Topic: 1600m: persuade me on mileage vs speed please!

[chipset]

Hi.

I'm looking to forums like dyestat.com and letsrun.com and just Lydiard's/Magness' materials and I see a lot of materials on importance of high mileage (+60 mpw for teens) and huge aerobic base in the beginning. Basically the statement is that training should go in phases (roughly and approximately).
1. Base/aerobic
2. Strength
3. Anaerobic/speed

And that's what I plan to do: base until mid-february, then some strength (hills) work, and then anaerobic concentration (200m-800m) in track&field.

But I come here and I see people who are smarter and much faster than me telling me I should just do 200m-400m repeats until I reach my goal. Oh, and by the way, my goal is to break five minute mile (aggressive goal: low 4:50s) by May.

If I don't make my goal that's fine (I understand that not everyone breaks five minutes the first year). I just want to understand that I didn't waste two months of training on base/speed to bring me nowhere. So when I go on a five/six/seven/ten miler I feel from one side that I do something beneficial for the 50% aerobic part of a mile. And and from the other side that I waste my time running long slow 8-minute miles and I can't run faster on a long run like that without racing and just going all-out.

So how you explain world class athletes who run 4:01 miles from 180mpw (which weren't intervals I reckon)?

I just want to know how to not waste my time and progress towards world domination and being a womanizer sub-five minute mile.

[Ryan Ford]

Well if you ask me, a 5 minute mile is great for parkour and your time would be better spent working on power and speed through sprinting. But I guess it depends on if your goals are for parkour or something else.

[whiteninja]

The thing about "building a base" is that training builds up on itself, and running long and slow verses short and fast are two completely different experiences for the body. So why not start out heading in the direction you want to be? Steve made some great arguments on it in this thread:
http://board.crossfit.com/showthread.php?t=24418
However, the being an aspiring 100m sprinter is a bit more specific than a 1600m race, both are still unlike 5k+.

So how you explain world class athletes who run 4:01 miles from 180mpw (which weren't intervals I reckon)?

They're genetic freaks. Seriously.





... Lucky bastards.

[chipset]

Well, I sort of am not even going to question that 100m sprinters should never even try to run more than one mile. The "long run" is probably like 400m 100m is 100% anaerobic and compare bodies of 100m sprinters with those of milers (even 800meterers).
But mile is really 50% aerobic and I just want to know why I am not supposed to first increase my aerobic capacity, and then increase my anaerobic skill?

But still I didn't say about running long and slow. I mean running as fast as is comfortable for legs for a long distance. There's a difference between jogging and running 5 miles even if it's all slower than regular tempo/threshold. I understand that jogging for 6 miles at 9-10 minutes per mile sucks. I am talking about more like 7:00-8:00 minute miles.

They're genetic freaks. Seriously.





... Lucky bastards.

That's true. But check this out. Our top mile runner (4:28) runs 56 400m split. Another 5:01 guy runs 57.3 400m split.
Another 4:59 miler runs 60.4 400m.  Another guy with 4:56 runs 63.3 400m! Isn't this evidence that 400m and 1600m are incredibly different events?

[chipset]

Oh, and what would you say on workouts like 6x800,5x1000, 4x1600m,3x2000m? Not quite sprints but not a long run either

[Steven Low]

Intervals significantly increase aerobic AND anaerobic capacity. If you look at the research on HIIT-esque protocol as well as tabatas and metcons. This is just the by product of this type of training because *after* you exhaust your anaerobic capacity you start delving straight into aerobic capacity for energy. Hence, why max effort intervals, tabatas and metcons work significantly to increase the capacity of both.

Running those long distance increases your aerobic capacity but it's doing absolutely nothing for your anaerobic capacity which you start to delve into when you want to run faster paces in your miles. No wonder you're not improving right? This is what I've been trying to tell you all along. Long distances are GREAT for long distances.. but unless you significantly start increasing your pace or start running intervals just working aerobic capacity isn't going to help you much for running a sub 5 mile with your shoddy anaerobic capacity. Hell, even trying to run a 5 minute pace and then burning out like at 1/2 mile and then continuing that until you can is better than pacing yourself to complete the mile everytime in 6,7,8 minutes.

That's true. But check this out. Our top mile runner (4:28) runs 56 400m split. Another 5:01 guy runs 57.3 400m split.
Another 4:59 miler runs 60.4 400m.  Another guy with 4:56 runs 63.3 400m! Isn't this evidence that 400m and 1600m are incredibly different events?

