Is this related to that feeling you get in an Ironman, where you are not breathing hard, your heart rate is low, you feel like you have piles of energy, yet you can't apply any force to the pedals or to the road because your legs just feel heavy and have no bounce...in which case, it is just all about endurance in "low zone 1". RAAM riders feel this all the time. They are going at 12 mph yet their legs burn. It is just endurance, if you go long enough the legs will burn at really really slow speeds :-)

OK since nobody is biting I'll take a stab.

It's the ability to hold a given force for an extended duration.

Example: stand up and raise your arms perpendicular to your body, parallel to the ground. You are doing no work at this point, yet your muscles will fatigue eventually. Someone will have to chime in on what physiologically is happening at this point to create fatigue.

So muscular endurance is enhanced working at high forces for extended periods. Since tempo and threshold efforts are high intensities (and thus, higher forces relative to lower intensity workouts) and can be maintained for relatively long periods of time, they are a good method for improving sport-specific muscular endurance.

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Note to self: increase training load.

I believe this is a BIG TIME limiter for me, especially as it relates to cycling. I have very poor muscular endurance. Explosive power is there, but my muscles fatigue very quickly. Long rides typically result in dramatic losses of power despite adequate hydration and nutrition. Long runs = same story. Long swims however do not result in power loss as I have adequately developed the muscles critical to maintaining my stroke for long periods of time. Part of this probably relates to my athletic backround. Repetitive motion in the upper body is not foreign to my sytem from years of golf, baseball and tennis. Unfortunately those sports did very little to help my legs.

It's my totally unfounded entirely speculative belief that variances in muscular endurance is what allows some people to work at lactate threshold for long periods of time while others (read: me) can only stay there for short periods while maintaining pace (or power).

[reply]
Example: stand up and raise your arms perpendicular to your body, parallel to the ground. You are doing no work at this point, yet your muscles will fatigue eventually. Someone will have to chime in on what physiologically is happening at this point to create fatigue. [/reply]

I won't try to speak to the physiology of this, but I would say you are definitely doing work in this example. You're fighting gravity to hold your arm out, so work is definitely being done.

Saltman, what if you swam for 5-6 hours...do you think you'd lose arm strength like leg strength while biking for the same duration. I bet you do...its just that your long swim equates to your short bike ride...your legs can likely still last longer :-)

"Saltman, what if you swam for 5-6 hours...do you think you'd lose arm strength like leg strength while biking for the same duration. I bet you do..."

Arms and shoulders start to feel weak after a couple hours. It feels like your pull has no force to it, and your hands 'slip.'

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maybe she's born with it, maybe it's chlorine
If you're injured and need some sympathy, PM me and I'm very happy to write back.
disclaimer: PhD not MD

It is tempting to say that the concept of "muscular endurance" exists among triathletes because, as a group, we need something MUCH more polysyllabic than "tempo". But the term "muscular endurance" is much more descriptive of the training load you perceive while doing it, and of the specific fitness gains that you notice from doing it.
I doubt you runners have been neglecting it per se, but you are welcome to borrow our $10 word whenever you need it. As it refers to a type of workout, it means "hard runs in the hills". As it refers to fitness, it means "endurance".

"I believe this is a BIG TIME limiter for me"

How long have you been training? How long have you been training long?

I say this with respect, but perhaps you just have not put in enough time yet. People respond to training stimuli differently. However, the bottom line is that many of the real, substantial and sustainable gains in endurance fitness come over much longer periods of time( read: years) than people imagine. The good news is, that once you have put in the time, say 5 - 6 years and established adeep base of fitness and endurance, it will stay with you for a long time, even with just a maitneance training schedule.

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Steve Fleck @stevefleck | Blog

Endurance - The act, quality, or power of withstanding hardship or stress.


From a physiological point of view there isn't such a thing as "muscular endurance", simply because all endurance is muscular. Using terms like "muscular endurance" makes you believe there are other kinds of endurance, which there aren't. Except the mental endurance you need to see people invent physiological concepts, that is...

The good news is, that once you have put in the time, say 5 - 6 years and established adeep base of fitness and endurance, it will stay with you for a long time, even with just a maitneance training schedule.

I can personally attest to that statement, currently being at the bare minimum of a maintenance training schedule, yet was able to slog it out for 5 1/2 hours plus on an indoor bike last Saturday...granted, for the most part I wasn't riding all that hard but as an anecdotal data point with more than 20 years of "endurance sports" floating around my past---I got through it and am not completely trashed.

(Hee hee hee)

I looked up "muscular endurance" in my Exercise Phys text. It's not in the index or the glossary.

so it does not exist ?

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maybe she's born with it, maybe it's chlorine
If you're injured and need some sympathy, PM me and I'm very happy to write back.
disclaimer: PhD not MD

It does. It's called endurance.

Not to be a smart@$$, but isn't that just getting tired?

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Brandon Marsh - Website | @BrandonMarshTX | RokaSports | 1stEndurance | ATC Bikeshop |

Mike,

I have had similar experiences recently. I don't "train" that mch anymore. Just fit in what I can when I can, but I have 25+ years worth of non-stop fitness to tap into. It does not seem to take me that long to ramp it back up and be competitive.

I have jumped into sprint triathlons here and there on a whim the last few years and despite limited, to no swimming and running and a modest amount of cycling, I have not embarassed myself, and in a couple of instances surprised myself and placed well in my AG. I am not sure how else to explain this other than the huge base a resivoir of fitness and muscle memory that has built up over time.

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Steve Fleck @stevefleck | Blog

I ass-u-me that most people know this, Friel defines it as:

Muscular Endurance (ME) - The ability of a muscle of muscle group to perform repeated contractions for a long period of time while while bearing a load. The combination of force and endurance abilities.

Endurance - The ability to persist despite the onset of fatique.

THANK YOU PAULO!! but dont tell Mr Friel!

Kurt

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http://www.pbmcoaching.com
USA Triathlon Level 3 Elite Coach
USA Cycling Level 1 Elite Coach

And he is wrong. Force is a component of endurance, not a separate ability.

Do you agree with his ability regions? If not, then how do define strengths and weaknesses?

Can I buy your book on Amazon.com?

No.

Strenghts and weaknesses can only be related to the three energy systems.

What I am saying is not exatly new. I'm sure that you can find plenty of books on Amazon.com with what I am saying.

Any comments effects of sport-specific weight training on muscular endurance?

For example leg press for cycling. What would be the optimal number of reps to perform? 6, 10, 20, 50? Even doing 100 reps is much less than the number of contractions when doing a long bike ride. Should the sets be done to complete failure, as recommended by strength trainers?

Only on race week...

LOL... fucking classic :-D

Seriously!

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Steve Fleck @stevefleck | Blog

Strenghts and weaknesses can only be related to the three energy systems.

You might be coach, but I (used to be) the biochemist, and I'll call you on this and say that its absurdly reductionist. Our current understanding of cellular and metabolic respiration might not provide a particularly good way to understand how someone can ride a 40km TT in 52 minutes but cannot ride 100 miles in less than 6 hours; that doesn't mean that such people cannot exist. We have clues about the reasons why someone can put out that kind of effort over an hour but cannot sustain lower workloads for 6 hours. We know that with enough training, they can probably bridge the gap. But to say that all that is happening is some kind of shift within 3 specific biochemical pathways in the body is just way too simplistic. Pain tolerance, body and joint mechanics, motivational issues - these all play significant roles in the "appearance" of muscular endurance but have nothing to do with biochemical energy systems.

What if I wrote this:

"Strenghts and weaknesses can only be related to the three energy systems and how they are called into play in a performance situation"

Does that make you happier?

And you're the one that is saying that a 40km and a 100mi maximal efforts are different. In fact, they are much the same and the limiter for both is the same too. We've been over this many times, there isn't such a thing as an athlete that is "very efficient" at lower speeds than higher speeds.

And muscular endurance now comprises motivational issues too? I didn't know that, better ask Friel that...

Endurance - the ability to do the action for a long time (pedal a century at 15mph)
Force - the ability to apply force to the action (put out big watts for a short time)
Muscular Endurance = force + endurance aka put out big watts for a long time

I thought you had read TTB/Going Long?

It's a part of endurance, scientifically. Practically, it's that point where power is extended over longer durations. Maybe not a scientific construct, but definitely a useful mental one.

Let's dive deeper....

Example A: I'm a TT specialist in flat long course. I can hold my threshold power, but have a hard time on hills and shorter effort compared to my counterparts. What am I missing?

Example B: My name is Ramussen and I can generate large amounts of wattage for climbs, but have a hard time maintaining power for long periods of time to be known as a TT specialist. What am I missing?

I hear what you're saying, but it appears there is a grey area where you see black and white. If there are (3) energy systems, it appears there would be infinite number of combination for each individual rider to enhance their skill. Perhaps it's just an argument over the term "muscular endurance" rather than the actual area which is represented on his triangle......

No?

Paulo, I'm wondering that if you changed the statement from "motivational issues" to "neural performance" there might be some truth to it when it relates to performance. Some people can concentrate for an hour or a few at high levels of concentration (be it crunching numbers using Maxwell's equations or riding a bike). Some people can never apply a lot of brain power, but can grind away doing an audit of Worldcom's books for many hours a day or ride at 18 mph all day. Some people can just concentrate for longer than others, and it is reflected in how hard they can go. When the brain stops telliing the muscles to fire, then everything stops...how else can we explain a guy running 6 minute miles at the end of a marathon, and then crossing the finish line and unable to walk a step? Did something magical happen in the muscles 1 millimeter past the finish? I'm not sure. The brain is a powerful thing. I'm don't really care if motivation/neural performance fits into a definition of muscular endurance (or any endurance), but to Dawhead's point, it is a factor in how a person performs.

First some definitions. Traditional Tri Training folklore: LSD = Endurance.

Can there not exist two people such that Joe and Bob can put out 500 watts for 60 seconds, and both can pedal for 8 hours, yet Joe does his 8 hours best at 200 watts while Bob can only put forth 150 watts?

Scientifically the limiter may be "endurance", but the workouts needed to correct Bob's deficiency is [probably] not more LSD work. Hence the notation "muscular endurance".

Call it what you want. The biology isn't as important as the mental constructs and results:

Endurance: LSD.
Force: Hill Repeats.
ME: Tempo.

Example A: If you're talking about rollers, that you have to "power up", then your anaerobic capacity plays a role there. If it's long climbs, you're probably lacking specificity and you need to devote more time to ride hills.

Example B: My name is Rasmussen and I have an excellent power/weight ratio basically due to my weight. When in flat time-trials, where absolute power and aerodynamics are more important, I lose to the others because of shitty aerodynamics and an average threshold power when compared with others.

There are 3 energy systems, but one is responsible for over 95% of energy production for events above 2minutes (don't give me a hard time about the percentage here).

If you still want to consider the triangle, then it is pretty useless for endurance sports because force or speed are NEVER a limiter. So if you want to think about the triangle, just remember that in endurance sports you're so near the endurance tip that the others are too far away for you to worry about them.

So if you die on rollers, then anaerobic endurance is your limiter? Friel would prescribe short submaximal efforts to address this. Are you saying long course athletes need "speed work"? How much?

I'm still not catching ya. Maybe you can explain in portuguese. (kidding...then I'd have to call my psycho x-girlfriend to translate...and she'd probably kill me).

Okay...let's say I have endurance, I've finished 8 Ironmans in 12 hours. I wanna improve both my bike and run. Doesn't the fundmental issue of training with power to increase functional threshold? Wouldn't this be the medium between endurance and force? Or would you simply call this an incease in endurance?

