I have some other links bookmarked, but I'm going to have to dig through them. I don't think any were as specific to triathlon as this one was though.

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Heath Dotson
HD Coaching:Website |Twitter: 140 Characters or Less|Facebook:Follow us on Facebook

We see the above changes to lactate profile fairly consistently throughout our day to day testing.
Those who do a significant amount of training in the "middle" tend to have a flatter curve with higher baselines but not extraordinarily large jumps above threshold. (and also increasing lactate at low workloads) This is also the pattern we tend to see in untrained athletes, albeit the workloads are higher in the trained.

Those who only do low intensity tend to have low baselines, but also low maxes unless they are naturally anaerobic.
Those who do only high intensities tend to have both high baselines and high maximums. (and also increasing lactate at low workloads)

Those who do a "polarized" tend to have low baselines and high maxes. This allows for the highest threshold wattage and thus performance, regardless of what type of event (road racing or TT etc.). Of course there are nuances there and I do not want to see a criterium racer and an ironman athlete with the same profile. Just as a general carpenter and an electrician may have similar tools, but each with their own special ones.

When it comes to purely increasing threshold, polarized is the way to go. It is about honing the tools (aerobic and anaerobic energy systems) to work as well as possible despite what you're putting them to use for.

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I talk a lot - Give it a listen: http://www.fasttalklabs.com/category/fast-talk
I also give Training Advice via http://www.ForeverEndurance.com

The above poster has eschewed traditional employment and is currently undertaking the ill-conceived task of launching his own hardgoods company. Statements are not made on behalf of nor reflective of anything in any manner... unless they're good, then they count.
http://www.AGNCYINNOVATION.com

Cracking, thank you.

Sorry to be a dumbass but could someone quickly clarify in these studies how easy was easy in terms of FTP? I've heard lots of 'talking pace' mentioned and heart rates but I don't use heart rate at all, and talking pace for me on the bike is well up into tempo?
I had a 2 hour spin the other day on the rollers at about 80% FTP, but I'm guessing this is too intense for the easy portion?

According to Coggan's Training With Power Book, it looks like easy would be under 75% of FTP

That's my concern as well. I commute 45 minutes each way daily and have been more or less trying to sit at the lower end of the "Sweet Spot" -- ~75%-80% of FTP (NP, at least). I've seen pretty good success with this (and it doesn't require much in the way of thinking and is sustainable) but if we more or less call that black hole stuff, then I'd be happy to take an edge off and dedicate that effort a bit better.

Probably won't change my methods for a while, but worth playing around with in the future.

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The question of who is right and who is wrong has seemed to me always too small to be worth a moment's thought, while the question of what is right and what is wrong has seemed all-important.

-Albert J. Nock

Yeh I think if I am going to start polarizing more I am going to have to pull the intensity down, take those rides at 70-75% FTP instead of 80. I feel a little silly spinning away at that low on the rollers, alas, soon the weather will get better and I can get outside.

this may be a silly question from a non-roller user, but how do you get up to 80% FTP on a roller?

if I did 120 min of 80% ftp on a trainer, I'd be quite weary to say the least.

Krietler 2.25s and a headwind fan! Almost infinite resistance!
But then I used to have a set of 3 inch minoras that I had no problem getting up to threshold. It's just a case of the right tyres (really bad rolling resistance) and tyre pressure, just enough to stop the sloppy movements.

This whole thread is hard for me to grasp. I am totally stuck inside all winter (it was -13 this morning with a high of -3 today…with 15mph winds…brutal out) so I will/cannot ride more than 10-12 hours per week.

From what I have read over and over again is threshold training (zone 3, sweet spot, and zone 4) is the way to go in winter is you are stuck inside or time limited. So that is what I do (and have done in the past). I do a lot of little surges (30 second into VO2 max) and then back to tempo...lots of modified "hour of power" workouts, without killing myself. I do very little pure zone 5/6 work. I am trying to build as much aerobic "base" as possible and I want to able to ride everyday so try never to completely trash myself in a workout. I will not ride longer than 3 hours (and only have done that once). I try to stay away from zone 2 so I mostly do 1.5-2 hours per day with an IF of .85 to .90 with 2 active recovery days a week in zone 1.

