What would you change if you aimed to compete at 200m rather than 100m?
Well, possibly the length of the final sub-max runs, depending on the strengths of the individual athlete and the length of the final SE/races . If the final 100% sessions was 2 x 200m, you might go out as far as 180 for the 2nd sub-max session if it’s at the lower end of the sub-max time range.
My memory is crook but I seem to recall Ben time trialling (in training) a 200m in something like 19.6 just before the Seoul Games.
Charlie: Why did you decide to take him out as far as 200m?
(apologies if you’ve answered this before on the forum because I obv missed it :o )
He’d missed all the mid distance stuff with injuries and hadn’t gone beyond 60m since the meet in Cologne. He had PB’d in training out to and including 60m (by my reckoning, equivalent to 6.28 to 6.30e!)
This was done in Toronto before we left for Japan a bit over three weeks out- there were two such sessions of 2 x 200 with the second one at 19.5, 19.5. These were not the final sessions at 100%.
That’s interesting cos this year (12 day taper because of where competition fell) I tried the following for an athlete running 21.0:
1st: 90m (8.8s)
2nd: 180m (19.8s)
3rd: 120m (13.2s)
4th: Blocks to 40m
Charlie, I think you posted somewhere that you decided to switch Angela’s plan from L-to-S to S-to-L at some point. If this is the case, what made you come to this decision? Thanks!
PS sorry, but I can’t find this post of yours now…
It’s more that she wanted to try it based on Ben’s success with it.
You can read about it in Running Risks. She talks about how her start always botherer her and the key to ben’s success was that he didn’t do longer SE runs because he was lazy 
What is the rational behind this? To maintain rhythm?
If you had 7 days till your next meet can’t you just follow a 7 day period of doing NOTHING? that would be the simplest taper to understand. Also very relaxing and organized as nothing is involved.
That’s a good enough reason! 
I’ll get Angela’s book, yes!
So the moral to the story is…don’t do intermediate (100-200m) SE as well as intermediate (intensive) tempo?
This is also what I saw in my own phase 2 this year. SPP with a session of 60s, a session of 80s and John Smith’s 300-200-100 saw 8.4h for 80m in two separate sessions during the SPP (not tapered). But precomp with 4X80 and 3X120, which I thought was going to be faster, was actually slower and races (2) were slower. Then, following one of Verkhoshansky’s papers and doing competition period training roughly at competition distance for 100m, with 60+2X80+100 and 2X30+4X90 eventually yielded much faster times.
Given that I know that both SMTC and HSI have historically done SE as breakdowns, I’m tempted to start doing the 80/100/120/150 BACKWARDS and not doing any SE that doesn’t at least end at race pace/race distance or faster.
Comments?
Can you explain it a bit better? So you were running fast doing 60s and 80s (I assume speed work?) and the 300-200-100 special endurance session, but when you went to only speed endurance (80s and 120s) you stagnated? Sorry I am just kind of confused by your post and how your progression goes (I did read your thread about your JS influenced spp).
i agree his post is hard to understand.
The times with 4X80 and 3X120 didn’t just stagnate. They got slower. This changed around when I went to shorter SE during comp period.
Ignoring tempo and weights (both 2X/wk in the whole phase) to avoid making the post too long, the progression went:
SPP
Sun: 2X30+3X60
Mon 300+200+100
Fri 4X80
Precomp
Mon: 3X120
Fri: 4X80
Comp
Mon: 60+2X80+100
Fri: 30+4X90
Do you think that extra 20m really made the huge difference or was it more an intensification as the season went on (you were running races), you adapted to the training, etc.?
The volume is basically identical on a weekly basis with the only real difference being a slight bit more variety in the distances and 20m less max distance (100m vs 120m). What were the competition results like during the comp period and what was the progression? Do you have times from the workout and such?
One thing I see is that there is a massive drop in volume from SPP to the precomp period. You go from over 1000m a week of SE/special endurance to <700m of just SE. One thing I have noticed in my own training is that too dramatic of a change (even if it is towards less work) can cause decreases in performance as it really disrupts what the body has been doing.
I am interested to hear your thoughts though and also why you said don’t do SE and intensive tempo? I don’t see any intensive tempo in your training… at all, at least as I know it. I am assuming the rest for all those reps are basically complete except for the special endurance 300, 200, 100 session in SPP?
Comp
Mon: 60+2X80+100
Fri: 30+4X90
i dont get this whats the +2,+4 for?
HSI, SMTC, Charlie’s program (and others) have many common points and a few differences. They had great success obviously. But combining them won’t give the expected results. Each of them had unique progression which was monitored by the coaches. It’s no longer a matter of what to do but how to do it.
Exciting!
Many people would have assumed that BJ would not have run anywhere near so well over 200m, even in training.
Pardon me again if you’ve posted this already somewhere recently, but what did Ben achieve in his final 100% sessions during the taper for Seoul?
Did he stick with 200m as a distance or come back down?
He came back down. We had a relay meet in Japan that would have been the taper session but the weather was shocking and we had to do the minimum to stay in one piece. He did an 80m where he ran a PB- equivalent to the 8.02 he posted in the race itself. I’m guessing the 200s would have given him around 19:90 to 20:00e, much better than his best of 20:29 run in 1985.