Speed Development vs. Speed Endurance is there a difference

To my mind speed development means running properly fast to develop leg speed, form, efficiency, neuromuscular stuff. It has little or nothing to do with developing energy systems. Short fast reps with full recovery, strides, hill sprints.

Speed endurance is about aerobic power i.e. VO2max. You're nowhere near sprinting but you're going fast enough to be hard to keep up for 2+ minutes. 600-1200 intervals with same-time recovery, at around 3K pace.

Don't do them on the same day. VO2max intervals are harder on the body than speed reps but it's your choice whether to do back to back hard days or buffer with easy days before and after. Speed reps don't beat you up - do what you like the day after, but don't do a very hard day the day before.

If you tried to target both in the same workout you'd basically be doing a mile PR effort. Leave that for actual races or the occasional time trial.

Name that distance wrote:

If you tried to target both in the same workout you'd basically be doing a mile PR effort. Leave that for actual races or the occasional time trial.

Not true, you could do a tempo run or some longer intervals and afterwards do some short hill sprints or shorter reps. Example:

4-6 Strides + 6 mile tempo @ half marathon pace + 6 x 50m hill sprint @ close to all out

4-6 strides + 6 x 1k @ 5k pace w/ 2 minute jog + 4 x 150m @ 800m pace

But to answer OP, think of speed development as increasing your horse power/ torque. And think of speed endurance as, increasing to length of time you can run at a fast pace i.e. think of it as fuel economy. Example of the first is mo Farah improving his kick in the last 400m of a championship 5000m/10000m race. And speed endurance is like how a sub 4 minute miler when he first started running in high school may only have been able to run a 800m in 2 minutes, but over time he increased his endurance to run that speed for twice as long.

labels and language...…...problem is we say the same words for things with different meanings...…….

In the sprint world, speed development is improving your absolute top speed.....think how fast you can go for 10 meters.

Speed Endurance is about holding high percentages of that absolute speed over longer distances.

Alactic Short Speed Endurance up to 6 seconds with long rests like 1 minute per 10 meters

Glycolytic Short Speed Endurance, less than 80 meters, but short rests like less than a minute, getting the effect from multiple reps.

Speed Endurance, up to 20 seconds at near max effort with long rests of 10+ minutes

Special Endurance 1 up to 45 seconds at near max with long rests of 15+ minutes

Special Endurance 2 of up to 120 seconds at near max with long rests of 15+ minutes.

Distance coaches may use the same labels of speed development or speed endurance to mean different things.

................................... wrote:

labels and language...…...problem is we say the same words for things with different meanings...…….

In the sprint world, speed development is improving your absolute top speed.....think how fast you can go for 10 meters.

Speed Endurance is about holding high percentages of that absolute speed over longer distances.

Alactic Short Speed Endurance up to 6 seconds with long rests like 1 minute per 10 meters

Glycolytic Short Speed Endurance, less than 80 meters, but short rests like less than a minute, getting the effect from multiple reps.

Speed Endurance, up to 20 seconds at near max effort with long rests of 10+ minutes

Special Endurance 1 up to 45 seconds at near max with long rests of 15+ minutes

Special Endurance 2 of up to 120 seconds at near max with long rests of 15+ minutes.

Distance coaches may use the same labels of speed development or speed endurance to mean different things.

I am glad you wrote what you did. I think what you say about speed development is basically correct

although I'm sure it has application for all distances even up to the ultra marathon.

The speed endurance workouts you suggest really intrigue me. Who does those workouts?

Which famous coach suggests running repeats of 1:45 seconds at near max with 15 + minutes rest.

I will give you points on listing some unique workouts but Lydiard, Daniels, Tinman, etc., certainly do

not recommend these workouts.

Maybe they are workouts suggested by some unknown marathon coach?

I truly do wonder if 90% of the people on LRC are marathon runners.

I do think you know what speed development although you did not say why distance

runners must include it as part of a well-rounded program. We try to develop maximum

speed so that running fast is easier and also to learn acceleration towards the end of a race.

When talking about speed endurance we must talk about developing specific speed endurance.

This means working at distances from 150 meters to 600 meters for track & field events.

Running at 3K pace has relavance for the marathon but not so much for the mile.

I agree that trying to do both speed endurance and speed development on the same day is

not a good idea. I suggest that some runners when they are mad, depressed, or even happy

about how they are running tend to overwork this way and get injured~~~even when the

workout is not designed for them to put the two together. That is why having kids run

fartlek workouts is not always a good plan.

Your answers are good but speed development is more complicated than just working on your finishing

kick. We distance runners tend to think that working hard is what produces results. Sprinters know that it takes

a lot more than that to get good. They have to work on technique, acceleration, form, and relaxation.

Relaxed running will produce speed. Distance runners need to talk to good sprint coaches to

develop good sprint mechanics.

Sprinters, Hurdlers, and some Jumpers

No matter how much I preach about speed development, distance runners tend to

avoid it. The problem is they do not really know how to develop speed.

*Name that coach or runner who advocates the use of 45 seconds at near max with

15+ minutes of rest.

just about every sprint coach in the world, again, the words used will have different meanings to different populations. Much of what was written as definitions might be totally foreign to a distance runner, but common knowledge to the sprint coach. Just as most sprint coaches couldn't tell you what VO2max is it relates to the athletes they coach. It is very likely what sprint coaches call extensive tempo.

UyUtsIJkM wrote:

*Name that coach or runner who advocates the use of 45 seconds at near max with

15+ minutes of rest.