Nope. The top mile guy with the better 400m just has a better anaerobic AND aerobic capacity than the other two guys. Sucks for them.

Once you can run a sub 60s 400m you have a decent enough anaerobic capacity to do a sub 5 mile like the guys you're exampling. Simple, no?

[chipset]

No wonder you're not improving right?

Ehm.. I dropped my mile from 6:52 in october to 6:15 in November just from aerobic/faltrek  workouts and it's probably even lower now.

The question is to whether speed will make me drop time faster since I understand that it's exponentially harder to drop times as you go lower (i.e. harder to go from 5:00 to 4:50 than from 9 to 7). I now agree extremely that faltrek is very beneficial and I did use it and I will use it.
I have basically understood that I ran many my steady runs this fall in faltrek type of style since I can't really control my pace. So I was accelerating a lot, then slowing, then accelerating again.

I have troubles understanding why you are against long runs once a week and mileage runs?

[chipset]

Here's an interesting thread to throw into the flame.
http://209.85.173.104/search?q=cache:-pMN95blLs4J:www.coolrunning.com/cgi-bin/ubb/ubbmisc.cgi%3Faction%3Dfindthread%26forum%3DForum5%26number%3D5%26thisthread%3D004275%26go%3Dnewer+mile+training&hl=en&ct=clnk&cd=15&gl=us&client=firefox-a

There's a guy who talks about 20x400m with 200m rest. I am not sure I can go through with even half of that until I have a solid base. What I actually have in mind is to spend next six weeks running some faltreks/hills/long runs, then in February do this: http://www.runningcoach.info/mile-training/ and then just take it where my coach leads me.

PS. Or this http://www.runnersworld.co.uk/news/article.asp?UAN=58

[Steven Low]

No wonder you're not improving right?

Ehm.. I dropped my mile from 6:52 in october to 6:15 in November just from aerobic/faltrek  workouts and it's probably even lower now.

Not cause of the aerobic runs though. -_- Fartlek is effective.. but you do it in long runs which is going to help although not as much...

The question is to whether speed will make me drop time faster since I understand that it's exponentially harder to drop times as you go lower (i.e. harder to go from 5:00 to 4:50 than from 9 to 7). I now agree extremely that faltrek is very beneficial and I did use it and I will use it.
I have basically understood that I ran many my steady runs this fall in faltrek type of style since I can't really control my pace. So I was accelerating a lot, then slowing, then accelerating again.

I have troubles understanding why you are against long runs once a week and mileage runs?

It's not that I'm against them.. but your goal is SPECIFICALLY to decrease your mile time which long runs are not effective for. If you were training for like a 5k or 10k or something like that then longer runs start to become more effective because of the significant increases needed in aerobic capacity. However, since you're aiming at a mile which requires both pretty much equal aerobic and anaerobic components, and it's proven that intervals (tabatas/metcon/HIIT/etc.) significantly help both as opposed to longer runs with mainly just aerobic components.... I mean you have your answer right there.

*Long* fartlek runs while they are going to help you.. they're not going to help you as much as you think. I'm not quite sure why you're still hanging onto those. Again, the more you can power bias your workouts here the better as significantly dropping your 400m time will help significantly.

I think you would benefit a lot more from 16x100m, 8x200m, 4x400m runs with a minute or two rest between them than from anything in those runner articles. If you need a bit more distance with these go ahead and add them but if your goal is a better mile it's not going to do you much good to run more than 1.5-2 miles in intervals total distance.

P.S. Please spell fartlek right. Faltrek is kind of getting annoying.

[chipset]

*Long* fartlek runs while they are going to help you.. they're not going to help you as much as you think. I'm not quite sure why you're still hanging onto those. Again, the more you can power bias your workouts here the better as significantly dropping your 400m time will help significantly.

Well, basically the reason I am hanging to those is that I see a lot of people under 4:30 running 10-15 milers off-season. Basically, long runs worked for me 'till now, it probably worked for them, and now there is a whole new theory that I can train mile on merely sprint intervals without ever going over 2 mile only off fartleks (okay, I hope I spelled it correctly now ).

I see that it's new and popular way to burn fat off with HIIT and train your muscles with HIIT but it kind of defies all the old knowledge and are there any sub-4 minute athletes who train with <100mpw?

[Steven Low]

Alright I'm going to lay out pretty much everything here so I hope you understand.