Shouldn't it be speed-endurance there? Got to get your Friel lingo right there...

Just tell me what to do Feb. 16th.

Bingo! It IS an increase in endurance, there isn't nothing else to increase.

Dev,

What you're asking is more or less this:

"If I'm doing this race and would prefer to be sitting on the couch drinking beer, what exactly is happening in my muscles?"

"Okay...let's say I have endurance, I've finished 8 Ironmans in 12 hours."

If the person was serious about improving their IM time, here's what I would suggest. Take a year or two AWAY from IM. Most people doing IM in this time zone tend to be in a bit of a rut - the training is likely ALL the same. Time to shake it up. These athletes possibly have a monster base, so take a year or two and REALLY focus on the Olympic distance races and shorter. Side projects would include setting life time absolute best standalone performances in the 10K run and the 40K ITT. If this is done right, they will come back to IM racing in a year or two and take a huge chunk of time off their IM PR.

Just a thought.

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Steve Fleck @stevefleck | Blog

I'm still not getting it....

Assuming PE is the same (while increasing FT), how is this only endurance?

I know you're going to say that's the definition of endurance, but I'm hoping you're going to acknowledge the part about getting faster by somehow saying that it's impacting force as well.....

What's the point of intervals (on the bike) for Ironman racing?

B/c Paulo is saying that focusing on force isn't going to yield gains b/c it's still an endurance activity......

I have said above, force is a component of endurance. As you improve with training, the force requirements for any endurance sport go up a very small fraction.

Hey Paulo...yes and no. Sometime a guy is out there racing and actually WANTS to go harder, but cannot get his muscles to harder. Is it possible that the efficiency of the neural transmitters going from the brain to the muscles to get those muscles to contract is not that great after 8 hours? Are those electrical signals getting weaker? I don't know, I'm just postulating with no background. All I can say is that for most humans doing any task involving the central nervous system, the ability to concentrate seems to decline after many hours of repitition. Some people can concentrate at moderate levels for much longer...some can concentrate at high levels of processing for short to moderate periods. There is an element of how our brains are wired that has an impact in all athletic pursuits. Its not as simple as getting more endurance in many cases...

I thought I would save that for posterity ;-)

And yes, there are neuro-muscular elements to fatigue. However, that's not what we're discussing here.

Paulo, I added that to appease you so that you can feel smart, because if we don't cater to your ego, we run the risk of you getting bent out of shape :-)...and I'd rather speak with someone who is humble enough to admit when they are just guessing (and admit it) rather than someone who claims to know everything about the human body when his education is actually in fluids...

While you may not be discussing the neuro side, some of us are...including Dawhead :-)

The less knowledgable often think that the more knowledgable are guessing. Oh, forgot the passive-aggressive smiley... oooops... my bad...

;-)

I'm glad your ego has been sufficiently catered too :-). Why don't you get Barry to start the Neuromuscular thread so that we are allowed to discuss another aspect that relates to performance :-)

:-)^2

Only on race week...

That made me laugh out loud. Great job.

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In another post ...

These strength trainers advising failure sets (God Bless Arthur Jones) ... are they going on a 45 minute run and 45 swim the following day?

Wouldn't common sense suggest the most applicable form of "strength training" for cycling would be "riding 40 minutes in a gear -- or two or three -- higher than you normally ride"? Isn't that progressive resistance? It sure seems a lot more applicable to cycling than doing sets of 20 or 50 leg presses.

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-- Every morning brings opportunity;
Each evening offers judgement. --

Now children do I have to turn this car around!

I must've learned all my Paulo lessons awhile ago, as I find myself completely understanding and agreeing with him.

Love the :-)^2.

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Too f@ckin depressed from various injuries to care about having a signature line.

Sponsored by Blue Shield PPO.

Ride more. LOTS more. 'Cause you know, like, "more is more."

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__________________________
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Yes, I too am on Facebook. And LinkedIn. And Twitter. Which begs the question - do I exist in the physical world? Do I?

That's exactly way I'm training/racing this year.
I'm re-learning what it means to go HARD! :-)

I'll let you know how it improves my next IM.

It is well accepted that the power/weight ratio is more important in climbing than in TT. Wheras absolute power regardless of weight is best for TT.

Another factor to consider is the effect of momentum. If you are going up a steep hill, you cannot stop pedaling at all or you'll lose it. You have to apply pressure to the pedals almost constantly throughout the pedaling stroke. When You are on a flat course, you can let up on the pedals somewhat and the forward momentum of the bike will allow you to catch up with your pedaling. You can stomp away with the bikes momentum smoothening things out for you. There may be subtle differences in pedaling technique for a successful climber versus a successful time trialist.

Dev

There is some evidence to support a neuromuscular component of fatigue under some circumstances. Tim Noakes does a good job of discussing these ideas in the latest edition of "The Lore of Running." He also discusses a loss of muscle elasticity (...no spring in your step...) and biochemical issues relating to fatigue.


General thoughts and questions, not directed at you Dev, just some rambling thoughts...

I think what Paulo might be saying (correct me if I am wrong) is that when Friel (or another coach) says that you have a muscular endurance limiter, it is a useless kind of statement. Muscular endurance is a useless concept (too vague....meaningless) Muscular endurance at what effort level? You cannot talk about endurance without talking about effort level. It all comes down to endurance and effort (or power output). How long can you maintain a certain effort level...or what effort level can you put out over a certain time frame or distance. It would be more useful to talk about concepts like raising your functional threshold power. I guess what I am saying is that it does not make sense to use vague terms like "muscular endurance" when we have perfectly good concepts like functional threshold power, VO2 max, CP30 etc...that we can work with. Honestly, I just don't get, "we need to work on your muscular endurance limiter" but I do get, "we need to raise your functional threshold power."

Mike

"Strenghts and weaknesses can only be related to the three energy systems and how they are called into play in a performance situation" Does that make you happier?

It makes me happier, but it means you just said less, not more.

And you're the one that is saying that a 40km and a 100mi maximal efforts are different. In fact, they are much the same and the limiter for both is the same too.

That must be why the record speeds in a 40km time trial are in the 32-34mph range, but for 100miles they are in the 26-28mph range. And I guess it explains why all the 40km time trial record holders have gone on to stellar results at the 100 mile distance. It makes me happy to know that when I get my 40km time below 1 hour, I can expect to do a sub 4hr century. Its going to be quite a year, I guess.

I guess what I am saying is that it does not make sense to use vague terms like "muscular endurance" when we have perfectly good concepts like functional threshold power, VO2 max, CP30 etc...that we can work with. Honestly, I just don't get, "we need to work on your muscular endurance limiter" but I do get, "we need to raise your functional threshold power."

That's fair enough, except that it strikes me that if you accept that there are neuromuscular elements to fatigue (and this has been well demonstrated; there was a great article on this in the NYT last year that blended a study of RAAM rider Jure Robic with new research on the CNS component of fatigue), then the latter statement is also pretty empty, and you'd do just as well to say "we need to make you able to ride further, faster". which is about as vapid a remark as a coach can make, right? FTP is a limit value, it doesn't indicate performance on a given day under given conditions. What accounts for the difference between FTP and an actual performance (in which FTP should be a reasonable indicator) ? When you find the answer to that question, please let us all know! At a more prosaic level, when you wake up one morning and go to run/ride/swim and find that its just not happening the way it should, is that one of the "3 energy systems" breaking down? is it that your FTP has dropped overnight? are there other systems in the body at work too?

Maybe a neurologist can pipe in here, because to this point no one on this thread has made any knowledgeable comments on how well those electrical signals from the brain to the muscles are transmitting late in the day, telling the muscles to contract hard. For example do the impedence characteristics in those nerves change over the course of the day as blood PH and other things in the body change. Does the mylene that insulates the nerve lose its dielectric properties over the course of the day resulting in a lower magnitude signal at the nerve ending. We know this happens in babies before their mylene develops...does it happen to us late in a race? We also know the decision making (brain function) can be severely impaired as blood sugar drops. What happens in the rest of the central nervous system as blood sugar drops?

The same factors that cause you to fatigue on a 40km tt are present on a 100mi tt. Doing well at both is a matter of endurance. I see both in their similarities, you see them as a completly different thing. I'll let you figure out on your own which one is right. It's the whole Bjorn vs Lance argument.

So two guys do the same identical training, same nutrition, same first half pacing, identical technique. One guy always wins at 40K, another always wins at 160K. Are you saying that they should have identical results?

I am saying exactly what I am saying. If I wanted to write what you wrote, I would have. I didn't.

dev, here's a "reprint" of the NYT article i mentioned on CNS factors in long term muscular fatigue (its also a great article on Robic).

http://www.triscoop.com/...cle.php?article_id=6

there is also:

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/...22&dopt=Abstract
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/...55&dopt=Abstract

along the way, i found this curious and not terribly rigorous abstract about the impact of music, which i am still trying to fit into paulo's worldview:

http://taylorandfrancis.metapress.com/...onresults,1:100184,1

Crikey! First you confuse strength and power, then you compound the issue by defining "muscular endurance" as some combination thereof.

You seem to think that I negate the importance of neuro-muscular fatigue as a component of general fatigue. I don't. However, you seem to think that component is absent from a 1-hour effort, when it isn't. A one-hour effort is as "prolonged" as a 4-hour effort.

Thanks Dawhead...I guess in Paulo's "study based" world view, the impact of the digestive system does not come into play. Some might have organs that can process nutrition at a higher aerobic performance level than other. This clearly has no impact on 40K performance, but would at 160K...

I don't personally care if "muscular endurance" is a real concept or not...it means something to me. When I think of muscular endurance I think of sustaining sub-threshold output...the ability to generate moderate power for reasonably long periods of time. 1/2 marathon is an example where you're running a bit below LT but it still takes a good deal of strength\power to maintain race pace. Maybe strength endurance is a better term. It seems a bit simplistic to reduce everything down to just endurance. By that logic we could also say that the 200m sprint is an endurance event. I can run fast enough to break the world record in the 200m...but I can only hold that speed for 50m so I simply need to work on my endurance, right? In a sense that is true...if I can sustain a given output for a longer time (endurance) I'll be faster at that longer distance. From that perspective do I need to generate more power? No, I need to sustain my max 50m power for longer...endurance. Translate that over to cycling and how does it apply to riding 112 miles faster? It suggests that there is no reason to be concerned with increasing FTP, we just need to sustain FTP for 4-5 hours. I think that is contrary to what most of us believe...raising FTP is a key aspect of becoming a better (endurance) athlete. So I guess I'm not disagreeing with anyone here...just trying to point out that we are all getting at the same things from a different perspective.

Why not just say "we need to work on your endurance"?

With that level of detail, the same factors that cause you to fatigue at 5km are present on a 40km tt. If you're going to group everything that isn't anaerobic fast twitch effort into "doing well is a matter of endurance" then fine, but once again, you're saying less, not more. And you know what they say about "More" around here .....

Moreover, the contribution (if any) of non-muscular factors to fatigue is all the more reason to prefer the simpler term "endurance" over the more specific term "muscular endurance". That is, if fatigue is multifactorial (which it practically always is), why profess to know more than you really know by being so specific?

I am speechless...

Two words: hell no!

"You seem to think that I negate the importance of neuro-muscular fatigue as a component of general fatigue."

I was just working from your statement: "Strenghts and weaknesses can only be related to the three energy systems." Since I don't see the CNS as one of the 3 energy systems, I assumed that you were excluding the CNS from playing any role in strengths and weaknesses.

