No matter what sport you are training for, in order to do well, you must have a plan. Elite level athletes never train at the same intensity all year long. If they did, they would not achieve anywhere near what they are capable of. More than likely, they would burn out or sustain various injuries. If you want to perform at your best when it counts, and continually build on your fitness level year after year, you need to plan your training using a methodology called “periodization.” In this article, I will define the term periodization as it relates to training, and break it down into its component parts. Hopefully, after reading this, you will have a better understanding of the method behind your coach’s madness.

Periodization is a systematic approach to training whereby the year is divided into “periods” with each having a specific purpose or aspect of fitness to improve while maintaining the gains made in previous periods.These periods are most commonly referred to as the macrocycle, the mesocycle, and the microcycle. The basic premise of periodization is that training should progress from general to specific, and emphasize the individual needs of the athlete.

A macrocycle is a large segment of time that culminates in a specific race or series of races. It can be just a racing season, one full year, or several years, as in the case of most Olympic athletes, where it usually lasts four years.

A mesocycle is smaller set of time which can be anywhere from one to several weeks. Each mesocycle is usually separated into five periods; general preparation, specific preparation, pre-competition, competition, and transition.

The general preparation period is also called the “base” period. This is where the most basic elements of fitness are developed. Muscular strength, aerobic endurance, and sport specific skills are usually addressed in this period.

In the specific preparation period, the athlete is further refining the fitness gained earlier and starting to identify and enhance the systems that are needed for targeted races. This may include muscular endurance, anaerobic endurance, or power training. Low priority races may also be scheduled at this time, but the emphasis is on training to race.

The pre-competition period is when the athlete is brought to a performance peak for a race, or series of races. Peaking involves the varying of training frequency, intensity and duration, and is usually resulting in a decrease of frequency and duration while maintaining intensity. The rest allows for the physiological systems to recover from the stresses of training and reach greater levels of adaptation.

The competition period is a time of physiological rest and maintenance of systems in preparation for competition. It is usually a one week period, but can extend further for back-to-back races.

The transition period is the time for the athlete to refresh and rejuvenate physically and mentally. During this time the athlete remains active, but at a greatly reduced workload, with little or no training regimentation. This is a good time to participate in other activities rather than the big three. After a short transition, the athlete may return to the specific prep period, but after an extended transition, it may be necessary to return to the general prep period to rebuild the base fitness.

A microcycle is usually a period of only a few days, and is generally broken down to individual weeks (7 days). It is made up of a series of training sessions, and has a specific purpose based on the mesocycle. Typically microcycles follow a pattern of increasing stress before culminating with a rest and recovery microcycle. It usually involves 2-3 weeks of building followed by 1 week of recovery.

Whenever I talk or hear others talk about periodization, one statement is always at the forefront of the conversation; “Failing to plan, is planning to fail.” Although it may take a certain amount of time to come up with and continually tweak a training plan to fit your specific needs, it is always better, and most always results in better performances, to be following some semblance of a systematic plan, than to just be training haphazardly along. So, whether you are planning only one race, or 40, get that training log out, or find a coach to assist you, and map out a plan to help you do your best on each and every race day!

JB

I know you’ve heard the sayings, “there’s always someone out there training harder than you,” or “you have to work harder than the next guy to win,” etc. It all sounds like something you remember from your old grade school gym teacher, or football coach. In fact, many people and coaches are still using these sayings to try to motivate themselves, or their athletes today. While it’s true that you have to train hard and be dedicated to succeed, training harder all the time doesn’t usually equate with better results, and can oftentimes lead to injury, or burnout.

This is where I throw out another famous saying, “train smarter, not harder!”

As much as I like training, I would still much rather train less if my return from those extra miles, or extra reps is only negligible at best. I want to get the most return on my investment, which for me is my time and my effort.

So what does “training smarter” mean? It means understanding how to train at the appropriate intensity to get your desired results. This is crucial for the endurance athlete. Training too fast all the time, will never help you go farther and training too slow all the time, will never help you get faster, or stronger.

