Yes, excellent comments and definitely something to take under consideration. Volume at x + intensity at 2x = disaster for Matt. Agreed. I really have no idea and would be interested in Andy’s opinion as well but I found it interesting that someone like Gordo who came off an excellent season and a solid base decided to take this approach as he enters 2007. Now he has his Epic camp in January so I am sure the intensity and volume will be up just a notch ;)! Thanks.
While you can pick apart the article as written as being - well - physiologically imprecise - its an interesting point and it does match how most people talk (also physio. imprecise).
Mark Allen or any successful IM athlete has to be able to burn a lot of fat while racing. If you can’t go at race pace and burn 30% fat (or more) - you’ll bonk. You can fly in an oly or less without burning any fat - half IM you need to burn some or you’ll be on fumes toward the end. IM - you’d be lucky to start the run well without some good fat utilization…
Allen seems to attribute part of his success to slowing down (in training) which he feels helped his body learn to burn fat better. Makes sense to me.
I’d try it if I could train 20-30 hours. I don’t think you’d get very fast or improve much from year to year if you followed his plan on <12-15 hours/wk. You would stay injury free (most likely) and the work-outs are relaxing and nice. Healthy too.
Zones - simple - easy to calculate and probably work for 50-60% of the people. Better if you used max and resting HR but more complicated…
Dave
Does anyone know where the original Dr Phil is now??? No sign of him, his nutritional products, or any recent articles in the past few years. I know he sold the company but I can’t imagine someone so vocal about healthy eating and exercise would just take the money and retire. Phil Bars were certainly ahead of their time nutritionally. It still would be pretty hard to beat their ingredient list even with the longer list of natural/organic offerings today.
Peace
PeterP
i think he`s holding seminars here in asia, he just did a book signing and a seminar here (philippines) 3 weeks back.
I remember reading in numerous Allen articles on off-season training, including one I think in a recent issue of Triathlete, where he recommends doing some races in the off-season, particularly running races, to keep some intensity going. I think he calls it “blowing out the pipes.”
“I remember reading in numerous Allen articles on off-season training, including one I think in a recent issue of Triathlete, where he recommends doing some races in the off-season”
That would be my reccomendation to. Have a little race goal almost every month of the year. Keeps a bit of focus. Sets a bit of a goal. Gives you something to look forward to. As a general rule, I find that triathletes don’t race enough - not just triathlons, but also running races, bike races/time-trials and swim meets and open water swims. Each of these events/races can be outstanding training sessions in their own right, a heck of a lot of fun and you will likley learn a great deal at each one.
Our running group debates this shit constantly with me all the time. Now, if I could just throw down a 3:15 or something in a marathon, they just might listen, but until then…its more of “well if that worked, why wouldn’t you be kicking our ass…Mr. Zone 1, Heart Rate Guy…”
And therein lies the rub. I feel your angst.
I don’t think you guys are quite understanding the concept. This is not LSD, but more steady. The goal is to use this HR cap until you are no longer seeing improved results in your pace for that given HR. Then you add some intensity for a few weeks and then back to AeT training. It is all about absorbing the training, not just doing it.
The heavily debated topic of intensity vs. AeT training–The answer is the appropriate amount of both, which is different for every athlete.
Mat
I don’t think you guys are quite understanding the concept. This is not LSD, but more steady. The goal is to use this HR cap until you are no longer seeing improved results in your pace for that given HR. Then you add some intensity for a few weeks and then back to AeT training. It is all about absorbing the training, not just doing it.
Thank you! As I was reading through these replies, I kept thinking “These guys are missing half of the puzzle here.” To everyone else, go re-read Allen’s article. He doesn’t say to only go easy, he says stick with one until you don’t see any performance increases, then flip to the other. Lather, rinse, repeat.
Good point, which I also made with respect to Gordo’s so called 8 months of base during which I suspect he can do lots of zone 1 250W and zone 1 6:10 miles. Just cause guys are doing “base” does not mean they are going slow (certainly not pro triathletes).
Keep in mind that guys like Allen or Gordo while “building base” were/are doing 20-35 hours per week, so they have a high overall training load…quite different from your local age grouper, on his way to a Minneapolis law firm in minus 15F in the dark trying to cram in a 40 min workout before the kids get up and the entire daily “cycle” kicks off.
My main point is that if you look around the age group ranks in Dec-Mar, there are lots of people doing 10 or less hours per week of training and plugging along in low zone 1 “building base”. Then the spring comes along and they ramp volume (mainly by biking more outside) and also now that they are getting close to race season ramp to more threshold oriented interval training. Suddenly volume and intensity go up simultaneously and guys get injured, burnt out or suffer from poor recovery for the next workout. In effect, rather than building from the previous year’s fitness, they “detrain” over the winter on the 10 hour per week of relative lameness and don’t realize the gains they might make season over season if they had kept some semblance of intensity going.
