• Ryan Hall for writing the foreword;
• the world-class marathoners profiled in these pages for sharing how they’ve succeeded; and
• Jack Daniels, the late Arthur Lydiard, Bill Rodgers, David Martin, Bill Squires, Joe Vigil, Lorraine Moller, Kevin Ryan, Arch Jelley, and Randy Wilber for their valuable insights into marathon training.
PART I
Training Components
Chapter 1
Elements of Training
The marathon demands respect. The physiological and psychological demands of the marathon are extreme; therefore you must plan your preparation intelligently and thoroughly.
Unfortunately, intelligent and thorough aren’t the two words that most readily come to mind when thinking about some marathon training programs. Search the Web under “marathon training” and you’ll find thousands of well-meaning but only intermittently helpful sites. The training advice on many of these sites is based more on personal anecdotes and handed-down folk wisdom than on exercise science. You’d be hard-pressed to cull through these sites and summarize why they’re prescribing the type of preparation they present.
That’s too bad because while running a marathon isn’t easy, training for it should be relatively simple. Running a marathon requires specific physiological attributes. The task at hand is to run 26.2 miles (42.2 km) as fast as possible. The requirements for this feat in terms of fuel use, oxygen consumption, biomechanical requirements, and even psychological attributes are highly predictable. In this chapter, we look at the physiological demands of the marathon and how to train most effectively to meet those demands.
First we look at the physiological demands, such as having a high lactate threshold and the ability to store large amounts of glycogen in your muscles and liver. Then we look at the types of training that are most effective for improving marathon performance and explain why. Next we investigate how to structure your training so that it progresses logically to your desired end point. Finally, we look at the importance of using shorter races as tune-ups to the marathon. After reading this chapter, you’ll see the logic underpinning effective marathon training and will better understand which types of training to emphasize and why.
Marathon Physiology
Successful marathoners have many factors in common. Most of these factors are determined by both genetics and training. Genetics determines the range within which you can improve; training determines where your current abilities fall within that range. In this section, we’ll consider the physiological variables necessary for marathon success.
Successful marathoners have these physiological attributes:
• High proportion of slow-twitch muscle fibers. This trait is genetically determined and influences the other physiological characteristics listed here.
• High lactate threshold. This is the ability to produce energy at a fast rate aerobically without accumulating high levels of lactate in your muscles and blood.
• High glycogen storage and well-developed fat utilization. These traits enable you to store enough glycogen in your muscles and liver to run hard for 26.2 miles (42.2 km) and enable your muscles to rely more on fat for fuel.
• Excellent running economy. This is the ability to use oxygen economically when running at marathon pace.
• High maximal oxygen uptake (VO2max). This is the ability to transport large amounts of oxygen to your muscles and the ability of your muscles to extract and use oxygen.
• Quick recovery. This is the ability to recover from training quickly.
Remember, no one factor makes a successful marathoner. Frank Shorter, for example, had 80 percent slow-twitch fibers and a
O2max of 71.4 ml/ kg/min (milliliters of oxygen per kilogram of body weight per minute). In contrast, Alberto Salazar had 93 percent slow-twitch fibers and a
O2max of 78 ml/kg/min. More anecdotally, consider that marathon world-record holder Haile Gebrselassie has the sprint speed to have won an indoor world title at 1,500 meters, while Bill Rodgers never broke 2:00 for 800 meters. Still, each was the best in the world at his peak. The combination of these physiological factors, in conjunction with biomechanical variables and psychological makeup, determines marathoning success. Let’s look more closely at each of the main physiological factors.
Your thousands of muscle fibers can be divided into three categories – slow-twitch, fast-twitch A, and fast-twitch B. The higher the percentage of slow-twitch fibers in your muscles, the greater your likelihood of marathon success. Slow-twitch muscle fibers are naturally adapted to endurance exercise.
They resist fatigue and have a high aerobic capacity, a high capillary density, and other characteristics that make them ideal for marathon running.
The proportion of slow-twitch fibers in your muscles is determined genetically and is believed not to change with training. Although fast-twitch muscle fibers can’t be converted to slow-twitch fibers, with general endurance training they can gain more of the characteristics of slow-twitch fibers, especially the fast-twitch A fibers. These adaptations are beneficial because they allow your fast-twitch fibers to become better at producing energy aerobically.
A muscle biopsy is the only method of determining your proportion of slow-twitch muscle fibers. In a biopsy, a small amount of tissue is cut out of your muscle and analyzed. Though it is interesting (and painful), this procedure is pointless – once you know your fiber-type distribution, there’s nothing you can do about it. In contrast, you can improve other physiological characteristics with training.
A high lactate threshold (LT) is the most important physiological variable for endurance athletes. Lactate threshold most directly determines your performance limit in any event lasting more than 30 minutes. Your marathon race pace is limited by the accumulation of lactate (a by-product of carbohydrate metabolism) and the associated hydrogen ions in your muscles and blood. A close relationship exists between your lactate threshold and marathon performance because lactate threshold reflects the rate at which your muscles can sustain aerobic energy production. Successful marathoners typically race at a speed very close to their lactate-threshold pace.
The average runner’s lactate threshold occurs at about 75 to 80 percent of his or her VO2max. Successful marathoners generally have lactate thresholds of 84 to 88 percent of VO2max; elite marathoners tend to have lactate thresholds of about 88 to 91 percent of VO2max. This means that elite marathoners can use a larger proportion of their maximal aerobic capacity before lactate starts to accumulate in their muscles and blood.
Lactate is produced by your muscles and is used by your muscles, heart, liver, and kidneys. The lactate concentration in your blood represents a balance between lactate production and consumption. Even at rest, you produce a small amount of lactate. If your blood lactate were measured right now, you would have a lactate concentration of about 1 millimole. As you increase your effort from resting to walking to easy running, your rates of lactate production and lactate consumption increase, and your blood lactate concentration stays relatively constant. When you run harder than your lactate threshold, however, your lactate concentration rises because the rate of lactate clearance can no longer keep up with lactate production.