One of the easiest and most widely used methods of measuring intensity is to monitor your heart rate. The faster or harder you work, the higher your heart rate will be, and vice versa. It sounds simple enough, but at what heart rate should you be training at to get the most out of your workouts? The answer depends on what you are trying to achieve. Depending on your goal for the workout, there is a specific intensity zone you should train in. These zones are delineated by specific heart rates, and determined by your lactate threshold.

Before I discuss the different training intensity zones, it is important for you to understand what the lactate threshold is. Your lactate threshold, or LT is the point at which your body goes from training aerobically (with oxygen), to anaerobically (without oxygen). At low levels of exercise, your body is able to create energy by breaking down fats and carbohydrates. The breakdown of carbohydrates produces lactic acid. At these low intensity levels, the body recycles the lactic acid easily to create more energy for your body to use. As intensity increases, lactic acid continues to build up and be recycled, until the point at which it accumulates faster than the body can clear it and the build up begins to inhibit muscle contraction. This is called the onset of blood lactate accumulation (OBLA), or your lactate threshold. At this point the body is going to rapidly fatigue and the duration of exercise will be short.

Knowing at which intensity, or for our training purposes, heart rate, the LT occurs is vital to setting up proper training intensity zones. Below I describe 7 different training zones. They are based on the model by renowned endurance coach Joe Friel. I have also added the percentage of lactate threshold heart rate at which these zones occur.

Zone 1 -Active Recovery 65-81% Threshold Heart Rate

As the description clearly says, this zone is for recovery purposes, and for early fitness building. This is also the zone used as the active rest portion of interval workouts. Workouts in this zone are meant to be easy to enable the body to recover from harder training sessions.

Zone 2- Aerobic/Extensive Endurance 82-88% Threshold Heart Rate

This is where those long duration sessions are most commonly done. It is used to build aerobic endurance and help the muscles become stronger and better able to use oxygen for energy production. Your slow-twitch muscle fibers are doing the majority of the work.

Zone 3 -Tempo/Intensive Endurance 89-93% Threshold Heart Rate

This zone is used for early season tempo work and to begin LT improvement. It helps to build base endurance and incorporates more fast-twitch muscle fibers as support for the work of the slow twitch fibers.

Zone 4- Sub Threshold 94-100% Threshold Heart Rate

As you may have guessed from the title, this zone brings you just under, or right to your lactate threshold. Its purpose is to stress aerobic capacity and challenge energy production. Intervals, hill work, and tempo work are all common sessions in this zone to help increase muscular endurance and threshold speed.

Zone 5a – Super Threshold 100-102% Threshold Heart Rate

This zone is used together with Zone 4. Intervals, hills, and tempo sessions are used to improve lactate tolerance and removal, as well as the fast-twitch fibers conversion to slow-twitch characteristics. You are now working anaerobically, so training duration will be decreased.

Zone 5b – Anaerobic Endurance 103-105% Threshold Heart Rate

Now working exclusively anaerobic, the body’s ability to tolerate and remove lactate is severely stressed. Fast-twitch muscle fibers are used to provide a large amount of the work at this level. Intervals and hill work to improve anaerobic endurance will have a work to rest ratio of 1:1.

Zone 5c – Neuromuscular Power 106%+ Threshold Heart Rate

Zone 5c is fast. For the endurance athlete, its use is limited to possibly a final sprint, or to make a pass. It can only be maintained for a few seconds, and intervals are paired with long recoveries.

Now that the training intensity zones are clearly defined, there’s still one issue. How do I discover my lactate threshold?

There are a number of different methods, and each involves a test of some sort. If you have access to a lab at a sports center, or university, you can get a maximum capacity test whereby they will measure your carbon dioxide to oxygen gas exchange difference using a breath analysis machine to help determine your LT. Another way which is gaining popularity is to perform a max test and actually have blood drawn from your finger at regular intervals to measure the blood lactate levels at different intensities. This one is obviously more invasive. For those of you who do not have access to either of these methods, you can perform a time trial running and on the bike to give yourself an estimate of your LT for each discipline.

