A new world...of pain

A whole new world of useful pain

Written 11^th May 2013, Brisbane Queensland

According to most experts, the fastest way for an aerobically-trained athlete to rapidly improve is via ‘High Intensity Interval Training’. ‘HIIT’ shocks the body into a greater level of stamina and fitness by subjecting it to increasingly higher levels of intensity for short periods followed by short recovery periods. There are various ways to do this including interval training (set period of intensity followed by rest), VO² (maintaining a high, but not impossible level for a period longer than previous) and of course, the good old hill runs and other forms of interval running (e.g. Percy Ceritty’s famous sand hill runs). Whatever is chosen, the point is to increase the heart rate via an intense physical activity, and maintain it for longer and longer period.

When six times world champion female ironman competitor Chrissie Wellington was asked her secret to training for improvement she said ‘Never ever let your heart rate drop’. She said ‘train with high heart rate in order to race at a sustained lower rate’. It seems the mantra for improvement is - when it’s time to train hard, make sure you train hard.

But not all training can be hard or at high intensity. As far back at the 1970s Arthur Lydiard, a successful NZ running coach was saying that high intensity training sessions MUST be followed by at least one easy recovery day to allow the body to recover and adjust. He also cautioned that HIIT was not a way to improve running speed - it was the way to improve anaerobic fitness, overall fitness and the ability to finish strongly in races. Speed improvements come from specific speed training such as sprints drills. Most of all, Lydiard and others strongly cautioned to only start HIIT training after a solid aerobic base fitness had been established over time.

Why am I telling you all this? Well, for the last three years I have worked as hard as I dared at building an aerobic base without letting my heart rate get too high. I have almost no experience at holding my heart rate at a high level – every time it has started to rise I have backed off the effort level, to bring the heart rate down. Amongst other things I thought I had to do this because of my low oxygenation : I thought it was important to ‘not push things too hard’. But lately I have been getting frustrated that my running times are not improving despite lots of hard exercise and many many long runs. And I know I am still getting tired in the middle parts of long runs. I started doing a few interval runs, regular boxing/ aerobic endurance sessions and several hill runs to see if I could improve my fitness but overall, I still backed off when I started to feel my HR increase.

Hmmm, what to do? How will I improve my times? These small attempts at interval training are not delivering what I need.

So, after several long discussions with my Personal Trainer i.e. ‘The Smiling Dragon’ and other respected sources of advice, I decided to introduce HIIT into my training schedule. It was agreed I have a reasonable aerobic base and I have a schedule that would allow sufficient recovery. It was agreed my most immediate need was to learn to handle High Intensity before starting on sprinting and speed work.

So yesterday I tried my first hard, non-stop VO2 max session – On the treadmill, start off fast then increase the hill incline at set times; with the goal of lasting for as long as possible.

Man-o-man, how ugly is that!!!! I only lasted 2 minutes and I still feel sick today (24 hours later). My body and mind is just not used to that intensity.  The feeling of oxygen-debt was terrible….I felt like I was drowning… and I was nauseous, coughing and spluttering, incredibly tired and sleepy. Overall, I just felt awful. And it lasted all day. Yuck!

But now, on reflection, I think I gave up too early and I reckon I can do better. I am actually looking forward to doing more of these, and to seeing my times increase. I am almost excited at seeing how far I can push myself, even if it’s just small increments of improvements. I am looking forward to making myself sick once again. And I’m thinking- If I am going to feel that bad after just a short time, I may as well hang in there a bit longer. I couldn’t feel any worse and the improvement would probably be faster. Might as well hang in there, and go longer. The main thing is to not panic when I feel like I am drowning, and to mentally tough it out.

I am not saying I am going to like it. The opposite probably, but what I am saying is -

No pain, no gain.

Actually, I think I just found out what that saying really means.

Till next time, 'keep living, laughing, lovin' and runnin'

Wandering James, the Slow Runner