[xcskier]

xcskier on June 29, 2020 at 2:36 pm · in reply to: Scott Semple’s “Planning a training season” #43153

Scott,

One last question about this.

So, your highest intensity sessions were in the Fundamental period?
Meaning, most of your Zone 4 sessions were in the beginning of your training.

How many weeks did you spend on working much above AnT (your 130% sessions)?

In almost all Canova’s posts he doesn’t give many examples of these higher intensity
work (that is really not connected with the event, ie. if you are a marathon runner
it may make sense to do 3K pace sessions early but not in specific period), so I am
wondering long is spent on developing that.

[xcskier]

xcskier on June 25, 2020 at 4:03 pm · in reply to: Scott Semple’s “Planning a training season” #43060

My longest sessions were between three and four hours (at ~80% of AeT).

Yes, this totally makes sense. So, about 1.5X your event duration.

There is a trend among cross-country skiers (event length 50K-60K —
so between 2h15′ to 3h) to train huge volumes:
https://www.dn.no/langrenn/lillehammer/kvafjord/harstad/fra-null-til-tusen-seriose-treningstimer-i-aret/2-1-52666

And I’ve never seen an explanation what the benefit is. As Canova said many times
running long and slow will only make you able to run slow for long distance.
I fail to see (Caveat: once you build properly your aerobic endurance and aerobic base, of course) what training huge volumes at 70-80% of your race pace most of the time, what is the main benefit of that?

[xcskier]

xcskier on June 24, 2020 at 3:04 pm · in reply to: Scott Semple’s “Planning a training season” #43031

A couple of questions where adjustment in philosophy
(to a different sport) was probably needed:

1. Microcyle periodizations. Canova doesn’t have much
volume modulation week-to-week. Namely, there’s no
“recovery” week where the volume would be significantly
lower.

Was that also the case for you, or you had 2-3 weeks of
high volume (or intensity) followed by an easier week?

2. How long were your long long sessions (in hours or percentage of weekly volume)?
Just one a week?

[xcskier]

xcskier on June 21, 2020 at 1:43 pm · in reply to: Scott Semple’s “Planning a training season” #42950

Thanks for clarification and details!

A couple of more questions:
1. Is the reason you chose to compute your pace percentages from AeT
because that was you “race pace”? Or because it’s just easier to determine?

I know Canova computes his paces from race pace, but in running you
can do that.

2. Were there any tricky things converting Canova’s philosophy to skimo
training?

One thing that could be tricky is adjusting sessions lengths and overall volumes
to a different sport. I presume that your overall training volume (and session length)
were longer than what marathon runners do.

[xcskier]

xcskier on January 14, 2020 at 1:44 pm · in reply to: Iñigo San Millán Interview: Mitochondria, Zone 2, and metabolic health #36269

Maximum fat burning rate can be computed from a metabolic test.
This max fat burning zone will obviously vary from person to person.

Here’s two posts by Jeukendrup who authored several papers on this some 15 years ago:
https://www.mysportscience.com/single-post/2015/03/18/What-is-Fatmax
https://www.mysportscience.com/single-post/2015/08/04/Finding-your-fat-burning-zone
(see paper references in the posts)

Jeukendrup says they found FatMax on average to be around 65% of HRmax (but it can be as
low as 50% or as high as 80%) which is in line with what has been discussed here
and recommended by Uphill Athlete coaches. I guess it all comes down to zone definitions and individual physiology (based on metabolic tests).

And the paper by San Millan and Brooks mentioned in the original post above is this:
https://www.researchgate.net/publication/317660005_Assessment_of_Metabolic_Flexibility_by_Means_of_Measuring_Blood_Lactate_Fat_and_Carbohydrate_Oxidation_Responses_to_Exercise_in_Professional_Endurance_Athletes_and_Less-Fit_Individuals

[xcskier]

xcskier on January 14, 2020 at 8:08 am · in reply to: Iñigo San Millán Interview: Mitochondria, Zone 2, and metabolic health #36247

One of the things that San Millan emphasized is the importance of Zone 2 training,
not surprising. What was surprising was his statement about the volume of Z2 training
(for professional cyclists). He seems to suggest that they do much more Z2 training than
what I’ve seen discussed in the context of “uphill athlete”. He mentions this in another
article:

Zone 2 Training for Endurance Athletes: Build Your Aerobic Capacity

The explanation I’ve seen was that once you start getting faster (=better endurance)
that you start replacing Z2 sessions with more Z3 sessions. But after listening to
San Millan it seems that man pro-cyclists have a large volume of Z2 training.