I will describe how to perform these time trials in another article, and include a “Zone Calculator” to more easily figure out your specific intensity zones.

No matter which method you use, knowing your LT is important for setting up your specific training zones and planning your training for the season.

JB

Click here to download a Heart Rate Zone Calculator

For the beginner in multi-sport, or any endurance sport, the terms VO2 max and lactate threshold will inevitably become a part of his or her vocabulary. For most, it easy to be confused about what exactly each one is, and how they relate to training. Although it will involve a certain amount of scientific terminology, I will try to give you a better understanding of what these two terms mean, how they are important to you, and how the body creates energy for you to perform at your best.

Vo2 max is of particular importance for endurance athletes. It is defined as the maximum volume of oxygen the body can consume during intense exercise, or physical exertion. More to the point, it’s the maximum amount of oxygen from what you inhale, that the body is capable of converting to energy for use by the working muscles. (Each muscle cell uses oxygen to convert food energy into ATP for cellular work.)
It is measured either in liters per minute (L/min) or milliliters per kilogram of body weight per minute (ml/kg/min).The second method takes into account differences in body size and thus is more commonly used. If your body were a car, VO2 max would be described as the size of your engine. Based on genetics, or let’s say manufacturing, some people will have a higher VO2 max than others. The good news is that VO2 max can be trained and increased. (Think of it as upgrading to a higher performance engine.)The bad news is that there is a limit to the size of the engine that will ultimately fit.Genetics will limit maximum oxygen consumption. Whereas, you might come out of the factory with a VO2 max of 40 ml/kg/min, with proper training you could improve to 45-50 ml/kg/min. However, a champion endurance athlete can have a VO2 max of 70-85ml/kg/min!

So what does that mean for those of us who were not born a Ferrari?

Well, it means that we have to train to use as much of our maximum capacity as we can.Engine sizes being equal, the one who gets the most out of what they’ve got is the one that wins the race! Steve Prefontaine captured it best when he said, “Most people run a race to see who is the fastest. I run a race to see who has the most guts.” I know he wasn’t really referring to the same thing, but I think it works for what I’m about to say.

This brings us to what we call our lactate threshold (LT). Defined, lactate threshold is that speed of movement, intensity level, or percentage of VO2 max at which there is a specific blood lactate level, or where we see the onset of blood lactate accumulation (OBLA). Basically, the body is producing more lactic acid than it can get rid of in a timely fashion. In untrained individuals, LT can begin at 50-60% of VO2 max. In trained athletes, it can be from 60% to well above 70% of VO2 max. Many elite athletes are at 80% or more! Several studies have shown that lactate threshold is a better indicator of performance than VO2 max.
So, what exactly is lactate, or lactic acid, and why does it affect your performance? To answer this we must look at how the body creates energy for muscular activity.

I’m going to try not to be too scientific as I mentioned at the start, but I can’t make any promises…

The human body gets its energy from food, much the same way a car uses gas for fuel. The body breaks down carbohydrates, fats, and to a lesser extent, proteins into usable energy so it can perform work. In order to create this energy, food must be converted into molecules called adenosine triphosphate (ATP). Energy stored in ATP is used to power muscular activity. How the body creates ATP is determined by the energy needs or intensity level of the activity it’s performing.

There are 3 “energy systems” that the body uses to create ATP. 1) the Phosphagen system, 2) Glycolysis, and 3) the Oxidative system.

Since we are talking about energy production for endurance, and the phosphagen system is an anaerobic process (occurs without oxygen), and is used for very high intensity and very short durations, I’m going to skip it. There’ll be no drag racing in this article! I apologize to all of you “funny cars.”

Before I begin with the next two energy systems, it’s important to know that at no time during exercise or rest, does any one system provide the complete supply of energy. Depending on the intensity and duration of the activity, each system is contributing to ATP production.

The oxidative system (aerobic – occurs with oxygen) is the main source of ATP at rest and at low intensity activities.

