There has been quite a discussion lately on the forum about HR’s and HR’s monitoring.
Role of Tempo is rather clear in its purposes with regard to CNS functioning,and skeletal muscles recovery;
anyway, what is the effect of Charlie’s approach to Tempo and other Low Intensity training components on the Sprinter’s heart muscle in the long Run?
Should a Sprinters ’ Coach just disregard heart muscle structural and functional dynamics as not a primary limiting factor of performance?
Charlie?
Anyone with on field experience of Charlie’s approach to tempo and Low Intensity as opposed to others’ extremes ( no tempo <—> intensive tempos) ?
I have a distance running background and have started to use tempo work to speed up my pace so I can try and improve my occasional 400/800/1500 times.
Have done sessions of 25 secs every 1min or 55 secs every 1min 30.
I did these wearing a heart rate monitor and found the effort level got up to that experienced when running my distnace efforts for VO2 max. eg running stuff like repeat 800s at 3000 pace which are classic VO2 sessions for distance runners.
The time I spent at this HR on tempo sets was not as long as on the longer reps. eg spike up to 160bpm rather than holdoing it there for 2 mins.
My theory is that the tempo runs suggested by Charlie provide good VO2 max training but without the sustained load of lactic you get when running 5 X 800m etc. The shorter durations also encourage better running style since over 30 ses to 50secs you dont lose technique.
I would be interested to hear Charlie`s take on my findings re HR and tempo runs.