To a sprint/hurdle/jumps/multi's coach, 'speed work' means sprinting. Sprinting is maximum or extremely close to near-max velocity.

A 45sec near-max velocity run w/15min rest, then repeat, is a special endurance workout designed for athletes running 300m hurdles, 400m/400m hurdles, or even a 800m runner who is running a 400m workout.

This is very simple.

And by "very simple", I mean the concept of the workout. The workout itself can be very difficult.

Old Mel wrote:

No matter how much I preach about speed development, distance runners tend to

avoid it. The problem is they do not really know how to develop speed.

Yes. It's the ol when you're a hammer, everything looks like a nail, situation.

Distance runners will talk about doing a speed session of 200m, but want to do 15x200m... It's difficult to get out of that distance runner mindset of more more more more.

................................... wrote:

labels and language...…...problem is we say the same words for things with different meanings...…….

In the sprint world, speed development is improving your absolute top speed.....think how fast you can go for 10 meters.

Speed Endurance is about holding high percentages of that absolute speed over longer distances.

Alactic Short Speed Endurance up to 6 seconds with long rests like 1 minute per 10 meters

Glycolytic Short Speed Endurance, less than 80 meters, but short rests like less than a minute, getting the effect from multiple reps.

Speed Endurance, up to 20 seconds at near max effort with long rests of 10+ minutes

Special Endurance 1 up to 45 seconds at near max with long rests of 15+ minutes

Special Endurance 2 of up to 120 seconds at near max with long rests of 15+ minutes.

Distance coaches may use the same labels of speed development or speed endurance to mean different things.

Respect! Good stuff and great guidelines for people to use!

Here we go again.

There is:

1 - Alactic Short Speed End. [ASSE] 30-80 meters 90-100% and rest intervals btwn 1-3 min / set int between 5-10 min depending on what adaptation you want

2 - Glycolytic Short Speed Endurance [GSSE] - Almost the same less than 80 meters but less rest

3 - Speed Endurance [SE] 80-150 Meters -90-100% effort - 5-10 min rest depending on whether you want some lactate recovery

4 - Special Endurance 1 or Long Speed End. [LSE] 150-300 meters - 90-100% effort - 10-15 minutes rest

5 - Special Endurance 2 or lactacid power [LP] 300-600 meters - 90-100% effort - 15-20 minutes rest

As I said about speed endurance in another thread which got tossed aside a bit by other posters is you do not need a whole lot of it even if you are a sprinter for "speed" development.

True speed development comes from efforts of less than 50 meters at full effort and with big rest (3-8) minutes so that Pcr levels are restored. Don't get that mixed up with ASSE or GSSE.

Someone read their USTFCCCA Handbook.

A lot of coaches seem to hate when workouts get labeled too rigidly, but this thread is a great example of why those labels are important for discussions. No one is going to get upset if you are a using 85m for speed development or if you have an athlete doing their SE2 workouts at 88% instead of +90%.. However, there are two very different camps who think they're talking about the same thing; distance oriented people saying speed endurance is VO2max and sprint oriented people saying it's maximal sprints from 80-150m.

If you're going to use a sprint term, we need to play in the sprinters sandbox. If sprinters want to talk about critical velocity (the shiny new designer term we like to throw around) then I expect them to follow the outline that middle and long distance coaches provide.

That's usually a great segue into why the term "speed work" is awful, but I'l save that for another day.

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As to the original question: Is there a difference between speed development and speed endurance?

There is, but it's less nuanced than the delineated paces that you see in distance running.

Sprinting is very neromuscularly intensive and requires massive amounts of coordination that have very little to do with trainable energy systems. Speed Dev and Speed end. both rely on our alactic systems through Creatine Phosphate (PCr). Our PCr energy is relatively innate, we all have about 7 seconds worth of alactic energy available to us before we need to recover or switch to another fuel through anaerobic pathways and eventually aerobic pathways. Some coaches claim that you can increase that PCr window, but I haven't seen any research to support that.

Getting back to coordination, there are some athletes that even a 200m race is just too long. For nearly all of those sprinters you will see a breakdown of form. When limbs are moving at those very high velocities using up very precious energy you start to see fatigue and loss of coordination (locking up). Speed end. is meant to improve this by teaching the body to maintain coordinated movements longer. When a muscle decides to stop firing, what other fibers can it call on to keep the movement fluid.

Speed endurance though, is still maximal. It's not 95%. It's not "fast but controlled." Speed endurance is about enduring speed longer, not enduring pretty fast longer.

My point was that if you run at max effort for less than 80 meters and take a 4-5 minute break, that is different than taking a 1-3 minute break.

It may seem subtle but it is important if we are talking about speed vs. speed endurance.

Also, you never really "switch" to the glycolytic recovery system after 7 seconds, it just takes over as the primary method of ATP generation. It's important remember that these systems are on continuum.

Dave Jackson wrote:

What is speed development?

What is speed endurance?

Can you develop both in the same workout?

What do you do the day before and the day after the workouts?

We have gotten some good commentary on what speed development is

and what speed endurance is.

I agree that you can develop both on the same day but you risk overtraining the athlete.

I think only two people touched on what

to do the day before and after the speed development day. (How much

recovery you need after speed endurance depends on how hard that day is

as represented by 8 x 1K w/90seconds rest!)

So what kind of workout/run do you do before the speed development day

and what kind do you do after speed d.?

How often should you do speed endurance? I would like to do it every 7 days

but am having a hard time fitting it in that often.

Thank you to everyone who has posted on this thread.