Topic: sprinters or distance runners

[Jacquis "Curfew"]

ok, ive recently gotten back into the swing of things and in my training ive been wondering...should i train as a sprinter would or as a distance runner would. cause ive noticed theres a difference between the two body types, burst speed levels and overall move...NESS...yeah, just curious

[J Kyle Smith]

I personally think you should train both ways (although I am guilty to training long distance running more than sprinting). Ideally I say train in both. Sprinting for speed, and long distance for stamina.

[Casey Boatwright]

I personally think you should train both ways (although I am guilty to training long distance running more than sprinting). Ideally I say train in both. Sprinting for speed, and long distance for stamina.

spot on with both.    Personally for drill and just running practice,  I work in run long distance maybe 4 or 5 blocks sprint a block and repeat as many times as i feel torturous   

[Jake Vigil]

Sprint. Casey is on the right track, but I'd drop down that slow interval significantly. Sprint a block, jog a block, sprint a block, jog a block. You'll want to puke harder, faster, and get better results overall.

Sprinting like that will get you more stamina than jogging for miles on end. 2 birds with one stone. Train smarter. Sprint harder, quit LSD...

[Casey Boatwright]

Sprint. Casey is on the right track, but I'd drop down that slow interval significantly. Sprint a block, jog a block, sprint a block, jog a block. You'll want to puke harder, faster, and get better results overall.

Sprinting like that will get you more stamina than jogging for miles on end. 2 birds with one stone. Train smarter. Sprint harder, quit LSD...

thanks for the tip   

[Jake Vigil]

And by Jog, I mean run.

[Casey Boatwright]

And by Jog, I mean run.

[J Kyle Smith]

I might have to take this to mind too. I'm trying to gather as much information as possible to build a new workout routine, my last one didn't have any cardio at all (except for an occasional 2 mile run every week or every other week)

[Alex frogger Brown]

Neither. you'll want to take from both but dont train as one. keep in mind, the way most highschool athetes train isnt for life. quite frankly, they tear their bodies apart.

[mospunk]

**Sound of skipping record fuzz***

WHAT ARE YOUR GOALS? 

In general, you should consider what you want to achieve.  Do you want to be able to run long distances and do some Parkour as you go, or will you need to escape something so quickly that it will in all reality be about 3-5 minutes of intense movement?  It's true, training distance will get you in shape for distance, but it will not help your explosive sprinting power.  Sprinting, on the other hand, has been shown to not only help with -- you guessed it -- sprinting, but also to improve stamina/endurance.  When you think about the movements in Parkour, they are explosive and powerful, thus sprinting is the better option, if you would need to choose one over the other.  There was also something I read here or in a link posted here on APK about endurance training potentially hindering the building of explosive power, due to the formation of muscle (don't quote me on the details, look it up).  Just look at marathoners vs. sprinters.  Long slender muscles in marathoners are not going to give you explosive strength and speed.  Anyway, use the search function in the fitness section and you'll find all the research from Chris Salvato and Steve Low primarily.  You can also find some good examples of training schedules as well.

Good luck! 

[Rafe]

Get strong and fast first, worry about endurance second. The reason is simple its always easier to work with in a lower percentage of your max, if you have a 400 pound deadlift 250 for 20 will be easier then if you only have a max of 300 whether you work on endurance or not. Same applies to speed, if you can run a 11 second hundred a 6 minute mile will be relatively easy because it is low percentage of your max speed potential.

My understanding is that most chase and escape situations are usually decided by the first quick burst, think of it like this if someone is chasing you with a knife are you going to pace yourself like marathoner or sprint as hard as you can? If you are clearly faster you will put distance between you quickly and most often people will give up, or slow down and then you have a chance to look at other options, calling the police, getting a car etc.

I think there is place for endurance in Parkour training but I think its only after you have developed good baseline strength and speed.

[Casey Boatwright]

Get strong and fast first, worry about endurance second. The reason is simple its always easier to work with in a lower percentage of your max, if you have a 400 pound deadlift 250 for 20 will be easier then if you only have a max of 300 whether you work on endurance or not. Same applies to speed, if you can run a 11 second hundred a 6 minute mile will be relatively easy because it is low percentage of your max speed potential.

My understanding is that most chase and escape situations are usually decided by the first quick burst, think of it like this if someone is chasing you with a knife are you going to pace yourself like marathoner or sprint as hard as you can? If you are clearly faster you will put distance between you quickly and most often people will give up, or slow down and then you have a chance to look at other options, calling the police, getting a car etc.

I think there is place for endurance in Parkour training but I think its only after you have developed good baseline strength and speed.

Rafe i love your signiture   

[Andy Animus Tran]

+1 Rafe.

My thoughts exactly.

[Dan Elric]

Get strong and fast first, worry about endurance second. The reason is simple its always easier to work with in a lower percentage of your max, if you have a 400 pound deadlift 250 for 20 will be easier then if you only have a max of 300 whether you work on endurance or not. Same applies to speed, if you can run a 11 second hundred a 6 minute mile will be relatively easy because it is low percentage of your max speed potential.

Doesn't quite work that way in running.  Though if you can run an 11 second 100 then I'd hope you'd be able to run a sub 6:30 mile.  Running is unique in that endurance running requires a lot cardiovascular endurance (not just muscular endurance).  Now if you trained HIIT - then yes, a sub 6 mile should be easier.

My understanding is that most chase and escape situations are usually decided by the first quick burst, think of it like this if someone is chasing you with a knife are you going to pace yourself like marathoner or sprint as hard as you can? If you are clearly faster you will put distance between you quickly and most often people will give up, or slow down and then you have a chance to look at other options, calling the police, getting a car etc.

