Here’s a link to the original thread:
I wanted to make a few clarifications and present some new “understandings” that I have from a few recent email exchanges that I recently had with Jack Daniels (he was very helpful).
Again, I am talking specificaly of V02max intervals that are to be done leading up to and/or during your racing season.
- INTERVAL PACE: I had recently suggested interval pace to be near 5K race pace. This is actualy a pretty good pace for someone who runs under 16 minutes for a 5K, but is probably too slow for too many people (especialy many traithletes who really aren’t “runners”). Andrew Coggan had also questioned me on this pace so, as I promised, I did my research.
Daniels’ recommended pace is actually at ~11:00 race pace. In other words, you want to do your intervals at a pace that you could race for 11 minutes. That may be difficult to calculate. You can use Daniels’ VDot tables, the McMillan Calculator, or remember that every time you cut your race distance in half you should be able to run about 15 seconds a mile faster (ie a 22 minute 5k person would want to do intervals at roughly 2.5K race pace. So, 22 minute = 7:05 pace. Subtract 15 seconds and you have 6:50 pace)
- VOLUME: Daniels and I went back in forth on the issue of volume of intervals. He sticks to 8% of weekly training volume, but where some gray areas lie are that he is refering to “run only” programs. In a triathlon program you aren’t going to be throwing in nearly as many recovery runs and you probably won’t be getting in 3 workouts a week. So, where one person might actualy run 40 miles in a week and do a tempo run and TWO 5x1,000 meter interval workouts, this same person as a triathlete may only run 30 miles in a week with a tempo run and only ONE other workout of 4,000 meters. Is it enough? You may have to figure that out on your own. However, where I’m really concerned is the triathlete who’s only running 20 miles a week. Now their workout is 3x800 meters. Frankly, I just don’t believe that’s enough of a workout to truly get the effects that you desire.
I questioned Jack about a kind of “minimum recommendation” and he replied with “5x800 meters” which from my experience working with high school kids seems like a pretty reasonable goal for even the slowest of runners. I had previously recommended 4-6,000 meters of track work but then was challenged by Tri-Yoda about the total volume of the workout. I had to go back and reasses my “target audience.” For one who is running intervals pretty close to 5K race pace, I still feel that a 4-6000 meter workout should be pretty easy to accomplish regardless of your total training volume. However, I can now see how difficult it would be for that 22 minute 5K runner who is running FASTER than 3K race pace.
What rule should you then follow? Uh…here’s where you have to use some judgement. I don’t claim to be an expert on how much intensity you’ll want to put into each workout in relation to all of the other type of training that you have to do for the triathlon.
- “RACING PHASE” - I think that many people incorrectly describe Daniel’s Running Formula as “Base - Reps - Intervals - Tempo.” Where I specificaly feel that there is a discrepency is refering to the last phase as “tempo.” I like the word “racing.” Jack drops out much of the interval training during this phase because he expects athletes to be doing a lot of racing. Races are very stressful and can serve as a “replacement” of intervals.
So, my point is, nearing your goal race, on the weeks that you have a race it would behoove you to drop the interval workout for that week. If you don’t have a race an interval workout would be ideal. You see, according to Daniels Formuls, it’s not that tempo runs are more important during this phase, it’s that you are running races so there’s no need to get in interval workouts. He admits that this is contrary to the beliefs of many coaches who prefer to continue hard intervals mid week during the racing season. The point I want to get across is to either do an interval workout OR a race during each week of this last phase.
- HOW MANY WEEKS? - I still think you should have an absolute maximum cap of 12 weeks of intervals. However, if you go out 12 weeks you ABSOLUTELY must make sure you have an adequate base AND the volume of intervals should be low. For most of you I still highly recommend less than 6 weeks of intervals since many traithletes are better served by focusing on mre miles and more LT training.
Anyway, I hope that some of you found this useful. Please bump it back to the first page if you think others will want to read it.
…oh, and as always, open up a discussion. Someone before had used the word “lecture” to describe my posts and I don’t intend it to be that way. I merely want to get some information out there and hope that we can share our ideas.
-Barry