What I am reading is I need to consider doing a lot more zone 2 rides and 2 workouts a week of zone 5/6 in winter. This will build my base better than the zone 3 / 4 stuff I am doing. Two zone 5/6 workouts a week all winter on the trainer would be very challenging. I find threshold to be really hard on consecutive days so I mostly stick to SS with surges.

I am planning to start zone 5/6/7 work as I get closer to racing in the spring…first big event is late April. I also plan to increase my time zone 2 as I get outside as this zone is far more enjoyable outside than on the trainer and will help my recover from my zone 5/6 work. It seems this would be a better overall plan for a time limited person who wants to get as strong as possible without the ability to ride a ton. I am loosely following the plan put forth by Charles Howe with input from Andrew Coggan.
Thoughts?

First, 10-12 hours per week is a legitimate amount of riding time. You can accomplish much more than people think with that many hours.

Second, with a significant amount of mid intensity work, you'll find the threshold work (and above) to be quite tiring and tough on your body.

Third, I would say that zone 3/4 do very little to actual build your aerobic ability.

Fourth, It all depends who you believe. Seiler has his points and they sound good. Coggan has his points and those sound good too. Anyone can make anything sound good at some point in time, because you can find benefit with any type of training.

Fifth, I believe, based on my experience and research, that the aerobic system is best set up to adapt when you allow the body to focus on aerobic ability. The body wants to find the easy path, it wants to survive with as little effort as possible (so to say). In my experience, that means the aerobic processes are not developed unless you work at an intensity that allows for the vast majority of work to be done aerobically (< 1.5mmol Lactate). Once you cross above that, you start to have more anaerobic contribution. The body can very quickly become reliant on anaerobic as it is an easier process with less steps and less enzymes etcs.

As I mentioned above, when people train primarily in "tempo" or "sweet spot" they tend to rack up a large TSS which plays into the performance manager and makes us all smile because our fitness is so good, or so it would seem. However, when we do serial lactate testing, those individuals lose their aerobic ability. lactate levels tend to increase slowly, but steadily, at lower workloads. This is indicative of the anaerobic system having a larger contribution at lower workloads, decreasing performance in endurance events.

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I talk a lot - Give it a listen: http://www.fasttalklabs.com/category/fast-talk
I also give Training Advice via http://www.ForeverEndurance.com

The above poster has eschewed traditional employment and is currently undertaking the ill-conceived task of launching his own hardgoods company. Statements are not made on behalf of nor reflective of anything in any manner... unless they're good, then they count.
http://www.AGNCYINNOVATION.com

Thanks for the response. That helps some. As I stated above I have been training mostly below threshold (around 80-90% of threshold with a lot of 30 second surges) as this is an area that I can usually do three solid days in a row. I then usually do a recovery day in zone 1 for an hour. Rinse and repeat...my CTL load rarely goes up (in the winter) about a point every 2 weeks. To hard when I can not add volume and if I added intensity I would crumble (meaning have to take days off...which I do not like to do). I rarely do interval sets at threshold or above for lengthy periods. For example this month (since Jan 1st) only 16 percent (6 of 38 total hours on the bike) of my training was above 235 watts...my threshold is 253 (I log every workout and ran the data for this post). And most of that time 253 and above is collected in small 30 seconds blocks or 2/3 minutes surges at the end of SS/Tempo intervals. I will occasionally do 10 minute intervals around 245-250...maybe 2/3 a week, and only when feeling good.

