The treadmill is an attractive training option for a few reasons: control of speed/effort, control of incline, no worries about weather, reduced impact, etc. Of course if you’re going to train on the treadmill, you’re hoping your work will translate to faster times on the road. The article below suggests that running on treadmill and road are different enough that improvements on the treadmill may not translate and may, in fact, hinder economy on the road. Any thoughts on this article? It’s referenced, but I notice the references are mostly quite old…
That was an interesting article. I tend to like to do one tempo run on the treadmill per week. I like it because I can really dial in on my pace, and can tend to push myself a little more. I also like to do these runs because I feel like my leg turnover needs to be a little higher on the treadmill (since I don’t have the firm ground to get as good a push off), so it allows me to work on higher turnover. I know there’s guys in the gym that tend run faster on a TM than they do outside, so there must be something different going on, and I don’t think running exclusively on a TM would be as good as using it as a supplement to training (like paddles and pull bouy in the pool).
I believe this article has been discussed before. The authors don’t understand physics in their description of the forces involved with running on a treadmill.
I did most of my running in the 3 weeks before a half (last sunday) due to bad weather/ work schedule on the treadmill, and had a PR run.
there is research on pubmed showing that treadmill running improves many of the markers of economy such as shorter strides, higher turnover, decreased vertical bounce. I’m just too lazy to turn on the other computer and pull up the link.
I’ve done some research on that too and concluded that the boredom factor of the treadmill was only reached by the trainer boredom (although I know someone who thinks the trainer isn’t that bad despite living in a fun place to ride)…
A prior poster mentioned this, but the article you reference is not sound.
Physics dictates that the energy is the same regardless of if you are moving and the ground stationary, or vice versa. Think about it, if you were not accelerating the mass of your body RELATIVE TO THE TREADMILL belt, you would be immediately ejected off the back of the treadmill.
There are minor differences. Treadmills often have more flex than a road, and thus offer less pounding. Your muscles will fatigue faster with more pounding. Some treadmill motors cannot keep the belt at a steady speed, and slow then reaccelerate with each step. The most significant issue is that many treadmills do not report the correct speed; and it is often way off (in the 10%-20% range).
One minor issue is that some people will not run the same on a treadmill as they do outside. If they perceive the deck to be to short, then they shorten their stride. Or if they have balance issues to begin with, they may narrow their base of gait.
But, running on a good treadmill is equivalent to running on the road from the “big picture” of muscle usage and energy. I do currently and have done significant percentages of my training, and based on my results I see no difference between training on the road or treadmill. (No difference that is besides the obvious issues related to boredom, temperature, availability of fluids, etc.)
Edit*
One last issue that I forgot to mention is the issue of wind speed. There is obviously no wind resistance on a treadmill, and there is running on the road. I always put the treadmill at 1.5% grade to account for this. If you run flat, and the speed is accurate, you will be able to run just a little bit faster on the treadmill as a result of no wind resistance. Search the internet and you can find some charts showing the grade versus speed to approximate wind resistance using grade.
Edit*
Paul
I’m a slow runner – I ran 1:58:XX for a 1/2 marathon PR - so take this with a grain of salt…
I have bad knees so I do most of my running on the treadmill – helps with the impact…
I run once every other week or so as a long run outside – major difference is in the hip flexors and glutes…you really feel them outside and not as much on the treadmill…otherwise I’ve found treadmill training to be helpful - I think there was an olympic runner from alaska who trained primarily on the treadmill…
The major factor it provides is the ability to keep running at a steady pace for a set amount of time…gets the body used to moving forward…
So…in my scientific study of 1…treamill seem to work just fine.
-Ron
my former coach, marc becker at ironguides (.com), had me running on the treadmill for virtually all of my weekday runs and every other long run in 9 months leading to placid. it was boring. it was painful. but i pr’d my im run (3:49) on a pretty tough course. no doubt in my mind that the mil helped. by the way, never touched the incline.
marc works with brett sutton who also, from what i hear, loves putting his athletes on the mil.
That is really interesting. I usually run on the road but yesterday it was really hot/humid with a 25 mph wind so I got on the treadmill. Workout was 5 miles with my option to pick any 2 miles and run under a 7:30 pace. Warmed up for a mile and then dropped the pace to 7:20. My heart rate was in Z2. I ended up at a 6:48 pace and my HR was still in high Z3. A 7:20 mile on the road would have me in high Z4 easy. What does your HR do between the treadmill and the road? I was pretty much of the opinion that the treadmill was not for me but maybe I am wrong…
What does your HR do between the treadmill and the road?