Just because there's lots of people doing it doesn't make it GOOD training. Eventually if you do enough long runs you'll build up the necessary aerobic and anaerobic capacity.. but most of these guys have been training since they were in elementary school I bet or they're naturally just good runners. Remember, what is GOOD for a beginner is not what is good for an intermediate level runner which is not good for an advanced which is not as good for elite runners. This is true of ANY sport, and anyone who tries to apply an elite level athlete's training to themselves is doing themselves a disservice.

For example, look at say an elite bodybuilders routine which is like a 4 day split of chest & tris, bis and back, shoulders, legs.. is that going to help your average person just starting out optimally strengthen and build muscles? Hell no and anyone who has read the workout routine thread (with all the links) I posted up would know that. What works best for beginners through more or less intermediate/advanced lifters are full body routines with medium frequency and then increasing as you get stronger with more muscle. Check out gymnastics or olympic weightlifting or other sports that require training schedules. The better you get the more time you need to practice technique as well as work capacity/programming and such (and anyone who doesn't need that time is a genetic freak which most of us aren't anyway).

Knowing that let's categorize the mile first. I'd say sub 4 mins is more or less elite (although pushing it down below 3:50 is more "elite" I guess). Advanced would definitely probably be under 4:30 I would assume, and then intermediate runners would more or less be pushing the 5-5:30 minute barrier and less? Would you say that's right? Beginners would be pretty much anything above that.

Looking at the above, we know that you, as an 8 minute miler are pretty much a beginner on the mile scale and as you pretty much just started it seems to be the case. Pretty much anyone in high school or college with a couple months of training can probably hit an 8 minute mile or so, right? So the thing YOU want to do specifically is increase your anaerobic and aerobic capacities as fast as you can. You know that logging pretty high mileage is going to help your aerobic capactiy at least somewhat.. while on the otherhand not help your anaerobic much at all. On the other hand, we have things like HIIT/fartlek/tabtas where we exhaust all of the energy pathways very quickly in one workout which leads to massive gains in both anaerobic and aerobic pathways. Knowing this, you want to get on the optimal routine to increase both capacities as fast as you can right?

Again, it's not so much that HIIT is THE superior form of exercise otherwise all athletes from every running event would do it. But I do think it is the best for most beginner-intermediate runners. It builds both anaerobic and aerobic pathways insanely well which is what you want to do with people who have barely an capacity at all to start with. I'll explain this again: as your times go down further and further and more power (= work/time) is needed to do the mile, you start having to have a much larger aerobic capacity since muscle glycogen and phosphocreatine are fairly static. So when you need more and more significant increases in aerobic capacity you'll need to start logging more and more mileage. You're pretty much not at this point yet which is why I'm saying it's definitely not best for you to be logging all this mileage and it's really just going to wear you down at this point.

Again looking at this thread:
http://www.performancemenu.com/forum/showthread.php?p=22332
A guy who has run fast before (4:45) and stopped for 3 years -- thus dropping both anaerobic and aerobic capacities obviously -- comes back in 3 months running a sub 5 minute mile running ONLY 200 and 400m interval sprints. He had to build BOTH capacities back up at the same time. If he was only doing longer distance runs he would have definitely gotten some benefit from aerobic.. but nothing for anaerobic. Thus, it is definitely true that intervals would be vastly superior in this case because it helps capacities as opposed to just aerobic, correct? Plus, this is additionally true when we consider he is not at the limit of his capacities where anaerobic work would negatively affect his aerobic performance. In any case, if we look at it further if we see that he wanted to get sub 4 then the more and more his times dropped, the more aerobic component is needed so he would have to go for longer and longer runs to build up the capacity as his anaerboic capacity starts to max out.

Take a look at Hicham El Guerrouj's training schedule when he set all the WRs for like 1500m, 1600m and such:
http://run-down.com/guests/mv_el_guerrouj.php
We know his anaerobic systems are probably pretty much maxed out to the point where he can't run a faster 100m unless it negatively effects him in his middle distance running. Thus he has maybe one or two workouts for power/strength and such a week just to maintain the max of that ability. If his power and strength drop, then that will negatively affect his aerobic capacity (as max endurance is related to strength and power is related to stride pace). Since he is maxed out with those attributes, he focuses on the aerobic component which he hits very fast into a mile or 1600m because he's running at such a fast pace. Thus, we can see most of his runs are aerobic training.

