Physiology questions about Lydiard training.

Antonio,I think this is an unfortunate case of mistaken identity, and you've done Noakes an injustice. My best guess is you've mistakenly attributed something to Noakes that he did not say.Here's what Noakes wrote about Lopes training in the "Lore of Running" (4th Edition published in 2001):

Noakes says some other things about Lopes, mainly historical accomplishments, and other opinions from Frank Shorter, but this paragraphs seems to be the extent of Noakes commentary on Lopes training. Afterwards, he concluded very little from Lopes' training:

- A car accident 10 days before the LA marathon made him unable to train. Maybe this "recovery" contributed to his success.

- Lopes was not successful in school (like many other elites)

- Lopes ran his best marathon early (his fourth) (like many others)

Nothing about Lopes' training contributed to Noakes CG theory.

And there is no express mention of any interval training at all.

For comparison, here's how you describe Lopes training (in a 2008 rebuttal):

And here is (my best guess) the real "culprit", a claim from "training scholar" attributing Lopez (sic) training details to Owen Anderson (infamous for arguing the superiority of interval training to continuous tempos), who took them from some unnamed study:

Well, I only read 921 pages -- and it was some time ago. I didn't find back the "grandmother" quote.But from what you've described though, Noakes only said that Cerutty was a great coach and Elliot was perhaps the greatest miler of all time. It was Ron Clarke who remarked that his grandmother could have trained the talented Clarke to the same success.But I think Noakes is keenly aware of the "mind training" aspects that Cerutty represented. In a section entitled "Law 12: Train the Mind", Noakes cites Cerutty and Elliot as the first example: "Percy Wells Cerutty was one of the first coaches to write openly about the importance of mental preparation for running. Certainly, Cerutty (1964, page 29) recognized that his greatest protege, Herb Elliot, was mentally different:..."Even Cerutty, perhaps in extreme modesty, attributed Elliot's success to Elliot's mentality.I don't actually know that much about Cerutty, most of it probably coming from "shipsy" in ancient posts.But what I do know focused on things like "making a man" instead of "training athletes".

Antonio Cabral wrote:

Rekrunner. Don´t say you read more than 1000 pages from Noakes and you did lost this one !

rekrunner wrote:

But I think Noakes is keenly aware of the "mind training" aspects that Cerutty represented. In a section entitled "Law 12: Train the Mind", Noakes cites Cerutty and Elliot as the first example: "Percy Wells Cerutty was one of the first coaches to write openly about the importance of mental preparation for running. Certainly, Cerutty (1964, page 29) recognized that his greatest protege, Herb Elliot, was mentally different:..."

By the time i was say 25, i was representing my country in my event and coaching 100s of school aged children at any one time. This exposed me to a lot of parents and local coaches and a lot of questions came my way. One of the best questions is 'how important is the mind in sport?' My answer was it is the only thing. If they asked the question seriously i might go on to say, the body is under the control of the mind so to increase control of the body the mind is used to do it. So i actually believe nothing exists outside the mind, except our senses, which the mind controls anyway.

ps i am still living the life of a gypsy, except now it is involving boats, hence the ship part.

We can explode this sentence of yours into many pages if we wanted to. It is a big issue. Dreams v Reality. We must have both i believe. Feet firmly planted on the ground but with ones head in the stars. After all are not training goals simply dreams? they aren't reality yet because they haven't been done, they are still goals set for the future. Personally i prefer an athlete who can dream very far. Someone who isn't dreaming very far won't go very far.

I guess Ron is a bit bitter and twisted. Percy couldn't get Ron to see past his won ego, so Ron left, but before he left he did learn, so he knew how to push himself beyond. I think that explains why Ron is making such comments. he should have been number 1 after all. Anyway now he is into corporatism and politics and walks with a hunch and a limp, perpetually looking at the ground. So we can see how well he has lived his life can't we. In contrast Elliot is just so relaxed, cruising through.