Fair enough :-)

well, one reason to be more specific might be to distinguish between different manifestations of fatigue (and thus, reciprocally, other manifestations of endurance). When I collapse at the end of 3 mile tt effort having done my best to stay above 300W for the entire duration, the state of fatigue I am in seems very, very different from the condition I reach at a certain point in the evening.

endurance has a number of senses to it and "my quads just can't generate power any more" from "i'm so tired i'm going to fall over" seems to me to be a notable distinction. one of them gives a strong sensation of muscular endurance (or the lack of it), the other feels like the presence/lack of something entirely different.

Okay, I guess what I was saying is relative to race distances, I have adapted to the swim much faster as it relates to race distances. I don't believe swimming for 5 or 6 hours can at all be comparable to riding for 5 or 6 hours however. Different muscles have different capabilities. I can't imagine how long I would last if I tried to pedal my bike with my tongue!

To Fleck's point, I definitely am new to the sport. I pissed around for 5 years, but in terms of consistent training, I have about 1 year under my belt.

Forgive me, but I am still confused, if I can run 26 miles at a 9 minute pace, but only 4 miles at a 7 minute pace. Am I lacking speed or endurance? Ignoring the nuerological component.

Re: your faster pace at shorter distances, you are lacking endurance. It is obvious that you have the speed necessary to run 7 minute pace, as you can maintain it for nearly half an hour. What you don't have is the endurance to keep doing it for 2 1/2 more hours.

Maybe you lack the endurance to run a faster pace for the 4 mile race too.

And adding the modifer "muscular" to the descriptor "endurance" helps convey this fact how?

Sorry, but "muscular endurance" is wasted verbiage: either you get more specific about the mechanisms contributing to fatigue, or you just say "endurance" and be done with it. (I will say this, however: it isn't as bad as "strength endurance".)

hmmm.....I think Paulo's logic is all starting to make sense now. Assuming that it is the aerobic engine that drives all race distances we are referring to. Since there is no way possible I can hold a 3:30 minute pace for 26 miles, but I can for 100m.

Anyway, so then is endurance almost exclusively training or is their a genetic component to endurance?

Both.

I'd like to hear clarification of the idea of "muscular" endurance compared to "cardiac" endurance.

I did a long mountainous climb with a group of other cycists. After we all struggled to the top, some of us complained of our legs burning, and feeling like we couldn't turn the pedal another revolution (I was in this group), basically it was tired, burning muscles that were limiting our effort and our HRs were not that high. The 2nd group was saying it was the their HR skyrocketing, and their lungs burning that was what was stopping them; there leg muscles were not burning.

This type of story leads people to use the term "muscular" endurance for the first type of limiter compared to "aerobic" endurance for the 2nd.

Thoughts?

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Suffering on the the bike is always more fun than suffering on the run.

let me rephrase, would it be accurate to say that most of us will never reach or genetic limiter?

I wouldn't really know the relative influence of Nature vs Nurture with regard to endurance. I mean, most of us will never find our limits in triathlon or any other sport. The nature of the game is that we can always train a little harder, stretch a little more, roll a little faster, and push a little farther. But how long will we keep doing it, how careful will we be about injury, how much do we really want to spend on a bicycle wheel? Furthermore, will the weather be good? So I don't know. I don't like to speculate about the relative importance of genes though :-)

Re: your comment that the aerobic engine drives all race distances, I think you have it almost right. I would bump your bottom distance to 800m though. Put simply: Any distance that you cannot run while holding your breath is 99% aerobic.

If world records keep falling, and the guys who posted the previous times spent their entire lives in the pursuit of those times, only to be bested a year or so later, then yes, I think all of us will never reach our genetic limiter.

Is that a run-on?

My lunch break is up, so I'll be quick.......


Andrew, can you please enlighten us with a little more detail. You have the most experience of us in the field AND have a strong cycling background which is where this term *appears* to have come from.

What the heck is Friel talking about? Why does he use this term?


Thanks in advance!

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-----------------------------Baron Von Speedypants
-----------------------------RunTraining articles here:
http://forum.slowtwitch.com/...runtraining;#1612485

Sorry, but I really have no idea.

Sorry, but I really have no idea.
________________________

Those 7 words speak volumes. My guess is I won't get any slower by not understanding either ; ^ )

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-----------------------------Baron Von Speedypants
-----------------------------RunTraining articles here:
http://forum.slowtwitch.com/...runtraining;#1612485

Forgive me, but I am still confused, if I can run 26 miles at a 9 minute pace, but only 4 miles at a 7 minute pace. Am I lacking speed or endurance? Ignoring the nuerological component.
__________________

I'll answer that....give me a couple hours. I'm stuck in training right now.

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-----------------------------Baron Von Speedypants
-----------------------------RunTraining articles here:
http://forum.slowtwitch.com/...runtraining;#1612485

Actually, assuming that there is a reasonable degree of similarity between the courses (without which your comment would be meaningless), this person is truly mythical. What's more, it would be straightforward (if a little dull and time-consuming) to calculate the statistical certainty behind their mythical status by going through archives of UK time trial results.

i don't need to check the UK time trial records. i know of several cyclists locally who fit precisely this description. a 40km tt is about the upper bound of the distance they can ride fast at; when they go out on "long rides", its unclear if they can make it to the end. i'm not going to name names on a forum like this.

"i know of several cyclists locally who fit precisely this description. a 40km tt is about the upper bound of the distance they can ride fast at; when they go out on "long rides", its unclear if they can make it to the end."


I would suggest that these riders invest in the services of a qualified sports pyschologist.



.

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Put them on their race bike in a proper situation - i.e. 100 mile TT with decent course (like the course they've gone under 52 mins) with adequate support - and they'll go a whole lot faster than 6 hours. If you don't fulfil these conditions then the comparison is meaningless.

How do I know this? I am one of those people.

I agree with you; it would seem that these riders are either dogging it on long rides, sitting in radically different positions, forgetting to eat, or some other not-really-fitness-related reason. However, if we look at the question from a slightly less extreme point of view:

Why is it that two athletes who are roughly equivalent in one longish endurance event (say a 10k) might not be so close together at all over a longer or shorter distance (say, 5k or 20k)? I mean, we sort of accept that people have race distances that they are best at, relatively speaking. But if all race performance is limited by endurance, what gives? Someone is going to answer "fueling" but I know that can't be the whole story for the difference between, say, 10 and 20 kilometers.

What is the deal with individual differences in shape of power-duration curves?

I would hope so given the conditions you laid out. It would seem to me someone that can go 52 minutes over 40K should be able to go under 6 hours on a bmx bike!

Well, yes. But if Dawhead is comparing someone's performance in a well-prepared-for, flat 40 km TT to their performance when going out ill-equipped on a road bike for a variable-pace, hilly, 100 mile group ride, then the comparison is meaningless.

What do you mean by "what is the deal"? That they exist? Obviously, the answer to that question is yes...

I think that what MuffinTop is asking is the difference between changing the slope of the curve, or moving the curve up or down (hopefully up!).

Perhaps you could remind the good people here of what happens with the curve, a lot of floks still see the slope changing significantly.

Just because someone writes a book does not mean that they are correct or that the book should be followed. Mein Kampf comes to mind as an example.

Ric

"Just because someone writes a book does not mean that they are correct or that the book should be followed. Mein Kampf comes to mind as an example. "

Um...isn't it called the Training Bible?

Yes, Friel could best be described as the Adolf Hitler of triathlon.

WOW, it only took 5 pages...

Exactly, just as if someone writes a blurb on a message board!

Friel isn't an innovator, he was simply copying the work on the Theory of Methodoloy of Training (Bompa). Heavily documented (and disputed, of course)

But since you are such an expert, please tell me where he is wrong and what methodology produces the greatest gains.

Where did I say I was an expert? I was mearly responding to your comment above. All I said was that because someone writes a book does not mean they are correct.

The experts are on this thread and are posting, the fact that you are not listening to them is your choice.

Ric

All I said was that because someone writes a book does not mean they are correct.

You read incorrectly as Paula didn't write a book. Therefore, not writing a book doesn't mean you are any more correct or incorrect. There is no correlation. However, there are many sources of information (Friel, for example) which is based upon published evidence.

But, I do love Paulo and was sincerely asking him a question. Of course, he didn't really answer it. Well...he did answer it in his fashion, but there's still a gap between Force and Endurance which needs some sort of definition. IMO, he's just upset about the terminology and definitions, not the theory.

OK, we've hit 100 posts on what was a very simple question. I pretty much knew already what the answer was, but I wanted to throw it out there to see how people felt.

The answer is - it is terminology made popular by Friel that probably meant to simplify a training concept, but instead seems to have made it more confusing.

Many people have said that they know what "muscular endurance" is.....yet many of these answers are contradicting. Others have tried to define it more scientifcaly only to get jumped on by the scientists.

I don't think people here are lacking intelligence, knowlege, or experience....or at least not lacking it to the degree that you'd *expect* them to misunderstand a simple concept written in a book called The Bible (hmmmm....maybe he was trying to emulate the actual Bible? ; ^ ).



I'd like to take a moment to address some issues on this thread and how they relate to running:

There are many factors that directly relate to performance. Some are more important for certain distances while others are more important to other distances (Note: these are very generic...feel free to pick apart).

* Aerobic Development - your body's ability to turn oxygen and other fuel into motion

This is very important for all events lasting longer than 2 minutes. The longer the event, the more important this becomes.
Comparing two individuals, one might get tired after 10 miles of easy running when the other doesn't. It is likely he is not as aerobicaly developed

* Lactate Threshold - the point at which your body produces lactate quicker than it can be removed

This is also very important for events longer than 2 minutes. However, the closer one is to a race near this velocity, the more important training this aspect becomes.

One might get exhausted after an hour or hard running at 6 minutes a mile when the other one isn't. It is likely his lactate threshold is lower.

* V02max - the point at whoch your body is using the maximum amount of oxygen possible for the activity.

Also very important for races longer than 2 minutes. The closer one is to a race at this velocity the more important it becomes.

One might get exhausted racing for 11 minutes when the other isn't. His velocity at V02max is lower.

* The neuro muscular component - this includes coordination, economy, the body's ability to "spring" off of each step, good form (some of these terms are redundant).

Important for all distances, however, the *shorter* the event the more important it becomes.

* The ability to run hills - in many ways this is similar to the neuro muscular component. The only reason why I include it is because slightly different muscles ARE used when running up a hill. You want to train these muscles if you intend to run up a hill in a race.

* Weight - big people are slow for a reason.

* "Force" - important only in the respect that if you apply ZERO force, you cannot move forward. However, the ability to apply a lot of force regardless of how fast it is applied is important for weight lifting competetions, not endurance running.

* "power" - this is F*d/t ...or how quickly you can move a weight (your body...the weight of your limbs..etc). When we talk about this is running terms we are referring to power over a short period of time. Technicaly a marathoner who can put out 100 watts for 3 hours will beat one who weighs the same that can only put out 50 watts......but that isn't what runners mean. They're talking about the amount of power Ben Johnson can push versus Carl Lewis. The longer the distance is the more irrelevant it becomes with the possible exception of the final 50 meters or a race.

* others - flexibility, mental, nutrition, length of legs, etc.

With regard to running, each of these can be considered an attribute or a limiter and they are specific not only to the individual but also to the event that he runs. More often than not, the 1st 4 are very closely related. Being good in one generaly means that you will be good in the others. However, there are minor differences between individuals which is why some people tend to do better at shorter events (quick teenagers in the 800) than in the longer distances (a middle aged marathoner with an aerobic base developed over 40,000 miles of running).

