Run Run Away

Question:

– Hide quoted text — Show quoted text – FWIW, Bob Glover certainly hasn’t given us a break from long intervals (1-2.4 miles) and tempos this summer, in fact it seems we seldom do anything else these days. A lot of our people are training for the NY marathon.   Are you running in Atlanta, GA, with its weather, or in NY, with its (cooler, drier) weather? NY. It’s hot enough to slow pace on a tempo run down by 20 seconds per mile on a bad day, so a tempo run would be somewhat slower than any race I’d run in cool conditions, but it’s nowhere near as severe as what Phil describes.

I think I’m just going to stop whining and run in the morning, at least until the daily highs are less than 80 in mid September. Phil M.

Response:

What about recent science concerning training in heat and racing in cooler temps?

Off my radar – I have not read anything about it. All I know is I run better, faster and have more fun when I go from summer heat to fall coolness. No science just personal taste. I do know and experienced the revese this spring – I trained in cool and ran in heat and shit the bed big time. I’ll bet I get an amen from those that did Boston this year. -Doug

Response:

Off my radar

Been spending too much time on your hands and knees Doug?

Response:

Donovan, I’ll re-phrase Phil’s question slightly. It’s an old discussion we’ve played around with several times. Say you have two runners of identical ability. One trains in Bangor, Maine, the other in Atlanta, GA. They do virtually identical workouts for 6 months, consisting of tempo, LSD, etc monitoring their exertion with HRM’s, staying within identical ranges. However, because of the significant difference in temperature and it’s effect on the body, The Maine runner’s average speed for all the workouts is about 45 seconds per mile faster than his southern compatriot. Given the old adage that you "train fast to run fast, train slow to run slow,"  it would appear that in a race at a neutral site, the Maine runner would have the advantage, having trained at a faster overall rate. Otherwise, you could create a new adage, train slow in the heat, beat them Yankees anyway…"  <g Mike Tennent "IronPenguin"

Response:

FWIW, Bob Glover certainly hasn’t given us a break from long intervals (1-2.4 miles) and tempos this summer, in fact it seems we seldom do anything else these days. A lot of our people are training for the NY marathon.   Are you running in Atlanta, GA, with its weather, or in NY, with its (cooler, drier) weather? NY. It’s hot enough to slow pace on a tempo run down by 20 seconds per mile on a bad day, so a tempo run would be somewhat slower than any race I’d run in cool conditions, but it’s nowhere near as severe as what Phil describes.

  That’s why the different perspectives.  I checked the climatology a bit, especially the dew points, and mine are closer to his than yours, and are already bad enough to be worth more like 40-60 seconds/mile (to me) on a tempo-type run.  I’m definitely on the end of being more affected by hot and humid than most people.  But, then again, he’s also got worse heat and humidity to deal with.  The pace difference is enough that I feel that such training serves mostly to beat me up, but not do much towards racing, lactic tolerance, running efficiency, or anything else one is trying to train either biochemically or biomechanically in preparation for a race in cooler weather.     Now, if the race were liable to be in hot/humid conditions, absolutely do the tempo runs in hot/humid conditions.  Specificity is required there, and Dr. Clark showed the merits.  But Chicago is just not that hot and humid in early October.  Even if the temperature gets high, by running standards, the humidity doesn’t (well, much less often than the temperature) get high in October. — Robert Grumbine http://www.radix.net/~bobg/ Science faqs and amateur activities notes and links. Sagredo (Galileo Galilei) "You present these recondite matters with too much evidence and ease; this great facility makes them less appreciated than they would be had they been presented in a more abstruse manner." Two New Sciences

Response:

Donovan, I’ll re-phrase Phil’s question slightly. It’s an old discussion we’ve played around with several times. Say you have two runners of identical ability. One trains in Bangor, Maine, the other in Atlanta, GA. They do virtually identical workouts for 6 months, consisting of tempo, LSD, etc monitoring their exertion with HRM’s, staying within identical ranges.

I object to your premise. In particular, "etc" could possibly include a lot of things. Neither LSD, nor tempo training, do a whole lot for speed development (that’s why milers don’t just run tempos). Both of these primarily train the aerobic system. However, because of the significant difference in temperature and it’s effect on the body, The Maine runner’s average speed for all the workouts is about 45 seconds per mile faster than his southern compatriot.

No it isn’t. Both of them will be able to perform their more anaerobic workouts at comparable pace. I ran a mile PR this summer. Likewise, a workout predictive of 1 mile performance (like two sets of an 800+400+2×200 ladder with full recoveries) will be largely unaffected by heat, because you simply don’t heat up a whole lot in the space of 3 minutes (and you use full recoveries to minimise cumulative heat buildup) Given the old adage that you "train fast to run fast, train slow to run slow,"  

The old adage is just that — an old adage. We now know that there are a number of problems with that assertion. In particular: (1) running ones base milage at a faster pace does not have a demonstrated advantage over running ones base milage slowly. (2) running at race pace is not as beneficial to running economy as training at a pace that may be much faster than race pace. In other words, doing the ladder workout I mentioned will do more for ones running economy than doing a tempo run (even if the actual race is run closer to tempo pace). (3) it’s well known that it’s not necessary to focus on speed-development for the entire training season. An emphasis on the aerobic system early in the training season, far from being detrimental, has provided excellent results for many athletes. In other words, you need to run fast sooner or later, but you don’t have to run fast all the time, and there will be several weeks for speed development after summer and before the race. it would appear that in a race at a neutral site, the Maine runner would have the advantage, having trained at a faster overall rate.

