LYDIARD OR DANIELS?

Agreed Rich, Year round I have my athletes run 6 to 10 X 100 "easy, fast, relaxed strides" every Monday and Friday as part of the 45 mins to an Hour run (depends on time of year.
For those who wonder " How fast ?". Tinman gives a good indicator, Use your 5 k pace.

Remember, Lydiard shuffled around his schedule quite a bit from the original "Run to the Top" days till the latest "Running to the Top". Original "Arthur's Boys" were doing hill exercise on an 800m long uphill, 2-mile loop total, with windsprints and fast downhill striding, 6 days a week. He realized (1) not many people could do that much of heavy load (most of them weren't as strong as the original boys) and (2) many just did uphill exercises which was sufficient but there were some missing elements.

Many people complain that they get slower by doing just slow running. Well, they weren't doing just "slow jogging" but certain elements needed to be developed during the hill training phase. Uphill, as most would agree, would develop power in the legs and some technique elements such as high knee lift and back-leg extension. But this is when you should start working on leg speed to overcome muscle viscosity (some may argue scientifically if there's such thing...) and work on the leg-turn over. Some windsprints performed at the bottom of the hill would help but the best way to do it is actually downhill striding. Snell was running an 800m downhill section somewhere around 1:50. Some people fear hurting themselves by doing that and avoid downhill section all together. Some well-known athletes, such as Marty Liquori and John Walker, did avoid downhill for fear of injuring themselves but they could get away with it because they compensated that element.

In most cases, people use shorter hill than 800m (2-mile loop) and Lydiard cautioned doing too much windsprints if the hill is short. Then if people avoid downhill striding and just jog down the hill, which was in most cases, they weren't completely preparing themselves for the next phase: track anaerobic phase. Soooooo... He included what he called "leg-speed" exercise in between hill training days. What it is, as HRE cautioned, is you go out, using slight downhill if possible, always with the wing on your back, never against the wind, run down 100~150m stretch by MOVING YOUR LEGS AS FAST AS POSSIBLE. Don't care about how fast you're actually running. Just concentrate on moving your legs fast. You should take plenty of recovery, at least 300m jog in between, so it won't be highly anaerobic if at all. Also, you should be doing plenty of warm-up and cool-down; if anything, do this after jogging something like 8 miles or so.

I personally recommend you not do this 3 days a week but perhaps twice, even once, a week and do at least one day, if not twice, of long jog of 1:30 instead. Particularly I feel most people don't use long enough hill that aerobic side of maintenance gets a bit short-sighted during this period.

It is Lydiard's fault that he didn't quite fully explain things and when he changed schedule, he really didn't explain why and how he did it; but it's our fault also that we don't really read into what he really meant and just jump into the schedule and schedule only.

Spidey:

Zatopek (I don't think his first name was Emil...) who lives in Osaka, watching the TV coverage of Tokyo marathon, and I, who live in MN checking out several Japanese website links, did an instant coverage of the race last night. It was actually a lot of fun. It's on this message board site somewhere. We'll try to do that for Fukuoka marathon as well.

One story I picked up from some of the 'old hands'.
Onr time Peter Snell was not running the 'Downhill' 800's particularly well (somewhere in the 1:58 . 2:05 area !!!).
He was teased about this by some of the 'younger' guys.
One week later he came out and ran one in 1:42 !!.

He maybe able to confirm this.

One more thing to add to it; naturally when you come out from conditioning and go into hill phase, there would be a lot of changes in your body. Your body will take lots of beatings. Again, you really need to apply "Common Sense" to successfully complete this program. It is sequencial development where one phase comes after another like laying down blocks. However, it should NOT be literally like blocks. Transition would have to be smooth and gradual.

This means if you're not used to moving your legs fast, you should condition yourself for that. Good guideline would be to, say include some fartlek or some striding 2 to 3 weeks before the completion of conditioning; then start once a week of leg-speed exercise for the first week or two during hill training phase...something like that.

You would need to sit down and map it all out before the season; when is your target race, how long do you have, what is your strengths and weakensses, do you like to include some repetitions/fartlek during conditioning or do you like to just pile up mileage, geographically do you have access to long hills or short hill or no hill at all... You have to consider all elements when you put the program together and have a flow from one development to another and most importatnly have a clear understanding of just what the heck you're trying to achieve during each and every phase of the program. So you won't go like; "Gee, I'm in the third week of marathon conditioning phase; but I just want to see how fast I can run repeat 400s..." You may laugh but you would not believe how many actually do this.

Kim:

I was going to include this comment; perhaps I'll tell Peter that's why he got that stupid stress fructure coming down the hill! Even Peter. as great and cool as he is, has done a stupid thing like that!?

