Been enjoying this thread from afar. Dug this up the other day when cleaning out my office, converting over to baby's room , Guess I am headed to the garage.
Source Ken Doherty Track & Field movies on paper 1967. hopefully I am not infinging on anybodies copyright.
Doherty"s evaluation of strength's of the "Lydiard system"
Thye great strength of lydiard's system lies in its precsiely balanced emphasis upon such related but contrasting factorsas stamina and speed. He claims marathon training (100 miles per week), is key to his system,in the sensethat such "marathon" stamina provides a sound foundation for an even greater emphasis on speed than other systems can provide.
Another great strength lies in it's variety.For example, it insists upon a variety of terrains - and by terrains we mean not only hills and wood paths and running tracks, but also deliberately selected mud and slush,soft sand,fences and stone walls, paved roads, uneven bush country- all for the purpose of establishinga wide and firm foundationof running fitness. on these varied running surfaces, Lydiard planned a variety of training methods: cross country, road racing, marathon running, speed hill training, and when he finally got on the flat running track, many devices of modernn interval trainingand even of the old American over and under distance training with its repeated time trials. I have often criticized the latter because of its over emphasis upon all-out performance in each trial. Lydiard answers this by insisting upon planned increments of improvement: run what you can today, while being certainthat you'll be able to improve upon it next week and six weeks from now. He even has gone as far as to provide de3tailed tables of effort on a time basis.
Another great advantagw held by lydiard does not lie som much within his system as in his location in NZ where he has almost comlplete freedom to fix his competitive schedule so as to further the development of the individual. He can decide what races the athlete should enter to best prepare hiom of rhis BIG racesof the year, regardless of the team situation. Competition, which we tend to rate as all important, can be considered a motivator for training. IN NZ, Lydiard can organize about eight months of training in which competition is secondary. In contrast, in the United States school program, there areabout seven months in which team competition is crucial; individual development through daily trainingmust often be a lesser concern. ( Santee?)
This relative freedom meant that Lydiard could start beginning runners from where they were. They could progress gradually - what a wonderfully sound word that is!- gradually through the various steps of his plan: through time training, mileage training, cross country, road racing, and all the rest. Each new level could be attempted whenthe preceding levbel had been , not merely tried, but masteredto othe point of certinty of control and ease of action.
This freedom from the burden of winning -them-all, which I have attributed to NZ, should also be credited to Lydiard's insistence upon first things first, then second things , then third - and so oon. He is admant in looking ahead twelve and fifthteen months to the BIG RACES and in planning the year" program in terms of them. Even more, he insists upon planning an entire career.
For example: he wrote,
LYDIARD OR DANIELS?
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48 wrote:
For example: he wrote,
What happened to rest of post? Was it accidentally deleted? -
Hey Wiz! Glad yer paying close attention! :)
(I'm not having fun at Pacath anymore) -
Skuj wrote:
Hey Wiz! Glad yer paying close attention! :)
(I'm not having fun at Pacath anymore)
I can see that, re-read entire thread there, don't know what he's on about at all. That's a shame while other contributers are posting good stuff.
Questions for anyone, what is the VDOT system, what does the acronym stand for? -
So in 1953 I started these two nineteen year olds (Halberg and Magee) off together, although I still eased back on the work I gave Halberg because I still did not consdier him strong enough for the full treatment. it was in the 1953 cross country season - late in the year-before I finally got to work on him. In July that year I predicited publicly that halberg would be the greatest middle distance runner NZ had known an that he would start cracking world records at twenty seven- the year he actually won his Olympic title. I would stress here that they (his trianing schedules) are not aimed at producing immediates results... but steady improvement culminating in the ahtlete's best performance at theage when he reaches his full potential (25 to 30 or more).
Lydiard believed that mileage training hardens the steel of development in running, where as speed training sharpens its edge. Much can be done by achieving a sharp edge, regardless the quality of steel. The Gillette Razor Blade Company proved that in 1962 with its super blade which gave a mavellousshave once or twice. But to get such a shave again and again required a hardened stainless steel.So with training systems for running. Lydiard planned in terms of conssitent improvement and eventuallymaximum performance after eight or more years of training and competition. He therefore hardened his steel of training well beyond that of other world-level runners,perhapseven beyondthat of such "inhuman" trainers as Kuts and Pirie. Then, since his training steel was tough enough to take it, he was able to sharpen its edge wih speed trainingto a keeness beyond other systems. His men could runfaster more often because they first had been trained to run further. -
Sorry about that, it somehow managed to post before I got the whole thing written. I am truly sorry about the typos, I am obviuosly not a great typist. Don't know if it was worth while writing but I had hoped it might be enjoyable from a historical perspective as Kenneth Doherty was a brillant T & F mind. There is a weakness evaluation I will be happy to write later if anyone is interested.