What I have noticed is I can hold my tempo and SS for a lot longer time. I have set records at 90 and 120 minutes (and I have been collecting power data for 5 years)....for example I held 233 for two hours and I was not even really spent. I have not done an all out hour test as it would crush me but I almost know threshold is slowly moving up. I do not see how my aerobic system is not being trained when I ride tempo? I also track HR carefully as I find is it a useful supplement to power (at least when I am inside). I looked yesterday and my HR is about 5-7 beats lower at all the power levels from November when I started this plan.

One thing I have read from people who know way more about this stuff than me is all workouts level 5 and below are aerobic and basically cause similar adaptions...the timing of when you use the hard zones is the key to having a good season...especially level 6

Finally, maybe I have a great anaerobic system...I can not sprint really well (1100 is my best) but I can hold almost 600 watts (587 is my best) for 1 minutes at 132 pounds. Maybe that is helping me more than I know.

To what extent have you correlated these changes in lactate observations with actual power production over some aerobic duration?

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Kat Hunter reports on the San Dimas Stage Race from inside the GC winning team
Aeroweenie.com -Compendium of Aero Data and Knowledge
Freelance sports & outdoors writer Kathryn Hunter

Would you mind explaining in a bit more detail what you are referring to as "baselines" and "maximums" as well as what being "naturally anaerobic" means?

After having read this: "First, anaerobic capacity helps determine aerobic power and thus the lactate threshold, because it interacts with aerobic capacity. Briefly, the anaerobic system limits the body's use of the aerobic system by putting out more lactate and hydrogen ions than the aerobic system can absorb, inhibiting muscle contraction. We refer to this as the gate-keeping effect, which is discussed in detail on the CD-ROM and elsewhere in the triathlon site. If the anaerobic capacity is too high the athlete will be slowed down by the excess acidosis that accompanies lactate production. So for endurance events it is necessary to train the anaerobic capacity down. The lower it is the more the aerobic system can be utilized before acidosis occurs. But, it can’t be TOO low....
Second, because anaerobic capacity affects performance by determining the total amount of carbohydrates that are available for the aerobic system during competition. Carbohydrates metabolize faster than fats and unless the anaerobic system is generating enough carbohydrate fuel for the aerobic system, the aerobic system will have to use a higher percentage of fats which metabolize slower and force the athlete to slow down. Thus, if the anaerobic capacity is too low, less carbohydrate will be available for aerobic metabolism. In our first point it indicated that a lower anaerobic capacity would be desirable in order to raise aerobic power and the threshold and that is true but if it is too low it will cause the athlete to rely too much on fats and this will slow down the athlete. Supplementing the glucose/glycogen that is used during a race is why an athlete will consume glucose products as the race progresses so that he/she can utilize more of a faster metabolizing carbohydrate fuel instead of fats"

From http://www.lactate.com/lactate_threshold.html

as far as cycling goes, I think that I potentially might be one of the "naturally anaerobic" types (whether through nature or sport history as I am a recent convert into what I would consider pure endurance sports). I have no scientific evidence to justify this. However, I feel I have a pretty big engine, am aerobically fit, but also strong anaerobically. However, my FTP sucks, and I have very little tolerance when at or near my lactate threshold. (Friel power zones) I can go all day in zone 2 and love short intervals in zone 6 and 7, but put in me in zone 3 or 4 for any extended period of time and I start sucking in a major way. I am thinking that detraining anaerobically might be the way to go. So I'm guessing something like 80% zone 2 workouts and 20% zone 5 interval workouts would be the most optimal way to go? Nothing above zone 5 and stop any lower body strength training? Regardless, this is a totally new training concept to me (before this thread, I just KNEW that the only way to increase FTP was to train at FTP), and I am finding this entire concept quite interesting and enlightening and appreciate everyone who is adding to the knowledge on this thread.

Regards,
Ryan

Thanks for your reply.

Just of couple of points.

Zone 4 mentioned (in the 5 aerobic Norwegian zones) is defined as 88/93% of VO2 Max (or 90/95% of Max HR) should roughly fall between high Z4/low Z5 in the Coggan 7 zones.
Is that correct?

