Extended periods near maximum heart rate

[ampire]

I find the biggest issue of really hard sessions is the toll it takes on the Central Nervous System. You feel drained and doing it too much without sufficient rest will just keep draining you, exactly what Paul was referring to with Craig Alexander's quote.

This is certainly true. It took me about 3 weeks to recover from the 5K I did on Feb 4th. For that 5K, I was above 180 after 5 minutes and continued for nearly 14 more minutes hitting 192 in the final couple strokes. I still don't feel fully where I was yet for a typical workout's watts at a given heart rate. I deloaded a lot in terms of mileage and intensity and increased my calories and sleep.

[Gammmmo]

On the erg for shorter stuff, raw power is king, you see the aerobic monsters come short on the really short stuff. Anything above 1k is a different matter, for that you can never be aerobicly enough, but on the shorter stuff, Raw topspeed is very important. And on the erg raw topspeed is very much a matter of getting really strong. To pull sub 1.05 splits fitness does not cut it.

Which is why I will never be a sprinter #weedy

Its partly a choise, say instead of the endurance training you would put in that same time in Weights for a few years, this would completely change you. I know a guy who used to be a pretty serious runner. At that point he was 70 kg ish. Later on he stopped running and picked up weights, in a few years he was 90kg plus... and double, if not more in strenght.

It is a choice. I've started to go away from pure endurance. I actually think as we age it's a more healthy thing to do [to introduce weights, crosstrain and focus on power]. I am still compromising somewhat though. There are LWT guys who can pull >370m in 1 min. That's not easy. Sure, most of those will be fast twitch fibre dominant/focused but as Henry says don't pigeon hole yourself until you make a really good go of it.

[uk gearmuncher]

1) Re raw power, simple the most force you can pull into the flywheel. Watts/pace per 500.

2) Most pure power athletes don,t make it beyond 1 min.

3) Cardio and strength don't match well, so you seldom see people go for both at the same time.

1) Ah, ok. The reason I wanted to check is that force and power often get used interchangeably in discussion but they are not the same.

2) That's no great surprise when, as I mentioned earlier, the aerobic system really kicks in at around 35-40 seconds gone. It would also likely add credence that either the crossover point between the two types of athletes is probably closer to 500m than 1000m when you look at the energy systems involved or that the power output degradation from the strength monsters will be severe ...but then not so great that they'd lose out to pure aerobic engines until a lot of time has passed. I'd guess that's not the case though because if you look at power data from maximal efforts in studies in several sports, the tailing off in maximal effort strength-based efforts, isn't gradual - it's a cataclysmic nosedive.

3) It's an exchange to be sure, but then in many endurance-based competitive sports, it's about ensuring you have the strength work tailored to the sports needs in races. For example, in sports like sprint kayaking and dragonboating, the high force efforts only last a few seconds (or less than ~6 strokes). After that, the force applied on the paddle is quite low. Rowing too sees huge loads but only for the first few strokes. After that, the forces aren't as high as you may think. Either way though, as you say, it's hard to have the highest levels of both so athletes will/should put their money in what will return the biggest bang per buck on their race. All this really means (and as you have pointed out) is that the kind of animal that wants to do well in a 500m shouldn't train the same as someone who wants to do well in a 2km. Interestingly though, when you scan through the results at nationals of the 500m and the 2km (and I only did this as a quick glance, not a full blown study), it still doesn't see huge specialisation between those two distances.

[hjs]

Re 2, on the erg getting havier is no problem, otw it is. That gives a switch up. Indoorrowers are bigger. Its closer to 1k than 500. Not due to the energy systems but all aspects

Re 3, true, 2k and above strenght is seldom a limiting factor. A deadlift twice the bodyweight is enough. Strong rowers don,t have to train for that.
For sub 1.05 splits thats a whole different ballpark, here you can never be strong enough, just lije an endurance athlete is never fit enough.