Lydiard or Speed Endurance?

[Roy Scott]

There was an article in the Daily Mail on Friday last week. Researchers from Stirling university took two groups, the first did 5x4mins hard 2mins easy, 3 times weekly on a stationary cycle. The second group did 60 mins steady 3 times weekly. After a month they swapped over. The researchers claimed the interval style training gave twice the improvement in power and performance. Researcher Stuart Galloway was quoted 'it is a case of training smarter. Amateur athletes tend to spend a lot of their training in the moderate intensity bracket which showed smaller improvements.'

This shows what is possible on a thrice weekly interval program for a month but it would be a mistake for an athlete training 5-7 days a week to do three interval sessions. They might get away with it for a few weeks but then they'd burn out.

When you collate the most effective global endurance programmes, i.e. those with used by the elite of endurance, there is only one single theme running through them. That theme is that when they work hard they really, really work hard, close to their maximum heart rate. Everything around that is done at an almost pedestrian pace. There is no, or very little moderate (or no man's land as I like to call it) training.

So if you are an athlete looking to improve, you may as well drop your moderate runs and save your chemical reserves for the tough stuff that makes a difference. Unless of course you can not muster the bottle to work that hard.

[Tuffer]

When you collate the most effective global endurance programmes, i.e. those with used by the elite of endurance, there is only one single theme running through them. That theme is that when they work hard they really, really work hard, close to their maximum heart rate. Everything around that is done at an almost pedestrian pace. There is no, or very little moderate (or no man's land as I like to call it) training.

So if you are an athlete looking to improve, you may as well drop your moderate runs and save your chemical reserves for the tough stuff that makes a difference. Unless of course you can not muster the bottle to work that hard.

Oft said is we run our slow runs too fast and our fast runs too slow, which fits with the above.

An anecdote i take with me is that an athlete coming back from a first time elite training camp was really struck how slow they ran most of the time, but really put it out there on the quality sessions.

[A.P.E Knott]

I am not saying that certain individuals are not more predisposed here. If you are going to be abrupt then save it for conflicting viewpoints. No one has identified skill factor as a variable in this debate but is flawed without it.

touche

[IainR]

Oft said is we run our slow runs too fast and our fast runs too slow, which fits with the above.

An anecdote i take with me is that an athlete coming back from a first time elite training camp was really struck how slow they ran most of the time, but really put it out there on the quality sessions.

This may be true..

BUt my issue, well when I have a job, is time.. 10 miles at 6:30 is 65 mins.. 10 mins at 8:30 is 1:25.. but I also get bored running that slowly...

[Twister]

This may be true..

BUt my issue, well when I have a job, is time.. 10 miles at 6:30 is 65 mins.. 10 mins at 8:30 is 1:25.. but I also get bored running that slowly...

I'm lucky to get 10 miles in under 2 hours. I think I need some of this fast training.

[shaunaneto]

Hmm, reckon IainR took it easy when I went for a run with him.... thankfully

[nikalas]

This may be true..

BUt my issue, well when I have a job, is time.. 10 miles at 6:30 is 65 mins.. 10 mins at 8:30 is 1:25.. but I also get bored running that slowly...

run for time rather than distance?

[Turlough]

When you collate the most effective global endurance programmes, i.e. those with used by the elite of endurance, there is only one single theme running through them. That theme is that when they work hard they really, really work hard, close to their maximum heart rate. Everything around that is done at an almost pedestrian pace. There is no, or very little moderate (or no man's land as I like to call it) training.

So if you are an athlete looking to improve, you may as well drop your moderate runs and save your chemical reserves for the tough stuff that makes a difference. Unless of course you can not muster the bottle to work that hard.

Not sure i completely agree. Endurance events are aerobic by nature. Renato Canova a famous Italian marathon coach advocates building aerobic power and aerobic resistance initially. ie 10k training plus moderate paced long runs. When these are developed his training program then aims to extend this aerobic power at race effort. i.e. Intervals get longer and more of them. Long runs get faster. But none of this would be near max heart rate which burns glycogen like a fire and is not desireable for an endurance athlete.


