Lets assume we have a 800m runner who can only train once per day(because of time, work etc…), and has 3 “hard” sessions per week. Intervalls. Rest of the days are easy jogging for recovering.
How is it possible for that person to progress in the long term?
Here are the possibilities I can come up with
Increase freqensy of hard training to 4 days a week.
Maybe risky because of too little time for recovery between hard sessions
Increase length of long runs
Sounds like a bad idea because it can hinder recovery
Increase speed of easy recovery runs
Same reason as above
Increase volume of the spesific training on the hard days
Sounds like a good idea to me
Increase the speed/intensity of the hard days.
Ok short term solution, but very hard to to week after week.
Reduce recovery beetween intervals on the hard days.
In this case, what do you think one should do to have a long term improvement?
An interesting question and one that many face at different stages with different athletes.
Its hard to say which is the best scenario without knowing more about the athlete and understanding their strengths, weaknesses and the direction you believe is the best for them to follow to maximise their performance.
Sometimes the best course of action for the particular athlete whom you are working with may not be the philosophy you stick fast to. For example you may be training an athlete S-L and realise that with the characteristics they have brought to the table a L-S approach may work best.
I think you will need to unwind a few different rhythms and phases to see which your athlete appears to respond best to. You may actually be surprised at what they can or can’t do.
As a starting point I would consider either 2 or 4 however this is without knowing what the strengths and weakness of your athlete, if they have any contraindications to certain work, their training history and the type of 800m runner they are (are they a 800-1500m runner or a 400-800m runner not what you believe they should be trained as but the characteristics that tell you that they would respond better from an option A v Option B approach) and / or their performance goals and the time available to achieve them (do they have only 2 years before they retire or is this a one prep thing or is it open ended?
Greater speed over 200m
Greater aerobic power
greater Vo2 max
greater La+ threshold
La+ threshold will only go so high, once it’s there, it’s there. But it will take some hard work to get it there.
Vo2 max, again, will only go so high, but again, will take hard work to raise it up
Aerobic power - virtually unlimited (off season x-country, road runs etc)