textbook-perfect safety-first baton swap in the 4x4, osaka 07
… and then of course there are alternate scenarios
Does anyone have relay splits?for wariner…
(Merritt 44.4, Taylor 43.8, Williamson 44.33, Wariner 43.09)
Thank you:) I got the same yesterday re-watching the video…
The following is taken from another thread http://www.charliefrancis.com/community/showthread.php?p=168170#post168170(try and keep all this together)
[i]In the “lactate threshold” thread under Fundamentals there is a (very) detailed description and discussion of the concurrent program theory and the types of sessions involved (inc 6x200 and 200+200)
The 6x200 was a figure I settled on but it was sometimes 5x200. The number of reps depended on how fit the athlete was, how tolerant the athlete was to this kind of endurance training and how fast the speed of the 200s.
6x200 was done during the General Preparation Phase (GPP). If we went back into consolidating the base later during the year, sometimes 6x200 would be reintroduced.
But usually once we entered into the pre-competition or in-competition phases of the year, we broke the 6x200 session down into one set or two sets of 200+200 and used this work as a yet more race-specific endurance developing set. Sometimes the first 200 was used to race-model for the 400m race pace plan. At other times it was just a moderate tempo run (maybe at the speed of the comehome 200m of the desired 400m race model, eg: if you want to run 44-0 for 400m, the general race model is first 200 in 21, second comeback 200 in 23-seconds).
The 200 multiple sets were always done with a 2mins recovery. BUt as the athletes became fitter the recovery tended to be about 1min 40sec because they jogged 200m recovery distance. We always ran the reps with the prevailing wind on the day. I tried always to keep the technique pretty good, pretty specific to racing positions.
It can be argued that we would have been better to maintain a thread of 6x200 throughout the year, regardless of whether we also introduced work such as 2x200+200.
If you are trying to race 50sec, then your 6x200 pace ultimately should be 26seconds Or slightly faster - because your normal race model for 50.0sec 400 is 24 + 26. (there is of course a degree of individual variation: some will go out much faster and finish much slower to get their 50-flat. BUt it seems the most economical and relatively painless method is to go closer to even-pace which, as expressed in the 400m, involves a differential between the first 200m and the second 200m of about 1-second.[/i]
what about in the pre or early comp phase doing a session of
300+150 rest 30 mins 200+200?
Yes, we did that at various times. We would mostly do 2x300+150 and once did 3x300+150 which reduced my main guy almost to tears when he couldn’t talk me out of it. But he had thought he lacked strength (for the rounds of an upcoming tournament) and I wanted to prove to him that he was fine in that department. He did the 3 sets of 300+150 each with about 40mins recovery. And he did them well.
But if I felt that two sets might be a bit much, or that the 300 element in the second set might tip them over the edge, I would drop the second set to a 200+200 or a 150+150 (with perhaps something shorter, such as 60, 40, 20 off the end of the second 150 rep).
BUt we always kept in mind the overall objective of the session for that day and we kept in mind the timetable we were on leading up to compulsory participation events - such as the team trials, or the Games. Those dates don’t move.
So obviously you can bob and weave around the issues of nailing or avoiding various performance threads, but ultimately you have to face the music.
So you could change individual sessions and water them down from time to time, but you always needed to keep on schedule to make that athlete bullet-proof or you knew for sure that trouble was just around the corner.
Would you see that approach being as necessary for someone not running rounds and only competing at club level? I believe I made a mistake last season of doing too much volume at HI (for me) in comp season hence the question. Not backing off the work required just managing it more appropriately.
Yours is an interesting question and one I’ve posed myself. I still don’t have a perfect answer. I asked it myself to Dan Pfaff at a time he was coaching Bruny and Donovan. He said he “isn’t smart enough” to figure out how to prepare an athlete with a specific variance for either grand prix style (one-off) competitions or championship tournaments (multi rounds).
But I honestly do not think my sessions, often with only a couple of sets (or 4 reps in total, no longer than 300m on a single rep - discounting the “broken” element to the set) are high in volume or intensity .
But you can keep the same work and turn down the intensity, gaining your race specific conditioning from … racing.