Each one of these components is a contributor at all race distances with different priorities associated to each relative to each distance (Pfitzinger has some good tables) and relative to long term training goals. Each is specific to a certain process that happens in the body and there is pleanty of information on how and when to train each.

The term "Muscular Endurance" IMO is very confusing and, especialy when refering to cycling, leads someone to believe that there is some radicaly different process that relates muscles to endurance that is different from other aspects of endurance....as if it was related to strength...or strength over time...or something. The process that occurs in the body has been completely ignored...or at least not explained very well.

In Going Long I believe Gordo explained it as, "1 st you want to work on your endurance. Then your muscular endurance. This is the ability to push a really big gear for a long time." What does he mean by "big gear" and "long time?" That was all he said! It's the #2 priority and that was the explanation he gave! (...don't want to be too critical...it was a pretty good book).


The best I can tell, when they say ME they really mean Lactate Threshold. It has nothing to do with force, power, big gears, etc.....it directly corresponds to your CP60 and it is the point where your body produces more lactate than it can remove and, yes, there is a certain "feeling" associated with it, yes it is imporatant, yes it can limit you in a race.

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-----------------------------Baron Von Speedypants
-----------------------------RunTraining articles here:
http://forum.slowtwitch.com/...runtraining;#1612485

i humbly suggest to you sir fredly: if you were an older, somewhat heavier rider who spent most of your time training for 3-18 mile tt's and crits, squeezing in the occasional sub-55/60 min 40km as your longest distance event, that the moment your IM/ultra friends took you out for a century on mixed (not particularly hilly, but not totally flat) terrain, you might also find it a challenge to finish. maybe a sports pyschologist could help, but then we'd be talking about CNS effects on endurance, which was PRECISELY my point when i started participating in this wretched thread.

I was always under the impression that the use of terms aerobic endurance (AE) and muscular endurance (ME) was an attempt to apply a descriptor (for a layman's purpose) to the type of training one can do to improve muscular vs cardiovascular fatigue. Yes, I'm sure he realizes those two go hand in hand (not either/or) but there are many ways to improve your endurance and I believe Friel was just using a specific term to help the athlete associate the use of turning a bigger gear for a long(er) period of time via a specific workout which just so happens to make the muscles feel like they're working harder than than the lungs.

Sometimes it actually works much better for an athlete when a coach uses layman-like terms even at the expense of deluding the scientific or real definition. Although, it is amazing how many people think they have an ME limiter simply because of how much their muscles (and not their lungs) hurt by mile 18 of the run.

Thanks, Chris

Forgive me, but I am still confused, if I can run 26 miles at a 9 minute pace, but only 4 miles at a 7 minute pace. Am I lacking speed or endurance? Ignoring the nuerological component.
______________________

If these are both race paces, then you are probably lacking endurance. Someone who his well trainined for a marathon who can run 4 miles in 28 minutes should be able to run a marathon @ 8 minutes/mile.

Use this calculator for other references:

http://www.mcmillanrunning.com/...unningcalculator.htm

If you get the chance to read through my long ass post, note that "speed" (which usualy either refers to "spritning power"....the ability to cover 100 meters really fast, or (incorrectly) the neuro-muscular component that combines with all other endurance elements to allow you to run the middle distances well (800-1600 meters)) is a low priority for any distance above 4 miles, and only of small significance for races between 3 and 4 miles (if refering to middle distance "speed"...if sprinting speed then almost no significance).

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-----------------------------Baron Von Speedypants
-----------------------------RunTraining articles here:
http://forum.slowtwitch.com/...runtraining;#1612485

But, I do love Paulo and was sincerely asking him a question. Of course, he didn't really answer it. Well...he did answer it in his fashion, but there's still a gap between Force and Endurance which needs some sort of definition. IMO, he's just upset about the terminology and definitions, not the theory.
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Some one who can apply a lot of Force can lift a lot of weight (like squat 500 lbs) once in a very slow manner. This is unrelated to "endurance."

Did you mean something else? Comparing force to endurance is like comparing color to endurance.

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-----------------------------Baron Von Speedypants
-----------------------------RunTraining articles here:
http://forum.slowtwitch.com/...runtraining;#1612485

"The best I can tell, when they say ME they really mean Lactate Threshold. It has nothing to do with force, power, big gears, etc.....it directly corresponds to your CP60 and it is the point where your body produces more lactate than it can remove and, yes, there is a certain "feeling" associated with it, yes it is imporatant, yes it can limit you in a race. "

So it has nothing to do with force or power, but is directly corresponds to CP60. Now we only need to figure out what the "C" and the "P" in CP60 stand for and we'll be all set. Can we then bring this thread to a close?

:)

JFT.

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�The greater danger for most of us is not that our aim is too high and we miss it, but that it is too low and we reach it.� -Michelangelo

MoodBoost Drink : Mood Support + Energy.

What I mean is, when we call it a "power-duration curve", I expect it to be a curve where power decays as some relatively simple function of time. But looking at it a little more closely, it seems that many people have what appears to be an unexplained "sweet spot" where the curve flattens out unexpectedly, or a "dead spot", where the curve drops off unexpectedly.

So I understand two equivalent 5k runners whose abilities diverge at 10k - one has more endurance. But I do not understand what could make their abilities converge again at 20k or a marathon.

I appreciate the 5 pages, but it seems rather trivial. I've given examples before and there are all sorts of "real world" examples at every bike race (seems easier to pick on cyclists than runners)...

I'll try my question one more time:

What is the gap or reason between a region I and region II cyclist?

I know these guys...they exist. They are all over the place. Two guys, simliar size, simliar age, etc...one can ride flat TT / the other can kick ass on the hills. Of course there are numerous factors involved, but up until your "LT" post, it hasn't been discussed.

While you guys are harping on Friel, he still seems to be the only one making sense.

I was always under the impression that the use of terms aerobic endurance (AE) and muscular endurance (ME) was an attempt to apply a descriptor (for a layman's purpose) to the type of training one can do to improve muscular vs cardiovascular fatigue. Yes, I'm sure he realizes those two go hand in hand (not either/or) but there are many ways to improve your endurance and I believe Friel was just using a specific term to help the athlete associate the use of turning a bigger gear for a long(er) period of time via a specific workout which just so happens to make the muscles feel like they're working harder than than the lungs.

Sometimes it actually works much better for an athlete when a coach uses layman-like terms even at the expense of deluding the scientific or real definition. Although, it is amazing how many people think they have an ME limiter simply because of how much their muscles (and not their lungs) hurt by mile 18 of the run.
____________________________________________________________

I think you hit it here. What I don't understand is just how dumb he thinks the layman is. By this I mean, in order to read his book and get anything out of it, you must be reasonably intelligent. Trust me, I've looked through about 15 tri and cycling books recently and his is one of the more advanced. A term like "muscular endurance" and his lack of a *reasonable* definition for it is the kind of answer you give an audience that you don't expect to really learn anything, but you need to give them a reason for doing the day's workout. This is completely inconsitent with everything else he writes in his book. It's like going to calculus class and having the teacher telling you to just start moving numbers around and making up a name for the process like "equation enhancing."

______
"of turning a bigger gear for a long(er) period of time via a specific workout which just so happens to make the muscles feel like they're working harder than than the lungs. "
_____

The biggest problem (and confusion) I had coming into triathlon was that he carried this term over into running and you simply don't have that sensation (at least none of the runners *I* know do...maybe thick legged bikers do). Why couldn't he take it one step further and say, "I define this term to mean (what you just said). This typiclay happens around CP60. There is a change that occurs in your body that is beyond the scope of this book, but it is important to work on. Don't confuse this with the feeling you get in your legs after 6 hours of riding or hammering up and down hills. That is different."......if in fact he IS talking about LT (we still aren;t sure).

_____
Although, it is amazing how many people think they have an ME limiter simply because of how much their muscles (and not their lungs) hurt by mile 18 of the run.
_____

And that is my beef. Either these people are stupid, or it is a poorly described concept. I'll go with #2 (though his book is better than most).

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-----------------------------Baron Von Speedypants
-----------------------------RunTraining articles here:
http://forum.slowtwitch.com/...runtraining;#1612485

I just learned the term yesterday ; ^ )

Sustainabel power for 60 minutes.....or 60 minute race pace. I think the P stands for Power. C...probably for ....uh.....cookies?

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-----------------------------Baron Von Speedypants
-----------------------------RunTraining articles here:
http://forum.slowtwitch.com/...runtraining;#1612485

I know these guys...they exist. They are all over the place. Two guys, simliar size, simliar age, etc...one can ride flat TT / the other can kick ass on the hills. Of course there are numerous factors involved, but up until your "LT" post, it hasn't been discussed.

While you guys are harping on Friel, he still seems to be the only one making sense.
_______________________________

Ahhhhh....ok. I remember the question. Paulo answered the flat vrs hill question. Light guys vs aerodynamic guys.

I'm going to assume a deeper meaning relating "guys who can 40K TT well versus guys who can do the long stage." Like Paulo and AC said, it's ALL endurance and that endurance is ALL (mostly) related to the muscles. The difference that I posted about running should still apply to cycling - different levels of aerobic development, different LT, different V02max......like I said, I *think* Friel is really referring to LT (I have to infer this becasue the workouts that I've seen prescribed to work on ME are LT workouts.....though I'm getting that from different sources. I'm only 60 pages into his cycling book).

Friel makes sense if you understand him (and if you are right in thinking that you understand him). ; ^ )

The problem that some of us have is that we learned what is going on in the muscles when you train a long time ago and his terminology and explanations lead to a lot of confusion (ie 5 pages of arguing over what he means ; ^ ).


Paulo and AC make sense. You just have to speak Phd ( I speak conversational Phd.....but my grammar is poor ; ^ )

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-----------------------------Baron Von Speedypants
-----------------------------RunTraining articles here:
http://forum.slowtwitch.com/...runtraining;#1612485

While you guys are harping on Friel, he still seems to be the only one making sense.
_______________

PS - I'm harping on him, but there IS a reason I bought his cycling book. It's not bad. It just seems IMO that running books have been much better about attacking these issues. But I am biased! ; )

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-----------------------------Baron Von Speedypants
-----------------------------RunTraining articles here:
http://forum.slowtwitch.com/...runtraining;#1612485

Might as well string this out to 10 to 15 pages...

Why stop at ME; what about power and Anaerobic endurance?

"i humbly suggest to you sir fredly: if you were an older, somewhat heavier rider who spent most of your time training for 3-18 mile tt's and crits, squeezing in the occasional sub-55/60 min 40km as your longest distance event, that the moment your IM/ultra friends took you out for a century on mixed (not particularly hilly, but not totally flat) terrain, you might also find it a challenge to finish. maybe a sports pyschologist could help, but then we'd be talking about CNS effects on endurance..."


A fine suggestion, but not what was stated in the post I responded to.

Funny how this started at "52 minute 40k" and is now up to an hour. If you keep lowering the number, eventually no one will be able to argue the validity of your point.


.

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Tech writer/support on this here site. FIST school instructor and certified bike fitter. Formerly at Diamondback Bikes, LeMond Fitness, FSA, TiCycles, etc.
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Paula did write a book, I forget what's the name. But you're on amazon often, I'm sure you'll find it.