I would agree that accumulating minutes there could be very beneficial, but, before doing that, and in particular for low volumes (6/8 hours per week), wouldn't be good to work at a bit lower intensity (let's say Z3 norwegian, Z4/low Z4 Coggan) rather than Z1?
I think that for low volumes there is not enough stimulus (in winter time, it would mean for instance 3 out of 4 indoor, 1 hour session, at Z1)

The Z1 mentioned is roughly equivalent to Coggan's Z2 as far as I can gather. Hence they are saying that work in the Coggan zones of z3 low z4 lead to higher production of lactate at all aerobic levels below which would make us less efficient at anything above a sprint distance triathlon, (probably less than that even)
So winter should be 80 % Coggan Z2 and 20% Coggan Z 5 maybe upper of Z4
Assuming I've understood the theory behind it?

Great thread!!!
I think what desert dude is trying to say would correspond with this post by Steve Magness. and is very valuable.

http://www.scienceofrunning.com/...t-really-doesnt.html

Or in short, don't just jump ship because of a few articles before looking at it from a few more angles
Seiler's work is must read stuff for any coach and athlete in my mind. But if you change your training totally because of one thread it would should lack of understanding of your training in the first place.

PK

That was very helpful and confirms what I have learned from my countless hours of reading....mix your training up. Plan your season around your races, build a base, evaluate progress through testing, and when you get ready to race (a few months out)start some HIIT. It makes no sense to me to do lots of zone 1/2 and zone 5/6 and skip the other zones. At some point I would adapt to that and it would fail to produce results as I simply would run out of time to add zone 2 and you can only do some much HIIT before you break. I suppose if I had endless amount of time I could keep adding zone 1/2 work and maybe I would continue to improve but that is beyond my pay grade....and I don't have that time and never will.

I have 10-12 hours...I could so 10 hours zone 2 and 1-2 hours of hard zone 5/6 and I know I would get better (in fact I will be starting that training in a few weeks) but I also believe that if I stated that training in November it would do very little for me now as I would have already adapted to that stimulus. It truly see zone 3 and low zone 4 as a great way to build an aerobic base when time is a limiter. At some point I know this will stop working also but my data does not show this yet and we are still in deep winter so I stick to 3/low 4. On a side note I personally think to much zone 4 (at 90-100%) is a recipe for burn out so I stay below that level and work out every day.

As I read many times "Lydiard was right"....

PK,

I like Steve Magness's stuff, but I think this particular blog entry doesn't really mate with DD's point. Or perhaps only in part, if you mean random training-->random results. I read Steve's point as more a knock on Crossfit being debunked since the middle of last century. DD was more getting at folks tend to cherry pick one or two particular workout(s) without considering & executing the whole plan, then bemoan the fact that <insert method name> doesn't work and they're injured or burned out.

I think you're right that most don't understand their training plans, but you might be a bit harsh (though only a little bit) here on people jumping ship to a new method. I think many folks are frustrated because they have tried different training regimen and haven't had the kind of progress they would like, don't understand why, and don't even have the tools to understand why. Yes, changing your training based on one thread would be kinda crazy. You should do your homework and see if that method is bunk or not. But let me turn this around. What fraction of athletes understand their training? 1%? 0.1%? What fraction of coaches understand their training plans? What level of understanding is needed to execute a training plan?

Good discussion! -J

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Life is tough. But it's tougher when you're stupid. -John Wayne

This is what I was getting at. People listened to that lecture/read the article and heard 4x8 min the rest easy. They grasped this and held it up as the silver bullet. They didn't grasp the rest of the key points & they failed to think about what was said/written and failed to understand the big picture. I suspect, unfortunately, if my PM's and emails on this topic are any indicator, many will fail as they implement it.

I think people should read this thread concurrently as well: http://forum.slowtwitch.com/..._latest_reply;so=ASC

That might help people connect some dots instead of using only 1 dot.