So if you race a lot, then tone down the sessions. Go with a 200 + 200 for example in the style of a strength & control session - the first 200 at the speed of the backend of your goal 400m race which, for a 50sec 400 would mean your opening 200 of the set would be inaround 26sec. Then you take your 2mins and you back it up in another 26 or whatever you can manage while maintaining form and avoiding too much tension.
I always tried to get “my” athletes to take “the physical” out of every run (especially races). By that I mean not trying to “muscle” the run. The more you try to use your strength, sometimes the less you have of it to use.
As has been said early in this thread, it is a paradox. You spend all year trying to build the threads of performance, but then if you try too hard to use them they desert you.
So you need to let everything come to you through rhythm.
I think that was the biggest lesson we all learned from watching Carl Lewis hold his nerve during his races. And of course we saw the same capacity in Tommie Smith.
These guys didn’t “push” - they didn’t grasp for something that wasn’t there. They just let it come out without forcing it.
That’s how I tried to get athletes to run their training sets because that’s ultimately how I wanted them to race.
My mantra to my sprinters is “You can’t make yourself go faster, you can only let yourself go faster.” Seems to help with some of them.
Thanks, that actually helps a lot. 
Your comment about not forcing it is a good one, IMHO the way Wariner is running this year is a good 400m example.
One thing i have been thinking about John, in not only regards to yourself, but to Club level Females too. is that roughly we are talking about a 60sec race. To a elite level male, that would be roughly a 500m+ effort, maybe even 550m?
Hence, training for a race over 400m for an elite level male v’s a Club level female or Masters competitor must be diffeent in relation to Energy systems used.
Typically, a 40sec rule is used roughly to measure when Full lactic starts swarming your body. Thats ok for a elite male, they have 4sec left to run. However, a 60sec person has still 20sec to go. Hence, at different areas of the run you will hit certain areas of the energy system differently.
ie, instead of aiming for a 200m time that is only “1” sec off your current best, i would imagine it Must be more closer to 1.5sec or 2sec off. If you go too fast, you will hit total lactic too soon, and have 20sec of saturation to dig into.
Somehow, you would need to hit your lactic saturation later in the race, so by the end of the Sand pit in the home stretch your Hurting like crazy, not 150m to go.
It would also show then, that Aerobic work would be a larger part of the picture than 1st assumed. Potentially a greater area of improvement for a 60sec race,
1st to get to required speed in the reps,
2nd Gets the reps up in volume
3, Gets the Reps distances up to 300m in length. then
4, to work on Recoverys in Tempo After the above are in place.
And thats Just the tempo side. Still leaving you the faster work on your other days.
i hope that makes sence? or that i have writtin it our right?
Bold,
that makes a lot of sense and I am actually wondering if (in my case anyway, and lets face it I suck 
) the key is basically not to worry too much about what the split is at 200m in relation to PB as that leads to crashing and burning just focus on trying to get even splits throughout and getting the total time down. Speed and general endurance can be dealt with elsewhere in training with a greater emphasis on endurance than an elite.
Interesting point Bold.
Does this suggest that non elite 400m runners should work harder at the aerobic end of the training spectrum than at the pure speed end. In other words be an 800/400 type rather than a 200/400 type ?
Clyde Hart recognizes this problem as well, in a slightly different context. He uses 300m for women as the equivalent of 350m for men in his training runs, figuring they would then hit the anaerobic threshold at about the same number of seconds.
Or if you suck AND are a girl, a 250:)
But seriously that’s an interesting point about the 400m being more aerobic for a slower runner. Kitkat, should that be a major consideration when dealing with for example a 60sec runner compared to a 50sec runner?
Although I definitely agree ther may need to be a higher aerobic focus the 2 main issues I see with your suggestion are
- It is easy to get away from the max speed element.
- Volumeitis and becoming an 800/400 runner.
I also wonder if as you age the difference between high and low elements decreases (as with a beginner) and almost everything is essentially a high intensity element therefore you need to allow for more rest. 
Of course. That’s why extensive tempo works so well overall but represents a higher percentage of what’s done for beginners.
With this in mind and the other discussion around this topic I wonder if instead of doing 300+150 it may be better to do 250+200?