Lydiard Speedwork?

If you're following the whole program, hillwork would be your next stop.

Ditto HRE on this one.

Hills are essential.

I in know way have as much info, or experience having trained with Lyidard. I know the two men Kim HRM; both knew the man and lived close to hem. And Nubby also knows as much or more about his system and trained under hem then anyone else. I have read just about every one of his books. And re-read them as if you look at every system that get long term results and ends up producing the top runners 5-10 years you will find a program that is very close to the one. That a little old shoe maker who dropped out of high school and did not charge for his training came up with.

One thing I have noted in all of his older books, and in parts of his newer books. Is that your raw speed. The type called Anna-Lactic to be precise is something that needs to be worked on all year. In fact I remember reading hem say that it was something one should work on 365 days a year. Keep in mind that this form of work is only about 7 seconds all-out and then there is no point on going any longer, as you will just engage something else. As for hills I also remember hem stating that hills springing is something that one should do a little bit of all the time.

I did not understand why he held these ideas, as HADD among others will tell you that anything that is anaerobic will just end up destroying your aerobic enzymes. Well doing runs of 2-3hr everyday. And hill springing, two times a week. Just 5-7 reps of seven seconds. As far as strides look at the way top 100m runners do there strides. They do 3-5 all out and they are short. If the goal of doing strides is to build base then do Ten easy. If the goal is to bild speed train like a short sprinter!

3 weeks ago I went out and ran an all out 400m sprint, well I only ran 58 seconds with a friend timing me. Within 3 weeks I had a friend time me and my ran 51.7 faster then I had ever run in high school. And I have not done any speed training in years. A little hill work will make your stride longer. No work faster then 1-3 seconds total then my current 1OK time and longer runs 5-15 seconds slower.

I would stick with what Kim and HRE say, and when your working on getting race fit do the hill workouts just as they are written by Lyidard. It is my understanding that the workouts are about 60 min long so you’re going to be running a lot of hills.

Ok, I'll go back and re-read what I've got about hills. From off the top of my head this entails springing and bounding up the hill, short strides up the hill and some runs down the hill to help turnover, is this correct? I believe he mentioned just setting an amount of time, like 45 min. or 60 min. and doing a combination of things at the hill, focusing on what you need the most work on.

Now, hills last for what? 4-6 weeks? After THAT, back to my original question: what should the speedwork look like?

Thanks in advance!

Actually, now I think I recall the hill phase should last for 4 weeks, right?

*4 weeks hills:

-2 or 3 days a week

-warm up for 15 minutes, "spring" uphill for 3 minutes, jog for 3 minutes, run hard down the same hill, jog 3 minutes, do some short sprints, jog 3 minutes, repeat till you reach an hour

-Personally I think it's fine to just find a long hill that takes you 2-3 minutes to run up and run the hills instead of springing them

-Also, Lydiard has his athletes do this training on a 2mi loop and they would just run loops. I'd also suggest finding something similar

-Lydiard above all was for personalization

*4 weeks intervals:

-2 or 3 days a week

-He didn't care what you did as long as you were tired at the end

-He suggested around 3 miles worth and equal distance recovery so something like 6x800 w/800 recovery.

Today is day one of my hill phase, following 10 weeks of base work. I am doing just what Runningart describes.

For me, 1 hour is too much to start out with. I did 31 minutes of hill circuits today and that felt like plenty. My long run (24 mi) was yesterday, so that was a factor too. Within a few weeks, I should be able to handle close to an hour. If you are not used to these, you could strain a calf pretty easily if you try to do too much, so its probably best to ease into them.

Kim: I'm going to send you an email.

Thanks guys. Now what about running a few races in order to get into racing shape (i.e. using them essentially as speedwork). I've read Molvar's article, and in that I believe Lydiard allowed for racing once a week, or a time trial of overdistance or underdistance depending on if the runner was able to keep up the pace but not able to go any faster, or not able to sustain pace for the entire length of the time trial. Didn't Lydiard believe the best speedwork was about the same distance as the goal race (in order to not give the athlete a built-in need for recovery)?

I don't think it is a great idea to race much during the hill phase. It is the one phase where my legs don't have much zing. You are basically zapping your fast-twitch muscles 3 times a week. The schedules I work from start time trials in the next (anaerobic) phase and have even more in the coordination phase.

Then again, I'm running the Peachtree Road Race next week, but if you live in Atlanta, you HAVE to run Peachtree. I'm not expecting much of a performance, though. My experience has been that you can run a pretty good race right after completing the hill phase.

Yeah, I meant racing during coordination/anaerobic phases, not hill phase. Sorry for not clarifying.