I agree here, the initial burst is necessary to get away.  Endurance is necessary to keep getting away.  For this reason I suggest training more middle distances like 400s and 800s. 

I think there is place for endurance in Parkour training but I think its only after you have developed good baseline strength and speed.

HIIT will develop speed and endurance at the same time.

[Rafe]

Daniel the cardiovascular system ramps up in response to muscular effort, if you are expending less muscular effort compared to your max your cardiovascular system will also be less taxed. Of course these relationships are not perfect, Usain bolt will not win any marathons. At the far end of development optimal speed adaption will be opposed to optimal endurance adaption but that does not really apply to novices were adaption is more systematic. Its important to understand that and that speed is important for endurance and the reverse is not true. For an athlete who wants both speed and endurance the focus should be on speed first, even for the athlete who wants to focus on long distance there is need for a base in speed and strength, were as again the reverse is not true.

HIIT is overated, it does not cause optimal speed adaptions and only causes aerobic adaptions for 6-8 weeks, anaerobic endurance is the easiest quality to develop spending a bunch of time on it doing HIIT is dumb and the intensity can easily cause overreaching.

I personally do about 2 sessions of 5-10 5-10 second sprints(parkour routes or flatland sprints) plus 1 sessions of 3-5 30-40 second sprints a week, with one of the above replaced with an interval(20 second to a minute of work with 10 seconds to a minute of rest 5-10 rounds) or long route workout( 5-10 minute continous parkour) every other week, in addition depending on recovery I will do light runs of 1-2 miles up to 3 days week(the key here is low intensity though).

I am not sure what would be optimal for a beginner yet its one of the areas I am trying to figure out in programming Parkour training.

[Chris [.5gibbon] Stevenson!]

i am really wasting my time by even posting anything after what rafe just said.  my existance as a helper is usless now.

[Dan Elric]

Daniel the cardiovascular system ramps up in response to muscular effort, if you are expending less muscular effort compared to your max your cardiovascular system will also be less taxed. Of course these relationships are not perfect, Usain bolt will not win any marathons. At the far end of development optimal speed adaption will be opposed to optimal endurance adaption but that does not really apply to novices were adaption is more systematic. Its important to understand that and that speed is important for endurance and the reverse is not true. For an athlete who wants both speed and endurance the focus should be on speed first, even for the athlete who wants to focus on long distance there is need for a base in speed and strength, were as again the reverse is not true.

Lifting is not an effective means of training cardiovascular endurance.  The improvements are mostly neuromuscular.  Strength training will increase your maximum strength, which will of course make doing things under the maximum easier (thus increasing endurance).  But a mile relies so heavily on aerobic abilities that strength endurance just doesn't cut it.  There's a reason you don't see milers in the gym lifting - it isn't very effective towards their goals.

Lifting is necessary for a traceur because we demand high levels of strength.  Now, HIIT isn't as effective as lifting is with sprinting speed increases, but HIIT improves VO2 Max significantly - something that lifting will not do.  This VO2 Max increase is a much much bigger influence in endurance than maximum strength.  In the case of a mile the anaerobic to aerobic ratio is roughly 1:1.  You can't ignore the aerobic factor.

I agree wholeheartedly that traceurs should get a good strength base, and that it does help with endurance, I'm just saying there's an aerobic factor that needs to be taken into account that can be gained by training HIIT.

[Rafe]

Lifting is not an effective means of training cardiovascular endurance.  The improvements are mostly neuromuscular.  Strength training will increase your maximum strength, which will of course make doing things under the maximum easier (thus increasing endurance).  But a mile relies so heavily on aerobic abilities that strength endurance just doesn't cut it.  There's a reason you don't see milers in the gym lifting - it isn't very effective towards their goals.

Lifting is necessary for a traceur because we demand high levels of strength.  Now, HIIT isn't as effective as lifting is with sprinting speed increases, but HIIT improves VO2 Max significantly - something that lifting will not do.  This VO2 Max increase is a much much bigger influence in endurance than maximum strength.  In the case of a mile the anaerobic to aerobic ratio is roughly 1:1.  You can't ignore the aerobic factor.

I agree wholeheartedly that traceurs should get a good strength base, and that it does help with endurance, I'm just saying there's an aerobic factor that needs to be taken into account that can be gained by training HIIT.

I agree there is an aerobic factor but I think your underplaying the effect of neuromuscular factors on that, and no study has shown any further aerobic endurance gains after 8 weeks of HIIT.

The world record in the 10k is 26.17:13 thats 100 sub 16 second hundreds. Assuming their max speed is 11 seconds in the hundred that means there working at 66 percent of make speed aproximately, you will never approach that speed if you work at 66 percent of max speed and your best hundred is 16. The fasest way to get to that kind of performance is to get under 12 in the hundred then worry about building the aerobic base to sustain work at that percent of max that long. 

[Dan Elric]

I agree there is an aerobic factor but I think your underplaying the effect of neuromuscular factors on that, and no study has shown any further aerobic endurance gains after 8 weeks of HIIT.

The world record in the 10k is 26.17:13 thats 100 sub 16 second hundreds. Assuming their max speed is 11 seconds in the hundred that means there working at 66 percent of make speed aproximately, you will never approach that speed if you work at 66 percent of max speed and your best hundred is 16. The fasest way to get to that kind of performance is to get under 12 in the hundred then worry about building the aerobic base to sustain work at that percent of max that long. 

Indeed, it appears I was underplaying the effect of strength on endurance after looking up some stuff.


As for the OP:
http://www.eatmoveimprove.com/2009/08/why-speed-work-is-necessary-for-elite-endurance/

[Jacquis "Curfew"]

thanks for all the advice guys. ima do some research and inthe mean time i was thinking i could do like 5 sets of sprint training through obstacles.....i'll keep thinkin though