posted May-24-2007 02:32 PM            

One study took some folks applied one set of training treatments (fairly traditional cardio, iirc), split out the "non-responders" (lowest quarter of responses), put them in a more strength-based program, and some responded to that. (Sorry, I've forgotten the details of population, training details, length of treatment, % of responses, etc. - and where I saw the study.) And sometimes it's a series of treatments that are needed. That's why training pgms need to adapt to focus on current needs of runner. From my own experiment of one (the only study that *I* really care about since the populations of many studies don't include older runers), I've found some things help me and other things don't, but that's not to say the reverse happens after a couple years.

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posted May-24-2007 03:08 PM            

quote:

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Originally posted by Richard99:
Seriously, that's the message you took away from that entire post?

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Yep!

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posted May-24-2007 03:43 PM               

That is most definitely not the message of that post. You might want to re-read it a few times till you understand the major point.

------------------
Richard
World's Fastest Slow Guy
www.powerrunning.com

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posted May-24-2007 03:56 PM               

quote:

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Originally posted by Richard99:
My discussions of talent is not meant to discourage participation, it is meant to encourage participation. It encourages by helping people understand that there are differing levels of talent, to help them understand and not get discouraged if they aren't as fast as they think they should be or as fast as they want to be or as fast as a friend.

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So if they aren't as fast, you're telling them it's because they just don't have the talent?

Oh, yeah...that'll work.

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posted May-24-2007 04:29 PM            

"Why not settle for the bronze? Its probably the best you will ever do."

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posted May-24-2007 05:21 PM               

quote:

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Originally posted by runfastcoach:
I asked Pete about the relationship of response magnitude to ultimate potential. He thought for a moment and said, "Good point, young man. Just because a subject response dramatically to a stimulus and shows quick improvement does NOT necessarily mean that they have more talent than another subject."

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Good one, Tin! The other side of the coin; when you look at young runners who ran faster than Ron Daws in high school or Dick Beardsley in high school, whatever the kind of workout their HS coaches were giving them, they responded much better to that kind of stimulus and "showed some talent or promise" in their teens. But in the end, the ones who excelled were Daws and Beards. So it goes back to the square 1 question: How do you determine "talent"?

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posted May-24-2007 05:28 PM               

quote:

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Originally posted by Nobby:
So it goes back to the square 1 question: How do you determine "talent"?

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Just to make sure; I'm not challenging you, Tinman! ;o) This question is actually my statement; I'm not seeking your answer (unless you dear! ;o))

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posted May-24-2007 05:30 PM            

quote:

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Originally posted by Kim Stevenson:

Now This is stuff that interests me. If the guys are helping with "Project Phil" then may I play too.
"Phil's " diet interests me. Not that I am into anything extreme. But it as an area where some basic adjustments can make a huge difference.
For instamce ; Many US Households eat large amounts of Carbohydrates (as do Kiwi ones), possibly too much "red meat" and not enough Fruit and vegetables. Simple adjustments in these areas can work wonders.
This was an area that had Arthur fascinated in the early mid 80's when Eira was diagnosed with Cancer. But he was also looking at athletes as well. One reason he was looking is that New Zealanders were no longer occupying them selves with vegetable gardens and what was available in Supermarkets, may look good but was not necassarily 'fully' nutritional. Hundreds of acres of Tomatoes grown in 'special houses' Hydroponically are a classic example.
He took me to lunch one day and then as we selected various items he gave me a run down on what the food value of each was.
I reached for a Chicken leg. Arthur said "I would not touch one of those, Paul Ballinger told me they are full of hormones"
Needless to say I did not have a Chicken leg !.

Any fedback on "Phils" diet ??

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Phil had a complete physical assessment in early February, including treadmill stress test, lung function, etc. Also included was an analysis of daily habits, with a particular attention to eating. Phil goes to bed at approximately 7 PM, after eating his dinner at about 5 PM. He was told to avoid carbs in his evening meal because they would probably not stray far from his stomach area. (but would exit the stomach) due to his early sleep patterns. (He rises at 3:30 AM) He was also told to drink more water and eat fewer cookies and ice cream cones, which seem to be a favorite snack for him.

At the time of the medical Phil had already lost about 10 lbs over 4 months, and has lost several more lbs since then. He is paying more attention to diet; including more vegetables, less starch and more protein. Basically he has gone to lower glycemic foods, however he still can be seen gobbling an ice cream cone most evenings, and is known to sneak into the kitchen for a handful of cookies from time to time. Breakfast consists of two fried eggs and one piece of dry toast. Phil also enjoys fresh fruit at breakfast and supper, and a large green salad at supper as well. He normally has a bowl of soup and a bun for lunch. He breaks down and has several muffins mid morning and occasionally mid afternoon as well. He eats several fruit per day...mainly bananas for potassium. He avoids most fried foods other than eggs. He does not take vitamins or supplements of any type. It's not a moral or ethical issue. He just feels he doesn't need them. He says ice cream is mankind's perfect supplement. Phil eats most meats, but not internal organs. Again, this is not a moral issue but one of taste.

