I will keep using Daniels' plans until Tinman publishes something at least half as informative as The Running Formula

Tinman wants $2,000 a year to personally(?) coach you online. I wonder if he would make more $$$ bu publishing a book?

pay day wrote:

Tinman wants $2,000 a year to personally(?) coach you online. I wonder if he would make more $$$ bu publishing a book?

That is just a robbery with his s*it program!

not opposed to it wrote:

Forget about which philosophy is superior for a minute.

Daniels: His philosophy is published in 3 editions and broken down into easy-to-understand concepts, and he then offers sample training plans that have applied those principles. The runner knows exactly what to do and why they are doing it, and he/she has the freedom to tweak it.

Schwartz: His philosophy is available thru second-hand adaptations on bootleg PDFs. The runner, out of frustration, runs 5x1k @9k pace + 200m sprints for a few weeks, figuring the principles are something like Daniels' but never really knowing for sure, then does something else for variety.

I really want to like Tinman, but I need something more concrete than following Drew Hunter on Insta.

Books don’t coach people. Coaches do.

pay day wrote:

Tinman wants $2,000 a year to personally(?) coach you online. I wonder if he would make more $$$ bu publishing a book?

Probably makes a ton more money coaching if he can get people to pay 2k/year. The market for training books isn't high AND the guy has zero name visibility (i.e. you aren't go to pick it up versus one from some famous olympian).

Don't confuse availability with effectiveness.

Yes, I wish Tinman would publish a book, too. But if I really wanted to built up a Tinman-based program, there are lots of old LRC threads I could look at, interviews on other websites, and Tinman's own website. He's under no obligation to publish a book. He doesn't owe you anything.

It's similar to Canova's training. If you want to put together a program based on his current training approach, you'll have to do a lot of the work yourself. That doesn't tell you anything about how ineffective or effective the program is. If you think that Tinman is that much more effective than Daniels, and the difference is worth it to you, then you'll have to do some work. If it's not that important or you don't think the difference is significant, then just carry own however you want.

Book worm wrote:

Books don’t coach people. Coaches do.

Good luck getting that PhD without using a book (or two hundred)... the teacher and the book are not mutually exclusive.

The same can be said about a coach that claims to have discovered fiber type transformational adaptations (not true) and invented the best training philosophy to maximize his unique discovery (also not true). Kind of hard to prove your theory without publishing your work.

Based on the hyper-sensationalism surrounding the "system"... the book would likely do very well. But... once you put it out there, you lose the mythological aura surrounding the system. Risky move.

I assume once he coaches a guy to an Olympic medal the book will arrive. Passive income + more free time are hard to turn down.

not opposed to it wrote:

Forget about which philosophy is superior for a minute.

Daniels: His philosophy is published in 3 editions and broken down into easy-to-understand concepts, and he then offers sample training plans that have applied those principles. The runner knows exactly what to do and why they are doing it, and he/she has the freedom to tweak it.

Schwartz: His philosophy is available thru second-hand adaptations on bootleg PDFs. The runner, out of frustration, runs 5x1k @9k pace + 200m sprints for a few weeks, figuring the principles are something like Daniels' but never really knowing for sure, then does something else for variety.

I really want to like Tinman, but I need something more concrete than following Drew Hunter on Insta.

How many books has Canova and Patrick Sang published? They have had more success than Daniels. I think a lot of people are looking to science too much as a crutch and not focusing on meeting the demands of the race. Those types of coaches won’t ever publish anything as much because there hasn’t been a boat load of research backing it. The causal masses won’t purchase a book unless a guy with a Ph.D or Olympic qualifications has written it. It’s the appeal to authority. Why would other coaches waste their time then? Be thankful you have places like letsrun (in the past) to even have gotten any other kind of training information. Dogmatic training is bad for you. Wouldn’t recommend it.

ghost_coach wrote:

Book worm wrote:

Books don’t coach people. Coaches do.

Good luck getting that PhD without using a book (or two hundred)... the teacher and the book are not mutually exclusive.

The same can be said about a coach that claims to have discovered fiber type transformational adaptations (not true) and invented the best training philosophy to maximize his unique discovery (also not true). Kind of hard to prove your theory without publishing your work.

Based on the hyper-sensationalism surrounding the "system"... the book would likely do very well. But... once you put it out there, you lose the mythological aura surrounding the system. Risky move.

A PHD is a nonsense.

Books don’t coach people, just like school books don’t teach. They are educational aids. And in some cases, poor ones at that.

Former Sub 14:00 wrote:

How many books has Canova and Patrick Sang published? They have had more success than Daniels.

That post reeks of Steve Magness.

Sorry... that's just inaccurate (the bolded text above), and an unfair assessment of Daniels' system.