One of the things you’d have to understand about the Lydiard program is that there are many elements you need to develop and one development would come after another in a systematic way. I fully endorse HRE and Kim in advising to move on to hill training phase after completion of marathon conditioning.

You have done your homework in reading some literature on the program; however, it seems that you have not quite put everything together in order. When Lydiard talks about “speed”; he in general uses that term for “sprinting speed” or “pure speed”; which he means by “you should do something about 52 weeks a year (not quite 365 days a year)”. This involves some hill exercises (not necessarily hill bounding/springing for the Hill Training Phase), sprint drills, and other strengthening exercise and flexibility exercises. Not too much in volume or intensity so it will become too highly anaerobic. Don’t think of this as hill sprinting workout (even if it’s only 7 seconds); but more or less just simple exercise which you might perform during the morning jog or on an easy day’s training. For those who think Lydiard was contradicting himself when he said “no anaerobic work during conditioning” and “do something for your speed all year around”; this is what he meant. To him, intervals or repetitions are totally different from these “pure” speed works.

I would assume you are talking about anaerobic training (I might be wrong) when you stated “Lydiard speedwork”; Lydiard had a very unique, in a way, idea on anaerobic development training. It is not speed training because it counteracts speed (due to accumulation of lactic acid); it is the least important aspect of the entire program; and it does not have to be performed in an explicit way as many people tend to think it should. I gathered you have Lydiard’s newer book, either Running with Lydiard or Running the Lydiard Way??? The story of how he coached Richard Tayler is probably the best illustration on how he thinks anaerobic training should be approached; and is probably one of the most beautiful lessons we can learn from (as Dick Brown said to me once). It does not matter how far or how fast or how many times you do them as long as you come out tired with speed. This is also demonstrated in the documentary video on Lasse Viren, “Running is Your Life”. You just go on to a park or trail and run certain length with equal jog recovery and keep doing it till you had enough. I used to use this stretch at my home town in Japan that happened to be about 550m (I measured it later) and usually 7 or 8 times were enough. That pretty much corresponded the rule of thumb Lydiard gives—about total of 5000m (fast segments) with equal jog. Now, if you’re doing a longer distance like a mile, you may not want to jog whole mile because you’ll be too cold by the time you start the next one (as Bill Baillie told me!); but 5 may be a bit too many, unless you’re doing them too slow and then you’re probably stimulating a different energy system (LT or AT or whatever it may be).

In regards to hill circuit, I always like Runningart’s analogy but in this case, if the circuit is short with 3 minutes segment each, doing sprints at the bottom each time you come down may be too much. In most cases, it’s not easy to find the circuit that long. It’s always better to “underdo” anaerobic type training than overding them particularly in the early stage. Of course, if you can handle it, by all mean! But I totally agree with him in doing just running up hill if the hill is quite long instead of bounding or springing. As a transition from conditioning to track schedule, which in this case it should be unless you’re using it as speed development, it would be better to use a longish hill and do “steep hill running” instead of bounding or springing. Of course, again, if you can handle them easily, by all mean, go ahead.

Echoing Nobby here, Arthur used the term "speedwork" differently than most people do. He meant sprinting, working on yor ability to run very fast. As Nobby says, he did not mean sessions like 3 times a mile or 20 times 440. He did have people run those sessions, but that was anaerobic work, not speedwork. From your question, I gather that this is what you're asking about.

The answer may well disappoint you. Again, echoing Nobby, what mattered was doing these sorts of sessions. But he really wasn't at all fussed about what the sessions consisted of. He once said, "We all go to the track. You do 440s. I do 880s. The other guy does 220s. It's all a lot of eyewash. The important thing is to get yourself into a big oxygen debt and be tired when you quit." So, if you like repeat miles, do some. If you like quarters, do some. If you like sessions like 5x5 minutes with a three minute jog or 8 x 3 minutes with a 3 minute jog, do some. That's sort of the advice he gave me. Barry Magee just sent me a copy of several weeks of training that one of his better marathon runners did recently as a race approached and all of those sorts of sessions turned up.

The one feature of Arthur's anaerobic phase that I think is fairly unique is the time trial. Typically, I was given a couple of anaerobic sessions a week and a time trial, usually done at 3 to 10 km, but in marathon preparation, there would be one long time trial; usually 20-30km (down from the full marathon or 20 miler he used to assign.)

PS,

So that weekly race you're referring to is a form of time trialing.