It uses mostly carbohydrates and fats for energy production. At rest, it’s approximately 70% fats to 30% carbohydrates. As intensity levels increase, it changes to primarily carbohydrates, as long as there is enough supply. However, during long, submaximal, steady state exercise, it gradually shifts back to fats.

During fat oxidation, fat, or after being broken down by an enzyme, free fatty acids enter the mitochondria of the muscle cell where they undergo beta oxidation and are converted to acetyl CoA and eventually, a very high amount of ATP. Don’t worry too much about the scientific terms; just know that fat uses oxygen to create ATP (energy).

For carbohydrates, things work a little differently.

This is where it gets interesting. Remember what I said before beginning this paragraph, no system works alone.

When you eat carbohydrates, they are converted to glucose (sugar) for immediate use by the muscles, or glycogen. Glycogen is just a stored form of long glucose molecule chains. This process, called glycolysis, is where the oxidation of glucose and glycogen begins. That’s right, the other energy system! During glycolysis, glucose goes through a series of enzymatic reactions in the cytoplasm (cell fluid) of the muscle cells. Basically, it’s broken down from one glucose molecule into two pyruvate molecules which go on to produce ATP. Now, depending on the intensity level of the exercise, pyruvate can go one of two ways: 1) slow (aerobic) glycolysis or 2) fast (anaerobic) glycolysis.

By now, you know that aerobic means with oxygen, and anaerobic means without oxygen. I’m sure you know that at higher intensities, where energy demand is great, the body works anaerobically, and during lower intensities, where energy demand is smaller, the body works aerobically. If you were really paying attention, you will also know that the body is capable of doing both at the same time. So, let’s see where this plays out.

If there is enough oxygen present in the mitochondria of the muscle cells, the two pyruvate molecules created from the break down of glucose, are transported to the mitochondria. There they are converted to acetyl CoA and eventually ATP. This is slow glycolysis.

On the other hand, if there is reduced oxygen availability in the muscle cells, fast glycolysis occurs. During fast glycolysis, the pyruvate molecules are converted to lactic acid and eventually the salt lactate. Although this process creates energy fast, it leads to muscle fatigue due to high concentrations of lactic acid and a decreasing cellular pH which inhibits the enzymatic activity of the cell’s energy systems. Going back to the car reference, there’s too much viscosity in the engine oil, preventing it from running smoothly. Maybe you can also say that there’s too much junk in the trunk.

Okay, now you should have a basic understanding of the body’s energy systems and where lactic acid comes from. Let’s get back to lactate threshold and how it affects your performance.

As your body is performing exercise, the muscles involved are using carbohydrates and fats to create ATP/energy to keep you going. Some of the muscles involved are also creating lactic acid because they do not have enough oxygen present for the mitochondria to create ATP alone. At this point, the lactate is at a level that body can easily handle and it can be reconverted to pyruvate and used to create more ATP.

As you increase your intensity level, your energy demand also increases. Once the amount of lactate in your blood increases faster than it can be cleared, or reconverted to pyruvate, you have reached the onset of blood lactate accumulation (OBLA). This is what you know as your lactate threshold, or LT. This is the curse of the endurance athlete. Once you reach your LT, your intensity can only be sustained for a short duration. Depending on how high above your LT you are, will determine how long you will last.

Fatigue that occurs at exercise below LT is usually caused by low levels of carbohydrates or dehydration, but that may take hours to occur depending on the individual.

Fortunately today, you can find a number of places to be tested for your VO2 max and LT. Usually this will require a maximal effort test with breath analysis, and blood analysis, to determine at which heart rate you reach your LT and VO2 max. From there you can use the information to create a training program to improve your performance, or find a good coach to help you do so.

One thing is clear, however, that in order to improve your performance, regardless of what size engine you have (VO2 max), you will need to increase the level of your LT. This will require some training at elevated levels of blood and muscle lactate.

Oh, just one more thing before I go. For you multi-sport athletes, your LT will be different for each discipline due to the different muscles involved.

Good Luck! JB