who can argue with results? great job!

how has it worked for triathlons?
do you also do the downhill running he recommends or the aerobic intervals? or the periods of anaerobic training? just curious - i've read his book and have been intrigued ever since. tell us more about your training, if you would.

That's a great result. It IS working, but the question is really whether or not you would have gone any faster had you done some speedwork.



Speedwork is scientifically proven to improve performance. I would be pretty confident that you would see another PR this season if you used Daniel's approach, as an example.

What I see is a lot of God given talent.

If you can run 16:25 on 30 miles a week at 7 minute pace I'd hazard a guess that you've got a sub 15 minute 5K in your legs screaming to get out....if only you applied yourself.

;-)

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"A society is defined not only by what it creates, but by what it refuses to destroy."
John Sawhill

I noticed you take quite a few race day supplements. I was curious if you have experimented with the effect of those on your performance in races or training.

MartinSF: Trust me, God given talent is at a premium in my gene pool as I've been running for over 15 years w/ mediocre results up. About 4yrs ago, when I started to follow MAF's program more closely, I started to see a dramatic move fwd in my results. It's not that this is my 1st season racing and I'm winging it w/ MAF's program, as I've been running for years and tried every training method under the sun - trust me, I'm a student of the sport and don't approach my training haphazardly! I ran track/XC for (4) years in high school with an 18:36 5K PR and 5:27 mile PR - hardly a running prodigy. I've been racing tris for 10yrs and for the 1st few seasons did the typical Base 1>2>3 Build 1>2>3> peak and with meticulously planned out seasons.

The 1st season I followed these protocols my 1/2 marathon time off the bike dropped from 1:33 to 1:21 and my 5K PR went from the mid 18's to the mid/high 17's and have been steadily dropping since. I did not have nearly as good results when approaching my training w/ sufficient amounts of AT training, closely monitored by some of the best coaches in the business.

NickC: As far as supplements are concerned, I'm in a similar situation as Tom D in that because I own PBN, I have the luxury of getting to try everything under the sun and can experiment with what works for me more so than the avg triathlete. I don't want to turn this thread into a promo for PBN so all I'll say is that the supplements I take, I continue to do so because I have been able to quantify positive results when taking them (not simply anecdotal). Those which have proven effective I continue to use and those which haven't, I don't use and openly discuss each (+ & -'s) on our forum.

Herschel34: It has worked extremely well in triathlon from the Sprint to IM distance. When doing AT sessions, I was consistently in the top 5 in my AG at the local events, but never getting near o'all contention. Since working exclusively in these zones I have had much better results moving up to an o'all contender at all of the local events and doing fairly well at larger tris (9:31 IM PR at IMF '03). I do complete the downhill sessions at least 1x per week to work on leg turnover but am constantly working on run cadence on every single run (regardless of pace).

Again, my goal is not to say that high intensity training doesn't work, as it obviously does for thousands of athletes, but for some (including myself), our physiology is such that the most gains are had through an alternate training stimulus.

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Brian Shea
http://www.PersonalBestNutrition.com
Open-Water/Masters Swimming at the Jersey Shore:
Monmouth County NJ Ocean Swim/Masters Workouts

Thanks for the post Brian. It is certainly interesting.

I am in the process of deciding how to approach my training for the next 6 months. For the past 3 months I have run every day with a weekly distance total between 84-92 km. The training days have been varied - fartlek, intervals, tempo, tt and easy days. I am always questioning whether I am taking the best approach.

What I am unclear about, and perhaps you have some insight, is why it has to be all of one type of training. If the purpose of MAF training is to turn your body into a fat burning aerobic machine, could this not be accomplished by doing 4 days per week of this (alternate days) and put in tempo, intervals, hill repeats on the other days?

