| Anaerobic Critical Point Distance Racing |
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| Athletes and coaches often fall into a trap of not understanding or applying training to the realities of racing at any level. At a beginning level of cross country or track racing, workouts aim for generalities in conditioning without any focus on event-specific needs of the athlete when it comes down to crunch-time . . . the big race. Although this approach is fine for the initial base period of conditioning, lasting about two years in the average scenario of a youth distance athlete, as soon as the athlete understands the demands of an all out race to win, the training must become more event and physiologically specific. |
| In its most elemental form, distance training is adapting the body's capability to transport oxygen to the peripheral muscles while removing by-products of exercise such as lactic acid from the same involved musculature. This involves cardiovascular, pulmonary, and peripheral development, most of which will not be complete without 24 months of relatively consistent training load. In a youth athlete, this adaptation primarily involves building of additional capillary beds in the peripheral musculature that allow greater and more efficient transport of oxygen, although substantial cardiovascular enhancement is possible during this first phase of training as well. However, while this physiological adaptation is taking place, a coach and athlete need to be learning an important facet of how to blend the tactical and physiological demands of an intensive race. Through training for and understanding the 'critical point' of distance racing and adapting training to deal with the needs of the athlete as she or he transitions from aerobic to anaerobic racing energy systems, the coach will be able to maximize racing performances. |
| The critical point of a distance race occurs when an athlete has reached a time in the contest where recruitment of faster-twitch muscle fibers and a physical 'shift' of rhythm through increased stride frequency must occur. It is common to see athletes of all learning stages run a distance race with perfect pacing, coasting in to a finish in an aerobically exhausted state, then within seconds stating to a coach or a parent, "I think I could have gone a lot harder!" They have trained using strength and perhaps speed endurance, but have been uninformed how to best use both the aerobic and anaerobic energy systems to best advantage. This "critical" point typically occurs in the last 200-300 meters of an 800 meter race, the last 300 to 400 meters of a 1500-1600 meter race, and the last 400-600 meters of longer races. The concept of ideal anaerobic critical point distance racing is to get to the critical point of your race as efficiently and fast as possible while maintaining the ability to shift rhythm to an anaerobic state (kick)! |
| The aerobic/anaerobic shift occurs at a point an athlete is confident he or she can reach the finish line without systemic failure but at the highest racing speed possible. To get to this point with a goal of overall racing effectiveness, the athlete first must arrive at the critical point in position to win. Athletes who ignore speed-endurance training and arrive at this point totally spent both aerobically and anaerobically will obviously not be able to make the metabolic and rhythm shift to a higher-speed finish and will slow dramatically, so the first concern for a coach should be to ensure that an athlete is able to get to the critical point of a race without total energy-system failure. A solid and long-term aerobic base (summer mileage) is always a good first step, but a coach can do wonders with judicious use of sustained power runs, steady-state high VO2 runs, step-down runs with 800-1200m steps, and speed-endurance intervals, the crux of many programs. Speed-endurance intervals, an example of which could by 5-6 x 800m with a 3:00-3:45 (HS) or 4:00-4:30 (Youth) jog-walk rest, are critical in developing an athlete with the proper physical and mental conditioning to reach the critical point of a race with enough left to change rhythm. Keeping speed-endurance intervals consistent and at or near the goal pace of a race (regardless of the race distance) helps the racer adapt psychologically to the stresses of running at speed, adapt to the duration of the speed (speed-endurance), and focus on economy and form issues which will help conserve energy. This training accounts for 75%-90% of the actual race distance run . . . every step until the critical point is reached. Even without a sustained mileage and distance build-up phase, it is possible to present microcycles of training (weekly) which have both speed-endurance and critical-point speed training elements during the competitive season. |