Phil says he needs to count calories in order to lose weight. If he fails to keep track of his intake it will rise to meet his level of output. When he tracks it he manages to keep a deficit of a couple of hundred calories per day, more or less.

Oh yes, did I forget to mention the red licorice?

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posted May-24-2007 05:34 PM               

quote:

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Originally posted by tigger:
Phil had a complete physical assessment in early February...

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C'mon! Don't tell me his name is actually "Phil"! Of are you just going along? Then thank you. I thought you might come back and say, "Hey, don't make up a name for my buddy!" "Project Phil"...I like that! ;o)

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posted May-24-2007 05:48 PM            

quote:

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Originally posted by Nobby:
Good one, Tin! The other side of the coin; when you look at young runners who ran faster than Ron Daws in high school or Dick Beardsley in high school, whatever the kind of workout their HS coaches were giving them, they responded much better to that kind of stimulus and "showed some talent or promise" in their teens. But in the end, the ones who excelled were Daws and Beards. So it goes back to the square 1 question: How do you determine "talent"?

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I know a girl who began her first season of XC as a HS senior. Her HS coach knew very little about running, and set the kids up with a plan to run 4 dpw, with one speed session and a "long" run of 8 km. There were a number of girls in her area who were faster than she was in the local HS XC races, but she managed to qualify for the provincial senior HS XC championships held in Thunder Bay. She ran and placed mid pack overall, and was behind about 4 or 5 girls from her area.

She trained all winter on a Lydiardesque program that I put together. The focus was a HM race earlier this month, that she had asked to run. She was diligent with her training all winter, running up to 75 km per week, with long runs up to 25 km. It was tough for her because she has very little running background, and there were days where she couldn't run due to other priorities, and days were she was just too tired. She also got a sore hamstring about 3 weeks before the HM that caused her to take a week off. But overall I think she ran an average of 50 to 60 km per week from November to May. From November to February it was all easy running. From there til May she also ran one weekly threshold run, beginning at 20 min and extending it out to about 45 min. We targeted a 1:40 to 1:45 HM race, but she surprised both of us to run 1:36 and change, and took first place in her AG at the Vancouver Half Marathon, held May 6.

The last two weeks since the HM have been track sessions at a series of regional track meets. She has never run anything less than 5k, but at these meets she tried 800 once, 1500 three times, and 3,000 twice. She has come first in all of these races, (5:18 PR at 1500 meters) and beaten all of the girls who were faster than her last fall. It's amazing how much talent you can acquire in six months!!

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posted May-24-2007 08:50 PM            

quote:

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Originally posted by Nobby:
C'mon! Don't tell me his name is actually "Phil"! Of are you just going along? Then thank you. I thought you might come back and say, "Hey, don't make up a name for my buddy!" "Project Phil"...I like that! ;o)

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No, not really, but it's a good name. It means Horse lover or something similar. I guess we could have called him "Buddy" but no one would believe that one!

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posted May-24-2007 11:54 PM               

quote:

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Originally posted by fredurie:
Nobby,

There seemed to be a lot of speed in that program and I
wondered if it worked, or whether it set up the next stage of
his training.

The elite Japanese female marathoners training in China
seemed to go from a lot of slow mileage to hammering 30k
or track repeats. How do they set it up to make the
transition?

Mayeroff once said that Shibui had run so hard that she
could barely walk later in the day.

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I'm catching up with your inquiry now.

I would not necessarily say that (Seko's 1977) program has that much of "speed" training. Yes, he seems to have had a lot of "repeats" but, for example, for someone who could run 28 minutes for 10000m (at the time), 10 X 1000m in 2:50 isn't that hard. It is actually his 10k pace. I'll have to go back and check that particular schedule one more time but, for example, like I said, at his prime he might do this sandwitch program for 2 or 3 days and then follow that with 3 or 4 or 5 days of jogging (or some walking).

As for Mitsui team (the one I'm assuming you're talking about in China); again, everybody is different. Shibui is more of a speed type runner and she likes to do shorter but faster work. On the other hand, Tosa, whose training I know better, is the opposite and her speed training may be 5000m tempo at about 15:30~45. Yes, that's it! She's the endurance type and she might do 30 laps of 1km XC course (on dirt) at about 3:40 each lap bringing it down to 3:20s.

