Necessity is the mother of all invention (Exercise example)

       I recently finished the book The Perfect Mile: Three Athletes, One Goal, and Less Than Four Minutes to Achieve It by Neal Bascomb. It is a book about Roger Banister, Wes Santee and John Landy's quest to be the first to break the 4 min mile marker. The book did a remarkable job covering each athletes chase to be the first sub 4 min miler. One aspect that struck me was the training. In 2023 these athletes would be sponsored by Nike, decked out in the latest gear, access to the best training known to man and dedicate their lives to achieving their best mile. in the 1950's these athletes were in college (or in Banister's case in medical school), running on cinder tracks and training more or less on their own. Santee had a coach and ran for the University of Kansas track team; however, the book did a wonderful job detailing his struggles with running on a team and being a part of collegiate athletics (that story is for another post). For the focus of this post, I'll cover the training methods of Bannister. Take in account for his busy schedule he devised a unique training method for that time period: Intervals.

         Interval training is a style of anaerobic training. Anaerobic is a style of training that does not use oxygen as fuel but ATP (energy currency) and glycolysis. Simply put glycolysis is the breakdown of carbohydrate by either stored in the muscle or glucose deliver via the Cori cycle. The Cori Cycle begins with the metabolization of glycolysis into Pyruvate. Through chemical reactions Pyruvate turns into lactate in the sarcoplasm of a cell or into the mitochondria (Krebs cycle) depending on the presence of oxygen. Since this post details anaerobic style training we are going to focus on the Cori Cycle. One of the more misunderstood results of the Cori Cycle is the formation of Latic Acid and the relationship to fatigue. Lactate or Latic acid is not the cause of fatigue. It is the increased presence of Hydrogen that increases the PH levels resulting in the disruption of glycolytic reactions, turnover rate of cells energy system and the Sliding Filament Theory in general. Why mention this deep science exercise science? How does this relate to running a sub 4 min mile? Two reasons, 1. In trained individuals Lactate Threshold begins at 70%-80% of maximal oxygen uptake (VO2 Max). Meaning Bannister could run at a longer intensity than the normal person. 2. Your lactate threshold can be trained to be able to handle high levels of intensities for longer durations. Bannister was able to train at a higher intensity with less time. His demanding schedule created a small window of training and interval training was the best available method to running a sub 4 min mile.

      Mimicking Bannister's training style is broken down into two parts: Run hard then rest. In Bannisters example he ran quarter mile repeats with designated rest periods then ran another quarter mile. He ran at specific intervals due to his event. A longer distance race might require longer intervals (with longer rest periods). A two-mile event for example training would have 800m repeats at race pace or a pace that you are trying to hit for the 2 miles. For example, if I am trying to run a 14:00 two-mile time that would be 7 min a mile with a 800m split of 3:30. Since this is interval training 3:30 should be the ceiling in terms of pace. Anything sub 3:30 that I can maintain for several reps is ideal.