So I think you can clearly see that HIIT/fartlek/tabatas/metcons are pretty much superior to long distance aerobic work for beginner and intermediates just like full body routines are better for beginners and intermediates in weightlifting as well. Just like weightlifting programming needs to become more complex as the runner/lifter/swimmer/anything gets more advanced. As you can see El Guerrouj's routine is actually fairly complex in the programming of his 2-a-day workouts where the 3/1 cycle is not exactly the same from microcycle to microcycle especially in terms of his afternoon workouts. Beginners need something effective that works both capacities well because they're well below the max for both anaerobic and aerobic. More advanced needs more mileage needs to be increased to help up the aerobic capacity as anaerobic starts to hit it's limit (aka your high school friends logging all that mileage). And elite level runners (at least middle distance) need mostly aerobic work (distance) with a fairly complex power/strength/race/pace programming to elicit gains in their times that your high school friends don't need yet to elicit gains in their program.

Your friends might have not hit a wall yet but they will.. and if they don't have a good coach they won't know what to do to keep improving. It's just like if you do what they're doing you won't make optimal gains either with very little progression (as you well know from your slow improvements and us discussing this here).

Make sense now?


P.S. That is to note that "more mileage" isn't excessive mileage like you're talking about 10-15 miles maybe up to 20-25 miles is pretty much what El Guerrouj was doing if you look at his aerobic work schedule. Anything more than that for milers is excessive. "Upping the mileage" refers to increases from about 1-2 mile HIIT up to about 10-15 miles a week more or less and then you probably need more complex programming after that. QUALITY over quantity. Quantity without quality will just burn you out quickly or give you overuse injuries. So none of this "off season" 10-15 and "in season" 40-50+ for good milers. That's just ludicrous.

[chipset]

No questions whatsoever 

PS. I'm running low six minute mile but that's still beginner. I guess never really understood how most of the people were running ten milers at 6:30 pace for recovery.
I am keeping one long run a week though

PPS. But why, why did my mile went down significantly when I joined cross-country and pretty much forgot what fartlek is for two months? I did run my longer runs irregularly but I was never focusing on full out sprinting during them, just some accelarations. I mean, okay here's my history:

May: 7:40 mile
May-August -- fartlek intervals like you said. I did mile warm up, and one-two miles of running with 100-200m bursts as fast as I could and jogging (really slow -- 12 minute mile pace) recovery.
August: my mile is 7:20 (O_o?)

August: I join XC and start running:
1. Long runs, which pretty much were tempos for me because I tried to run very fast for as much as I could keep up with the team. Then I just ran on what's left. Usually 5-6 miles.
2. VO2max -- 500m/900m intervals full out.
3. Some 5k races.
5. Easy three mile recoveries.
October: I run 7:03 mile.

Then I remember a couple of 3x900,4x400 workouts I did. But I still was running mainly long steady runs and tempos.

Then I took a break and jogged slowly/walked for two weeks. My mile is dropping to 6:45.

In November, I start running stuff like 5-6 miles consistently. I also started running 8 milers (which is new) and 6 mile tempos. XC season is long over by that time.

Then, here's how it went:


three days before this week I went 6:30 mile.
Week1: 4miler @ 7:30 pace, 1 suckish 8-minute mile, rest, 2.6+2 mile (double), 3.4+3, long 8 mile run.

Week2:
Monday off.
Tuesday: 5 mile progressive run: started in like 8 minutes, finished in 6:40.
Wednesday: 2 mile recovery
Thursday: 6:16 mile!

So, basically I knocked down 40 seconds without ever doing any sprints or stuff like that.

I am scared to lay off the technique that worked wonders for me and switch to something that has done a terrible job for me. Maybe I am mutant or something?

The thing: I progressed fastest only when I ran long miles.
Another point: I went from 7:03 to 6:16 without running anything less than 1 mile.

[chipset]

What could you say about this though:

Monday: 5mi recovery depending on feel.
Tuesday: mile repeats or 2-3 mile tempo (tempos)
Wednesday: 5mi recovery, might be 3 if I feel really crappy.
Thursday: something like: 8x400m, or 12x200m or 4x400m+4x200m+4x100m. Track work out
Friday: recovery.
Thursday: recovery.
Sunday: long run.

Even if I run 2 miles, it's better than nothing. I remember taking weekends off and coming on Monday feeling like my legs were two pillows. Then on Tuesday I felt fast again.

[whiteninja]

Re: Steven

Since he is maxed out with those attributes, he focuses on the aerobic component which he hits very fast into a mile or 1600m because he's running at such a fast pace.

What do you mean by "hits very fast into a mile?" I've read that a fast mile is about 83% anaerobic, though I can't find the site right now...

