Interesting stuff for sure, but I wonder whether the conclusion of the article that endurance athletes should train for "power" is really demonstrated by the evidence in the studies. To me the studies show that sprint times and plyometric ability are good predictors of the sucess of a competitive endurance athlete's potential, but they don't demonstrate that training to improve those skills improved an athlete's competitiveness.
I read the article with an eye towards "what does this mean to my training" and I'm not sure what to conclude. I'm busy training for the NYC marathon in November which is a huge leap for me. I was a competitive sprinter (100m + 200m) and long jumper in school and have never shown natural abilities for distance. But that doesn't mean that since I could crush most 5k runners in a 100m sprint I should win a 5k. Nor do I think that increasing my focus on strength and power will help me complete the marathon since the long distances are what are really difficult for me.
I guess my reation to the article is that the studies are interesting but the authior is wrong-headed in the recommendations he makes based on the studies. Of course on the other hand the article was not written for someone like me, it was written for the guy who logs miles and times not sets and reps.
I don't know what to make out of these either. I can get that two people of equal training...one of them is faster in the short distances...they'll potentially be the faster at long distances.
But like UpNorth...I'm not sure what that concludes torwards training.
Any thoughts? What does that mean for the 5k'er 10k'er? Or the 1.5m'er (near and dear to my heart!)?
Buk> If you have ideas on ways to improve I'll be the guinie pig. Late july, early august I'm going to be getting into run mode for a test in oct\nov. Volume would have to be somewhat light. I'm looking at trying to do 3x a week run of 3x800 right now w\ some plyo drills tossed in to hopefully help footspeed. Probibly no lifting (unless it was an A\B lift\run thing). I don't know if my knee will ever really get better, but volume really dorks with things.
I think the article is a lead-in to entice you to buy one of their training programs, which I imagine includes more speedwork where you push into the anaerobic zone than typically done by many people training for long distance races (emphasis on logging lots and lots of miles). So that's why they don't give you the practical application info.
I think seeing the actual studies that they talk about could be interesting. I may try to find some of them this week.
Basically they are seeing a coorelation of sprint times and plyometric ability to endurance running, and making some assumptions. You could argue the exact opposite side of the equation and claim that endurance efforts are good predictors of sprint and plyometric ability. Espically since(as I understand), the athletes traind for the distance events, it would be this training that created their sprint and plyometric performance. Now maybe the opposite study is in order - see if the same correlation exists in athletes that train primarily for power? Could endurance running be the key to 50m sprints?
It is common in weightlifting to suggest to increase your max, so that 75% 1RM(what you can typically do for 10 reps) increases. This is a less common path in running, but also the endurance events are much longer than any lifting endurance. Is it simply a different mentality about the type of training that is perfered? Lifters want to lift heavy(15 reps is lame), and runners want to run far.
Running economy still seemed to be the strongest predictor of endurance events. Maybe it is the real answer. The best way to improve running economy is believed by most to rack up the miles. But what are the true components of running economy, what else improves running economy and what else does improving running economy improve? I would assume that improving the stretch-shortening cycle(through whatever means) would improve running economy of a non-healstriker. The stretch-shortening cycle is a big component of sprinting and the plyometric jump. Notice that the static jump wasn't mentioned as a predictor(at least in the article, need to see the actual studies), so power isn't the answer, it is the plyometric ability. So can running economy(which most likely will improve distance efforts) be improved through plyometric training. Track athletes do a lot of plyometrics and form running drills, these seem absent in distance runners(admittedly I don't know what college cross-country runners do). Distance runners improve running by running, but would form drills not help them as much as it helps a track athlete. Same for plyometrics, basically improving the bounce off of the ground. The article mentioned one study that showed a coorelation between ground contact time and distance performance, stronger plyometric ability seems to be one avenue to decreasing ground contact time to me.