What about the huge number of coaches (both high profile and amateur) that have achieved great success using Daniels? Yes... of course that counts as Daniels' success, and furthermore, Daniels in many (if not most) instances was a consultant, working with a team of coaches and hyper-elite athletes that achieved (for American standards) very high levels of success. Daniels is the coach of the coaches! The success of his programs are literally everywhere. Daniels isn't an attention whore looking to over-hype a system based on someone else's work (like Steve Magness, possibly Tom as well). Though no other US based coach out there (with the exception of Lydiard perhaps) would have a legitimate claim to do so.

Yeah... there's other coaches making progress at the A-standard elite level (not including Tinman in this reference... he's not there yet), but until they put "their system" out there for the world to scrutinize, they're just as likely to be using Daniels or Lydiard or Canova as they are some highly intuitive secret methods (not very likely). If you were Jerry Schumacher, and basing the majority of your training principles on the work of another coach (e.g. Daniels), would you be forthcoming and quick to advertise this? I think not.

ghost_coach, this is a legitimate question - who do you think Magness' system is based off of from a work perspective?

Shocker - I find nothing wrong with your approach.

There are lots of coaches who have had lots of success. Might other coaches be better than Daniels? Sure. But Daniels' approach will get you reasonably close to your overall potential, and you won't have to break your brain trying to figure out what to do and how to adjust when you are having an off day and need to modify a workout. Once you absorb the concepts, customizing them is easy.

Which is the great attribute of Daniels. I'd love to give a Canova approach to marathon training a whirl, but I understand Daniels' approach so intimately that the risk/reward matrix is such that it doesn't make a ton of sense for me to do that at this point in my life. With Daniels; there's almost no risk (at least for me).

Tyletc wrote:

ghost_coach, this is a legitimate question - who do you think Magness' system is based off of from a work perspective?

I don't mean this to be an insult, but it would be a much more legitimate question if you asked it with a registered user account. Anyway...

The short answer is, let me read his book and I'll get back to you (likely in another thread)... I just got it a few days ago to go beyond the blog posts. I'll learn more there than I will from his blog. His blog posts (which is all I have to go on) are noting more than the rantings of a passive-aggressive wannabe with an internet connection. He literally spends 80+% of every post rambling on, regurgitating previously published material (nothing new being introduced), while attempting to explain why everyone (coaches, scientists, et al) besides him and his devoted acolytes have run/endurance training all wrong... only to eventually conclude with an attempt to justify why everyone he just finished "shredding" continue to use those same methods (including himself), and rely on the science anyway (because we have nothing better to go on). Obviously smoke and mirrors rhetoric, and desperate for attention (or friendship) rambling isn't a sustainable philosophy for athletic success. The typical pattern is pick a coach or concept, attempt to use big words while shredding the coach or concept, then eventually return full circle and admit that he actually uses the concept... but in his own special way. He's more like a politician than a coach.

Sorry I can't give you a more precise answer.

Tinman has commented on this. He actually has a training book written but it remains unpublished because a big publisher wouldn't pick it up, and he wouldn't find it fair to his private coached athletes to reveal it (of course it would have a risk of reducing his private coaching income, although I don't think that is the case).

Overall, I think it would benefit the running community and Tinman's wallet (from book sales and increased private coaching) if he published the book. He just needs a bit more social proof (e.g. Drew Hunter WC or Olympic medal).

I don't care for your apparent vendetta against Magness or Tinman. I would still argue Sang and Canova has had more success than Daniels. They have coached athletes to levels that Daniels never did. Yes, Daniels had a widely known series of books. That means he immediately will be more accessible and thus will have more people who use him and thus will have more chances at amateur/intermediate level success stories amongst coaches/athletes. In fact, random runnersworld contributors throughout the years have probably had more wide spread impact on the average joe than Canova and Sang ever would. Those people probably also improved from that advice. With that being said, Daniels is a VERY successful coach. More than myself and you could ever hope to be. Multiple things can be true at once.

As you shift the goal posts, my point still stands: science isn't everything. The Ph.D isn't everything. Publishing a book (Tinman hasn't done on his own) isn't everything. Coaching is part science and part art. The second part of that equation gets lost on people who's minds get fixated on only the measurable, repeatable variables through contemporary lenses. Daniels really helped bring together exercise physiologists and coaches into one package. For the time it was very valuable and he did progress the sport. He is not the end all be all though. At one point Igloi, Cerutty, and Lydiard were their own modern day Daniels equivalent. Other coaches who are experiencing success are worth learning from whether or not they have published a book, claimed a certain measurable variable is most important to train at, or that they invented certain training terms. We should look at what programs share in similarity and acknowledge their differences while trying to learn how best to apply it to our own athletes. Stop focusing so much on a coach's inane rhetoric, mannerisms, and claims of their legitimacy over others. Although it is easy to dismiss a lot of what a coach says based off of that, they HAVE had quite a good amount of success and are still worth listening to. You act as if you have no intense bias in the situation, but you do. Smoove is a Daniels die hard and admits it so and I respect him for that. No secrets there. You could really benefit from self reflection.