There is a large gap between Force and Endurance because they're two distinct things. If you're so fond of the triangle, it is important that you understand it well. For an example of something that is halfway between Force and Endurance, let's think of doing squats at say 80% of your maximum load. If you want to mantain this exercise for a long time, then you will need to have endurance specific to that exercise, because it's an exercise where both Force and Endurance are important. However, even though that is somewhat halfway between Force and Endurance, I wouldn't call it muscular endurance either, because it would be a term that it wouldn't make any sense.
Bottom line here is, the term muscular endurance never makes much sense.

Paulo,

Isn't about time for the "More is more" quote :)

Seriously!

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Steve Fleck @stevefleck | Blog

Who knew?

Fernanda Paula Sousa Maia DID write a book!!!

Congrats....

I actually meant PNF ;-)

not a direct reply ... just wanted to post a long quote from the NYT article on fatigue/endurance/Robic last year, because I suspect that not many here read it:

----------------------------------------------
From the time of Hippocrates, the limits of human exertion were thought to reside in the muscles themselves, a hypothesis that was established in 1922 with the Nobel Prize-winning work of Dr. A.V. Hill. The theory went like this: working muscles, pushed to their limit, accumulated lactic acid. When concentrations of lactic acid reached a certain level, so the argument went, the muscles could no longer function. Muscles contained an ‘‘automatic brake,’’ Hill wrote, ‘‘carefully adjusted by nature.’’

Researchers, however, have long noted a link between neurological disorders and athletic potential. In the late 1800’s, the pioneering French doctor Philippe Tissié observed that phobias and epilepsy could be beneficial for athletic training. A few decades later, the German surgeon August Bier measured the spontaneous long jump of a mentally disturbed patient, noting that it compared favorably to the existing world record. These types of exertions seemed to defy the notion of built-in muscular limits and, Bier noted, were made possible by ‘‘powerful mental stimuli and the simultaneous elimination of inhibitions.’’

Questions about the muscle-centered model came up again in 1989 when Canadian researchers published the results of an experiment called Operation Everest II, in which athletes did heavy exercise in altitude chambers. The athletes reached exhaustion despite the fact that their lactic-acid concentrations remained comfortably low. Fatigue, it seemed, might be caused by something else.

In 1999, three physiologists from the University of Cape Town Medical School in South Africa took the next step. They worked a group of cyclists to exhaustion during a 62-mile laboratory ride and measured, via electrodes, the percentage of leg muscles they were using at the fatigue limit. If standard theories were true, they reasoned, the body should recruit more muscle fibers as it approached exhaustion — a natural compensation for tired, weakening muscles.

Instead, the researchers observed the opposite result. As the riders approached complete fatigue, the percentage of active muscle fibers decreased, until they were using only about 30 percent. Even as the athletes felt they were giving their all, the reality was that more of their muscles were at rest. Was the brain purposely holding back the body?

‘‘It was as if the brain was playing a trick on the body, to save it,’’ says Timothy Noakes, head of the Cape Town group. ‘‘Which makes a lot of sense, if you think about it. In fatigue, it only feels like we’re going to die. The actual physiological risks that fatigue represents are essentially trivial.’’

From this, Noakes and his colleagues concluded that A.V. Hill had been right about the automatic brake, but wrong about its location. They postulated the existence of what they called a central governor: a neural system that monitors carbohydrate stores, the levels of glucose and oxygen in the blood, the rates of heat gain and loss, and work rates. The governor’s job is to hold our bodies safely back from the brink of collapse by creating painful sensations that we interpret as unendurable muscle fatigue.

Fatigue, the researchers argue, is less an objective event than a subjective emotion — the brain’s clever, self-interested attempt to scare you into stopping. The way past fatigue, then, is to return the favor: to fool the brain by lying to it, distracting it or even provoking it. (That said, mental gamesmanship can never overcome a basic lack of fitness. As Noakes says, the body always holds veto power.)

‘‘Athletes and coaches already do a lot of this instinctively,’’ Noakes says. ‘‘What is a coach, after all, but a technique for overcoming the governor?’’

The governor theory is far from conclusive, but some scientists are focusing on a walnut-size area in the front portion of the brain called the anterior cingulate cortex. This has been linked to a host of core functions, including handling pain, creating emotion and playing a key role in what’s known loosely as willpower. Sir Francis Crick, the co-discoverer of DNA, thought the anterior cingulate cortex to be the seat of the soul. In the sports world, perhaps no soul relies on it more than Jure Robic’s.

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I am sure that some will love this new way to think about Paulo and all the other coaches, "a technique for overcoming the governor" :)

That's hardly new, here's one of Noakes papers

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/...38&dopt=Abstract


But this one is much better ;-)

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/...;itool=pubmed_docsum

or this recent one...

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/...;itool=pubmed_docsum

Might as well string this out to 10 to 15 pages...

Why stop at ME; what about power and Anaerobic endurance?
_______________________________________________

Don't blame me for the 6 pages. Like I said, it was a very simple question, yet for some reason, everyone has a different opinion about the answer. *That* exemplifies my point more than anything.

BTW, sorry about the confusion with the term "force".....I read Friel last night and forgot about the endurance, force, speed triangle.

Like I said, it's a confusing term when you are actualy trying to understand what is really going on. It serves the same purpose of "flogiston" which, of course are the invisible particles that wood turns into when it burns explaining why it disappears (as opposed to explaining that Oxygen attaches to the Hydrogen atoms in wood creating water vaper and it attached to the Carbon atoms to make C02.)



I *was* henestly curious if this was some sort of term that all cyclists used and understood. Apparently not.

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-----------------------------Baron Von Speedypants
-----------------------------RunTraining articles here:
http://forum.slowtwitch.com/...runtraining;#1612485

Hills on the run, hard (high) gear training thrown in on the bike, paddles on some swim sets ? Buy the training bible for triathletes, or bikers it explains it
______________

The problem is......that's NOT the answer, but the term would lead people to believe that it is.

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-----------------------------Baron Von Speedypants
-----------------------------RunTraining articles here:
http://forum.slowtwitch.com/...runtraining;#1612485

term that all cyclists used and understood

It was until this thread! As mentioned, it makes sense as a reference b/w Force and Endurance. Most cyclist are aware who has the highest Force in the peloton, most cyclists are also aware who can ride all day effortlessly. The question becomes whether a person can sustain their breakway....which is basically the key point of any bike race. Should we let them go or not?

It's not Friel's term, it's Tudor Bompa's term, here's a link to his book. I (think) understand the arguments here, but no one seems to be offering a "bridge" which describes this area other than saying it's endurance. Of course, this could very well be the case and you are right, but in the real world of cycling, that lil area above truly exists and it's the "easist" way to describe when discussing training and periodization. I believe the context of periodization appears to be missing from many of the posts.

I'm an athlete, not a coach....so I really have no business in this thread. ;o)

http://www.amazon.com/.../105-6805406-2623666

Dawhead,

You wrote:

"Our current understanding of cellular and metabolic respiration might not provide a particularly good way to understand how someone can ride a 40km TT in 52 minutes but cannot ride 100 miles in less than 6 hours; that doesn't mean that such people cannot exist."

Actually, there isn't any such person, nor could there be (at least, in reality). And you know precisely why this is the case.

So, the question is: When did ex-biochemists start taking up jobs as sophists? Have you gone back and re-read how much bad faith you had to have and how much work you had to do to make the worse argument appear stronger on this "wretched" thread?

Indeed, there seem to be only two groups of people who agree w/ Noakes on this issue:

1) Noakes himself, and

2) those that just don't seem to know any better. :-)

Of course, this isn't the first time that Noakes has wandered off into the wilderness by himself: he's also been claiming for the last decade or so that VO2max isn't limited by O2 convective delivery, despite dozens and dozens of older and newer studies showing that it is.

I've never seen this.

"... he's also been claiming for the last decade or so that VO2max isn't limited by O2 convective delivery, despite dozens and dozens of older and newer studies showing that it is."
Could you explain what's meant by convective delivery?

Diesel,

It would seem that you haven't been reading my replies to you. I have addressed your questions regarding different types of riders. I have addressed the issue with the ability triangle and it's application to endurance sports. I am beginning to think you have a learning disability like certain people in this Forum. Please say it ain't so! ;-) If you want, I will also talk about how the concept of periodization applies to all this...

Beyond the first few minutes of exercise, it mostly just moves up or down. To a lesser extent, however, you can undoubtly change the slope of the curve. Moreover, at some point people will "fall off the curve" if they aren't adequately prepared to race that distance (e.g., the 10 k runner who tries to step up and run a marathon at the pace that Daniel's predicts that they can but w/o doing marathon training). Perhaps most importantly of all, however, the type of training that moves the curve up is the same type of training that flattens the slope is the same type of training that pushes back the point in time at which you "fall off the curve".

He suffers from what is know as "Frank Day's disease".

Sort of like referring to the heart rate that you can average during the last 20 min of a 30 min TT as "lactate threshold", or the power that you can sustain for X min as "CPsubX"?

OMG, you quoting Daniels, I never thought I would see the day ;-)

Seriously, one day you had this post about the power/duration curve that was very good, in a few paragraphs allowed me to see a lot of things much clearer.

Why not? I've been unintentionally channeling him for the last 5 y or so.

Thanks - it has helped me see things much clearer as well. For example, I think adopting that perspective helps you hone in the minimal training volume necessary for someone to successfully compete at a particular distance.

Now, now... I don't want to be associated with ANYTHING related to "minimum training"...

Actually, this person does exist. He's one of my main training partners. However, his inability to ride 100 miles probably has little to do with his physiological capabilities.

---

Stuff I like:
PBscience Triathlon Coaching and Lab Testing

The best mentors often look to themselves when 99% of the class fails and we are strung out to 10 pages of replies. Increasing muscular endurance, critical power 30/60/90/ and FTP pretty much all mean the same to me....which is the concept of sustaining an otherwise difficult output for a given period of time. You can call this whatever you'd like.

Even if such a perspective supports the notion of "more is MORE"?

EDIT: One of many reasons that I'm proud of my wife for her pursuit victory in 2002 is because she demonstrated absolutely zero fade in power across her three 3 km efforts. That, I believe, is a testament to the very high training load that she maintained during the previous "off" season. IOW, even for a pursuiter the minimal training load needed to maximize muscle fatigue resistance is still, IMO, quite high. That required to truly race an Ironman distance triathlon is undoubtly even higher.

I has to, more is MORE is an axiom of training :-D

Sort of like referring to the heart rate that you can average during the last 20 min of a 30 min TT as "lactate threshold", or the power that you can sustain for X min as "CPsubX"?
_____________________

From a coaching perspective I don't have big problems with these two examples.....except that it should be made clear (and often isn't) that the 30 minute TT *should* mimic the effort of a 60 minute RACE and that it is only a rough approximation of your velocity (or power) @ lactate threshold.

Actually, now that I think about it...I do have a big problem. That was originaly how I found this board. I was trying to figure out how the hell I could do a 30 minute time trial to find my lactate threshold and then do a 40 minute tempo run at the same pace.


Don't see anything wrong with CPsubX though. Can you clarify?

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-----------------------------Baron Von Speedypants
-----------------------------RunTraining articles here:
http://forum.slowtwitch.com/...runtraining;#1612485

No, your velocity or power (or heart rate) for 30 min would be much higher than your velocity or power (or heart rate) at lactate threshold.



"Critical power" is a scientific term describing (essentially) the slope of the work-duration relationship. Above this power, you will fatigue in a finite, knowable amount of time, whereas below this power, you can continue for a very long time w/o fatiguing (in theory, indefinitely). What Friel did to come up with his multiple critical powerS was therefore attempt to redefine an already agreed-upon term, and in the process (IMO) created unnecessary confusion.