There was also a discussion about training (and especially racing) on low carb
diet. San Millan believes that even training in a fasted state is detrimental:

Thank you for listening! My personal opinion is that training even at Z2 under CHO restriction/ketosis + fasting may be damaging and not very effective at improving mitocondrial function much. But that’s only my modest opinion

— Iñigo San Millán (@doctorinigo) January 2, 2020

[xcskier]

xcskier on October 12, 2019 at 4:06 pm · in reply to: Testing lab recommendation in Alberta #30148

Call the Bill Warren Training Center. It’s located at the CNC, and that’s where any testing would be done anyway. They should be able to tell you if they have a ski-treadmill, and if it’s available.

They do have a ski-treadmill and it seems it’s possible to get tested on it,
but it’s broken at the moment.

Any recommendations for a nice long (1+ hr) continuous uphill run (with poles) in Canmore?

[xcskier]

xcskier on October 10, 2019 at 11:39 am · in reply to: What do these sessions stimulate? #30011

For a one-hour event, while also incorporating sprints, over a macrocycle I would progress from 130% down to race pace (~107-108%) and from 80% up to race pace.

This makes sense. So, one hard session would be on the fast side (Z4) of things and the other
on the endurance side (Z2 progressing to Z3)?

What are simple tests (without a biopsy) to determine FT/ST? Just looking at lactate values
in some short event (like a 3K run)?

[xcskier]

xcskier on October 9, 2019 at 9:22 am · in reply to: Testing lab recommendation in Alberta #29734

I presume that none of the labs in the area can do roller-skiing test
on a big treadmill. Correct?

I am not from the area, just visiting Canmore/Banff for the first time
and it looks like it’s not the best time to do dryland training here.

[xcskier]

xcskier on October 7, 2019 at 12:03 pm · in reply to: What do these sessions stimulate? #29598

There is no ‘best’ interval training protocol. It depends on what event you are training for, your personal training history, Are you FT or ST dominant athlete, Are you needing more speed or more endurance.

I know it’s hard to generalize, but if your race pace is for example 7:00 / mile (for an event longer than an hour), is there a good rule of thumb how fast the intervals should be
for speed and for endurance? I presume not outrageously faster than your current (or desired)
race speed.

There was some great discussion of this in another thread about training for speed
and endurance.

[xcskier]

xcskier on June 5, 2019 at 1:35 pm · in reply to: Treadmill training — pole tips? #22968

I’ve seen these in some lab before, but I don’t know where to buy them:
https://www.rodby.com/pro/wp-content/uploads/2018/12/20181122_1036132.jpg

[xcskier]

xcskier on October 13, 2018 at 12:41 pm · in reply to: Functional Movement Screen #13953

I look forward to seeing the upcoming video. The other short video
was *very* useful.

Can you offer some advice who (a local physiotherapist, specialized sports medicine shop?)
can actually perform these movement/mobility tests and what would a good and comprehensive
test include?

[xcskier]

xcskier on October 10, 2018 at 12:17 pm · in reply to: Improving endurance — don’t understand research paper #13887

Scott and Scott, thanks for your replies.

I wouldn’t want to use this method (or other “sport science” training
methods) for actual training. Instead, I was just trying to understand
a possible mechanism for why performance improves despite seemingly
non-intuitive fiber expression change.

No elite (or highly trained) endurance athlete would be willing
to try this method for a study.

It seems that the endurance improvement may come just from a typical
“anything will work for a few weeks” for untrained subjects.

I am still somehow surprised by the amount of lactate that was
generated. While 6s may be initially short enough to just use
creatine-phosphate, 24s rest is way too short to replenish
for the consequent sprints.

[xcskier]

xcskier on August 15, 2018 at 11:36 am · in reply to: Volume and speed development #11174

Scott, I appreciate your insights.

Is this presentation (notes, slides, video) available somewhere?

[xcskier]

xcskier on August 11, 2018 at 5:37 pm · in reply to: Volume and speed development #11144

Thanks for detailed explanation.

Do speed training methods from running transfer to skiing?

Here’s an outline of a speed development for skiing taken directly from
track training:
http://www.nordictrainingsources.com/Understanding_Speed_Training.pdf

There’s also an interesting book for speed development for running:
https://www.velopress.com/books/speedrunner/
but I am wondering if there’s any transfer to other sports.