Nobby (and Zatopek) -- Thx for the tip about the "live" Tokyo Marathon coverage. I went back and found and read the thread. Someday soon we should have web simulcasts of these things, but until then making do with you and Zatopek at the microphones is swell; you sound like you had a great time (and I'm very happy for Naoko . . . though I'm sorry all the white people still look alike for you :>) ). -- S

Nobby, I agree that leg speed and technique are important all year round, and that we must not stray too far from speed during our endurance base training. But isn't it less confusing to a young runner to tell them to do - say 12 x 400 in 75 seconds with 200m jog in the same time, and gradually build up to 10 x 1000m in 3.05 or whatever?

Runners can easily become fixated with mileage buildup that is not much more than months of slow running. I criticized one regular poster for doing lots of mile reps in six minutes, which I considered to be a waste of time effort and ability, considering the young man in question can run 400m in well under 60 seconds.
We need to teach our legs the biomechanics of sustained fast running in a mostly aerobic manner initially, if we are to get anywhere near our potential as middle or long distance runners.

When this came up for discussion once with Arthur
"run down 100~150m stretch by MOVING YOUR LEGS AS FAST AS POSSIBLE"
He was asked by a guy who said "If you are running down hill as fast as you can (Moving your legs as fast as possible) you will loose all control and co ordination, How do you suggest we get around that"
Arthur came up with a neat analogy
He said "Find a set of atairs (In a house, office block etc) start at the top and try and go down those stairs quickly, but being aware as to what your feet are doing.
What you will find is your "mind" or "thought pattern" about "moving quickly" is suddenly "running ahead" of you as you descend."
He went on to say "You don't run recklessly down stairs, you 'coordinate' the movement.Otherwise you end up in a heap at the bottom !!!. What we are trying to do with the downhill running is move as fast as possible, but with coordinated movement.
Try to do the same thing as on the stairs. Move as quickly as possible with your "mind" running just ahead of you "

I have tried this and it works. It is quite a neat feeling and Man ! can you motor !!

Sure.... I can be nasty and just leave it at that!? Just kidding!

But seriously, yes, I don't see too much problem shuffling workouts like that providing (!) we have a clear understanding of what's it doing to the athletes. Second and third generations of Flying Kiwis; John Walker, Rod Dixon and Dick Quax in the 70s and Allison Roe, Ann Audain and Lorraine Moller in the 80s; all did variation of the Lydiard program. Both Dixon and Walker did lots of hills (can't avoid them!) but I don't believe they did specific hill phase. Quax, while again included lots of hills in his runs, never did hill phase as Lydiard laid out. If anything, Quax was probably closest to what you're describing (though personally 10X1000m in 3:05 is a heck of a workout for young athletes, considering Seko, with PR of 27:45, did 10X1000m in 2:55). So in that sense, Quax might have been the furthest out from the original Lydiard scheme yet he probably was the biggest promoter of the Lydiardism of all (till now with Lorraine and I). Again, hill training is just transition in most part. Whatever you feel sufficient to cover that purpose should be good.

Now I'd think you're not just talking about hill training. And, fine, there are many different ways to satisfy stimulation of all the necessary energy systems and other developments. I believe Lydiard program covers all that and he laid it out in such way that it makes sense (to me) most. There are other ways to do it. But if we're talking about simplest terms to make youngsters understand; I was watching "Leagues of Their Own" last night (good movie!), that drunken coach played by Tom Hanks, I would think a coach like him would go; "Hey, coach, how should I run a mile?" "(spit, spit) Go out and run a mile as hard as you can...(burp)" That would be quite simple. I believe Lydiard laid out a very sound training progam; from A to Z--in a very make-sense-sequential way to train and develop athletes. And it would be a coach's job to explain what to do, how to do it and WHY they are doing those particular workouts the way they are; and athletes understand why we are following this particular program.

Frankly, though, if we are talking about a less confusing way to train for young athletes, what's all this mumbo jumbo of LT run and AT run and lactate level and all that? I think 1/4 effort, 1/2 effort and 3/4 effort is much more simple and easier to understand.

Now whether doing mile repeats is waste of time and effort for someone who can run fast 400m or not, that's another discussion topic. I don't think they are; but I also know that some people feel that the speed of training should be the same as what's expected in the actual race. Again, this would bring us all the way back to whether running 100MPW at, say, 6 or 7 minute pace worthwhile for running a 4-minute-mile. I guess I would answer to this the way Lydiard would have probably answered (which actually agree with your point); it's all important. If you train at slower pace, regardless of how tough it is to do 1k repeats or mile repeats, that's not going to be enough. You need to work on faster speed. "You will not try a cake half cooked."