Obviously to run long distances you have to train at those distances, but this article makes me wonder what all of the components of running economy are. If they were line-itemed, we could identify which parts of runnung economy were our strenghts and which were our weaknesses. Maybe distance running addresses some of the aspects, but others are more coorelated to plyometric training and that is why the athletes in the studys who were better plyometrically were better at endurance events(and most likely had better running economy)? Does improved plyometric ability have a direct carryover to running economy and therefore distance performance. I don't know, but as a distance athlete is plyometric training going to hamper your performance? It will likely help improve your injury resistance.
There was an article on a runners world some time ago by one of the first to break the 4min miles. He was commenting on how he spent tons of time in the weight room and he strength was his "strength". This he compaired to newer runners whom are comparitivly lean. I think the exact term was "lungs with legs".
It's really funny to me that running is one of the most studied athletic acts in the world. It's one of the most basic sports that you can do. But we have so many questions and ideas! You'd think we'd pretty much have it figured out by now!
The more important part of training at distance is pacing vs conditioning. Alywn wrote a piece about that not too long ago saying that their wasn't any reason to actually run the distance untill the race day. I don't know where I was going with that, but something to ponder.
The big question in my mind is "is running itself" going to be an excersise in plyometric training? Would a 50meters sprint do anything in that reguards? Would a 5k? Where's the trade off(s) between one "common" running session vs a "HIIT" approach vs a "plyo" workout?
Basically they are seeing a coorelation of sprint times and plyometric ability to endurance running, and making some assumptions. You could argue the exact opposite side of the equation and claim that endurance efforts are good predictors of sprint and plyometric ability. Espically since(as I understand), the athletes traind for the distance events, it would be this training that created their sprint and plyometric performance. Now maybe the opposite study is in order - see if the same correlation exists in athletes that train primarily for power? Could endurance running be the key to 50m sprints?
I think there assumptions are flawed. I'd be interested in the reading the complete studies as well, but I just can't see a Kenyan runner spending a significant amount of his/her training doing 100m intervals. I don't think that is time well spent for such a specialized event (in this case 10k+ races). The studies show that those with better sprint and plyo abilities perform better. To me that shows that natural athletes are stronger competitors than those who are less gifted but work their ass off. However, certainly some strength/power training might benefit these folks in the long run because a well-rounded athlete is an injury-free one and we've all seen evidence of the muscles imbalances that running creates.
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Running economy still seemed to be the strongest predictor of endurance events. Maybe it is the real answer. The best way to improve running economy is believed by most to rack up the miles. But what are the true components of running economy, what else improves running economy and what else does improving running economy improve?
The guys at POSE will tell you exactly what makes the most efficient runner (in their view) -- it's a forefoot strike, never really using your heels. The interested aspect of POSE in relation to these findings is that a forefoot strike style of running is murder on your calves since it taking all of the shock from the landing, not your knees. You could stretch that fact and assume that plyo drills would improve the economy of the runner since those drills would overload the calf and force it to adapt and become stronger. Maybe that's too much of a leap.
I still believe however that other that tweaking a runner's form the best thing is putting in the miles. That could be long-slow distance, fartleks or tempo running, but nothing will improve a runners ability more than running.
I should also add, for full-diclosure purposes, that I'm currently training for a marathon (my first one) but am taking an unusual approach. Monday-Wednesday I'm doing whatever CrossFit throws my way. Thursday I'm doing plyometric drills (Thanks Buk!) and Saturday I'm doing a long run.
Basically I'm running only once a week and the training is going great. I'm running father and faster than I ever thought I could. So despite what I just argued above I'm following a program more like what I think Buk is envisioning.
IMO it's one of those things that everyone says no no no...and then try it and say "wow that actually works". It's neat to look at oldie timey marathon training logs to see different approaches. Some people (elite athletes of the day) only walked, some did almost entirely intervals.
It *seems* like the big fear with longer distances isn't so much that interval (only) training is bad, only that it's freaking hard in general and hard on the body. So longer interval session work that would be needed for the long distances would be hard for someone that wasn't in fairly stellar condition. It's a whole lot easier (and probibly better) for a new person to go for time or distance someone frequently than to know when to call it quits on an speed scheme. It just requires more skill and careful planning.