Not all parts of training are equal. Suppose you took two runners, one of whom his base milage at 7:30, the other whom did it at 8:00. But the one who trained at a slower pace also does a 4×1200 interval workout at 5:20 pace twice a week. Now on average, the guy with the 7:30 training pace is running faster, but which guy do you think is going to win ? The moral of this little parable is that: (a) you’ve assumed that they do identical workouts, but this needn’t be the case. The hot weather guy can add speed-specific work, and even do so in a fairly stress free way (strides, or 4×200 at the end of a tempo) (b) the 6 miles or so of fast running is actually more important as far as speed is concerned than the 70 miles or so of slow running. By incorporating a small amount of fast training (that doesn’t suffer from the heat) into the program, one can avoid losing speed. Cheers, — Donovan Rebbechi http://pegasus.rutgers.edu/~elflord/

Response:

I know we’ve discussed this recently and in the distant past. In fact, I recall a thread on this newsgroup between Mike Tennent and I back in ‘98. Go here for some interesting talk – http://tinyurl.com/6s2ue My question below still remains unanswered. [snip]

[more snip] Yes, that’s the problem. But maybe like Donovan says: So the point is that maybe you don’t get as much running economy workout of your tempo run, because the pace is slower. But this "should’t" matter a whole lot, provided that you’re already doing specific running economy work anyway. and Your speed really is there, you just can’t see it because of the shitty training conditions But you seem to think that the hot weather is a deterrent to quality training for a race to be held in cool weather.

  It may be that Donovan’s take is entirely correct.  On the other hand, his experience comes from a place cooler, and substantially drier, than even me, and mine is still drier than yours.  Might also be that you aren’t nearly as weather sensitive as I am.   To go to the matter of what’s going on when you are running in summer, as reflected by heart rate, and why I’m inclined to disagree about the effectiveness of sustained (as opposed to shorter) speed work in humid weather, …   Why is your heart rate elevated in the summer for given (distance) paces?  I’m confident that, notwithstanding how it feels at times, it isn’t because you have to push harder to move through humid air. If it were muscular effort involved, in one way or another, then I’d say no fundamental difference to the training as muscular effort is muscular effort and if the speed isn’t reflected against the track, it is indeed being built into the muscles.   Instead, though, I think that the pulse is elevated in response to the difficulty of getting rid of heat in the humid air.  It’s certainly necessary to be able to dump heat, but doing so in more difficult conditions doesn’t help your running biochemistry (lactic acid tolerances, metabolic enzymes, …) or your running biomechanics. It does good by way of keeping you from overheating/heat stroking/etc., which is certainly helpful to your training, by way of keeping you alive.       So my view is that for my tempo run heart rate of 174, if I run in (very) bad weather, that 174 represents a 14 bpm penalty for the weather, and 160 as the indicator for running training level and type (i.e., vo2 vs. lactic vs …) .  To get the running training level of 174, I’d have to run at 188.  So goes my rationale for runs of sustained elevated pace only.  LSD is LSD, even with heat and humidity, as are short forays into elevated pace.  ’short’ = short enough that heat dissipation is not becoming a major factor in deciding whether I can hold the pace.   Obviously this is physiologically testable, and may have been done (though my last forays in to zunis.org didn’t show me anything where they looked at the high humidity cases with respect to the sorts of things we’re talking about here).     Sam?  Someone else?  – Are there research studies on high humidity running and training effects? [snip]   In terms of the conditions helping or hurting … you have the conditions you have. True, but another option is to just run in the early morning and this whole   question as to quality of training can be dropped. The question will still be out there, but I won’t have to worry about it for now.

  By all means move those runs to the morning!  If you can dodge the question entirely, do so!     I’ve checked the weather for Chicago (taking Midway airport, MDW, as a better approximation to the course conditions than O’Hare), and, according to http://www.wunderground.com/history/airport/KMDW/2003/10/7/WeeklyHist… the highest high for the week beginning October 7 is 80 F (cooler than I’d have thought), average 73, and minimum of 59 — for the high, 57, 51, and 43 for the lows.  More importantly, the maximum dew point was 61, with the average being 47 F.  At a dew point of 61, even if the temperature is 80, and even if you’re as bad as me about weather sensitivity, you should be fine on the weather.   — Robert Grumbine http://www.radix.net/~bobg/ Science faqs and amateur activities notes and links. Sagredo (Galileo Galilei) "You present these recondite matters with too much evidence and ease; this great facility makes them less appreciated than they would be had they been presented in a more abstruse manner." Two New Sciences

Response:

FWIW, Bob Glover certainly hasn’t given us a break from long intervals (1-2.4 miles) and tempos this summer, in fact it seems we seldom do anything else these days. A lot of our people are training for the NY marathon.   Are you running in Atlanta, GA, with its weather, or in NY, with its (cooler, drier) weather?

NY. It’s hot enough to slow pace on a tempo run down by 20 seconds per mile on a bad day, so a tempo run would be somewhat slower than any race I’d run in cool conditions, but it’s nowhere near as severe as what Phil describes. Cheers, — Donovan Rebbechi http://pegasus.rutgers.edu/~elflord/

Response:

– Hide quoted text — Show quoted text – I know we’ve discussed this recently and in the distant past. In fact, I recall a thread on this newsgroup between Mike Tennent and I back in ‘98. Go here for some interesting talk – http://tinyurl.com/6s2ue My question below still remains unanswered. What I’m wondering though, is when training in all this heat are you ever able to really train at a level that would go along with your predicted race time (if the race is run at cooler temps)? I would think that ideally (though maybe not possible) you would want to train in conditions that would be similar to your goal race.   Certainly that’s the ideal.  Specificity is advantageous in most things.  But then, recall that we don’t train for marathons by running marathons.  Selective specificity? [snip] I did a tempo run yesterday while it was 93