Now, let me say a thing or two about defining "efficiency" as the ratio of power to heart rate... ;-)

I think perhaps it might be that CPsubX (or rather sub CPx) is probably more accurately expressed as (for example) "train for 30 minutes at CP65"?

Lactate is what breastfeeding women and cows do.

---

Stuff I like:
PBscience Triathlon Coaching and Lab Testing

No, your velocity or power (or heart rate) for 30 min would be much higher than your velocity or power (or heart rate) at lactate threshold.
______________

I don't personaly use or prescribe that test, but the *theory* is that you won't motivate yourself to ride as hard in 30 minute test than you would in a 30 minute race.......but again, I have no experience in the matter.

Thanks for the CP clarification. That would cause confusion.

---

-----------------------------Baron Von Speedypants
-----------------------------RunTraining articles here:
http://forum.slowtwitch.com/...runtraining;#1612485

I think you're missing the point: lactate threshold is an exercise intensity that can be maintained for quite some time (e.g., marathon pace, at least if you're reasonably quick), even if you aren't motivated by competition. The intensity that coaches and athletes routinely refer to as "LT" is in fact much higher, and is thus much closer to (or is) maximal lactate steady state/critical power/OBLA.

The mass transport of O2 via the circulation. The reason that I used that term instead of "maximal cardiac output" is that it includes arterial O2 carrying capacity and pulmonary O2 transport, both of which also play a role.

If it helps any, when dealing with isolated muscle stimulated to contract in vitro (and perhaps even in situ), O2 uptake seems to be limited by diffusion, not convective tranport.

OK, Diesel

I did much pondering on this topic during my meeting (that I have to return to in 10 minutes). Here's what I have come up with:


1) Friel's initial target audience is cyclists. Cyclists not only need the ability to endure a long race, or back to back races, but also need to posses the ability to sprint to the finish, attack, sustain a break, etc......

2) Friel address these needs by covering SIX basic components of training.

3) In an attempt to explain them he comes up with a graphic that links them together in a way that the audience (readers of his book) can easily understand. Unfortunately, his graphis is just plain incorrect. It does a fine job if his goal is to get an ignorant reader (meaning one who is starting from scratch in the learning process) to buy into the fact that the 6 aspects of training are important and that they have a relationship. For many people, that's all they want to know and are content to just follow his system (which seems liek a sound system). However, for the person who attempts to understand the concepts and begin to asses their own training (like myself), he leads them down the wrong path.


He begins with the force, endurance, speed triangle. Fine. But then he bridges the gap between Force and endurance with "muscular endurance" (which, according to his charts leads me to believe that he is talking about Lactate Threshold) and between speed and endurance with "anaerobic endurance " (I think) which is V02max. Both of these are misleading. They simply don't relate in that fashion.


Here I have taken the training pyramid present in many running books and applied it to Friel's model to show how the graphic *should* be displayed (forgive me....I'm short on time....did the best I could):



And this is how it should relate to Friel's triangle (whoch shouldn't be a triangle at all):




I'm OK with Force and Speed combining for power.....much like a track and field sprinter has a combination of leg strength and quick moving muscles....but quickness has little to do with "V02max" and force has little to do with "lactate threshold".......in fact, lactate threshold and v02max have more to do with each other despite being on opposite ends of the triangle. Like Paulo said earlier, this should all be under the endurance umbrella.


gotta go..................

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-----------------------------Baron Von Speedypants
-----------------------------RunTraining articles here:
http://forum.slowtwitch.com/...runtraining;#1612485

"I did much pondering on this topic during my meeting (that I have to return to in 10 minutes). Here's what I have come up with:"

Wow, must have been an exciting meeting!

;-)

Jodi

Barry,

It just pains me to see the graphics you posted. Also you got the wrong triangle/piramid...

There should be an administrator to pull posts like those! ;-)

a) I was a sophist long before I trained as biochemist. i ceased my endeavours in biochem a long time ago - the wholly tractable nature of software is much more appealing.
b) Such people *do* exist. Please note that when I said "cannot ride", I did not intend that to be interpreted as "could never ride", merely as "cannot, given their current training plans and physical conditioning, ride at this level". i am well aware that you could take any sub-55 40k tt'ist and convert them into a fast century rider if they were willing to train for it.
c) My main goal in contributing to the thread was to refute Paulo's claim that "Strengths and weaknesses can only be related to the 3 energy systems". I think that I actually succeeded at that quite well.
d) the fact that this forum is filled with cyclists (and friends of cyclists) who can both ride a sub-55min 40km tt *and* a 4-5hr century seems to have made my use of that kind of example rather poor judgement.

I think you're missing the point: lactate threshold is an exercise intensity that can be maintained for quite some time (e.g., marathon pace, at least if you're reasonably quick), even if you aren't motivated by competition. The intensity that coaches and athletes routinely refer to as "LT" is in fact much higher, and is thus much closer to (or is) maximal lactate steady state/critical power/OBLA.
________________

Lactate Threshold as I have understood it from Dr's Daniels, Martin, and Pfitzinger is defined to be very closer to what a trained runner can maintain for ~ 60 minutes. Marathon Pace has been described as being sleightly slower than that (though not much slower for elites). If they change the terms in their books I'll have to believe you for now.


A well trained distance runner should be able to RACE a 30 minute race at roughly 16 seconds per mile faster than they can for 1 hour. So, the theory (that....as I said, I don't use) is that if an athlete wanted to find a rough estimate of what their pace would be at their lactate threshold, they can do a 30 minute time trial test. Due to a lack of motivavation, they will likely not be able to sustain their full race pace (say their potential is 5 min/mile) and thus slow down to a pace closer to pace at LT (in this case 5:16/mile). Now the argument is....will they slow down that much? Personaly I think 8 seconds a mile is more reasonable....which is why I don't use the test.

Does that make sense?

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-----------------------------Baron Von Speedypants
-----------------------------RunTraining articles here:
http://forum.slowtwitch.com/...runtraining;#1612485

That's maximal lactate steady state/critical power/OBLA.

I like books just as much as the next person, but you love them, Barry...

It's not Friel's work......

If you read Bompa, he uses rowers and swimmers. For swimming, he uses the analogy of taking a 100m specialists and turning them into a 1500m specialist. That person has the "force", but needs to increase duration. Compare that to a 5000m swimmer who has the opposite situation.

I do like the LT analogy, but no one really cares what I think b/c I'm not a coach. My point is that this is a simple analogy that people understand.

Some feel you need endurance before speed...but there are SOOOOO many tri-geeks who would rather stick around Olympic distance before IM, even at the elite ranks. Of course, both "endurance" sports, but the relative force is different.

You don't need speed to race Olympic distance.
The relative force is different, but not that different. More importantly, the difference in forces between racing an OD race and an IM is VERY SMALL when compared with the maximum force you can apply to the specific movement.

IT'S ALL ENDURANCE, DAMN IT!!!!!!! ;-)

So..you're telling me that Normann beat Macca because he had more endurance?

I've got the Martin and Coe book at home, but haven't read it is a while, and I've never read the others. Regardless, if any of them define lactate threshold as the pace that a trained runner can maintain for ~1 h, they're wrong.

It drives me nuts that people think an Oly distance is a short race.

It's over 2 hours for almost everyone in the field.

   
Never said it was a short race.....but it certainly is relative to IM.

Or maybe it was because he had more speed...or was it more force? Yeah, yeah, that's it: he used the Force! ;-)

Seriously, I think you're proving Paulo's (general) point: if you really want to understand what limits performance at various durations, it's best to use terms that have specific, clear-cut definitions (e.g., VO2max). Layman's terms such as "endurance" or "speed", while familiar to all, are simply too poorly defined to be truly useful when attempting to communicate complicated ideas. Or, to put it another way: the precise communication of precise ideas requires the precise use of precise terminology.

(BTW, if I were to try to more precisely define "endurance", I would describe it as "the terminal slope of the power-duration relationship".)

If I increased my FTP by 15%, did I increase my endurance or force?

I don't know, which is the problem with using such vague terms as "endurance" or "force". What obviously can be said, however, is that you increased your functional threshold power by 15%, which means that your lactate threshold must have gone up by about that much.

I happen to like that one too - if for no other reason than I feel like I paid my tuition dollars to the right people. (

The paper made a lot of sense, while Knoakes' response was not a great rebuttal. But to say that I read through and understood everything that they were saying on the first read is not true. (and I haven't read again.) There are a lot of the things they were doing in the lab that I didn't really enjoy, thus didn't apply. Now I wish I had.

Sometimes I feel that Knoakes is so concerned about preaching his thoery that the value of what he has to say is lost. Therefore it fits into the mold (and my perception) of academic research.

Anyway - I posted a thread about this when I was reading those papers... it didn't go anywhere, but I'm still hoping for some more enlightenment.

previous thread: http://forum.slowtwitch.com/...est=10855175#1106904

---

--

garyd
endurancebasecamp.com

Indeed, some would argue that it's better to be known than to be right. Still, Noakes' ideas, although sometimes way out in left field, do serve the purpose of keeping everyone on their toes, such that they don't begin to think that they know more than they really know.

Did the LT thread not explain this very issue in relatively gruesome detail? How did people not walk away with a clear understanding that scientific LT intensity (~2mmol/L) is much lower than Friel LT intensity (~4mmol/L)? To give people a sense of how low LT is, let's throw out the other wonderful term (which AC loves so much) that is a much closer reflection of scientific LT: aerobic threshold (AeT).

Thanks, Chris

Maybe he should improve his popularity even more.... as I obviously can't remember his name (and spelling).

I do agree with:

"such that they don't begin to think that they know more than they really know"

Noakes' book and papers have made me spend way more time looking into what I do and do not know more than I would have had he not written them. Or cause the uproar that ensures around the ex phys community.

I often wonder if all this internal debating and blogging actually makes me a less effective coach as most of the athletes I talk to just need help and encouragement to train and then train more.... it probably doesn't matter what they are doing at the levels they train at.

Now to go back and finish the last few pages of this thread....

---

--

garyd
endurancebasecamp.com

That's maximal lactate steady state/critical power/OBLA.

I like books just as much as the next person, but you love them, Barry...

______________________

Thanks Paulo. I wouldn't say that I "love" them. I just wanted to be clear where my information came from. That gives AC (or you) a better understanding of where I am coming from. I'd love to read up on as much ex-phys as you two do......but other endeavors tend to get in the way sometimes. So i read what I can.

; ^ )

---

-----------------------------Baron Von Speedypants
-----------------------------RunTraining articles here:
http://forum.slowtwitch.com/...runtraining;#1612485

Barry,

It just pains me to see the graphics you posted. Also you got the wrong triangle/piramid...

There should be an administrator to pull posts like those! ;-)
_____________________________________________________

My mind reading skills are crapping out right now. Do you think the information is bad? If so, why? (and please explain it better).

Or are you making fun of my graphics? If so, be prepared for a mind blast!

---

-----------------------------Baron Von Speedypants
-----------------------------RunTraining articles here:
http://forum.slowtwitch.com/...runtraining;#1612485

He who knows not, and knows not that he knows not, is a fool - shun him.
He who knows not, and knows that he knows not, is a child - teach him.
He who knows, and knows not that he knows, is asleep - wake him.
He who knows, and knows that he knows, is a wise man - follow him.

Attributions:, Persian Proverb Confucius

Yes I do. Explain? We're up to the 7th page here, you want more explaining?