Your statement of "from lots of slow mileage to hammering 30k" might be a bit misleading. They may do a lot of slow mileage as well as hammering 30k but, as you know, no one should jump from "a lot of slow mileage" to "hammering 30k" over night. They (Japanese) tend to do some mixture all the time, though distribution is slightly different from time to time, throughout the season (you could say a bit like 5-pace philosophy) than, say, original Lydiard. You may hear a story from some one individual watching a part of training camp and say, "well, they were just jogging around for 3 days and next thing you know, boom, they were hammering on the track!" Well, we do that too! Perhaps a question is; what were they doing 3 months prior to that particular week? The training program always would have to be looked in terms of a pattern and flow; not just sample "week".

[This message has been edited by Nobby (edited May-25-2007).]

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posted May-31-2007 05:09 PM            

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posted May-31-2007 05:12 PM            

quote:

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Originally posted by obsessor:
But gene expression changes with training - I'm fuzzy on my cellular biology now, though. Anyway, in-born talent does not change, no, I'll agree with that.

But there are so many types of talent - some show little to no talent and have slow natural speed, but through many years of training, keep responding steadily and show great improvement. I don't worry about talent. I just train. I help people out, too, and I never worry about their talent. I worry about their motivation. That seems more important than talent. Give me the man or woman who is driven, and keep your talent. We have not talked about that. Training properly, and hard, and running many miles requires consistent long-term motivation, desire, willpower in the face of little to no prospect of ever achieving the pinacle of the desired goal.

Anyhow, my point is that the pinacle of one's potential cannot be determined by the rate at which one responds to training, although your model would assume so. Barring gross physical obstacles, this peak cannot be predicted. This is why we train. Simple.

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This is an awesome post!!!!!!!!!

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posted Jun-01-2007 11:52 AM               

quote:

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Originally posted by bigapplepie:
So having read one article, the reasonable thing to do was to give up on your dreams? Is that the message?

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I didn't get that from Richards post at all. Maybe you should go back and reread it bigapplepie, objectively this time. I think it makes some of you look bad when you argue with EVERYTHING that Richard says. Kinda makes you look like you want to argue for the sake of argueing.

Paul

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posted Jun-01-2007 04:53 PM            

1. It was David Costill who made the comment about Lydiard, not Jack Daniels.

2. Someone mentioned the classic Dixon vs. Smith marathon battle in New York. While Dixon was a miler, he also had fairly high mileage.

3. Peter Snell was one of the slowest 200m runners in the 800m final in the Olympics. However, his aerobic conditioning (from running 100-mile weeks) allowed him to carry what speed he had farther, and he won the gold.

Personally, I increased my mileage from 40 miles per week to over 60. After 6 or 7 weeks, I ran a 10K and broke my previous personal best by 2:30. After getting up to 85-90 mile per week, I set my personal best in the mile (4:19) although I was doing no training anywhere near that pace.

Genetically-gifted runners may run faster over a set distance. However, it takes no special talent to run that far. I used to race against a friend of mine who could run 16-flat for a 5K while only running 20 mpw. I had to run a minimum of 60 mpw to do that. If he ran 60 mpw, I couldn't get near him. That was a fact of life, but it doesn't mean I should reduce my mileage just because I'm not going to win. One of the good things about running is that you're constantly competing against yourself.

When I was running anywhere from 75-100 mpw, I never had any problems. Due to family committments, I've cut way back over the past few years. Now, I get stiff and sore at 40 mpw. I'll have to work my way back up to the 60-70 if I expect to see fast times again.

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posted Jun-01-2007 05:16 PM            

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posted Jun-01-2007 05:18 PM            

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posted Jun-01-2007 07:45 PM               

Physical talent is innate (natural). It is determines what stimulus is needed for a response to occur and how long the stimulus will be effective. It is qualitative.

Mental talent is probably more learned and is qualitative. Learning to deal with suffering and the struggle, along with learning to manage one's emotions, and find peace in the midst of storms is primarily learned (though one might say some of it is inherited, to a degree).

I think it is very hard to measure tenacity. A high schooler I've coached for 2.5 years has elevated his performance capacity enormously, compared to his peers. ON the surface, one might say his physically talented. But, as my athlete points out, that is probably not true. He was not a superstart early and had very modest performances despite having run from 7th grade through the middle of his sopohomore year (year-round training). He was dedicated and yet still could barely breat 5 minutes in the mile after 3.5 years of dilliegent training

What the lad really had, as time showed, is tenacity. He wanted so much to improve that he was willing to dedicate his days to training, no matter how hot, cold, windy, rainy, or whatever was thrown his way. He had, in how own words, "the ability to train." He may have had average physical talent, but his training ability, a mental quality, was top-notch. He rarely missed a workout.