Enough variation to know that HR isn’t a good measure.
I am relatively confident that your problem is the problem I mentioned previously; you cannot trust the speed indicator on the treadmill. Many treadmills do not have closed loop speed feedback, this only comes on more expensive treadmills, and even then not all. (Closed loop feedback means that speed is actually measured and the motor current controlled to produce the desired speed. Without closed loop feedback, the motor is just given the amount of current that should produce roughly the set speed, but without actually measuring and adjusting speed.)
I learned this the hard way several years ago. I bought a relatively nice treadmill, and had no idea that the speed would not be accurate. During several long runs, I found my HR going super high. I used my bicycle computer to verify that over the first hour of use, the speed would increase about 10%-15% as the motor heated. After many e-mails with the company, they finally owned up to the fact that this machine does not have closed loop feedback. I then surveyed all treadmills available, thinking about upgrading. I decided to just keep my machine.
But the lesson is, don’t trust the speed setting. Know what HR you want to hold for the workout and use that as your guide. Or, make sure the treadmill model you are using does indeed have closed loop speed feedback.
Paul
we never used hr but instead simple terms like easy, moderate, comfortably uncomfortable, hard ,etc.
i would assume that without the cooling effect of the wind, hr would be higher indoors. personally i enjoyed not being a slave to my hr and learning to read what my body was telling me.
Interesting stuff. The treadmills at my gym are Life Fitness - do you happen to know if they use closed loop speed feedback? The specific model is here: http://uk.commercial.lifefitness.com/content.cfm/95ti
It says it has a 4 hp motor with “MagnaDrive speed control”. I’m not sure if that’s a closed loop feedback system?
Cheers!
I don’t know. It was about 5 years ago that I had the issue with my treadmill. When I was researching a new purchase, I had to actually call or e-mail several manufactures because their marketing material is similar to what you provided in the link. What I found was that it was common for the manufactures at the time to use a terminology that made it sound like they had closed loop speed control, when in fact they did not.
Anymore I just judge my treadmill workouts on perceived effort. When I am done I sometimes put my bike front wheel on the treadmill to confirm what my final speed was, but I know that it varies while in use.
Paul
Interesting stuff. The treadmills at my gym are Life Fitness - do you happen to know if they use closed loop speed feedback? The specific model is here: http://uk.commercial.lifefitness.com/content.cfm/95ti
It says it has a 4 hp motor with “MagnaDrive speed control”. I’m not sure if that’s a closed loop feedback system?
Cheers!
Next time you go the the gym, do this: take along a tape measure, and determine the exact length of the belt. Then, while running on the treadmill time how long it takes for the belt to complete a certain number of revolutions (to increase precision) both early in your workout, as well as towards the end, while keeping the speed setting unchanged. With that data you will be able to not only calculate the exact speed at which you are running, but also determine whether the treadmill is speeding up or slowing down over time.
That’s a fair point – and being the technology dweeb that I am I turned on the foot pod to the Polar 625x (never leave home without it) when the HR was low and indeed, the treadmill was showing about 20 seconds fast on pace. Of course, the question is how accurate was the 625x when it had a moving belt under it as opposed to terra firma and I don’t have a clue – but my leg turn over was pretty quick. But assuming the 625x was close, 6:48 would be 7:08 and the HR was still low. I did notice the 625x pace was bouncing around a bit which goes to your other point and while the 625x is a little slow to adjust to pace changes, it is pretty accurate when it stabilizes. In fact, in terms of distance, it showed 26.1 for the last mary I ran and I thought that was pretty accurate.
But I think you are right. My noon gym, picked for its proximity to work is not the best and perhaps I will experiment on a treadmill at Lifetime. Thanks for your input.
I went to the MagnaDrive site and found this:
"The ability of the ASD to transmit power or to control speed is not affected by minor angular or offset alignment between the motor and load. Vibration due to misalignment is virtually eliminated. Transmission of vibration across the drive is also eliminated due to the air gap configuration.
When installed in a system, the MagnaDrive ASD is controlled from a process signal. The pressure, flow, level or other process control signal is provided to the MagnaDrive ASD actuator. The drive will then modulate the speed of the load to satisfy the control needs"
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To me it sounds like it has a closed loop feedback system, but there’s a lot of engineering and marketing-speak in there, so I’m not 100% sure.
Thanks Andy - I’ll give it a go tomorrow. Everyone at the gym will wonder what the hell I’m up to, but it’s worth it for the data!