Rek brings up Percy not coaching an athlete and instead making a man. Well every parents attempts this with their children don't they, but not many have such a defined path along which to travel, which Percy did. I like him for this fact. For the fact that he didn't write programs, he instilled the principles of training into his athletes, and they wrote their own. How many coaches today are doing it this way i wonder.

ps I think i trust Elliot's own words when he describes his relationship to Percy.

pps Noakes is a scientist, so i don't expect him to be masterful on the coaching side of things. I just hope for scientists to be more honest so we get better information from them. Noakes has stuck his head out of the crowd by coming up with what i see as an advancement on previous thinking. It is a new step for physiology but not a new step in the world. This idea has been around since yogic times, 6000 or even 10000BC.

Antonio,This attitude and paragraph I don't understand. How often do you tell Lydiardists to break out of their Lydiard shell and go out and do more research? Noakes did a lot of research, and surveys of research, and then some more research, and you claim he's running away from the real questions? Noakes dedicates 120 pages in a chapter called "Learning from the Experts", starting with "Deerfoot" in 1861, probably covering some 30-40 selected important athletes/coaches ranging from the mile to multi-day ultra-marathons. (Interestingly, he gives Arthur Newton a lot of coverage, and rarely mentions Arthur Lydiard, except as someone who helped make Newton's "aerobic" ideas popular). Maybe his training conclusions are more "common denominator" than "leading edge", but it's hard to imagine any scientist or amateur athlete who has done broader research, to try and sift out important common factors. Isn't that what you ask all of us to do? Go out and do our own research? Noakes does eventually give training advice, but mainly defers that to other popular experts: "Jack Daniels, Pete Pfitzinger, Jeff Galloway, Grete Waitz, Joe Henderson, Art Liberman, Bob Williams, etc. His target audience is completely different. He is not writing for elite or national class athletes, but sharing with the mainstream amateur who wants to learn more, and needs practical advice that is supported by science (or not).His unproven theory is to help figure out why we slow down before the end of races. Why do we fatigue prematurely, and are there techniques we don't know yet which could delay this fatigue? Maybe this will lead to training recommendations. Maybe it only leads to racing tips/strategies (e.g. optimal drinking strategy, and sponging the back of your neck during hot marathons). I don't know if you think characterizing the causes of fatique is a real question, but it seems like an important one to illuminate, if there is an answer.

See how Noakes is wrong in the facts about Carlos Lopes

First of all check it all out that i say now please. Lopes never did altitude training, medium or high altitude in his entire run career, what means from 17 years old to 38 when he finish. Not a single day of altitude training. the reason i because his coach Mario Moniz Pereira didn´t allow him to do so because Mario does´t trust in the hypoxia positive effect. Fernando Mamede that did the same Lopes coach didn´t also altitude training for the same reason.

Second. It´s not true that he did long runs from 90 to 120min. On the preparation for the LA Olympics the long runs he did was did 3 runs of JUST 90minutes, one of them he gave up after 75minutes. Consequently 35k in 90minutes don´t you think is too fast even for a 2h07:12 ?

All this that i say is well documented in Portugal and was known by Carlos in many occasions. As a curiosity, i know who did one of that 3 sessions 90minutes runs with him, it was Cidalio Caetano, the other portuguese present in LA marathon, and Cidalio was able to follow Lopes on that day. Cidalio did start the La marathon in the 84 olympics but didn´t finish. When at 32 k he did pass Rod Dixon and Salazar he got high dehydration - because he didn´t drink nothing at all since the start up to that 30k, and he falls on the road and he needed to be assisted in LA hospital and he stayed in the hospital a few days.

No one of this 3 items is true or factual.

Let´s see the facts.

First of all he did a car accident, earlier on he taught it was serious, but after some minutes Lopes knew that the car accident was without no major consequences apart a scratch and he did continued to train everyday like a horse. What is true is that when in did arrive in LA he said that was handicapt by that accident, the usual Lopes trick to make the adversaries think he was bad.

Second he did not the premature success as one Fernanda Ribeiro that with 13 years old did 1h13m in the HM, and as youth did win the european junior champs in 3000m, or the same success that did Fernando Mamede that with just 16 years old was 4th in the 400m and 5th in the 800m of the eurpean junior champs, and he did not such instantaneous success like António Leitao that with 17 years old did 13:42, however while starting at 17 years old, with 18 years old in the junior category he was selected to make the portuguese junior team in the world cross country. With 21 or 22 years old, he did break the 5000m portuguese record. Bt it´s true that his best seasons were only after 29 years old because it was the age he was permitted to be a professional runner, because before 29 he did work 8 hours a day and was amateur runner indeed.

