© Copyright – 2024 – Athletics Illustrated
“Good and bad training can look the same on paper.”
— Arthur Lydiard
Let’s get the language right when communicating about racing, training, physiology and the sport of running.
Athletics is a sport and lifestyle which carries a unique language. The terminology is often disparate and confusing, and the people involved consume information — especially online — that can conflate.
For example, when a coach (skilled or otherwise), lazily uses incorrect language to describe training, it may seem harmless if the athlete knows precisely what the coach means to say but if not, the message may cause the athlete to execute the wrong training session.
Accurate and concise communication is vital to success.
Let’s start with one of the most common language slip-ups used today.
Interval training
Intervals are the rest or recovery period in between repetitions of hard work. Case closed, that is the accurate way to phrase it. So, how many of you have said or have heard “interval session.” Don’t fret, even elite athletes and professional coaches will make this mistake.
But we should fix this. It is inaccurate and may lead to confusion. We are not training to rest, we are training to run faster.
Examples
400m track session
Correct: 10 x 400m repetitions run in 70 seconds each with 60 seconds of rest (or recovery) in between.
Incorrect: 10 x 400m intervals run in 70 seconds each with 60 seconds of rest (or recovery) in between.
Now it is unlikely in most scenarios to confuse an athlete with the incorrect description, the intervals, here, are meant to be the quality part of the session, but imagine scenarios, where a coach and athlete are rapidly exchanging this information back and forth over the phone or by text. You and I both know this could go sideways.
Tempo run
Tempo is one of the most misused terms in run training.
How many times have you heard, “I am going out for a tempo run,” or, more coy-like, “I raced that as a tempo run.”
The latter is an excuse to deflect from the fact that the athlete is out of shape, set the goal too high, raced with poor tactics or is in over his or her head. It is refreshing to hear, “I raced that one poorly, next time I will execute better, lesson learned.”
A tempo run is at a pace that is 15-20 seconds per kilometre slower than one’s own current 5K race pace. Popular coach Jack Daniels is one of several people who are credited with popularizing the term.
A good and hearty tempo session includes a healthy warm-up run of 3 to 5 km, followed by 20 minutes at the above pace (or effort), and followed by another easier portion of the run called a warm-down (yes, we will get into that in a minute, versus cool-down). Athletes will want to improve their ability to clear lactate (not lactic acid; now an archaic term). One of the sessions to include in a training program is tempo running, as well as threshold running.
Threshold running (aerobic and anaerobic threshold)
While a tempo run, as per above, will help train the body to more efficiently clear lactate, a 60-minute run (give or take) is effective too, as are longer runs, of course.
Anyone wishing to learn the ins and outs of threshold-termed training may become very confused by the myriads of definitions and ever-changing language available on the internet.
As long as the coach and athlete or training partners know what they mean to say, we can get away with loosely termed language. Again, it is best to get it right.
Aerobic threshold is a steady effort run in a long or longer run, below the lactate production pace/effort.
Anaerobic threshold (depending on who you ask) is lactate threshold running too.
Arthur Lydiard created an interesting threshold-like run called an out-and-back. These runs were created to allow a few things to happen:
1. Gives the athlete a session to get aerobically fitter during the base or marathon phase without just running slow, all the time.
2. Practice clearing lactate and
3. Check fitness without checking fitness. Let me explain.
During the aerobic phase of training (off-season, base, or marathon phase), the athlete can often get impatient and may want to check where their fitness is by racing. Racing all out or doing a hard anaerobic session may usurp aerobic development. It is like planting a seed, watching the tree grow, then pulling the sapling from the earth to see how the roots are growing, harming the tree in the process.
Out-and-backs:
A common out-and-back run is to warm up for 3 km or 20-30 minutes, run 30 minutes out and then turn around and come back over the same route (flat or gently rolling). The effort should be the same 100 per cent of the time (not pace: effort). Imagine a tachometer in your car and you have the needle hovering just below the red zone the entire time. This is not an easy effort and the athlete should not strain. When the run is complete, the runner should say, “I could have run faster if I had to, but I am glad I didn’t.”
Each time this run is undertaken, the first 30 minutes should take the runner farther out. Once the improvement stops, it is time to move on to the next phase of training. See Lydiard training here.
Full marathon
This is strictly a pet peeve. Again, even long-tenured folks in the running community say, “full marathon,” or “the full.”
Technically speaking, a marathon is a full marathon only when registrations are sold out. Otherwise, the distance, named after the plains of Marathon, where Phidippides died, is it.
Unfortunately, the advent of dance-a-thons and telethons co-opted the term and ruined it for everyone involved. Additionally, the creation of the half-marathon contributed to the misnomer, as participants chose to differentiate between the half-marathon and the marathon. The half-marathon is a newer invention, promoted by the notion that a destination marathon runner may have a travel companion who can tackle the half-marathon.
Let’s stop referring to the marathon as a full marathon. The marathon is a 42.195-kilometre race, plus 1m for every km measured over the shortest possible tangents.
Long run
Those who run shorter than 32 kilometres (20 miles) or 2:30:00 as their long run can absolutely be forgiven for referring to a 15, 20, or 25K run as a long run. It is long for them. However, for the distance running and not just the marathon, a “marathon long run,” does indeed have a minimum standard of 2:00:00 or 20 miles or 32 km. In the case of elite athlete, whichever comes first is an effective credo to keep for most long runs.
The training effect well over two hours becomes less and less as time passes, but the fuelling, weight control and general muscle fatigue adaptation continue to be of value. Cardiovascular and cardiorespiratory (the former includes the lungs, otherwise it is the same term), benefit just as well for most with an approximate two-hour run. This is where the author elicits all sorts of personal emails correcting the information. North American marathon record holder Cameron Levins is an outlier, as is world record holder Kelvin Kiptum, please, do not quote them.
Speed work
Another of the many abused terms related to running training.
Speed work is related only to the muscular and neuromuscular stimulus and function created by the fast twitch muscles and very fast, short bursts. Athletes perform “speed work” with alactic strides, sprints, drills, very short and relaxed hill repetitions and bounding-like exercises. These can be complemented well with weight resistance training, box jumps and sandhill running.
Pure muscular speed, is done with good form and quick turnover, often too fast to be carried out for more than a few seconds. Although 200m and even 400m repetitions contribute to neuromuscular stimulus they can become anaerobic if run too fast (for the base phase).
Fartlek sessions are done as they were originally intended by “feel.” Athletes will run faster but not straining when they feel ready to do so and slow by feel as well. Fartlek runs are a great sessions for staying “in touch” with fast, muscular function or speed.
The very popular 1 km, 1 mile or 1500m repetitions with 60, 90 or 2:00 recovery or rest are typically done at plus or minus 10 km race pace. This is not strictly speaking “speed work,” but anaerobic or near anaerobic training.