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Brian Stover USAT LII
Accelerate3 Coaching
Insta

Here is a link,

It's about runners though ;-)

Basically talks about increase in speed and reduction in BL while raising peak BL capacity, basically making the athlete faster at threshold while still being able to improve anaerobic side (say the last lap kick in the 5km/10km).

http://www.lukaljubic.si/...ength-endurance.html

Maurice

Since I wrote what you quoted about the lactate threshold, I will reply. Take it for what it is worth.

The baseline is the tendency of lactate to remain relatively stable for a certain range of effort levels. In the following set of curves, the typical lactate curves for three different types of runners are illustrated:



Notice that each will have a range where the lactate tends to remain near constant or changes very little. This is the baseline. If in the above example, the sprinter had been tested at lower speeds the baseline would have been about the same as the couple readings in the chart.

Also notice that the sprinter is generating higher levels of lactate than the other two runners.

Here is an abbreviated test for a world class triathlete. There is no baseline since the readings were not taken and not thought to be useful. The trainer was after the V4 (speed at 4 mmol/l)



This test includes a separate all-out effort about 20 minutes after the basic test. In the all out effort the lactate levels only reached 7.2 mmol/l. This means that the anaerobic system of this athlete is at best moderate. Now several years earlier this athlete's all out effort probably produced lactate levels in the mid teens since he was a competitive swimmer and these events need a high anaerobic capacity. So over the years the athlete had to train to lower his anaerobic capacity. As he did this, his lactate curve would move to the right as the anaerobic capacity got weaker. He would get faster in an endurance race as he could run at a higher percentage of his VO2 max due to the lower lactate production.

An aside: I once met a trainer at a gym where I belonged who competed in Olympic length triathlons on the weekend. He didn't aspire to be his best but liked the social life that these competitions provided. So his training was at best sporadic. He found out what I did and asked to be tested.

His V4 was about 6:00 per mile which is pretty good for someone not training very seriously. We then did the anaerobic test and his lactate levels were over 18 mmol/l which is very high. I said to him that he is too fast to be a good triathlete and he responded as a kid in school he was always the fastest of his friends and team mates on the track team. Even knowing that his potential was much higher didn't affect what he did. He was only interested in the social aspects of the sport and meeting people.

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Jerry Cosgrove

Sports Resource Group
http://www.lactate.com
https://twitter.com/@LactatedotCom

Karlaj
I can not disagree with what you say.
I guess the big picture includes a lot more than polarized training etc .. Technique, mental skills, strength, weaknesses, etc. etc.
At the same time we all interpret thinks differently and if we really want to know what steve and dessert dude say it would be best if they answer that
many ways lead to rome.
. I interpret steves article and dd post more like this
and since iam not a good writer let me use joel Filiol http://www.elitecoach.me/

In summary, we always respond to short term change, but that doesn't mean that change is in the right direction for the longer term for our performance goals.
This is a real problem with applied sports science research and it's application for coaches, and why while keeping current with the latest research is a good tool for coaches, changing programme direction as a result of research may not be a good strategy over the longer term.

Let me be clear, there is no doubt that the Norwegian cross country skier are absolute world class yet this is not the only way to be world class and some would say its the culture off excellence that would have as much an impact in their results, than the way they train. So the big picture is way bigger than this one study we are talking mainly about ( which i read the first time around 2009 and would read every year at least once and it would influence the way I coach

Jerry,
Thanks for taking the time to respond to my question. The curves make sense now. I enjoyed reading through your website and articles. Good stuff, very well explained for those of us who don't have have backgrounds in coaching, physiology, sports performance, etc, but who are eager to learn. I have definitely expanded my knowledge and added some more tools to the toolbox.
Regards,
Ryan

Funny to see the ST "coaching elite" squirm in this thread. Simplicity makes them nervous, I guess;-)

You are welcome.

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Jerry Cosgrove

Sports Resource Group
http://www.lactate.com
https://twitter.com/@LactatedotCom