I also agree that like with most things, some won't show any benefit or positive results.

Aghast wrote:

It is pretty established that it takes about 5 years to see real sustained improvements from altitude. I am not talking about increases in red blood cells. For some people the stress of training at altitude pushes them over the edge into something akin to overtraining. This is why some improve and others don't.

+1

Are people looking into this? The 'Why or why not' question. The only relevant idea that comes to mind is the concept of elasticity in our bloody carrying capacity.

I spent 3 wks at altitude coming from sea level. I ran 2 races after, 3 days and two wks back at sea level and ran well but have not been myself since. My times are way slower and even easy runs are harder with slower paces. I've had blood work and everything is normal. Wondering now if it could have been the altitude? It's been 3 mths. If anyone knows anything about this please help! How long will these adverse effects stick around?

This is precisely the reason it's hard to draw conclusions about the effectiveness, or not, of altitude training.

There have been "experts" who'll tell you that you have to re-acclimate to low altitude running after a stretch at altitude. One reason given for Ron Hill's "failure" to win the marathon at Munich was that he stayed too long at altitude prior to the race. But no one knows what would have happened if he'd come down sooner, or even later.

In your case I'm not sure how much training effect you'd get from three weeks at altitude. Maybe you got quite a lot and just need to have more time to re-acclimate, though after only three weeks I wouldn't think it's an issue. And there are so many other possible variables in play here that I don't see how you'd begin to isolate them. Here are just a few examples:

Did you train at altitude pretty much like you did at sea level? If so, the added stress of altitude running may have worn you down and that's manifesting itself now. Did you change your life routine at altitude? Maybe that wore you down. Maybe you've gone into your races expecting to have acquired some miraculous level of fitness at altitude and went out harder than you can sustain. Maybe you got slightly anemic or dehydrated at altitude. Maybe you're reacting poorly to the business of travelling to altitude and back.

At this point, if altitude really did make you worse, the only solution I see is to wait it out. I doubt that three weeks there did any permanent damage. But here's another tricky question. Let's say that in two months you're busting PRs like mad. Will you attribute that success to having spent time at altitude or will you wonder how much faster you'd be if you hadn't gone to altitude and had it make you worse?

Thanks for the reply. I'm a competitive runner and have been on 5 national teams for Canada. This summer has been rough and someone suggested I check out letsrun to see if anyone else experienced anything like this. I could have just caught some weird virus or something but I'm sick of it now and want to feel myself again! I did only go for 3.5 wks and I did train just as I would at sea level. Dumb in hindsight. I didn't know you weren't supposed to do workouts right away. My coach at the time never told me that and I just did what she said. Hoping to come around asap so I can do some fall racing. And if I ran fast in a couple months I wouldn't attribute it to altitude training. I'm done with AT!

I really think that in 3-5 weeks you weren't likely to have done serious or irreversable damage. Have you been checked for anything like anemia?

I once came down from a couple months at altitude and didn't run particularly well, though I didn't run all that badly. I seemed to have improved in about four months (maybe, it's been decades.)

Kenyans have more capillaries per muscle fiber than people born at sea level? Maybe, since Hall was born at altitude he too has more muscle fibers per capillary? I recall studying this in exercise physiology class, and I believe the study was performed by Noakes....He came to his conclusion by looking at muscle biopsies of kenyans and europeans...Therfore, Hall does not need to train at altitude in order to get the benefits? He already has the genetic makeup from being born in BIG BEAR??

very interesting that now all of a sudden we are told that there are no benefits to altitude training....At least we know that there is an acclimation period if one wants to run well at altitude..

A bit confusing to hear this news from Noakes

Elite Kenyan runners have the advantage of tens of thousands of years of ancestors living at altitude, which means they have genetic adaptations that Hall probably doesn't.

Ho Hum wrote:

Elite Kenyan runners have the advantage of tens of thousands of years of ancestors living at altitude, which means they have genetic adaptations that Hall probably doesn't.

Tens of thousands of years? Where did you pull that number from?

Ho Hum wrote:

Elite Kenyan runners have the advantage of tens of thousands of years of ancestors living at altitude, which means they have genetic adaptations that Hall probably doesn't.

Plus, they have an extra bone in their ankle.

The Kalenjin are believed to have migrated to their present location from the South Sudan region around 2,000 years ago.

There appears to be some misunderstanding of the difference between genotype and phenotype here. HRE makes some good points. The problem with any training program (or any runner to take the other side of the equation) is that some programs may work better for you, but you are a n=1, so you can't test them all simultaneously. It's not very difficult, if you have any sufficient math/science background, to consider how altitude training can be both ineffective on the whole but incredibly effective for some individuals.

My math skills are lacking, but here is a possible scenario for training at altitude: assume for 20% of the population there is a 10% increase in performance, for 50% of the population there is no net change in performance, for 30% of the population there is a 10% decrease in performance related to training at altitude. Given this scenario (which is just an example), it is true both that training at altitude is helpful to some athletes and on the whole not helpful at all.