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Adrian in Vancouver

I agree that Maffetone's guidelnes can work very well. The nice thing about staying in the lower HR zones for training is that you feel much more energetic than when you are doing higher intensity work. I think the big problem is that most people overdo intense work, and that is worse than doing none at all. Also, Maffetone's HR guidelines are simple to follow and conservative, but still aerobic, so they make a lot of sense to me.

Glad to hear you are ripping it up in races yet still having fun on your training runs.

-Marc

OK...you're a FREAK!...meant in the best way of course.

My best on the roads is 16:22 off about 80 miles a week, tempo runs, track work and a healthy dose of hill reps.

I'm currently on a modified version of your Maffetone plan....not by design, rather a result of laziness and lack of motivation...and I'd be lucky to break 17 minutes right now.

I really wish your plan worked for me but it doesn't. I need to grind it out.

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"A society is defined not only by what it creates, but by what it refuses to destroy."
John Sawhill

One HUGE benefit of the LSD training regimen is reduced risk of injury. I'm old school (and old) so I have this drive to go hard. A few weeks ago I overdid it by running way too hard on the downhill portion of long hill run. I know I need to underdo it for a while. Thanks for the reminder

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Cousin Elwood - Team Over-the-hill Racing
Brought to you by the good folks at Metamucil and Geritol...

Brian,

First off, congratulations on the continued steady improvement. Agreed, that Dr. Maffetone's theories are contreversial to the point of insighting riots, particularly whenever the good Doctor has chimed in personally. It's working for you and that's the most important thing.

I think there is some merit in what Maffetone talks about, but I agree with others that, the lab studies show, that if you REALLY want to get the max out of your training, you need to have some faster than race pace training.

The one telling bit of info that you talk about in your second post is that you have been running for 15 years. That's a long time, and if you have been steady and consistant about this over that 15 years, that is likly a huge contributing factor. You see the real, substantial gains in fitness, the kind of gains that stick with you for years, take years to build up. I think THIS is a hard thing to measure. I know that it's been the case for me. I have not run in years, but before I stopped running 3 years ago, had run at a very high level for 20+ years. I jumped into a sprint triathlon on a lark last summer, and was shocked to record the second fastest run split in my age-group, enroute to second place in my age-group. There is still base run fitness that is in my body from the many years of running, even though I have done NO running in three years.

Fleck

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Steve Fleck @stevefleck | Blog

First of all good on you. If you believe it is the Maffetone program, then stick with it. My problem with his program, at least what I remember of it many years ago, was that he never took individual heart rate into consideration. I remember something like 180 minus your age, plus or minus a few for variables. Here's my BIG problem with that. At 20 years old Spencer Smith had a max rate of about 169. Another girl I coached that was also 20 had a max of 260. There are lots of people inbetween those two, and will never fit into a fixed formula. Put Spencer in it, and he should be doing his bulk at 160 HR. I figure he would last about 20 minutes at that rate.This guy would be funning 5 minute miles at 140 heart rate, 160, I don't think so. The other girl I coached, would also at 160, but for her that would be a 10 minute per mile jog. I don't, and never have given much credence to coaches that try and plug everyone into the same formula. Perhaps he has changed from his old theories, if so, then I'd love to hear them....

fleck, you seem to insinuate that maffetone himself has posted on this site. is that true? his website has most, if not all, products as sold out. he seems mia.

Brian and Fleck - you dudes are both Freaks. (but in a good way) ;-)

Monty - great points, that I've heard from lots of other folks about how "random # - age + or - a few beats based on whatever"-based programs are flawed due to their very arbitrary nature.



For better or worse, I guess I just seem to be one of those folks for whom the arbitrary age-based formulas happen to be a pretty close approximation to the training zones I've determined thru testing. I'd hate to be one of those folks who are an outlier (either high or low) for whom those formulas are total and utter crap.

I even had the problem of using 4 yr old bike HR #'s (which were tested twice back then) for my current training, and it turned out they were all too high now. I was killing myself and wondering why what was supposed to be upper Z2 - Z3 was kicking my ass - turned out I was in Z4. D'OH!!!