| So now we have enabled the athlete to reach the critical point of a race in relatively competitive condition. Unfortunately, in many programs, the athlete will finish a race from the critical point never having used available full energy from the anaerobic system! The first need a coach has is to convince an athlete who has spent a career emphasizing consistency of pace and efficiency that there is a faster way to finish a race from the critical point. Good pacing and efficiency at the end of a race will produce a good result, but the winning athlete, all other conditions being equal, will be the one who is able to shift rhythm at the critical point and accelerate anaerobically to the finish! Any race from upper-level high school racing to the finals of the Olympics or World Championships shows the exact same result . . . a ratio of the race (usually 75%-90%) run at supreme aerobic effort, paced precisely to get the competitor to the critical point at the ragged edge of aerobic failure . . . followed by a furious change of rhythm in the stride frequency of the athlete as sprint-speed and anaerobic effort replaces the nearly-depleted aerobic ability. These athletes realize something that our youth need to understand before they will be able to race well at a higher level . . . although the anaerobic energy system produces high amounts of lactic acid and is non-sustainable, we must use it as the end of the race is approaching anyway and this is the fastest way to get to the finish! Therefor the coach of youth athletes will have to convince a distance athlete to change rhythm by driving the arms (down in particular), cycling the feet without any forward (overstriding) hinging action, creating a 'pawing' motion with the ball of the foot and a correspondingly large back-kick, and dorsiflexing the foot to produce an active 'sprint' foot plant. All of these form cues shift the rhythm through increasing stride frequency . . . the key to shifting speed at the critical point. This is how the anaerobic critical point shift is made at the distance from the end of the race, pre-determined by the athlete and coach through training, which allows maximum use of the anaerobic system before muscular failure. |
| Sprint-speed workouts to train maximum anaerobic efficiency are focusing only on the last 10%-25% of the race, but a percentage of the race which has much greater velocity and much less physiological efficiency. The 'sprint' phase which occurs after the critical point needs to emphasize physical efficiency as well as mental strength. It is of course hard to "run fast when you are tired" (the governing Kenyan philosophy of distance running), but work on form and mechanics under the watchful eye of a knowledgeable coach will help the athlete to maintain a high degree of efficiency even as lactic acid is building up at a high rate. To help in this regard, sprint-speed workouts need to focus on the sprint mechanics and sprint form of the anaerobic shift after the critical point. The workouts can be brief, intense, and highly structured to produce a lactic acid build-up that the athlete has to combat through proper mechanics at high speed. A good example would be the new sprint-speed workouts utilizing the information Dr. Don Paterson (University of Western Ontario, London, CA) is currently developing about 1:1 rest training at high VO2 Max (above 90%). Athletes should focus on short bouts of intense speed form (15-90 seconds) with an equal rest period, keeping their VO2 max above 90%. This is easily accomplished by keeping distance athletes in proper sprint form with descending time intervals, again forcing the athletes to run fast when they are tired. An example workout would be (after proper warm-up) 3 x 90 seconds, 3 x 60 seconds, 3 x 30 seconds with a precise 1:1 rest, all at sprint-speed using proper arm and leg mechanics. A corollary benefit of this type of workout is the actual formulation of fast-twitch daughter cells in the muscle fiber, but the athlete will mainly benefit from the form work at speed, muscle-memory during a race, and psychological sense of confidence that he or she can and will get to the finish line with a devastating kick from the critical point of a race! |
| Speed-endurance work and long aerobic threshold runs have an additional benefit to the critical point concept. Long and intense runs are the best way to produce the training effect responsible for the body producing metabolic buffers that help an athlete deal with chronic build-up of lactic acid. In other words . . . the more time spent in training for the first part of the race prior to the critical point, the easier the final adaptation will be as the athlete deals with rapid lactic acid production in the terminal stages of a race after the critical point is reached. However, there is no substitute for form and speed training at the critical point in order to get the distance athlete to finish in control, at speed, and using every available element of energy from both the aerobic and anaerobic systems. |
| To Run Your Best Race Using Critical Point Training: |
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| 3/6/01 Jeff Arbogast Bingham High School South Jordan, UT USA |
| USATF Level II Multi-Events USATF Level III Endurance Candidate |
| Copyright © 2001 BINGHAM All Rights Reserved. |