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This is getting away from what 48 has written, but related to "long term development" .
Just yeaterday I was part of a team that organised our National Secondary Schools Mountain Bike relay Champs.
I had to park my car 2 miles from the Event so I threw on my Back pack, carried my fold away chair and ran to the event.
The race was held at a plateau at the top of a road called Nusery Hill (We do our hill work here). I have run this hill many, many times. The last time was with HRE and his son when they were here.
My athletes and myself also have made the statement that no Mountain Biker has ever beaten us up that hill !!!
So at the bottom there were rather a lot of young mountain bikers !!!. (Road was closed to traffic so everyone walked or rode their bikes up)
I had no alternative but to preserve that reputation that we have expounded for a number of years.
Yes ! I beat them all and caught a few more on the Hill. At no stage did I feel that it was "too hard". I reached the "summit" feeling good and thought about Arthur and what he would have said.
My point here is that I have been really inconsistent with my running for the last 2 months and am due for Arthroscopic Surgery on my left knee in 2 weeks. I am also 56 years old.
I was able to run that hill so easily purely because I have something like 37 - 38 years of consistent Running behind me, or in a perverse way I am on a programme of "Long term development".
Arthur was as much about "Health and wellness" as he was about Training athletes. I feel I would be letting him down if I did not keep myself in shape where I can run with my athletes. No ! I cannot run the quicker stuff, but I do run all the "easier runs" with no problem.
Today : the knee is a little sore. But Hey ! It was great running that hill. Thanks Arthur ! -
Cool post, no problem with typos.
Hardening the steel before sharpening the edge, simple but descriptive analogy.
I'm still basically ignorant about the Daniels method. I am sort of drawn to both of these two coaches theories...Long time ago I read some of A. Lydiard's writings and did get quite confused with a lot of his terminology to the point I would not be able to follow it when it came to the track w-outs.
J. Daniels to me without reading anything about it, sounds like he could be a scientific improvement to A. Lydiard? [Oops not meaning to be critical here :)] I'm offering this as a possible solution to runners who are out there who may be on a rehab./comeback program
To me A. Lydiard probably was one of the best coaches in the 60's in that he was ahead of his time and more so (now recall reading the great distance runner, Ron Clarke's "The Lonely Breed") was a real caring hands-on type coach...he apparently commanded a heap of respect from and for his charges. -
Hey Wiz, Nobby, et al.
Nobby, I pasted that interview at pacath - sorry about not attributing the authorship. I'd love to see that other interview that you mentioned. Could we link it at pacath? (Then I'll just STFU there for a while, hahahaha. Sheesh!) -
Kim Stevenson wrote:
This is getting away from what 48 has written, but related to "long term development" .
Just yeaterday I was part of a team that organised our National Secondary Schools Mountain Bike relay Champs.
I had to park my car 2 miles from the Event so I threw on my Back pack, carried my fold away chair and ran to the event.
The race was held at a plateau at the top of a road called Nusery Hill (We do our hill work here). I have run this hill many, many times. The last time was with HRE and his son when they were here.
My athletes and myself also have made the statement that no Mountain Biker has ever beaten us up that hill !!!
So at the bottom there were rather a lot of young mountain bikers !!!. (Road was closed to traffic so everyone walked or rode their bikes up)
I had no alternative but to preserve that reputation that we have expounded for a number of years.
Yes ! I beat them all and caught a few more on the Hill. At no stage did I feel that it was "too hard". I reached the "summit" feeling good and thought about Arthur and what he would have said.
My point here is that I have been really inconsistent with my running for the last 2 months and am due for Arthroscopic Surgery on my left knee in 2 weeks. I am also 56 years old.
I was able to run that hill so easily purely because I have something like 37 - 38 years of consistent Running behind me, or in a perverse way I am on a programme of "Long term development".
Arthur was as much about "Health and wellness" as he was about Training athletes. I feel I would be letting him down if I did not keep myself in shape where I can run with my athletes. No ! I cannot run the quicker stuff, but I do run all the "easier runs" with no problem.
Today : the knee is a little sore. But Hey ! It was great running that hill. Thanks Arthur !
Well this 57 yr. old (58 in 4 weeks time) certainly is in admiration..a lot of the time I'm wondering how many running veterans like ourselves with 35 plus yr. experience are still out there hoofing it on the roads & trails.