I'm guessing that Brian also happens to have HR zones that correspond reasonably closely to Maffetone's protocols. Everybody else is probably much better served to determine theirs thru testing.

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float , hammer , and jog

I don't know Phil Maffetone personally. Never met the man. He was a regular poster and contributor to the old rec.sport.triathlon( RST) newsgroup and other forums of the day, back in the late 90's. As I seem to recall there were some very involved, and in some cases heated discussions/debates/arguments, regarding his theories, in which Phil often directly participated.

Fleck

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Steve Fleck @stevefleck | Blog

Brian, I set all my PB's from 5K up to Ironman on Maffetone training in the mid 90's. I ran a 2:48 marathon on no speedwork back then and then with 6 weeks of speedwork (in my core season) I got down to 16:12 for 5K. Those days are long gone, but I do believe in the program. My main issue with it is that I have gone past "training for performance only". Don't get me wrong, I like having good races, but I really enjoy training. I love to hammer in all sports when I feel good and I don't want to be stuck riding at 140 bpm when the road head uphill and all the boys in our group attack. Much more fun to counterattack and stay with the group :-)

But for someone training for performance, the program is very simple and it really produces good results. Are the results optimal...perhaps not, but what I like about it, is the emphasis on good health first and fitness second. Many programs get way too unhealthy in the quest for speed (and yes, it is possible to be quite unhealthy and super fast).

Dev

Man, I'm so jealous. Among the few things I know about my body is the effect of high versus low training intensity, and it's become clear that I require very very hard intervals to get any running speed whatsoever. I've been running consistently for about 8 years, and it's only after some serious pain that I can just barely hold 8 min miles. And this is on similar overall volume. I still can't run one lap around the track at a 5:20 pace!

Sleestack, The main problem with most people is not that they cannot run fast enough, it is that they cannot run enough mileage to actually get reasonably efficient at running, so that they can sustain top end speed for some time. Trust me, pretty well every human can run at 6 min per mile pace for a few meters. The trick is to run it for 10K or a marathon :-).



People will log 8 hour weeks in the pool or 20 hour weeks on the bike, but can't seem to get much past 3-5 hours per week of running. They claim their bodies can't take it.



T0 run faster, you need to run mileage often at a moderate pace. The only way to run more is to be recovered for EVERY run. If you run super hard anaerobic intervals, you'll be cripple for multiple days and can't run (ie run consistency goes out the window, and you are stuck down at 3 hours a week of running).

It is much better to run intervals at an aerobic heart rate (ie you can still maintain a conversation with your running partner...forget about what the heart rate number of the lactate number is...just go by perceived exertion), and do lots of easy steady running the rest of the time. The bottom line is if your legs are heavy and sore the evening after a run, then you went too hard. Notch it back so you are "recovered" 6-12 hour after your run and ready the next day. Sleep, eat stretch and repeat this process, day after day, week after week, month after month for several years. Save the high end "intervals" for races. Too many guys leave their best run on the practice track.

Feel free to hammer like nuts on the bike and swim and work your cardio hard, but notch it back on the run and your body will be much happier...and if you can lose 5-10 lbs and you'll automatically get much faster :-)

[reply]The one telling bit of info that you talk about in your second post is that you have been running for 15 years. [/reply]

exactly.. Whenever you ask someone about the training that works for them, you have to also ask about their background. Brian has much the same background as Mark Allen had when he started Maffetone training, and it clearly works for them.

The other consideration is that training is based on changing the stimulus. Whenever one kind of training stops producing speed improvements, it's a signal that it's time to switch. Basic Lydiard stuff..

I had a similar experience, after ten years of dedicated high-intensity run training and a five-year plateau, slowing down significantly in training produced huge speed improvements (marathon from 3:08 to 2:45, 10k from 38 to sub-35).

For me, the HR is simply a way to quantify RPE. As long as it's adjusted to the individual, it should work just fine.