Does an anaerobic start hurt you in distance running?

Pros start out in a jog unless you are talking about the 400. Every second under ideal pace during first 1/2 of a race results in 2 seconds in second 1/2 of race. Even pacing is ideal.

So, you are thinking the first 5-6 seconds at the start will not affect your lactate production part of your race. 400 meter runners blast the first 5-6 sec knowing they have that in their alactic energy system and there is no sense in not using it up. There appears to be no negative side effect to this approach on your lactate production.

The question is how much time can you save by blasting that first 5-6 seconds. Also, could you be disciplined enough to immediately reduce your speed to proper race pace after 5-6 seconds? I think that is the main concern: not falling back into a proper race pace for your distance.

It's pretty true in the sense that the first 8 or so seconds of a hard effort can be run off the energy stores already in your muscles, which we might call creatine phosphate. That should be able to regenerate easily enough once you're moving aerobically, so you'll get that back. Your body is still producing byproducts during any exercise, though, and if the first few seconds are run at a hard effort it max not tax you much at the time, but there will still be some byproduct buildup in your system. It's probably easy enough to run through if you can find an aerobic rhythm soon in your race.

I was at a 5k the other day and a guy by 200 meters had something like a 10 second lead on me. He basically held that 10 second lead the entire rest of the race. Good for that guy. I bet he's very comfortable with sprinting and that felt natural. I wondered if I squandered my whole race by not sprinting at the start. I, on the other hand, am not very comfortable with sprinting from standing starts and am not fast out the gate. If I tried to do what he did, I would probably pay for it a few hundred meters into the race until I hit my sustainable rhythm. TLDR I think some runners handle those kinds of starts better than others based on their physiology and I wouldn't recommend you do it if it doesn't come naturally.

Let's say your top end speed is 15 sec for 100m. You would be at the 33m mark after 5 sec. If your ideal 5k race pace is 6 min per mile (18:45 ish pace), you would cover 22m in 5 sec. So blasting out of the gate before settling down puts you 11m ahead with no downside. 11m at 6 min pace is about 2.5 sec. So there is your practical application answer.

I've heard that the first 8 or so seconds of a race can be run anaerobically without consequences, how true is this? Discus

the discus is not generally considered to be an anerobic event. few discus throwers will have gone anaerobic in their training, none will do so in competition and only a very small proportion of discus throws will take longer than 8 seconds. there doesn't appear to be very much to discuss here.

cheers.

bump

3200y5000 wrote:

After googling and googling and not finding anything, I'm turning to letsrun for answers. In big races, you always see pros starting out in a sprint. Indeed, I've heard that the first 8 or so seconds of a race can be run anaerobically without consequences, how true is this? Discus

It depends...............absent an adequate warm up, possibly. If the anaerobic start is too fast and lasts too long, of course. Also depends on the race distance and your degree and type of conditioning. If you're talking about just 8 seconds, then probably not so much assuming an adequate warm up. I once ran a 10K XC race in SOCAL, about 200 runners in the field, I came through the first mile in around 4:24 and I was in the back of the pack. The first 200M to 400M was a sprint, which I had the presence of mind not to participate in. I reeled in quite a few runners over the 10K course, many of them went out way too fast and couldn't recover.

3200y5000 wrote:

After googling and googling and not finding anything, I'm turning to letsrun for answers. In big races, you always see pros starting out in a sprint. Indeed, I've heard that the first 8 or so seconds of a race can be run anaerobically without consequences, how true is this? Discus

Yes. True.

Anaerobic alactic system has 6-8 seconds of "use it or lose it" fuel allowing for a fast start at the line. Important for 8s, 15/16/mile, and 3/32/2 mile positioning. Vital for fast 800s.

This is instantly available ATP in the muscles for "fight or flight" efforts and is not available once other energy systems take over.

...Anaerobic glycolytic system takes over immediately after 6-8 secondes and your pace then will directly affect your lactate turnpoint and acidosis rate.

You need to either settle into ideal pace for longer events or have the anaerobic training to buffer, utilize and suffer for the fast events.

5k and longer events require settling into proper pace immediately to induce the aerobic system and not spike acidosis. The aerobic system is functioning fully after about 40 seconds.

Alactically speaking wrote:

Anaerobic alactic system has 6-8 seconds of "use it or lose it" fuel allowing for a fast start at the line. Important for 8s, 15/16/mile, and 3/32/2 mile positioning. Vital for fast 800s.

This is instantly available ATP in the muscles for "fight or flight" efforts and is not available once other energy systems take over.