Third his best marathon was his 7th and not the 4th. First in Portugal with 32 years old, second in NY that he give up, 3rd in Rotterdam the one he lost or Castella, 4th Rotterdam again that the winner was Ikanga from Tanzania, 5th LA Olympics and 6th Chicago that he lost for Steve Jones 2 months after the olympics Rotterdam, and finally 7th the best one word record of 2h0712 still in Rotterdam Holland, and he did run another one (the 8th) in Fukouka japan that he did give up at 16k. Noakes wrong again.

This is the problem of one man of supposedly from science that takes as trust source what another runner said. this is not science, This are information made by rumours. If on the facts he was so wrong how might we trust on his theories? One individual is not a trustful source for me - him ! Hoe can someone bit a theory with data support that is wrong ?

Nothing about Lopes' training contributed to Noakes CG theory. ? ? ?

First of all the basic Noakes premise, the early Noakes hypothesis that moves him to think bot something that might be one universal and cognitive factor of performance estimation or performance analysis a fallacious. Why? Because if we all are different and we all need training individualisation also there willn´t be a single universal factor or reason to justify why someone did one certain performance. In one runner might be for one scientific reason and in other runner for another. Even if the Central Governor existed, to some runners we would attribute to the Central Governor as the scientific reason of their performances to some others tere would be another kind of different reason out of the Central Governor and to a third one another different reason, and so and so. The hypothesis there will be one universal single reason why such and such perdfromance would be done WILL NOT BE A FACT EVER !

As far as i know Noakes he says that early to think about something that in the human physiology, one factor that might justify why someone runs faster than another he studied in the lab a few years the effect of the lactate. He also says that because he got the conclusion that anaerobic threshold is a poor estimate of the performance was the reason of his idea of something in the "brain" like the Central Governor.

Or the Lopes training denies that the LT training isn´t a good thing. One rnner with no special talent, no rich physiology parameter why he did win so many times and was superior to some others with better ability. Because

Or precisely Carlos Lopes with so many LTp (Max Lass really) runs in his training schedule is one example of someone that did get the level of individual performance enhance due to that faster daily runs, because if from the perspective of VO2mx or any other known physiology factor he was estimate to be just a average runner, there we got one clue to the positive influence of the MaxLass training on him. However the Noakes quote that says Lopes does easy runs as daily training wile quote as source the book "How they train" is what is wrong.

Shipsy and Rekrunner

I see why you defend Noakes and you go from hypothesis to hypothesis, from speculation to speculation, get some arguments, some of your own interpretation what Noakes wanted to say, what Noakes said i another sentence, what you think why Clarke said what he said, what´s the reason Noakes quote that sentence. You may right many posts, one book just to deny the intentions what Noakes wrote.

But ther´s no way to escape to what Noakes said. He did write, it´s done, ther´s no escape, no way to be evasive. No need to run away from the main idea. Once again. He said just this.

(…Percy Cerrutty may have been a great coach but he also trained one of the greatest milers of all time. Ron Clarke who actually knew Elliott once remarked that his (Clarke’s) grandmother could have coached Elliott and Elliott would have been just as successful….)

Little by little, step by step, idea by idea... sentence by sentence, gramatical by gramatical, word by word. Noakes said so because he wants to let us know that the training that Percy did on Eliott doesn´t justify Elliot rich performances, to be unbeatable in the 1500m. Noakes wanted to say that The main reason what Eliott did what he did is because his talent. This is the meaning of "Clarke’s grandmother could have coached Elliott and Elliott would have been just as successful.

All your considerations, that doesn´t deny the main idea why Noakes said (did write) what he said (write)

This is the fact. All the rest is fantasy, your fantasy. I also love music, arts, films, philosophy, but training methodology is the concrete world, the objectivity, not fantasy. Fantasy is the Lord of Rings, training is objectivity, one runner, one training method, one (several) performance(s).

Antonio, I already fully explained my position, did you ignore it?

My goodness look at Percy's physique in that picture half way down. This is supreme. This is in the league of Bruce Lee. I have never seen that before and i'm amazed and inspired.