>>>or in a perverse way I am on a programme of "Long term development<<<
My sentiments/program to the T. However, tho' not faced with any knee surgery I'm plagued with problems higher up the biomechanical chain, BUT, am on my own rehab. walk/run prog. suggested to me on our local running forum by an online contributer who's identity I think I now know. -
Wizzkid:
You are actually exactly right. Way back, I posted a comment from Dick Quax ("I don't care what it's called, as long as I know what I'm doing..."). Lydiard is probably not too far off. I remember listening to the tape of him Japan lecture; when he talked about intervals and repetitions, I could hear Japanese coaches scratching his head. In Lydiard's term, the difference between intervals and repetitions is a bit different from what conventional "terminology" refers thenm as. Nevertheless, it really doesn't matter what he called certain workouts. As I said earlier, you go back and read Richard Tayler story. That tells it all.
(I remember in 1981 when I first met Arthur, he talked about that story during the talk and it was like being hit by a hammer. Later I got together with him for tea and wanted him to autograph his book, "Running with Lydiard". I asked him to repeat the Richard Tayler story. He simply said, "It's in the book." Embarrassing...) -
Skuj:
Look, I'm a computer illiterate! I don't know how to post it here but I do have a pdf file (not the finished one but M&B sent it to me for the final proof). I would actually encourage anybody who's interested in reading this interview or learning about the Lydiardism to go ahead and contact Marathon & Beyond and purchase this issue. They have Lydiard interview as well as Peter Snell interview done by HRE. It's May/June 2004 issue, volume 8, issue 3. Contact Jan Seeley at [email protected] (now I have fulfilled my obligation...). -
Yeah, I'd love to see the Snell interview too. I've heard that he is "scientifically analyzing" Lydiard's methods these days, in order to please the Type A's of the running world. :)
Did Arthur "modify" his approach as the years went by? I keep hearing that the hill phase shrunk from 7 weeks to 3 weeks, and some followers may have decided to discard it alltogether, while others thought of it as absolutely indespensable. What motivations did he have for tinkering with the program that brought so much success in the Snell days? -
48:
Thank you for that post. I particularly like the last line: "His men could run faster more often because they first had been trained to run further."
That is the whole secret. Anybody who criticise Lydiardism being LSD with no sharpening don't know what they are talking about. -
Skuj:
Yes, he had modified it quite a bit. I look at it as "stream-lining", trying to suit the readers but I don't think it really worked that well simply because the readers couldn't follow it well and Lydiard wasn't explaining it well enough either (I don't think he quite understand what and why the audience couldn't understand).
Now I don't want to be the one to say this; there have been others who "interpreted" that Lydiard had realized hill training was "indespencable" simply because some of his "disciples" didn't carry on the strict hill training phase. This is far fromt he truth. He kept his stance that "there can be no more rewarding way to train than training on hills" or "hill training can improves runners immensely." He always encourage people to head out for hills every opportunity they get.
Yes, he did lessened it from 6 days a week down to 2 or 3 but that was simply because most people, beyond his original runners, weren't fit enough to handle that kind of workload. It has always been 4 to 6 weeks; 6 if you can handle it and if the time allows. Snell did 6 weeks of hill phase before Tokyo Olympics. Many always use coach Wetmore's example as "phasing out of hill phase" in the Lydiard program. First, realize his racing situation. College situation may or may not allow anybody to complete full Lydiard cycle. Second, consider the type of terrain CU guys train on. Would they really need separate hill phase? -
The correct way to express VO2 is to have a dot over the V, which means the Volume (for which the "V" stands) is a 1-minute volume of oxygen, rather than just a volume of oxygen. For instance if you measure an amount of oxygen that someone consumes over a period of 2 minutes, and that volume is 8000ml, then the VO2 is 8000ml, but the VdotO2 is 4000ml (volume per minute). When we did all our original computer calculations (using that old fortran style of programming) we gave VdotO2 the term "VDOT" rather than referring to it as "VDOTO2." So VDOT refers to a 1-minute oxygen consumption (expressed in ml per kg body weight per minute). Now and then I check to see if I should be involving myself in this neat discussion. Carry on.
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48:
I'm so glad you posted that article. It clarifys yet another myth people often argue about: all the running should be done on the road. What Lydiard said is that, "for the time spent running, running on the road would give the best result (because of better traction)." He never "insisted" that we do all the running on the road. On the contrary, "it insists upon a variety of terrains - and by terrains we mean not only hills and wood paths and running tracks, but also deliberately selected mud and slush,soft sand,fences and stone walls, paved roads, uneven bush country- all for the purpose of establishinga wide and firm foundationof running fitness." There you have it. -
Hey Wizzkid.....just like 1973 again, eh?
"Go Back Jack, Do It Again....." :)
Thank you jtupper. This beginneth my Daniels learning! -
jtupper:
Yeah, doc, let us here from your own word. How would you summarize your own training program? -
I meant to say, "hear in your own words."
