Lydiard Almost Got it PERFECT! (by John Kellogg)
It's SPOOKY how much of this stuff Lydiard got dead on with practically NO ONE'S shoulders to stand on. Through 20+ years of personal refinement and examination of hundreds of other careers (to separate the UNIVERSAL principles from the "experiment of one" quirks), I have only been able to make the most MINOR modifications to this near-flawless system.
A few of the fine points that Lydiard couldn't get around to addressing are:
1.) Career development goes smoothest if technique work and joint/muscle integrity are developed in the pre-teen years (up to age 15 in some people), and if gradual, INCREMENTAL exposure to high mileage in LIMITED SEGMENTS is introduced from the start. In this way, the athlete can always be preparing for a future of very high REGULAR mileage while also getting the needed adaptation time in the early years. There are some hormonal and neurological considerations as rationale for this approach.
2.) There are specific training speeds and durations which optimize your "objective function value"
(getting the most profit with the least squandering of available resources). These weren't known precisely to Lydiard, but he got EXTREMELY close through trial and error alone. His long "progressive pace" runs of 20-22 miles (125 minutes for the elites he coached) was one thing he got PERFECTLY, and he also had his runners do some EXTREMELY slow jogging which was not initially included in his mileage totals (I know now to count that stuff, though, because it DOES have several real training effects - the Japanese have latched on to this, as well). Though the "trial and error" method is the ultimate science, examination of physiological processes and of other careers CAN provide some basis for refinement.
3.) There are some workouts which improve lactate "clearance" via muscle cell transport (MCT) proteins which were not known in Lydiard's day. SOME of the INDIVIDUAL workouts have been done through the ages, but there are specific distances to run and there is an optimal SEQUENCE for these types of workouts. Of course, exercise scientists will NEVER be able to figure out how to incorporate these workouts into the overall scheme, since the SCOPE of exercise science is too myopic to account for the number of variables present in a well-rounded training program. Knowledge of WHY something is working is fine, but can hardly replace trial and error. Nowadays we have BOTH laboratory-gleaned knowledge AND decades of trial and error by thousands of real running careers. The trick is putting both the knowledge and the WISDOM together in the right fashion, with a profound emphasis on the WISDOM.
Those are about the only things I can think of right now that Lydiard didn't nail, but it was probably
ONLY because he didn't have TIME to do that much refinement. Look how much he got exactly! His
long runs (at a progressive pace) were refined to a length of near 125 minutes. I can tell you through
untold suffering that this figure is uncannily accurate. Moreover, there are MANY physical processes that occur just PRIOR to the 2 hour mark in such a progressive run which train the nervous system, the respiratory muscles, and the ability to store and access fuels (and muscle fibers) in the OPTIMAL
sequence.
Unfortunately, many in the U.S. got away from Lydiard's methods and were lured by the siren song of
low mileage and hard intervals and the quick fix those things can often provide. If we had only used
Lydiard's endpoint as our starting point, think where we'd be now. That's what I devoted my life to during the years I was able to train at a high enough volume to make learning my lessons a real possibility, so you can jolly well take my word that Lydiard's system is the ONLY basic system that will truly maximize the potential of the "mzungu". Many Africans seem to have characteristics (capillary density, myoglobin, MCT proteins) which allow them to train more intensely more often, but the white man MUST develop the endurance FIRST by spending as much time at or below the threshold as possible.
But, I ramble ... Get out there and put in the relaxed high-end aerobic running!