I’m not trying to debate what is good for Allen or pros, but more about what is more effective approach to training for age groupers. Giving us “watered down” pro plans simply does not work. We’re operating from a completely different set of daily constraints. Thus the Mike McCormack (M2) approach I believe is much more effective for us.
Dev
yeah, the only problem I have with it is the arbitrary zones. I am really surprised he hasn’t updated that part of the theory as it makes zero sense. Maybe he reasons it’s better to be out there doing something poorly than inside wondering what to do?
Dan
www.aiatriathlon.com
I guess the question I ask is, “What is the point of the heart rate cap” if I only have 7 hours per week and I already have a huge base from the previous years. I can apply the heart rate cap and get significantly detrained over the winter, or I can use this time more effectively to make progress. Given that I am pretty well “tapered” for every workout, it is a great opportunity to hammer out fast stuff, that I can’t normally do when I’m up at 20 hours per week. Going hard also requires different level of muscle contraction, application of force and timing from the perspective of your “endpoints” and neuro transmitters. Never “going fast” for months means that you never actually get your muscles and neurons firing. Going fast typically requires a completely different level of application of technique and athleticism under duress as well as cognitive focus that you can never simulate while plugging along.
Food for thought.
This is not LSD, but more steady
Yes. Agreed. According to his formula, you would be training at around 80% of maxHR, which is considered at the top end of the aerobic zone (or AeT). I will ogten term this myself as “LSD”, however, others think of LSD as more like <65% of maxHR (these are numbers for running).
I think th emain problem he addresses here is a problem that I also like to address. That is the people who NEVER train “slow” (steady). In general it seems that you should be either training aerobicly OR be doing a specific intensity workout where you are pushing BEYOND your comfort zone.
Like Mr. Miagi said, “Karate do or Karate don’t. Karate “so so”…squish like grape.”
yeah, the only problem I have with it is the arbitrary zones. I am really surprised he hasn’t updated that part of the theory as it makes zero sense. Maybe he reasons it’s better to be out there doing something poorly than inside wondering what to do?
No different than the AeT zones that were made up and are arbitrary. I think Andrew Coggan had one of the best posts in this thread.
There is also a transition period that adds additional stress on the body and that is the crossover from “trainer miles” to “road miles” experienced in the spring, when you first hit the blacktop. It takes several weeks before you can “feel” the gains made over the winter. Riding outside and dealing with traffic, accelerating, hills, etc., is quite different than steady state–or even CT riding indoors. Try and ramp up too quickly during this adjustment period and you can have problems.
In Reply To I’m not an Maffetone/Allen devotee, although I have read their stuff and experimented with it. I agree that the HR zones don’t take into account individual variation in max HR. As far as never going fast during base training, along with the “blowing out the pipes” races I mentioned in an earlier post, Maffetone/Allen also recommend downhill running to stimulate the muscles and neurons without getting the HR too high. Similar training can be done on the bike and via short intervals in the pool.
Maybe he reasons it’s better to be out there doing something poorly than inside wondering what to do?
“Poorly” might be too strong of a word, but I tend to agree with the point.
It is this very concept that I find is a point of contention with the …lets say…more academic types (the ones with letters after their names). I’ve worked at both ends of the spectrum having been a high school teacher with the task of teaching even the slowest of the slow AND having worked as an engineer in a university research center (along side ~30 Phds).
On one end of the spectrum you have a group of people who’s primary concern is correct information. On the other end you have a group of people who are incapable of grasping this information. In between you have the coaches/teachers who do their best to serve as translators. This is one of the reasons that we still teach the Bohr Model in Chemistry, ignore aerodynamics in motion equations, use BFlat blues in Jazz improv class, and teach a particular offesive set on th ebasketball court. They are all fundamentaly incorrect but serve to get the student to begin to understand what they need to know to accomplish what they need to accomplish.
Now, like DD and AC siad, I get the feeling Mark Allen doesn’t really “know” what he’s talking about, but he did know how to train.
An athlete may need to make changes to the HR cap, based off the equation. For example, the number that I get while plugging my info into the equation is 159 bpm. I could either keep this or make changes based on PE. I choose to move my HR cap to 150, because at 159, I feel that I am going a bit hard.
If you take this number accross all 3 sports, you will find that you can go pretty hard. The only instance where you may have to slow yourself down would be on the running and sometimes the pool.
As far as HR zones, you can call them whatever you want. Don’t get caught up in Zone 1,2 etc. You can call them whatever you want–EZ, Steady, Mod-hard. They are just Zones
This number is a cap not a target. The overall pace of your workouts will be faster by training steady vs. EZ. In my opinion this method works very well with IM training due to the pace of the event.
The Maffetone method is just “cookie cutter” method that will give you a mark/HR to test if you are absorbing your fitness. You can pick your own HR cap, just stay aerobic.
Mat
You can pick your own HR cap, just stay aerobic.
Okay, I pick maximum heart rate. 
This article is YEARS old… I wonder if Mark Allen still supports what he wrote way back when.
for instance, here it is on duathlon.com in 2002: http://www.duathlon.com/articles/1460