There are known knowns. These are things we know that we know.
There are known unkowns. That is to say, there are things we know we don't know.
But, there are also unknown unknowns. These are things we don't know we don't know.
-- Donald Rumsfeld

Shun him, teach him or follow him? ;-)

Yes I do. Explain? We're up to the 7th page here, you want more explaining?
____________________

Believe it or not, more explaining now will result in less debating later. You get quite good at it once you get to three lines of text.

(lots of smiley's and pictures of kittens here)

---

-----------------------------Baron Von Speedypants
-----------------------------RunTraining articles here:
http://forum.slowtwitch.com/...runtraining;#1612485

Why Barry, I had NO idea you were Canadian!

I'll give it a shot.... Andy and Paulo might argue that Lactate Threshold is not 60 minute race pace (LT pace is easier than that, 60 min race pace is more like MLSS). VO2 max pace cannot be held for 12 minutes. The bottom of that pyramid really does not belong. Is there such a thing as a recovery workout? The pyramid would make more sense with the bottom section removed. Also, economy could be spread over several of the blocks as both hard intervals and more steady mileage have both been shown to improve economy. You probably did not mean to convey all of this but the graphs make it appear so....

Just my $.02

Thanks Mike, but no Kitten for you. ; ^ )

I grabbed the 1st training pyramid I could find....like I said, I was in a hurry.

The numbers are a little off from what Martin, Daniels, and Pfitzinger present, but do you not think that it more closely represents the different activity zones to the layman than the Friel triangle?

Re: Lactate Threshold - I won't be able to recheck my sources until I get home Friday. However, this is a highly used and suppedly effective training point at least in the distance running community, college thru elite. Jave they been doing it wrong, or is it just a problem with the terminology?

Re: V02max - Daniels disagrees. Andrew had challenged me on the several months ago, though I had thought it was 15 minutes at the time. I was lucky enough to get a reply from Daniels and he said his research had his subjects sustaining V02max velocity for 11 minutes (sorry....I wrote 12). Obviously there's a discrepency. I don't doubt that he could be wrong, but for some reason his research has legs.

Thanks for the reply Mike. BTW, I thorughly enjoyed your LT thread.

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-----------------------------Baron Von Speedypants
-----------------------------RunTraining articles here:
http://forum.slowtwitch.com/...runtraining;#1612485

Why Barry, I had NO idea you were Canadian!
____________________

You just love playing games, don't you? ; ^ ) (oops....I was being Canadian again).


Seriously, 7 pages into a thread and I am on the cusp of making sense of where Friel is coming from. You and AC may not care because you already have the answers and don't care what Friel thinks. Others don't care because either they understand where he's coming from, they *think* they understand (more likely), or they just don't plain care to begin with (but they probably aren't viewing the thread).

As I said earlier, it seems as though Friel took 6 important components in cycling and tried to tie them together in a graphic in a manner that just doesn't belong. Diesel asked several times how to tie the gap between "Force" and "Endurance." You had made several attempts to explain but it was clearly lost on him (and most likely lost on others who were too timid to respond). I don't think it says anything about your explanation, just how confusing the concept can be when one has held on to a certain way of thinking for so long (liek trying to give up religion). Maybe *I* understood you....but maybe I didn't. As I've made it clear many times before, I can't know what I don't know if I don't know that I don't know it (Did that sound like a Stover sentence or what? ; ^ )

Based on my understanding of physiology and running based sports, you essentialy have two ends of the spectrum. On one end you have "endurance" - the ability to resist fatigue, and on the other end you have "speed."

Looking at track and field sprinters, though speed is highly genetic and is largely predetermined by numbers and types of fast twitch fibers (I'm not going to pretend to rember which are which...type Ia, IIb, etc), however it is still trainable. This training includes strength training, form training, and training for "quickness." In otherwords, it is important to be strong, efficient, and quick.

As the race distance progresses to roughly 400 to 800 meters, these attributes become less and less significant and the training is replaced with more "endurance" (aerobic) type training. As we increase the distance more and more, we find that we pass through certain points where the body experiences different phenomena. We slide past the point where the body maximizes it's oxygen intake, we slide past the point where lactate build up can be removed faster than it is produced, and then on into a more and more purely aerobic zone.

IMO, it seems as though Friel chose a terminology that he felt would be easier to understand. I don't have a problem with people inventing their own terms.....ie zone 2, threshold, mod hard, steady, LSD....as long as the terms are defined well. Even muscular endurance doesn't bother me if I can just translate it to "what ever happens during tempo training." However, what bugs me is how he tries to correlate "Muscular Endurance" (MLSS, LT, or whatever) to "Force" yet he correlates "Anaerobic Endyrance" (V02max) to "Speed." Yes it makes sense on some speudo scientific, philosophic type level.....but it just gets the wrong information across to the reader.


Anyway, that's my 2 cents. I understand that I am the mechanic trying to talk about engineering (figuratively speaking). I more or less know how to train and know how to coach but I DO care if I get the science correct because I don't want to missinform people. If you have a different opinion or if certain data is worng, please let me know which and what it is. I always appreciate it.

Thanks.

PS - The irony in the above paragraph is that in the real world I really am an engineer who won't get under the hood of his car ; ^ )

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-----------------------------Baron Von Speedypants
-----------------------------RunTraining articles here:
http://forum.slowtwitch.com/...runtraining;#1612485

I've got the Martin and Coe book at home, but haven't read it is a while, and I've never read the others. Regardless, if any of them define lactate threshold as the pace that a trained runner can maintain for ~1 h, they're wrong.
____________________________

Andrew, for what it is worth, I copied below a post from Daniel's on another forum. I'm not an exercise physiology scientist so I can't pretend to know which terms I use correctly and which one's I don't and why. Enlighten me about the confusion if you can figure it out.

Thanks again.

"Here is what jtupper has had to say on the issue in previous posts:

"I have tried to sort of standardize things by referring to a steady "threshold" run as a tempo run. Threshold being the intensity of effort associated with a steady-state accumulaton of blood lactate (which could be anything from around 2.6 to 7.2 mmole of lactate -- usually a mean among a group of runners, of about 4 mmole). Interestingly this is more accurately identified by %Vo2max than by a particular blood lactate value (for instance those who have a high lactate value when at threshold -- say 7 mmole -- are still pretty close to the 86-88% Vo2max value that another runner is at 3mmole). So, it is safer to use %max to identify threshold in most cases. HR is closer to 90-92% of HR max when at threshold. This is a case where HR is a useful tool because wind, terrain, running conditions can affect actual pace that is associated with threshold (although pace is the desirable way to go, and on level ground if possible). Aside from the physiological benefit of training at threshold pace (the body learns to clear lactate better when stressed to some degree, and a greater intensity becomes associated with threshold), there are psychological advantages to performing continuous prolonged runs at a pretty solid pace (referred to as "tempo" runs by many even if not at threshold intensity). That's OK. Just realize that "tempo" means different things to different runners. I coined the phrase "vVO2max" and now people all over the place define it a variety of ways, which is a shame because if this hapens to all terminology then we can get very confused. Just think of the many definitions of "interval training" that you can come up with. I have prepared a new table that addresses the issue of "tempo" runs of various durations -- how much to vary the original "threshold" pace, depending on how long a tempo run you feel is good for you. Could help, or could just result in more missunderstanding. A pretty good estimate of threshold pace is about 24 seconds per mile slower than current 5k race pace. It's also a bit faster than marathon race pace, depending on how fast a marathoner you are. Some people think threshold pace is too slow and especially when doing cruise intervals. I usually advise these runners to run a faster race to prove their threshold pace should be faster than they think."

AND

"My feeling is a true threshold is an intensity of effort that will produce a "steady state" of blood lactate accumulation (be it 3.0 or 7.5 mmole -- which is about the range many studies have shown the deflection to occur). A typical lactate profile involves a fairly short time at a progressively faster series of intensities, and look for a deflection, which can be quite subjective. Some people look for 2 different thresholds -- 2.0 mmole and 4.0 mmole. But once you have what you consider to be a deflection then you go back and try a steady 20minute effort at that supposed threshold. One of 3 things can happen -- during this 20min run periodic blood samples will show (1) a gradual increase in lactate accumulation, (2) a steady drop in blood-lactate accumulation , or (3) a relative steady state of blood-lactate accumulation. #3 seems more like a true threshold to me -- a point where clearance keeps up with production. Because of the different ways of testing and interpreting a deflection, etc. I think Luv2run has it best by using 15k race pace (for good runners at least). However, this is not too good for slower runners who take an hour to race 10K, because the pace at which you can race for about 1 hour is a better way of explaining it. Some swim coaches use a T-50 test which is the speed you can hold for an all-out 50min swim. Others use a T-30 test, with a 30-min effort. In well-trainined runners I get 86 to 88% of VO2max over and over again with a range of about 82-91% (which is a whole lot less variation than is what you can see in lactate values associated with a deflection (2.6 to 7.6)) I still like using performances to determine training intensities, because performance is what it is all about, and I am pretty convinced that two runners who both race 13:20 for 5k are pretty equal, even though one may have a threshold associated with 4 mmole and the other 6.5mmole blood lactate. Performance takes into account psychological factors as well as physiological -- so base training on performance."

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-----------------------------Baron Von Speedypants
-----------------------------RunTraining articles here:
http://forum.slowtwitch.com/...runtraining;#1612485

I don't understand why people get soo hung up on the reason WHY things should be named a specific way, epecially when most of the prinicples that are out there have been around well before our time.

We should in most cases be focusing on the HOW TOO to do things because after rerading most of this astonishingly long thread my only conclusion is I DON"T GIVE A TOSS what it's called just explain me how to do and I'll go out and do it.

Call it what YOU want so long as I understand the underlying principle of what it is. I'm happy.

I think I go and ride a for 2 hrs and pick a gear that is 1-2 gears harder then my normal race gear, as I want to train my muscles to be able to ride a bigger gear for longer periods of time and I might just call that ...................... muscular endurance, why? because its user friendly for us people who are not scientists.

I'll then let the scientitsts go about there job spending soo much time proiving me wrong. At least I'll be training

Paul

You're an idiot. But don't be upset, my definition of what an idiot is not what you think and really fits your personality.

Now that is funny Paulo. Semantically speaking that is.

---

Jason Goldberg
FIT Multisports

[reply][reply]
[reply]
...There are known knowns. These are things we know that we know.
There are known unkowns. That is to say, there are things we know we don't know.
But, there are also unknown unknowns. These are things we don't know we don't know.
-- [i][url "http://www.amusingquotes.com/h/r/Donald_Rumsfeld_1.htm"][#000066]Donald Rumsfeld[/#000066][/url] [/i]
[i][/i]
[i]Shun him, teach him or follow him?[/i] ;-)[/reply]

Did he really say that? Very confusing.

Socrates: So I withdrew and thought to myself: “I am wiser than this man; it is likely that neither of us knows anything worthwhile, but he thinks he knows something when he does not, whereas when I do not know, neither do I think I know; so I am likely to be wiser to this small extent, that I do not think I know what I do not know.”

No worries Paulo,

I value your constructive input

Paul

[reply]I.

... for us people who are not scientists.

I'll then let the scientitsts go about there job spending soo much time proiving me wrong.
[/reply]

Don't worry about them. Exercise physiology is certainly not rocket science.

