SPEED Part2: Speed Endurance (+Aerobic & Alactate speedwork) 10-05-2020 The term ‘speed’ can mean different things and that depends on the context. Building on my previous overview and part1 on ‘pure’ speed , here are my explanations and advice on speed endurance for middle distance runners and the optimum use of this running speed for longer distance endurance runners. 3. Speed endurance can be expressed that as speed and energetics that characterise racing 400m and 800m, and to a lesser extent 1500m. Energetics: these races require a significant contribution of the anaerobic system, very roughly: 60%(400m), 40%(800m), 20%(1500m). That means that there are extra fatigue inducing by-products (of anaerobic power) that must be overcome. It is not the lactate that causes this fatigue but hydrogen ions that inhibit muscle contraction. Lactate can actually be used as a fuel source, but it rises in anaerobic activity directly in proportion to inhibiting waste products (hydrogen ions), so that’ s why sports science uses lactate level testing as a measure of the degree of anaerobic activity (even though it’s not the thing that’s directly causing ‘the problem’) . Science lesson over! Knowing this, we must train to deal with and tolerate significant anaerobic contribution to perform well over 400m/800m/1500m and even in the closing stages of longer endurance races, especially where late surges are involved. Typically, sessions are designed like this (in the competition phase) for a balance of distance and recovery that match the speed & energetics of the event: Event: session reps to target race demands 400m: 4 x 200m off 5mins recovery 800m: 4 x 400 off 3mins recovery or 5 x 300m of 2mins:30rec 1500m : 5 x 600m off 100s rec.or 4 x 800m off 2mins30rec or 8x400m off 1min Notice that reps for 400-1500m total approx. double race distance. This does NOT work exactly the same for longer races! If you cut down theses recoveries or increase the number of reps, then you invariably simply slide the scale to being more aerobic and fail to target these race paces and associated (anaerobic) energetics ... Advanced/senior athletes racing 800m can reduce recovery for reps (for incomplete recovery), so long as grouped in sets, with large recovery between sets, e.g. 4sets x (300m ..rec 60s ...150m)....4 -5mins between sets ...or 4sets x (200m..rec 30s..200m).....4 -5mins between sets. Intense speed endurance/anaerobic work leaves significant fatigue for 2-5days and cannot be maintained to a high degree for too many consecutive weeks, so it has to be introduced to the training programme judiciously and scaled back in the last 5-7 days before racing. 4. Non-anaerobic speed development. Given the lasting residual fatigue that speed endurance brings, it would be ideal to train for the biomechanical demands and speed in the 800m to 1500m range without this (anaerobic inducing) fatigue, and luckily there are 2 ways! 4.1. 15s-30s aerobic strides Relaxed strides over 15s to 30s at 1500m pace with full recovery (say 3 times the run time) will keep energetics in the aerobic zone. This can be slotted into strides before long reps sessions or bolted on to recovery/easy runs. So your muscles, tendons, neural pathways, co-ordination are trained to run relatively fast, but with very little fatigue. Great for 5k-10k runners & very useful leading up to races where hard training is cut back, but with a need to keep a good % of running at race or faster than race speeds to perform well, but stay fresh. Just slow easy running leading up to races is proven by sports research and experience as sub- optimal race prep. Maintaining speed without fatigue is the best policy! 4.2 Alactate speed The first few seconds of sprinting is run using the oxygen we have already breathed in. Similar to aerobic strides, we can do shorter faster efforts without incurring anaerobic load fatigue. So something like 5 x 10s power hills with a slow walk back recovery, after a tempo run will not add much anaerobic load, but will create a slightly faster speed running stimulus. The same can be done on the flat, although the use of hills is thought to add benefit of greater muscle tissue recruitment. This may leave more fatigue than relaxed flat strides, but not if done regularly and not at flat out sprint speed. Although I don’t view 3k to Marathon race pa ce as real speed work, but rather endurance work (at endurance race speed) , I’ll cover some key pointers on these areas in the next speed snippet... Francis Twitter: @fmarsh_marsh1