Ahh, I get it. Now for my next question: I live in a very hilly area and get at least 4-5 good hills on every run, should I still do the aforementioned 4 weeks of hill phase? Thanks for the responses thus far, they have been very helpful. Also, should I expect to feel relatively "rusty" when I begin the coordination phase a few weeks from now, or is the hill phase designed to get me accustomed to the mechanics of running fast (i.e. higher knee drive, pushing off until the hind leg is completely straightened)?

Thanks again.

Oh, one more quick one: should I be doing strides more than once a week, that's as often as I did them during my base building period. 8-10x100m. For future reference, if speed is something I should work on year-round, would it be more beneficial to do this type of thing 2 or even three times per week?

A few more things: when I was supervising the lady who translated “Running with Lydiard” into Japanese, we decided to edit it a bit because, as many of us know, his description is not always clear. But she started doing it too much. I told her that, if she shuffles it around too much, then the real content may be contorted.

I know he’s been very confusion but time trial he refers to during conditioning is different from time trial during track schedule. You don’t have to worry about taking or not taking lap times during time trials in conditioning—just run certain distance, if anything preferably a bit longer than 3 miles. You don’t have to also, or perhaps shouldn’t, try to push it a bit harder next week either. That’s not the purpose of time trials during the conditioning (though time may or may not come down as you get fitter anyways).

In regards to repetitions, you’ve got the concept Lydiard always talks about right; you shouldn’t expect rest period during the actual race so you should train your body as such. But he never says “taking rest is completely unnecessary” during the speed (or I should here say anaerobic) training; i.e.; repetitions. I don’t know if this is where people got the idea of shortening the rest period during repetitions/intervals but Lydiard was always quite happy with taking the same distance for recovery jog—in fact, he was opposed to shortening the recovery distance because then you wouldn’t be running as fast during the fast segments.

John Molvar’s training schedule is perfectly fine but again, if you start mixing this part from this method and that part from that method, then it will be completely different system from all of that and it may or may not work at all. I know people have had success with Molvar system so if you want to follow it, by all mean, stick to it. But if “the best speed work was about the same distance as the goal race”, then Snell would have been doing 8 x 100, or 10 x 100. In reality, he did 20 x 400. It is because, if you are trying to develop your anaerobic capacity, you need the volume of speed work. It doesn’t even matter what race distance you’re training. But if you are honing yourself for the specific race, yes, it may be correct to do more closely to the race distance and race speed. Time trial, absolutely! Again, here we are talking about different types of “speed work”. HRE explained the details and specifics of Lydiard-type repeats much better than I had.

How you might feel when you jump into speed work (or anaerobic work) is completely up to the individual. Some handle it very well; some not so good. Ron Daws illustrated it beautifully—he was the latter and it always took him longer to adjust. His suggestion, and I completely agree with it, is to start with big volume at slower speed first; then move onto less volume at faster tempo. You may feel that “sudden rush” of race-ready feeling but that may take a couple of years, not weeks. You should try to find your own pattern.

Hotlanta: glad to know you’re doing the Lydiard Hill Phase right and sensibly. Good luck at Peachtree.

I was gonna let it rest... Doing a concentrated period of hill training should not hurt (unless you seem to always get injured by doing it for whatever the reason) even if you're always running over hilly courses (you're lucky, it's pretty flat here in MN). But also bear in mind; it might be a good idea to go on a more flat course once a week or so, particularly for your time trial or tempo type of run. Unless you're training specifically for a race over hilly course, specially for track events, it would be beneficial.

There are such thing as "too much of good thing". I'd think doing once a week strides during conditioning is good enough. You can do other exercises like easy hill exercise besides just strides. Once you get into track schedule and time to hone your "real" speed, then you might do it more than once a week. Even then, you should probably want to do it in a different form like; strides one day, drills the next, hill exercise the next, something like that. Of course by then, you should be doing time trials and sharpeners (for "pure" speed) and you may not have to worry too much about it.

Interesting!

More stuff...

*If you want to run a race during the hill phase don't expect to run fast.

*Lydiard's program was meant to be used for ONE PEAK during the year. I like the variation he used for those of us who like to race more often. It seems to fit well with the two peak year. Everything would remain the same through the hill phase then the following 8-12 weeks would be a combination of the interval/time trial phases. Race week would include sharpeners, a short time trial and the race. Non-Race week would include 1-2 days of intervals and 1-2 days of time trials, or something like that.

*If I'm running a half-marathon I like to run a 6-8 mile time trial in the two weeks leading up to the half-marathon. If I'm running a 10k I like to run a 3-4 time trial as the last workout before the race on Tuesday. The time trials are at Goal Pace.

*Time trials are meant to event specific. Use them that way. Train at race pace.