If you live and train at altitude (5,000 ft or above), are your run workouts significantly slower? Has anyone that lives at altitude - has it screwed up your run training? Or have you seen a positive affect when you race at sea level?
I’m, not a scientist, but I did stay at a Holiday Inn Express last night. I moved from sea level to 8000 feet about 8 years ago. It definitely takes some adjustment when you first move to altitude. Your pace should be slower a little bit (just perceived output - if you try to run an 8:00 mile because you could do that at sea level, you will probably get very tired very fast, be breathing hard, feel like you want to die, etc.). To adjust to the altitude, it is smarter to go slower, a little shorter and drink a ton more water. Eventually, you will adjust and will be back to running the same speeds and distances you used to (or close to it), but this can take a few months - yes, months, not days. There is definitely a positive effect when you go back down in altitude. I run approx. 30 sec - 1 min/mile faster, and it seems as though I can run forever when at lower altitudes. Depending on the distance your training for, slightly shorter runs at altitude will translate well to slightly longer runs at sea level, but that could be just me. Your body will adjust, and after 6 months or so of living here, if I needed to do a 13 mile training run, I did a 13 mile training run. It just takes a while to adjust, but the benefits are great.
i lived at 5000 feet for 3 years, and am an exercise physiologist.
your run pace should be slower, because there is not enough oxygen to support your highest intensity runs (the basis behind the ‘live high, train low’ training theory). some folks will acclimatize just fine, and show almost no differences between sea level and altitude. I found i was much better off at sea level, and suffer whenever i workout at altitude (more so running than cycling or swimming). although i could still perform pretty well, i find that i am faster with less effort now that i am bad in the lowlands.
it tends to be even more apparent for elite level athletes.
I live in El Paso. Between 3600ft and 4200ft. It’s not really high, but my running pace is definitely slower. And even though I’ve lived here for 7yrs, I’ve never adjusted to run the same pace that I run at sea level.
Typically, about 20-25secs slower per mile. Not sure if it’s only altitude, or also the very dry climate though.
I moved from LA to Denver last winter and took at least 4 or 5 months to adjust. I’m still anywhere from 10 to 20 seconds per mile slower than my sea level pace. I believe that Jack Daniels wrote that 10 to 15 " slower per mile is pretty normal.
I was in El Paso 2 weeks ago and I was just a little bit slower on the run.
Yes, it was dusty were I was at too.
jaretj
Thanks for the responses. Moved 17 months ago from sea level to 5,000 ft and am still having problems running normally. Been having a difficult time with being able to log the volume (miles per week) and speedwork I used to at sea level. For long runs, 16 miles is a very hard and I’m barely able to do a 20 mile long run. Always feel a little winded when running. My race times are horribly slow being about 30 sec to 1 minute off per mile.
Thanks for the responses. I’ll try not to get too frustrated when running.
Where are you at? Not many places at 8,000ft and I live in one of them.
I’ve been up here for a couple of years, have acclimatised but still can’t run (or swim!) as fast as I can at sea-level, but I guess you shouldn’t expect to. I find that the effect on swimming ir worse than running or cycling.
Been at 8000 for 7 years. I feel about the same here and sea level - maybe a tad faster at sea level. Lots of elites here - they seem to do fine.
5000 isn’t that high - I wouldn’t expect you to have problems like you do. Doesn’t add up in my opinion. I’d look elsewhere. How’s the swim/bike training?
Now swimming/breathing feels a lot different at 8000 - and you can fly on the flats with lower resistance on the bike. I think if anything though the altitude affects my bike training a lot more than my run training - as my run training is more aerobic based and my bike more intensity based…
Been at 8000 for 7 years. I feel about the same here and sea level - maybe a tad faster at sea level. Lots of elites here - they seem to do fine.
5000 isn’t that high - I wouldn’t expect you to have problems like you do. Doesn’t add up in my opinion. I’d look elsewhere. How’s the swim/bike training?
Now swimming/breathing feels a lot different at 8000 - and you can fly on the flats with lower resistance on the bike. I think if anything though the altitude affects my bike training a lot more than my run training - as my run training is more aerobic based and my bike more intensity based…
you’re right that 8000 is a lot different than 5000, however individuals respond differently to altitude. many elites will live in tahoe, boulder, flagstaff, etc, however there are also many that don’t because they suffer at altitude.
as an extreme example, i would say that mountaineers and marathoners are both exceptional athletes, but the literature suggests that they respond very differently to altitude. due to this, the best mountaineers would not make good marathoners, and vice-versa (mountaineers have ventilatory compensations to avoid pulmonary/cerebral edema, the marathoners lack of this compensation helps them run 2:04).
We just did a survey of the studies on the various ways of altitude training.
You know live high- train low
or
live high- train high
or
live low-train high
There is a lot info and research on this subject as you might guess. It really depend on what study you read and believe.
There’s a couple of good links to the most recent studies below:
I hope that helps you.
Crested Butte (elevation 8883) - where are you?
I do a LOT of my training above 9000 feet as the gym I have access to is in Mt. Crested Butte. I’m slow as hell running anyways, but I can do the long distance stuff if I build up slowly. I didn’t do Irondistance stuff before I moved, heck, I didn’t even do tri’s before I moved to the mountains, so it was 2-3 years before I tried a 20 mile run, I was acclimated by then.
I’m in Silverthorne. Home is about 8,100ft, but if I’m running any of the local trails I can get to 9-10,000ft pretty quickly.