As a 400/800m runner, what is a good way to train the anaerobic alactic system? Is there an optimum time to train it before a big race or should it be trained every week?

First, a point of clarification: The start of a race is always "anaerobic" because it takes your aerobic system a while to kick in, even if you run an even pace.

As others have noted, your phosphagen system gives you around 8 seconds of "free" energy at the start. It requires no oxygen, and it's just sitting there, ready to rock. Not a big deal to burn through that. It won't recover fully during the race no matter what you do. After that point, your anaerobic system picks up the slack, regardless of whether you're aggressive or conservative about pace. What you want to avoid, however, is going into too much oxygen debt early on because your total debt absolutely will not go down during the course of a race shorter than a half marathon or so. Going into too much debt, too early, will force you to slow down considerably later on. Also, it taxes your mental reserves. The mind can only push through so much suffering before it gives up, and starting too fast means you face serious pain for the entire race, instead of just the last 1/3 or 1/4 of it.

For me at 14sec/100m, the difference between 5 seconds and 8 seconds is 35 versus 57m.

Two questions:

Can I, by training, increase the use of this system from 5 seconds to 8 seconds?

How do I tell whether I'm going too long?

Right now, I am not using this system correctly. I don't want to just use it. I have to optimize it to win at the national level.

Unless it's the marathon, probably not. In distances from 800-10,000m your anaerobic system needs to cover energy requirements for the first few mins while your a robic system revs up. Also you have to consider posititioning. In XC you absolutely want a fast start to not get boxed behind a bunch of people.

But if you know you can get away with not sprinting, then don't. Otherwise you should.

going out hard and dying is a strategy.... it's a stupid strategy, but it is certainly an option.

NotPC wrote:

going out hard and dying is a strategy.... it's a stupid strategy, but it is certainly an option.

I disagree

fisky wrote:

For me at 14sec/100m, the difference between 5 seconds and 8 seconds is 35 versus 57m.

Two questions:

Can I, by training, increase the use of this system from 5 seconds to 8 seconds?

How do I tell whether I'm going too long?

Right now, I am not using this system correctly. I don't want to just use it. I have to optimize it to win at the national level.

Can be extended, slightly, with short, standing sprint starts, hard x 6 or 8, all season. Good auxiliary work for biomechanics too, but should be the very least emphasized portion of training and then, best for 800 & 1600 mostly, and for positioning for longer races.

Thank you. And lets add that it really takes some 30/40" for the aerobic system to fully kick in. Which is why, incidentally, for anything longer than 1' reps one is always better off to do jog recoveries as a way to avoid to increase overload with the plus that you are recycling some of that lactate during that jog recovery....

Predictor wrote:

Pros start out in a jog unless you are talking about the 400. Every second under ideal pace during first 1/2 of a race results in 2 seconds in second 1/2 of race. Even pacing is ideal.

The challenge in a big high school XC race is that you have to surge at the beginning to be in range of the top groups. This is especially true for a narrow (10-12 ft) lane for running, which will lead to endless bottlenecks. You have to get out strong for the first 200 meters or be way off desired pace and place.

Can't you train to ready yourself for this?

First thing to note is there are two anaerobic systems: Anaerobic alactic (also know as Creatine-Phosphate System) and Anaerobic Gylcolysis.

The first 8 seconds of any race is going to use the Alactic system. To instantaneously accelerate the human body from rest, a great deal of energy is needed very quickly. The aerobic system can't generate that energy fast enough so the Alactic system does.

It isn't a detriment to a distance race performance. If the pace isn't balls out fast from the gun after the first 8 seconds, the aerobic system should sufficiently supply the energy demands without the needed for large involvement by the anaerobic gylcolysis (lactate) system.

Fatigue of the Alactic system also doesn't affect the aerobic system as creatine phosphate can be resynthesized without O2.

So yes, no matter how hard you push the first 8 seconds it won't change your race performance aerobically. It may actually make the first lap easier as now your aerobic system has to spend less energy reaching race pace velocity as your Alactic system did it for you.

3200y5000 wrote:

After googling and googling and not finding anything, I'm turning to letsrun for answers. In big races, you always see pros starting out in a sprint. Indeed, I've heard that the first 8 or so seconds of a race can be run anaerobically without consequences, how true is this? Discus

Does being trampled by several thousand 5K or 10K runners hurt your performance? If there are one-thousand plus runners lined up, I break of the starting line somewhere between 65 to 70 seconds for the first 400m of road races. I do not want any clydesdales stepping on my achilles tendons.