after speaking to someone who insists ben ran out as far as 500m regularly for his special end session, i would like to know from CF if this is true or not? obviously ive read CF say he may not have (if i read properly), but i would be keen to know anyways.
thanks
Nope! Ben never ran 500 SE though he did do it in tempo sessions sometimes. Ben did go out to 300 for SE till 1981 but was mostly 150 and shorter after.
I do believe that when he came back in 1992, he did some sessions like that with Dennis Mitchel - but not with me- and not with any good result!
thanks,
so would you still do another speed end seesion going out to 120m, or would that be to much on the body to have 2 session’s a week going out to 150m and 120m in the same week?
Ben’s training partner Angela, says in her book Running Risks Ben stopped doing 150’s/200’s and did starts instead…Charlie to be clear, Ben rarely did SE over 150? Why then, do you espouse >200m?
CFTS suggests 200-300m.
Remember, as a developing athlete, it makes sense to improve your performance through general fitness and special endurance that targets the glycolytic pathways than concentrating on the phosphate envelope where you may only be able to shave off 0.5 secs if you are lucky(read Charlie’s Vancouver 2004 PDF files). Once you have brought down the large differential that exists at 100m and 200m between an elite and developing athlete, then you can concentrate on fine tuning the shorter distances.
Also the gains on a biochemical level from doing SE takes YEARS to disappear. phosphate and Glycolytic enzyme concentrations (the powerhouses responsibe for metabolism in muscles) takes YEARS to decrease. You lose aerobic conditioning and CNS conditioning FASTER than you lose anaerobic metabolic gains from exercise. Ben would have been more than catered for with Charlie’s training since the tempo would take care of the aerobic and the weights and speed work would work the strength end.
There are many different SE schemes that are appropriate for different athletes.
BTW, Ben certainly DID do a considerable number of 150s and his times over the distance were nothing short of fantastic!
In 1988, Ben briefly went out as far as 200m (2 x 200 from stand in 19.5, which would prob yield about 20.00e or slightly better out of blocks in a race.)
During SPP1 are the repeat 60’s used as SE for all levels even the beginner or lower level sprinters.
You have a great deal of flexibility on how you set up the SE. For example, you can sprint to the end, walk directly back and go again or go back and forth to shorten the break (making it equivalent to SE2 with enough reps- prob 3 or more)
What about an EFE/FEF approach for longer distances? Would this work in the same/a similar way? What would the advantages/disadvantages be? I am referring to racing distances longer than 100 m. Thanks!
Some use the FEF approach over 150 but I didn’t. I concentrated on using it to enhance acceleration and to vary the speed to prevent a speed plateau from forming during the early SPP. By the time we are doing the highest speed work, we’d usually drop the speed change drills because we couldn’t sustain that much total CNS demand and the accel needs were already in place.
That said, you could view the indoor SE as mult accels whenever you go back and forth. With Ben, I used 60s with a walk back of either incomplete or complete recovery, so you’d have to think of each 60 separately.
Where can we get the pdf files? I have the Van '04 DVD and the Welcome kit, thanks.
In the cfts, during the spp1 runs out to distances of 60m is recommended, then spp2 120-150m and then spp3 out to 200m. Can runs out to 200m be used in in spp1 as SE if the emphasis on indoor competition is not only on 60m but also on 200m. Or have people found that the 60m repeats are a better way to increase SE as well as accel.
So an ends to the middle, and I know some people dont like that way of training.
You can see in the Vancouver 204 DVD that you can approach the problem from either Long-to-Short or Short-to-Long but when you have to work indoors with tight corners, there’s no doubt that S-to-l holds an advantage
Thanks, Charlie! I was referring to early SPP, yes. Although I suppose you could extented a bit longer in the season, if a concurrent approach was employed; yes, no?
Yes, you can.
When you order the vanc 2004 DVD/download it should come with the download. If not you have to ask for it.
charlie, what did the comp phase of your spp2 and 3 look like? were you doing 150’s in it?
Sometimes but the meets might replace most of the highest intensity work with the rest sub-max once the pre-comp was over