Am I answering your question at all, or am I just mubling?

I've been following this thead for a while as it is a good one. I'd like to know what you all (Nobby, HRE, Kim or anyone else) think about this: http://www.runningtimes.com/issues/03nov/multi-pace.htm

Also, Is it possible to continually raise one's lactate threshold over time(ie. Arthur's max steady state) while adding in occasional repetition training. For example, if you are training for 5k's, and the 5k is 93-95% aerobic, then wouldn't it make sense to train with this ratio of aerobic to anaerobic pretty much year round? Say 5 miles a week at "anaerobic" speeds for a 100 mile a week runner. More or less than this depending on racing frequency.

I'd say that I'd like to thank Mr. Beck for writing that article; that sort of re-ensured the legitimacy of the Lydiardism??? I hadn't read the actual article till now (I slackened renewing the subscription and missed that particular issue but Greg McMillan had filled me in with the content) so thank you for posting the site.

There are a whole lot more that goes into the Lydiard program than just running 100MPW or slow jogging or mileage only or hill training, etc. Same reason why I don't like suggesting people to skip one season (track or cross country) and compete just one season a year; or suggesting people to concentrate on "base building" and nothing more for 6 months or 12 months or, in some cases people have asked this question, more than a couple of years straight. "Conditioning" means a lot more than just piling up mileage. And, yes, I'm reflecting what Lydiard had said! I've mede that mistake and Arthur corrected me.

In terms of including "5 miles" of anaerobic speed during conditioning phase, this is how I'd respond to that;

Without any proper scientific terms (because basically I don't really think we know just exactly where's aerobic and anaerobic and what it all really does to you), If you're doing those "5 miles" in, say, 2 miles all out (I'd say that would be anaerobic) one day and 3 miles all out one other day; I would not recommend it. If you're simply doing some leg-speed type strides of 100~200m at, often used, 5k race pace for a couple of days a week, I guess it wouldn't be too bad. There's nothing wrong with running faster in the Lydiard program. Magee or Snell were running 10 miles on Monday in something like 55 minutes and another 10 miles on Friday in about 53 or 52 minutes. Those are pretty darn fast! If not, they would do some fartlek once in a while, if not regularly. Baillie said that he used to do 200m relaxed strides on Friday (though Arthur wasn't too keen on it).

All Lydiard was saying is this: At certain period of year, you want to designate for developing aerboci capacity. It is best developed by performing a lot of running and it's very difficult to do a lot of training anaerobically because, in Arthur's words, anaerobic exercise is 19 times uneconomical than aerobic exercise and it takes longer (48 hours or thereabout) to recover from it. So it is not economical to introduce anaerobic running during conditioning. Same reason why he wasn't too keen on LSD--it's not as economical to gain the best result in the time spent training. If you feel you need to do it that way, go ahead and do it (Arthur would say), but you may not get the best possible result by doing it that way. You can still achieve reasonably good results. He's not against it; he's merely saying what he believed was the best and most economical way to train. With above example, instead of doing 2-mile all-out workout, you could do 8 or 10 miles steady state. You would be doing that later so why not?

I was just checking what I've written and...man, I found a lot of misspells and other funny stuff. In the part I talked about down hill striding vs. leg-speed exercise; "always wing on your back"? Man, that would help, wouldn't it!?

Easy question, easier answer.

Lydiard.

No question.

I have been reading Kim's, Nobby's, Glen's and other's who knew or trained with or under or near Lydiard and their posts with greater and greater interest. Starting off with great interest...whats greater than great?

Started off with page 1 and have read over at another site too (Nobby's contributions)...why anyone cannot get all they need out of this thread, is beyond me.

I am now a disciple of Lord Lydiard.

Do not let this thread go to page 2....every runner should see this.

bmp

This thread needs to be permanently archived at the top of the page along with the Renato Canova thread. I am somewhat surprised this has yet to be done. Probably the best running discussion online ever...

Stop bumping the thread. If there are things to be discussed, let someone fish it up and ask. But seriously, 1100 posts would seem to have answered the question. Stop with the purposeless bumps. It is dumb and contributes nothing.

BUMP!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Nope, I will not stop with the bump. It IS purposeful in that my pc or the site or something makes it very slow to go past page 2 to look for it.

If you don't like it toooo bad for you...go whine in the corner. - Lydiardism should be viewed top centre.

BUMP SET SPIKE!

And your whine is a bump of sorts anyway, so thanks!

Shut your mouth you brat. I hope your mother spanks you tonight.