AC, I've been thinking (unusually for me) and I have questions:

1) LT. I seem to recall much discussion of this on gordoworld in the past. Am I right in thinking that what you're calling LT is the point at which the body begins to produce lactate AT ALL? (If so, I'd have thought that pace was one you could sustain for a somewhat longer than a marathon duration - especially if you're reasonably quick, more likely a half-ironman or 100-mile TT)
2) FT. Is this MLSS - what "coaches and athletes routinely refer to as 'LT'" - or something else? Does it have a mean duration in your experience?
3) CP. Are you saying this a synonym for MLSS? How then do you account for the fact that below that point you'll preseumably still fatigue is a finite time (is one, for example, able to specify a wattage or running pace that is sustainable for, 2, 4 or 12 hours but no longer - or is the specified pace going to be entirely the result of experience?)

---

Stuff I like:
PBscience Triathlon Coaching and Lab Testing

I'm not AC, but here are some answers:

1) The body is ALWAYS producing lactate. LT is the point where PRODUCTION starts to be higher than REMOVAL.
2) FT like the name says is a functional threshold, the maximum normalized power you can sustain for one hour. MLSS is the maximum pace/power that you can mantain with a constant lactate concentration in your bloodstream.
3) CP is the scientific definition for critical power. It correlates well with MLSS but not a synonym since it's not a "lactate-based" definition. CP is based on functional tests.

Notice that nowhere in there does he refer to the intensity of which he speaks as LACTATE threshold, or LT - only "threshold". IOW, Daniels undoubtly recognizes that the intensity that most people believe to be lactate lactate threshold is in fact much higher, thus forcing him to use a different term and to explain in some detail why this is necessary. I faced the same problem re. power-based training, and hence coined the term "functional threshold power" (which I often wish I had called "maximal steady state power" instead) so as to avoid misusing the term lactate threshold.

Nope - the body produces lactate even at rest. As Paulo said (or should have said), LT is the exercise intensity at which lactate production initially exceeds lactate removal. OTOH, maximal lactate steady state is the highest intensity at which lactate removal balances lactate production. In between, blood lactate concentrations will at first rise, but then will decline back towards resting levels, or plateau (for quite some time, anyway) at a concentration below that seen at maximal lactate steady state.


No, because it is a performance-based (i.e., functional) definition. It would, however, be highly correlated with, and very close to, the intensity defined as maximal lactate steady state.


Essentially.


By definition, functional threshold power is a power that you can maintain for about 1 h.


It's not a synonym (again, see Paulo's reply), but as long as critical power were calculated from tests that weren't too short or too long, it would be very close to power at maximal lactate steady state (and to functional threshold power).


Simple: the critical power concept is based upon assumptions that aren't entirely correct. Despite that, it generally provides a very good description of the power-duration relationship (within limits), and as such, is useful from both a practical and a theoretical perspective.

Yeah, like any field involving biological organisms it's far more complex than that.

The problem arises when the terminology chosen gets in the way of such understanding - which, unfortunately, is true for the term "muscular endurance" (as well as "anaerobic threshold", etc.). Or, as I have put it for many, many years: the precise communication of precise concepts requires the precise use of precise terminology. Failure to recognize this fact leads to needless misunderstandings.

'initially'

AH! realisation, scales falling and so forth.

Paulo should thank you, I've just deleted a long and meandering list of questions I was about to ask him.

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Thanks a lot Andrew. I did some digging around the internet and what you told me is consistent with what I found last night. I also noticed that mahy of the discussions revloved around *why* there is this confusion.

....and the confusion continues with triathletes typicaly calling zone 3 "tempo" where runners call zone 4 "tempo"........then there's the sprint coach I once worked with that had her athletes do a tempo run that was COMPLETELY different than any of this.

Thanks again.

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-----------------------------Baron Von Speedypants
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I wrote "starts", AC wrote "initially"...was it the italic that made you understand the concept better?

No, it's the specifics of the term. Starts in you construction implies that it begins to do something and continues like that. Initially means it begins by doing one thing but then changes to do something else.

You were a great help, and I thank you for you explanation, but you left me with further questions about how close together the different points were. Those have now been cleared up because of that one word.

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Never send a rocket scientist to do an exercise physiologist's job.

I would say we can still do a decent job at it... the other way around... I don't think so!

I would be willing to bet that the percentage of doctoral candidates capable of passing the qualifying exam in the opposite field would be equally low.

Care to make that bet interesting? I haven't secured funding for 2008 yet ;-)

Well, you just failed the statistics part of the exam, because clearly one cannot determine the percentage of individuals in a population meeting a certain criteria based on n=1.

bastard!

I don't understand why people get soo hung up on the reason WHY things should be named a specific way, epecially when most of the prinicples that are out there have been around well before our time.

We should in most cases be focusing on the HOW TOO to do things because after rerading most of this astonishingly long thread my only conclusion is I DON"T GIVE A TOSS what it's called just explain me how to do and I'll go out and do it.

Call it what YOU want so long as I understand the underlying principle of what it is. I'm happy.

I think I go and ride a for 2 hrs and pick a gear that is 1-2 gears harder then my normal race gear, as I want to train my muscles to be able to ride a bigger gear for longer periods of time and I might just call that ...................... muscular endurance, why? because its user friendly for us people who are not scientists.

I'll then let the scientitsts go about there job spending soo much time proiving me wrong. At least I'll be training

Paul
________________________________

Hey Paul,

Since I began the thread I'll give you *my* answer (and I won't even call you names) : ^ )


I agree with you that for 99% of the athletes out there, it is far more important to know what to do, how to do it, when to do it, and to a lesser extent why it should be done (in terms of performance, not science).

I think Friel does a decent job of answering the first three questions (at least in his cycling book) and then did the best he could answering the 4th question with his triangle and how he ties "force, speed, and endurance to power, anaerobic endurance, and mucular endurance." Some of the terms he made up himself, which I don't really have a problem with. "Muscular Endurance" is certainly easier to remember than Lactate Threshold or MLSS, or BLAO (or whatever it was). Much like Gordo says to ride "steady" or "mod-hard" instead of at "aerobic threshold" or "at 85% of V02max."

However, coming from a running backgorund and being fairly well versed in the terminology and concepts used there, I ran into a lot of confusion trying to understand Friel's deffinitions...mainly because I had no idea if there were differnces between what happens when you ride a bike versus running. After digging around enough, I found discovered that, in fact, cycling and running are not really that different and I would have been a lot less confused if his triangles were not misleading.

The main point of contention is that he shows "muscular endurance" as being a combination of "endurance & Force" and "anaerobic endurance" as being a combination of "endurance and speed." However, as I discovered through his workouts that as you progress through different intensities, you go through different zones that are similar to running. Lets say 15mph is highly aerobic ("endurance"), 19 mph is "muscular endurance", 22 mph is "anaerobic endurance,"........ok, I understand that and am ok with HIS terminology.....however, I got REALLY confused trying to figure out why "force" is important at 19 mph but then it's not important at all at 22 mph......but then the combination of Froce and speed is important at 30 mph......you need force, but then you don't, but then you do again?


So, Paul, that was MY confusion and my beef. In the end, I'm ok with it as well. My entire goal is to be able to understand what the guy who wrote "the bible" means so that I can understand how to communicate with others (every now and then I get a PM from someone using his terms and had no idea what they were talking about).

Fair enough?

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-----------------------------Baron Von Speedypants
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I think that could probably be classed as entrapment. You should sue for potential loss of earnings as an exercise physiologist.

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The limitations of my english were apparently shown above, but I'll go for another round. For me, maybe because I am not a native speaker, "Lactate Threshold" is as easy to remember as "Muscular Endurance". I suspect that to Friel it was too, since he decided to use the term "Lactate Threshold" to designate something else.

Paulo, I'd just like to say that if I could write my second language as fluently as you write English I would be a proud and confident person.

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Man, George Brooks would not be happy to hear this!

  

The limitations of my english were apparently shown above, but I'll go for another round. For me, maybe because I am not a native speaker, "Lactate Threshold" is as easy to remember as "Muscular Endurance". I suspect that to Friel it was too, since he decided to use the term "Lactate Threshold" to designate something else.

___________________________

Paulo,

Again I'm not sure the intention of your post, so bear with me. Since Friel is referring to a range between what he calls "force" and "endurance" I was giving examples of different scientific terms used within that range (assuming he really is refering to the gap between really fast speeds and really long efforts.....can only assume here). I understand now that I was perviously using Lactate Threshold when I should have been using MLSS.....however, I DID mean to use all of those terms in the last post to get across the point I intended to.

So that is the response if you were insinuating that *I* missunderstood you.

Now, as to the concept of remmebering/understanding "muscular endurance" vrs "Lactate Threshold" it has more to do with the fact that you are a research scientist than it does with your English (I know you were not serious about your english). Scientific vocubulary (not to mention the concepts) is very confusing for *most* people. Yes, I know, it doesn't make any sense why it should be.....but it is. People have an easier time associating with concepts that they are familiar with (muscles and endurance) than with terms they don't normaly hear or use (lactate ....except refering to breast feeding ....and threshold....except when refering to their honeymoon).


The real art in teaching is to be able to explain new and challenging ideas in a manner that the student can relate to. How you handle this all depends on the level of the student you are dealing with. For example, a 14 year old boy understands why a football player will run through tires in training even though their are no tires on the field during a game. It then helps them to better understand how an education prepares them for later learning rather than merely providing a them with a set of skills that they will use later in life (trust me.....after enough "when will I ever use this" kind of questions, you figure out ways to explain it).

This is where the 5 training zones and Gordos "easy, steady, mod hard, hard, etc." terms have been very helpful for many athletes. I beleive Friel was attmepting the same thing here with "muscular endurance" and....well.....sometimes you hit, and sometimes you don't.


Mi dos pesos.

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-----------------------------Baron Von Speedypants
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Man, George Brooks would not be happy to hear this!
____________________________

I have no idea what you are talking about. Can you please elaborate? or was that a joke for Paulo?

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-----------------------------Baron Von Speedypants
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Hehehehehehehe... to me it also causes me some trouble to be talking about lactate and then say it's related to a % of VO2Max.

"The real art in teaching is to be able to explain new and challenging ideas in a manner that the student can relate to"

And let me add "and still use accurate and proper terminology and concepts"

Nobody profits from dumbing down things. Not the teacher and certainly not the student.

And let me add "and still use accurate and proper terminology and concepts"

Nobody profits from dumbing down things. Not the teacher and certainly not the student.
____________________

I'll leave this one alone since I'm sure you are as versed and experienced in pedagogy as you are in physiology.

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-----------------------------Baron Von Speedypants
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Nobody profits from dumbing down things. Not the teacher and certainly not the student.

-
Paulo Sousa



Wrong.

Do you need more explanation?? ;-)


paul

Yes, because your use of the word wrong might mean something else ;-)

And this is my last post on the thread, Jonnyo ORDERED me to let this thread die :-)

http://www.sportlegs.com/about/welcome.asp

3 Systems of muscular energy as most of you guys and gal's know. I thought I would throw this out you may already know it exist.

From the no twitch guy.

T

Is this a joke?

There is so much disinformation there just to sell a product.

I suppose 5 hour energy works too.

jaretj

Barry,

AC has a nice graph in one of his power presentations. Maybe he can post it. It won't answer all of your questions, of course, but I suspect it will help you fine-tune the location of different levels of intensity on a scale. It graphs VO2, HR, lactate, RPE vs power and identifies LT and OBLA/MLSS. What you'll see is that LT is at the point where lactate makes its first significant uptick which always occurs around ~2mmol/L. This is relatively low on the HR and RPE scale. Just thought I'd throw that out...

Thanks, Chris