Golgi Tendon Organ

This is a proprioceptor which is activated when a muscle contracts and it sends information (there is a nerve attached) to the brain about changes in muscle tension. It's purpose is to keep you from applying force levels that would tear your body apart, and it has effect on weightlifting and jumping power as well as running (sprinting) speed.

This is a piece of the "central governor" that you cannot argue about. It is there in muscle tendons. You can see it--and you can see it in anatomy texts. And it may be that the primary benefit of plyometrics is simply to inform your brain that "it is ok to do this".

You can argue all day long about whether the "central governor", skeletal muscle performance, or neuromuscular performance are dominant. But to claim that any of these do not exist is the same thing as placing limits on the performance of your athletes.

The Golgi Tendon Organ is more real than the anaerobic threshold.

great! And the muscle has its own version - the muscle spindle. Do you know of any other similar peripheral CG apparatus?

sorry for the multi posting but coach d, you sent me into some researching. Just found this article i really like on this issue. The article illustrates an important connection.

http://www.cbass.com/Balance.htm

Antonio,

You still continue to surprise me. It looks to me like, contrary to what you thought since 2008, and contrary to what you posted above, Noakes actually never said that Lopes only did interval training and never did tempos. Your rant in 2008, and now, was based on a quote that was anonymously, unverifiably attributed to Owen Anderson, who allegedly pulled it from some unnamed study. Hardly a solid foundation for a rant against Noakes.

"How They Train" by Fred Wilt (second edition) was written in 1973. "How They Train" was also written by Jack Pfeifer in 1982. I couldn't find a more recent version. I guess it's safe to say that Noakes did not talk about Lopes 1984 Olympic Marathon training in these books, or earlier editions.

Regarding "Ron Clarke's grandmother" quote, you can't fool me twice. I won't even believe Noakes said it, unless you can provide me a verifiable reference. Otherwise, I am unable to distinguish it is as "fact" or "fantasy".

The rest of your commentaries are too lengthy. It would be unproductive to attempt to debate Noakes with you (and doesn't belong in a Lydiard physiology thread anyway) because my starting point would be:

- Including Lopes details in the book has nothing to do with science, Noakes' scientific methods, or the Central Governor model. Lopes experience was not recounted for the purpose of creating or validating the CG model.

- The CG is not about declaring one "universal single reason" for performance. In fact Noakes uses 5 or 6 models concurrently in his book, suggesting that fatigue can be from any one of 5 or 6 reasons.

- The CG is not about performance at all, but the opposite -- fatigue. It doesn't predict peak performance potential, or suggest individual training method directions, but attempts to better explain when and why fatigue sets in.

- Measuring the value of CG by its contribution to training methodology is like the hammer looking at the screw.

- Noakes ideas about LT, had very little, if anything, to do with Noakes primal genesis of the CG model. Rather it was his ideas about oxygen delivery to the heart and muscle that caused him to reject the Cardiovascular/Anaerobic model proposed by A.V. Hill. Yet it was A.V. Hill himself who suggested its replacement: the idea of a "governor" that regulated the heart (so that exercise wouldn't always terminate prematurely with heart attacks). Noakes did not create the governor, just built-on the one suggested by A.V. Hill.

- His ideas about LT are simply that there is no "threshold phenomena". "Threshold" and "turnpoint" are technically incorrect (although he lacked a better word so settled on "turnpoint").

As much as you know about training methodology, I wouldn't consider you a better authority on Noakes then Noakes himself.

Well….

However i´ve seen lactate by microscope. I´ve seen lactate tests take from the human blood and the value of lactate concentration. Therefore lactate is real absolutely, one material substance. A chemical substance. I also see the value the mmol of lactate raise as fast or lengthier and faster the runner goes. Don´t you ? I also know that if one runner does better lactate cleaning or can hold higher lactate concentration or both he is able to run faster.

Another question is what´s the threshold of that substance. What´s lactate threshold. Therefore lactate and lactate effect is real, however the classic lactate threshold is open to debate. Another question is how to train to improve both lactate clearance and lactate concentration to able someone to run fast in distance,

There your example is useless related to the difference in between a real thing and what´s out of reality.

