Anyone with experience on Igloi style training

After Igloi I just ran round and round, it could have been a long run anywhere, during which I surged as I felt. Sometimes it was a restricted fartlek and sometimes just free and easy. Later, if out on the road or in the parks I would aometimes surge from telephone pole t telephone. My 7 year base of intervals made me very strong. At age 35/37 I raced as well as I ever had. It remained fun. What I did sometimes depended on who showed up to run. I ran 42 seconds faster than I had run in Boston in 1971 than I had run there in 1962. By the way, I finished behind 20 more runners and the number of runners went from 181 starters to 877 starters.

I spent 4+ years running under Bob Schul, for both his club team and in college. We trained under the Igloi system. What I can say about the system is it gets you into shape very fast (either coming back from injury or just a down period).

Intervals were done almost daily with varying degrees of diifficulty or effort (easy, good, good-build, hard, etc.interval for each ). It was expected that long runs were to be done on the weekends.

Workout/Interval days would vary between 8 and 11+ miles. We would always do a 2.5 mile warmup and 10 x 100 strides to start a workout. I can't ever remember doing a 100 meter stride at a very hard/all out effort. The strides were all about relaxation and getting in additional volume at a pace faster than race pace. We would walk 10 or steps and then turnaround and walk 10 or so steps and do the strides again (rest was very minimal).

The workouts would be between 3 and 6 sets. A typical set would be 10x160, or 6x300, or 4x400. Very rarely would we go over 400, however, we would at some points in the season do a few mile repeat days, but always random in nature. In between each set (a shake) we would jog 400 meters and then do 8x100 (another 1200 meters of total volume).

I liked the workouts, we were running hard and didn't always realize it. By the time you were done you would have 10+ miles in. Runners were definitely prone to injury and either you had great success or didn't improve much in the system. I think it varies by the type of runner that you were and if you had speed/didn't have speed.

Schul Athlete wrote:

and either you had great success or didn't improve much in the system..

Like every other training system in other words.

I think each individual has to find what training system works for them. It is not one-size fits all.

Schul Athlete wrote:

I think each individual has to find what training system works for them. It is not one-size fits all.

That's what I said.

Mihaly Igloi convert wrote:

I'm doing the 100m with a rolling start and doing them at 12.5-13.5 seconds and then I rest for 1 minute and repeat for 30.

Doesn't sound like Igloi wrote:

His runners ran much slower than that, and took slower recoveries.

But your training is better for 400 & 800 meters.

I meant to say ran much slower then that, and took much [shorter] recoveries.

Thanks for posting you session information. I couldn't agree more on the individual nature. Every person is completely different, sure we have similarities, but our bodies respond differently in many ways.

20 years ago in high school I was on a national development team and they did Vo2 max testing and HLa (lactic acid tests), I've kept the results and you can see how 6 different boys all pretty much the same age and fairly close in abilities have massive differences in strengths and hence would need different programs.

I wish this system was used by my college coaches. My high school coach who was similar in someways to Igloi, was very very different to my college coaches.

In high school my training was 5 laps warm up, 4 x 400m (50-52 seconds) or 8 x 300 (38-39sec) 10 laps warm down. Then my freshman year went straight to 10 mile runs and 1 mile park repeats. I hated it, got home sick and ran like crap. It wasn't until the coaches realised I wasn't coming back that they moved to training on the track and I quickly went from 1.55 to 1.52. But that was still way behind my expectations. I look back fondly on the time and would like to have been a better communicator with them. Sometimes what we say and what he hear are very different.

Without trying to be disrespectful to most coaches, Mihaly Igloi seemed almost like a scientist compared to most coaches who are generalists.

You got it!

I think the general assumptions on age and performance are not necessarily accurate.

I think the average age of world champions is artificially low because so many great athletes or potential athletes get sidetracked by life and start to have other priorities.

I'm now 38. If you put my 38 year old body against my 21 year old body, I'm stronger now in every possible way. My Vo2 max was recorded at 63 when I ran 1.51 as a 17 year. That's ok, but not great. I'm sure many people could exceed that well into their 40's.

I may or may not run faster at 38 or 39 than my 21 year old body, time will tell, but I bet the potential is there and if you had said that to me a few years ago I would have said it's not possible.

Probably the most important thing is it remains fun, like you said it did for you.

Coach used to say "I do not need strong runners, I need fast runners".

My muscles are mostly slow twitch. I am not fast. My best half mile was 2:06.1.

Also, I found his workouts too hard. I did not stay with him long enough to reap the best benefits of his training. I guess my goals were not big enough.

I'd like to have your marathon PR's though!

When I look at some of the session, I think 99.9% of all people would say they are too hard. Probably why he pushed the motto "big dreams" to help overcome it.

Orville,

I hadn't seen anything from you in a long time, but when I saw the subject of this thread, I wondered if it might tempt you to wade back into these waters once more. Good to see you again.

I'd like to have your marathon PR's though!

When I look at some of the session, I think 99.9% of all people would say they are too hard. Probably why he pushed the motto "big dreams" to help overcome it.

Mihaly Igloi convert wrote:

I've already done a few sub 50 400ms in training.

Amazing. Is that basically off the 30x 100s?

Yeah, that the only real running sessions I've added so far. I've done a couple of 4 x 200 sessions to see what speed I could do with 2 minutes recovery, but that's it for the last 13 weeks.Starting Oct 1 I'll add more elements.

J.R. wrote:

Mihaly Igloi convert wrote:

I've already done a few sub 50 400ms in training.

Amazing. Is that basically off the 30x 100s?

Thank you Avocado. I often lurk here.

As to the best marathon question. Of the 50 marathons I started I ran 8 in about 2:32 including 2:31:49 (62), 2:30:26 (67) and 2:31.07 in Boston and 2:28.22 (73) on a Ted Corbitt certified course that was not always run on the course as it was certified.

Mihaly Igloi convert wrote:

Yeah, that the only real running sessions I've added so far. I've done a couple of 4 x 200 sessions to see what speed I could do with 2 minutes recovery, but that's it for the last 13 weeks.

Starting Oct 1 I'll add more elements.

J.R. wrote:

Amazing. Is that basically off the 30x 100s?

So what are the chances that you try a 400 race and show off this speed in competition? Seems it would win the 35-40 division at your typical World Masters competition.

sub 50 for real? Dang. I might try some of those 30x100s. Seriously lacking speed. 35-40?

I was going to try the Henderson method, but this looks interesting.

I'd love to do more short interval training, but it's way to hard on the calves. Especially now that I'm even older than OP.