As I develop my training plan for '04, I’ve been reviewing various books and articles. Among them are the M2 website, and others, that advocate less LSD and more threshold training. This reminds me of a Rick Niles book I read several years ago. I listened to tri-coach Mike Collins speak several weeks ago. His philosophy was to build technique, tempo, and then endurance. A very similar approach.
I only compete in sprints and found that I had plenty of endurance, but lacked top end last year. Has anyone experimented with this type of training? What is the breakdown per HR zone they advocate? I am intrigued by their arguments, but would like to hear from anyone that trains this way.
daniels advocates that for running as well. it makes sense in the respect that you develop some speed then your threshold. your threshold pace can then be run faster.
I’ve done that with my running this winter and so far 2 thumbs up.
First principle of any form of training: Specificity. To race well in short races, you need strong speed at threshold, you also need the endurance to stay there.
It’s not either/or. You need the endurance training to go the distance; you need a high pace at threshold to go fast. You will not go the distance in an IM if you’ve done nothing but threshold training. You still need to do the miles.
Even in a a sprint race of an hour, some serious endurance is needed.
I personally don’t believe there is a “pyramid”. There is endurance training intended to hold off fatigue; there is threshold training to go fast. One or more of one or the other is needed for races of varying distances.
Nothing wrong with doing the threshold work “first”, as long as you get the miles in to have some endurance. Many people following the “reverse pyramid” approach to IM training never get around to putting in the miles, and don’t reach their potential. I’ve been there; I’ve done that.
daniels advocates that for running as well. it makes sense in the respect that you develop some speed then your threshold. your threshold pace can then be run faster.
I’ve done that with my running this winter and so far 2 thumbs up.
Last winter I ran with the local running club and HS cross country team. Their coach also had them start off with shorter reps then build to longer threshold. They were training for Indoor Track, but I found it work pretty well for me. I workout out with them for about 12 weeks then do to work started running with a different group and did mostly distance and strength/tempo and it appeared to work pretty well. If I wasn’t trying to focus on bike racing this early spring I would probably do something similar.
The intervals were all very short with short recovery 100m-300m with 100m recovery all on road loops depending on the workout. Pace was about 5k pace or so.
Your reply makes a lot of sense. Regarding endurance for a sprint, how much is enough? I realize this is somewhat specific to the individual, but have to believe that at some point continuing to add time/distance has diminishing returns.
With family commitments and a demanding career, I am looking to strike a balance of endurance v threshold. How long should I go?
"Regarding endurance for a sprint, how much is enough? I realize this is somewhat specific to the individual, but have to believe that at some point continuing to add time/distance has diminishing returns. "
A sprint race is an hour long; you need to go really hard for an hour. That’s up around the HR you’d hold for a half marathon; maybe a little below HR in a 10K. Yes, there are diminishing returns to more miles, but more mileage does continue to relentlessly improve your speed and endurance. Remember that even a 1500 meter track specialist might run 80-90 miles a week. All those miles for a sub-4 minute race!
I don’t mean to be obtuse, but the balance is this: whatever you have time to do, you do. More is better, but less training time is needed to keep life in balance.
I would love to train 20 hours a week, but I limit it to 10 hours – and no long bike ride at all.
The balance point? Start by carving out hours per week and hours per day. Swim at least twice; run at least 3 times; bike at least twice. You’re fit enough to have fun and garner 80% of your potential in a sprint race by training 4-6 hours per week. (with your strong cycling base, you might focus on frequent, easy running the first season; 5-6 runs per week done easy and short to toughen your legs up without getting hurt.)
Benchmark Durations for a typical week (one of each; fill in other workouts as time permits):
Swim 1500m
Run 6 miles (at least 1 hour)
Bike 30 miles (at least 2 hours)
Finally, buy the Triathlete’s Training Bible by Joe Friel. It’s all in there.
"…that I had plenty of endurance, but lacked top end last year. "
One more thing…
As an elite runner I know put it, “It doesn’t matter if you have all the speed in the world if you’re half a lap down at the bell.”
“Top end” is nice, but only lasts a couple of minutes. So, someone like me might move up from 20th to 18th by having “top end” the last half mile and outsprinting some poor other punter. So what?
The only way that I’m going to move from 20th to, say, 10th is to have lots of “middle end”. That comes with a mix of volume and “tempo” runs/bikes. That is, the endurance to run a 5k off the bike within 20-30 seconds of my open 5k time. (which I can do).
Now, if I want to really improve my 5k time…that’s a whole 'nuther thread. I spent a year busting my ass running and knocked only 40 seconds off my 5k and 90 seconds off my 10k.
I have found my limiter in sprint and Oly races to not be endurance in the three-sport-sense – it’s simply my inability to run+ride fast enough under any conditions to stay with the best in my AG. The top 10 in my AG (40-44) run 37-40 minute 10ks off the bike. I run 45 in an open 10k – and that’s with proper training, tapering and pacing, etc. The only good news is that I can run very close to that time off the bike.
A decent rule of thumb is do tempo runs for roughly 20min. do speed work for about .25-.5 of your actual race distance. For tri’s you need more threshold. for road racing I’d do the 50% of my distance raced for track work.
I do 2-3.5miles of high end speed and 6-8 miles of threshold broken into 2 workouts per week.