I also know what´s VO2max. It´s the maximum oxygen uptake for one unity of time related to the weight fo the individual. I know the values of some test protocols of some individuals, different ones from others. There VO2max it´s real. Other question is what´s the relevance of the VO2max. related to the performance enhance and another question is if it´s of some interest to high the VO2max another question is how to train to enhance the VO2max.

We know what´s aerobic and what´s anaerobic. The anaerobic lactate THRESHOLD it´s open to debate and not as real as that, you are right.

But…what about the Central Governor ? Where is located, how works, how the CG is one real and objective trace of performance enhance. How is measured ? If it´s “nervous system” or brain activity where is located, how is measured. This would be the first step to accept the existence, not vague examples that are nothing but curious stories which no one can prove by science the reality of that cases of study.

As a coach I know from phychology that the willing, motivation, the determination, the pressure, the tension, the ability to resist to pain, ther´s a number of physiologic factors that might influence the performance. But about the Central Governor ? It´s a unproved thing by the tools of science method. Therefore, the CG it´s just a theory as there are many that are just hypothesis.

shipsy

It´s a shame that Noakes can´t understand Cerruty training contribution to Elliot performances.

Cerruty was a master coach a man of ethics, philosophy and moral on the human behavior and take all that principles and also training methodology to his training.

Another story is what we might comment on Cerruty training. On this board It´s known my disagreement with Lydiard methodology, however it doesn´t cross my mind to think that Snell, Halberg or just an average runner that Lydiard did coach, Ron Clarke´s grandmother could coach them that they would run the same performances that they did.

That is to say that the coach training got no positive effect on the runner, but the reason of success is due just from the runner talent. Peter Snell, Halberg, Ron Davies and some more we don´t know what they would done without Lydiard as their coach.

It seems rekrunner is wondering where you got that quote from about Elliot; is it true and where did you get it? Also be careful about appearing to know about Cerutty. I think you will be hard pressed to find him saying much on ethics and human morality. Humans make that stuff up you know; it is not necessarily how nature actually works. And one important thing to remember. Lydiard created those athletes from nothing. This was not a long distance culture like Finland for example. To grow something so great from nothing, like Lydiard did, puts him in the same arena as the other great revolutionaries.

Genearlly speaking, concentric work will push your breathing harder, eccentric work will allow a fast pace without breathing hard. Learning to combine the two is the art of effective interval training. I can't really explain it, but when the muscle stiffness is optimal, you get more eccentric work giving more efficieny, and when muscle stiffness is too low you have to work harder. When it is too high, your muscles tie up.

the world largest project of brain investigation is suport and conducted by portuguese. By the Champalimaud Foundation.

http://neuro.fchampalimaud.org/en/about-us/

Let´s hope that the neuroscience they did discover the Central Governor.related to this the CG study is a joke.

I don't want to escape what Noakes said. But if we could plug that quote back into context, we can find out what he really meant to say, rather than having to take your words.Distinguishing facts from fantasy and determining what is the main idea. These are the very reasons why it's important to read Noakes' quotes in context. Luckily, I found it right here in letsrun, in a thread that's already been linked a few times -- we might as well just continue that discussion where it left off:http://www.letsrun.com/forum/flat_read.php?thread=2412208&page=37Now that we are all able to read the quote in context, we see that Noakes thought the "main idea" was, just a few lines above:"... I find it especially quaint that some runners and coaches of the 1950’s and 1960’s are now being held up as the examples of how athletes should train, 60 years later. Is it not possible that the sport has moved on in the past 60 years and that were those coaches to be active today they might not be quite as successful as they once were?"I also "google" found Clarke's quote in a few places, and it is usually accompanied with an observation that (paraphrased) "Elliot, as a junior, after just a couple of weeks of beginning training, ran a 1:52 (880 yds?) on a grass track." I guess Clarke was using the figurative tool of exaggeration to emphasize the raw talent of Elliot.Noakes leaves open the possibility that Cerrutty was still great, but his "main idea" was that their (Lydiard and Cerrutty) training is 60 years old, and that they might not have all the answers to modern questions -- maybe modern coaches have improved the sport.Surely you don't disagree with Noakes' idea to move forward to modern training?