I did bump into this while looking for it though:

http://www.chiroweb.com/archives/18/07/06.html

When a runner reaches a speed of about eight and a half miles per hour, the respiratory quotient rises to one, which indicates no fat metabolism is happening. Speeds above 8.5 mph are produced only by the anaerobic fast-twitch fibers, which can contract three times faster than slow-twitch fibers (25 milliseconds versus 75 milliseconds). The fast-twitch fibers can produce a speed in excess of 25 miles per hour, which is attained in the 100 and 200-meter dashes.

[chipset]

I'm sorry but I don't trust that article for obvious reasons such as: 8.5mph is a 7 minute mile
That's a marathon pace for average marathon runners. And marathon pace is 90% aerobic.
Hell, I can probably go run 7 minute mile without ever going into oxygen debt.

Does that mean running four miles at a seven minute mile pace trains me anaerobically?

http://www.brianmac.co.uk/energy.htm

120 to 240 seconds     Aerobic + Anaerobic     Muscle glycogen + lactic acid
240 to 600 seconds    Aerobic    Muscle glycogen + fatty acids

[Steven Low]

WN

What do you mean by "hits very fast into a mile?" I've read that a fast mile is about 83% anaerobic, though I can't find the site right now...

I don't know where you heard this.. or where chip and I have heard 50/50 but it obviosuly depends on your ability level. If it was mostly anaerobic or even 50/50 you'd see a lot more elite runners training like that. The simple fact is that if El Guerrouj was NOT training optimally and still be able to set WRs would mean he's an uber genetic freak who can get away with terrible training to set WRs. Which no one is really in this world of specialization. His training mostly aerobic because as the time drops the more energy is required and thus since muscle glycogen is fairly static it MUST come from the oxidative energy pathway. Remember, the higher the power output the faster you start to dip into oxidative energy (aka the "CF metcon principle" on power output -- well, it's not really CF's but yeah).

Now 100m and 200m and maybe 400m are short enough where fast twitch can overcome glycogen limits. I would say about 400m is about where it is starting to get mostly aerobic or about 50/50 if you look at Michael Johnson's physique and now Jeremy Wariner's physique. Johnson specialized in 200m and 400m so he's a bit more power biased hence his bigger legs.. while Wariner is a 400m specialist and he's relatively scrawny. Remember training BEGETS physique in this case (since we are training for performance not look).. and since both of them are near 400m WR time you can assume that they are starting to dip heavily into aerobic pathway at even 400m.

Anyone who tries to put a number on a race... "X" uses about 50/50 anaerobic/aerobic doesn't know what they are talking about on a biological level. As I have said before, it definitely varies on ability level.


Also, that Chiro web link is wrong (so don't buy into it.. especially you Chipset). Just because slow twitch fire approximately about 2-3x slower than fast twitch doesn't mean that speeds above 8 mph are all fast twitch. That's just foolish assumption. The body can obviously speed up by recruiting more slow twitch fibers at once (and it's not linear recruitment although I'm not going to go into that). How else would elite marathon runners be able to run at least 11s 100m? If what they were saying is true, most elite marathon runners would only be able to run 100m in about 20-25s compared to the 10s for elite sprinters. That's just stupid and false.


Chip:

Don't like it. I'd rather you run about 5 miles per week doing all interval work first. Then as your times start dropping you can transfer over to some longer runs with interval work slowly phasing it out.

[whiteninja]

Re: Steven
Thanks for the reply. That's making sense now.


Re: Chipset
I figure the Chiroweb.com link was referring more to the average American, where running a 7 minute mile would nearly be a sprint.

[Steven Low]

Again, Chip, from reading your log I don't understand why you still want to run long distance at least at this point in time. But more power to you I guess. Have fun with that I won't bug you anymore.

[chipset]

Well, I have been asking people who do track&field about my situation (and I gave times) and they said I need to do "VOLUME" like hell. Which kinda explains why I have been progressing like a madman off of the volume and staying in one place from the sprints/fartlek. Which is also described by Magness, when he says that aerobic development goes before anaerobic one.

[chipset]

+ I also want to try the 2 miler. I know I'd probably be much better at running say 400m than 1600m/3200m but I like distance races and what the hell can I do about it

It's always such a joy to race people over long distance, proving that you have endurance and strength to endure pain. I wasn't even really in the top half in cross-country races but I raced a couple of people and won and it felt incredible.
Man was initially made to run long distances anyway, not short.