Drew progressed from 35 miles per week to 80 by time he was senior. He ran many long runs, many CV intervals, many Tinman Tempos, and many times he didn't rush ahead and train fast to early, like his rivals did. When they were doing hard, fast intervals on the track, he was yet again going for a 12 miler. He had the patience to wait. I didn't give him hardly any anaerobic capacity workouts until the last month prior to his senior state meet.

For 2 years Drew focused on aerobic conditioning - mixing slow, medium, and somewhat fast distance work, and just a few striders. He might have experience much earlier success, but what counted for him was winning a state title, and he knew that his physicial talent wasn't good enough to do that on 35 miles per week and 16 x 400m at 1-mile pace, which is what he had been doing before I coached him.

Drew had the tenacity to stick to a plan that was LONG-TERM oriented, and results were a state title in cross-country (15:15 over 5km) and a state titel in the 3200m (9:16).

So, what is talent? For Drew, it was more mental than physical, I think.

Talent is hard to define! It has many variations and qualities!

Regards,

Tinman

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posted Jun-01-2007 08:24 PM               

nyway, I meant to say that Physical Talent is determined innately. And it is quantitative - meaning it can be measured and has limitations on expression. In contrast, mental talent is qualitative and can not be measured with accuracy. It is subjective and varying meanings and expressions. It is situationally dependent.

Take care,

Tinman

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posted Jun-03-2007 03:15 PM               

This works for many.

Absolutely nobody rows the equivalent of 9 min miles even on the longest rows. I would say I never row slower than current marathon pace and to that additional difficulties are added (stroke rate restriction).

One of the strongest 48 year old rowers had his lactate threshold and VO2max tested and the following recommendations were made:

Longest, slowest rows: HR 160.

At peak shape my pace on LSD rows (90 mins or more) usually had me at 160 at the end also and this did not feel hard.
At least half the row was at or above 150 with an estimated max HR of 180 (never actually seen but I am not really fond of max HR tests, I have seen 176).

I am reading on this board how people train with 9:30 miles and how this somehow translates into good race performances.

I find this hard to believe.

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posted Jun-03-2007 03:32 PM               

quote:

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Originally posted by oar:
Well, here is the view from the indoor rowing scene.
Since most people don't have the time to row 100 miles per week many follow a high intensity plan wherein the slowest row will be a 60 min at about marathon pace, all the other stuff much faster.
That plan is about 40 miles a week.

This works for many.

Absolutely nobody rows the equivalent of 9 min miles even on the longest rows. I would say I never row slower than current marathon pace and to that additional difficulties are added (stroke rate restriction).

One of the strongest 48 year old rowers had his lactate threshold and VO2max tested and the following recommendations were made:

Longest, slowest rows: HR 160.

At peak shape my pace on LSD rows (90 mins or more) usually had me at 160 at the end also and this did not feel hard.
At least half the row was at or above 150 with an estimated max HR of 180 (never actually seen but I am not really fond of max HR tests, I have seen 176).

I am reading on this board how people train with 9:30 miles and how this somehow translates into good race performances.

I find this hard to believe.

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Do these sports require different energy systems (and differing ratio of ATP::Aerobic::Anaerobic)?

I don't know the answer, but the principal of specificity of training has gotta apply...Nobby, Tinman, Andy, Tchuck, Richard, others have more info on this?

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posted Jun-03-2007 05:39 PM              

quote:

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Originally posted by oar:
Well, here is the view from the indoor rowing scene.
Since most people don't have the time to row 100 miles per week many follow a high intensity plan wherein the slowest row will be a 60 min at about marathon pace, all the other stuff much faster.
That plan is about 40 miles a week.

This works for many.

Absolutely nobody rows the equivalent of 9 min miles even on the longest rows. I would say I never row slower than current marathon pace and to that additional difficulties are added (stroke rate restriction).

One of the strongest 48 year old rowers had his lactate threshold and VO2max tested and the following recommendations were made:

Longest, slowest rows: HR 160.

At peak shape my pace on LSD rows (90 mins or more) usually had me at 160 at the end also and this did not feel hard.
At least half the row was at or above 150 with an estimated max HR of 180 (never actually seen but I am not really fond of max HR tests, I have seen 176).

I am reading on this board how people train with 9:30 miles and how this somehow translates into good race performances.

I find this hard to believe.

---

There is no impact in rowing, and if people were to run at race pace all the time they would injure themselves.

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posted Jun-05-2007 12:35 AM               

Tinman

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posted Jun-05-2007 12:39 AM               

Tinman

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