Also, posting on an unregistered account doesn't make your posts any less worthwhile. That borderlines the classic appeal to authority logical fallacy. Did you know that Daniels himself used to post on an unregistered account for a period of time? Jtupper. Eventually it got registered before he stopped. Not a good look for you either way.

dfegsrfgserg wrote:

Overall, I think it would benefit the running community and Tinman's wallet (from book sales and increased private coaching) if he published the book. He just needs a bit more social proof (e.g. Drew Hunter WC or Olympic medal).

I think Drew Hunter will eventually be a great 5000m runner, maybe even sub-13 one day. He however will never be a medal contender. Tinman needs to be more like Salazar and go find himself a Mo Farah or Yomif Kejelcha.

Daniels chose to coach at the college level for quite a long time. I'd say he's had more successful athletes than Canova, but at a lower level.

Canova is published by the way.

You can find more on google too. He's not selling anything on amazon, but you can find his entire program for free on various letsrun threads if you look. No coach is under obligation to be anywhere near as helpful as Canova has. No one is demanding the coach at NAU or other top programs write a book.

Maybe Tinman has as many privately coached athletes as he can manage. For the amount he's charging, he's got to be doing more than emailing a training plan. So even though a book will get him more, he's not interested.

Ghost_coach, I've lost a lot of respect for your posts because of your slamming Steve Magness. And you haven't even read his book yet? He's one of the most open distance running coaches alive. He's made more information freely available about his approach to training than practically anyone else, and he also has to deliver as a coach at the NCAA and pro level year round.

If you want to know who Magness bases his approach to coaching on, just read his book. It's got a long bibliography. He'll tell you freely that he's drawing on the ideas of previous coaches, and what ideas are supported by science, and what the limits of science are. He's a terrible speller, but so what? He doesn't claim to have all the answers, like you say he does. He recognizes a lot of things people believe aren't true, but doesn't claim at all to know everything. He's written at length about the limits of what he or anyone else knows.

I've read Daniels, and the book is great, but the science is outdated. It was groundbreaking stuff at the time, but it's been supplanted over the last 4 decades. That's just how science works. That't doesn't mean his book isn't valuable. I'm following one of his plans right now in fact so I can get a better idea how Daniels really works.

Daniels' books are a summary of the overall contribution he has made (likely his legacy for the masses), but not his crowning achievement (in my opinion). His work in the lab, and extensive field testing with the elites is where the most significant contributions were made. I respect your thoughts, and that you're seeing my distaste for the sensationalism of cut and paste coaching as an attack on the veracity of Magness' and Tinman's preferred takes on training methodology (the on paper methodology isn't the issue for me)... not as far as I'm concerned (I've said this in numerous posts). Indeed, multiple things can be true at once... as you said. Yes, I know that Jtupper is/was Daniels, and was initially unregistered... the point is he used the same username consistently, so we all knew who we were communicating with. I feel more comfortable knowing who is addressing me directly. My comfort level with this is for me to determine. This is my personal preference, and I like to build relationships with whom I communicate, and that is extremely difficult when random usernames are used throughout a single conversation. I registered as "ghost_coach" because it's related to my existing coaching practice (a nickname given to me by my athletes), not because I have something to hide. At times I do regret not using my real name though. Anyway... moving on to the most important part of this post!

Any appearance of "shifting the goal post" is most certainly unintentional, and likely a result of the injection of off-topic tangents with respect to the original post... perhaps that's my fault by invoking Steve Magness' name in a previous post while trying to make a larger point about sensationalized cut and paste coaching in general. My apologies for the diversion.

**

With respect to your paragraph (above)... this may come as a surprise, and this was also the case in another thread, but I completely agree with your comments and the reasoning behind them. The one exception to the above paragraph is the reference to my perceived bias toward Daniels, and any attempt to hide it. True... Daniels’ methods are the primary structural basis for my (initial) methodology. It's the easiest system to use for establishing a baseline for each individual athlete that I’ve come across, but I am equally open to customization and applying a great number of alternatively prescribed models when deemed necessary to maximize the performance potential of each individual athlete (myself included).

Furthermore, I believe dependency on any one training philosophy leads to a state of inflexible attachment. Which in turn, limits a coach's ability to objectively observe and adjudicate the needs of the individual athlete. I also believe strictly defined categories look great on paper and with sensationalized coaching tenet, but in reality, there are as many routes to success as there are individuals. As you can see, I'm not a slave to the Daniels system, or any other coaching dogma for that matter. I start with Daniels, objectively observe the results over time, and always leave the door open for additional influences to fine tune the results. There is a tremendous amount of wisdom to be gained by studying numerous coaching philosophies. Gaining this knowledge (agree or disagree with the conclusions) only strengthens a coach’s ability to individualize each athlete’s training needs.

Hopefully that allows us to move on…