It's easy to assume that relative strength could play a big role in gait effenciency. However I'm not sure what tests of relative strength you could do to see if that was\is a genuine weakness (or what to do about it if it were). It seems like the parachute (or more appropriately several of different sizes) is a good tool. But you'd have to be a pretty big stud not to get pointed and laughed at by everyone!
Would leg turnover be less important as distance increased? How would that effect plyo ability? I mean a powerful long(ish) stride high in relative strength that's nice and springy (should) be pretty ideal in effenciency wouldn't it?
The more and more you look at it, the more it really makes sense (on paper). It'd still be an interesting feat to impliment though!!
interesting...it didn't appear controlled enough to really "prove" anything but again it hints that their is potential in the madness. one thing that, that particular study screams at me is that the plyo group did additional (high intensity) work than the other. was it SPECIFICALLY plyo work that did the trick or would 100-200m repeats have done the same?
This is a terrific discussion and a great find by Buk. As a veteran marathoner and well-practiced tri- and duathlon guy, I can tell you that I've tried several different approaches to running distance. Twenty-five or thirty years ago it was running six or seven days a week; fifteen or twenty years ago it was no weight lifting (leg work) at all during mary training; ten years ago it was running very little distance and lots of fartleks; five years ago it seemed like the running world had weeded out the best of all the 'researched' trails and arrived at intervals, light lifting, and a moderate amount of distance work; today it's less running days of more distance, interspersed with intervals and punctuated by cross training, including (thank God) leg work in the weight room. Not to mention rewiring my stride length ever-so-slightly.
Of course all of the above are my own interpretations and applications of the information available at the moment. So the type of information that Buk found comes as no surprise, because it's probably just more refinement to the constantly evolving research that we set our running clocks to. And, like the 'new' information that came available in years past, it most likely has some elements of truth and application.
I wouldn't be at all surprised if next year or the year after I'm adding plyo work to my training. Hell, it would be good for me no matter what.
It occurs to me, not for the first time, that there simply aren't enough days in the week to get all the things done that need to get done.
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I came from the MH Fitness Forum.
It occurs to me, not for the first time, that there simply aren't enough days in the week to get all the things done that need to get done.
And therein lies the biggest problem of all, at least for those of us mere mortals that have school and/or jobs to juggle with fitness. I think I could be a much better runner than I am if I didn't want to lift heavy and use up 2-4 workouts a week that way. I think I could be a much stronger lifter if I didn't like distance running and didn't devote a lot of my time to it. Shoot, I could be better at both if I was a sponsored athlete and working out was my job. Unfortunately, that is not the case.
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"If it felt good, you didn't push hard enough. It's supposed to hurt like hell." - Dean Karnazes' track coach, Ultramarathon Man
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The good thing about plyometric training is that I'm assuming the workouts are relatively short (but intense). A 2.7% speed increase is significant. If that translated over to a 10K, it would be about one minute off a 40 minute 10K. At marathon distance, it's 4-5 minutes. Of course, the article describes improvement at 3K distance, which is not a very long run. Nevertheless, a 2.7% improvement (or even less) would be a nice return on the short time invested each week in these workouts.
I hear ya on not having time to get all of these things done.
yeah, I think chu's book said the workout would be a 30min max time. you probibly wouldn't have to do it "in addition to" your other workouts but instead of a shorter recovery style run (or just shorter runs in general). you're looking at 2-3 plyo workouts a week.
It ought to blur the line in between a resistance training\injury prevention training, type deal. Bounding, multi-jumps, and footwork drills (knee, heel, ankle). Most of the longer distance injury's from loss of springyness\form, should be pushed back. Stiffer ankles out to help with those trail run roots.
It'd totally depend on your program but it might not be to hard to work in esp if you're already out 4-6 days a week.
anaerobic power predicts distance efforts
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