Indeed, a lot of endurance events will involve burning glycogen and fat which means that the athlete should train at these (moderate) intensities so the body adapts to this exact fuel mixture.

You need to train hard sure and you need to teach your body to flush out lactate during hill intervals.

And no matter how much bottle you have, the biggest determinant of how big a session you can manage, is the size of the aerobic house youre living in. If your aerobic house is fully built (like elites standing on skyscapers) then the training should be mainly specific (and hard). If it isnt (like most fell runners here) then most gains can be made by the huge aerobic stimulus of a big increase in mileage over a period of several months.
That said, if people cant do more mileage (e.g time constraints) then they could potentially start making training more specific if potential aerobically development is constrained.
That may be the case for many people, but its not because training harder is beter, its because the best option (a big aerobic stimulus) is not available. And from my experience (in the past thank god) doing a 100ish miles week after week of different fast aerobic paces in a constant state of fatigue is hard training. Not many individual runs are punishing...but the volume is hard. I did specific training later but the ratio was 80:20. and that was about right.

[andy k]

Turlough,
I think that the term "hard" is perhaps misleading.
Hard is not only eyeballs out, lung busting, max pace intervals.
Sure if you are training lactate tolerance then that's what you go for.
But it can also mean a threhold run - a long one
It can mean doing tempo reps - lots of them.
All the sessions that you mention
The point is that the stuff you do inbetween should never be allowed to interfere with these key sessions.
"Hard" sessions should be prioritised so that they are done to the best of your abilty.
You do the amount you set out to do, at the pace or effort you intend.

Hard sessions are easy to spot.
They are the ones that daunt you through the day as you contemplate the effort involved.
When done well they are the ones that, despite worrying all day that you wouldn't manage to knock them out (all the reps, at the pace), you do complete them, feeling properly tired and very pleased with yourself that you overcame your doubt and completed as planned

[Turlough]

Turlough,
I think that the term "hard" is perhaps misleading.
Hard is not only eyeballs out, lung busting, max pace intervals.
Sure if you are training lactate tolerance then that's what you go for.
But it can also mean a threhold run - a long one
It can mean doing tempo reps - lots of them.
All the sessions that you mention
The point is that the stuff you do inbetween should never be allowed to interfere with these key sessions.
"Hard" sessions should be prioritised so that they are done to the best of your abilty.
You do the amount you set out to do, at the pace or effort you intend.

Hard sessions are easy to spot.
They are the ones that daunt you through the day as you contemplate the effort involved.
When done well they are the ones that, despite worrying all day that you wouldn't manage to knock them out (all the reps, at the pace), you do complete them, feeling properly tired and very pleased with yourself that you overcame your doubt and completed as planned

I take your point. However, The post in question did define hard runs as Max HR which is not aerobic. Lydiard training once max mileage is attained contains long tempos etc of different paces...THis is not speed endurance, however. Also you are fatigued throughout this phase so are never completely rested for any session. Thus the aerobic system is being generally attacked at all times at a range of paces which causes great adaption. This also provides excellent leg strenght to weight benefits. This allows you to do the more difficult race specific training that follow, the sessions youd escribe. To do the really hard sessions you need this aerobic base. The biger it is, the biger teh sessions that follow, the better you race. For a runner with low aerobic conditioning, specific training should be minimal, aerobic development will gain more. I donts ee speed endurance as relevant to any hill race of 15 mins or long except for teh very elite athletes and only then in limited amounts. Aerobic cionditioning always needs to be established, followed by the more specific work. If you can only do one (i dont see why this would be) you should do the aerobic stuff if underdeveloped and have the time. If you are aerobically mased for a particular mileage, i would do sessions getting more specific and harder, but keeping the key older sessions (maintaining abse). I take your point that hard specific training is important. The aerobic conditioning is essential though as i would see it, and speed endurance would only be relevant for elite hill runners in very short races. Strenght endurance is far more specific. For hill running relevance?? Lydiard any day in my opinion.