Running-based conditioning for team
sports
General vs. specific debate
Part 2
Click here for Part
1
Principle
#5: Training transfer
I have touched
upon training transfer in the discussion of work capacity. Transfer is defined
as: if I improve in doing X how
much will I improve in doing Y? Or in plain English: if I improve my
squat strength, how much my 10m run will improve? These two qualities could be
skills or motor abilities.
We tend to see
higher ‘transfer’ between the exercises that look similar (if you improve
vertical press, there is a more transfer to improve bench than squat), but on
the flip side there are not a lot of studies on transfer mostly because it is
hard to control it. We tend to see cross-sectional studies (throwers who throw
X1-X2 tend to have bench press of Y1-Y2, and throwers who throw X2-X3 tend to
have bench press Y1-Y2, or vertical jumpers of 30-40inches tend to have squat
of 1,5-2,0BW), but they don’t provide any proof of causation: if I improve/change one aspect how much other aspect
will improve/change in longitudinal way. Besides, no one is only training
vertical press to see improvements in squat 5 weeks later, so it is hard to
isolate training transfer from the training noise.
Training transfer
tend to be positive, negative or neutral. Positive means that if you improve
certain quality you tend to improve another related one. Negative mean that if
you improve certain quality you tend to decrease another related one. And
neutral transfer means there is no transfer. All this sounds great in theory
and it is very nice intuitive concept, but I am still not familiar with sound
studies on it using longitudinal approach. The ideas mostly come from the trenches of great coaches, like
Anatoly Bondarchuk.
Another thing
coaches tend to forget about training transfer is Production vs. Production
Capacity. Thus they tend to over-emphasize ‘specific’ activities that look like
movements in their sport for the sake of higher transfer (e.g. squats vs.
single leg squats on balance board). But we also have Production Capacity
transfer – if we perform activities that are not related to the competition
activity, yet they tend to reduce injuries and increase availability of the
players during the season, I would consider this transfer as well.
For the above
reasons coaches tend to favor specific drills, but as we have seen they tend to
have problems with specificity vs. overload principle and as we are going to
see with specific chronic load syndrome.
Besides they forget about transfer to Production Capacity as well.
As with develop
vs. express problem, training transfer tend to be a dynamic animal as well. For
example, improving squat from 1,0 to 1,5xBW will increase your vertical jump in
good degree. Improving it further from 1,5-2,0 will tend to improve it as well,
but slightly less. Improving the squat from 2,0 to 2,5 will yield some benefits
but they are going to be smaller and smaller, while the work that needs to be
done is increasing as well the injury potential. This can be said for anything
else from hammer throwing to soccer.
We tend to ask
questions when is one too strong or possess too much endurance? This is the
problem of transfer. With soccer for example, improving you endurance (MAS,
VO2max, LT, etc) will yield improvements in game related parameters along with
improvements in work capacity. But there is a tipping point where the transfer
is neutral and becomes negative. This negative transfer might not be ‘direct’ per se, but rather the process of
improving endurance to highest levels tend to distract you from the training
that have bigger importance to you as a soccer player.
Same thing with
strength training. Up to a certain point, squat strength improvements has great
transfer to improvements in acceleration and jumping ability (Production),
along with making you less injury prone (Production Capacity). This transfer tends to get smaller and
smaller and building up more strength tend to demand more and more time and
energy and end up distracting the players from more important training. Dan Baker talked about this as well in this PAPER from 2001.
The problem is
identifying this tipping point, and the coaches tend to the ditch the whole
strength thing because they tend to see things in black and white. Things like
– if weightlifting makes better football
players, let’s recruit weightlifters, or even worse – if weightlifting improves football, then football improves
weightlifting, which comes back to develop vs. express discussion.
Going back to the
soccer example and training transfer of endurance training. Since this is the
dynamic process it is important to identify whether there is some potential for
transfer of endurance training (running based conditioning) to game related
performance and work capacity (as far as I know there is only one longitudinal
study that involved mentioned hypothesis – a study done by Martin Buchheit et al. which I explained in the
following post on RSA). And this is the tricky part. It
might involve some experimenting and monitoring the effects. In my opinion, the
running based conditioning is mostly suited for intermediate guys.
Let me explain.
With kids and beginners there is no need to (specifically) improve
capacities since they don’t have the skill to exploit it yet (see Verkhoshansky
graph in part 1).
With highly
advanced guys their capacities are (tend to be) very high (for their
sport/position) and their skill to use them is very efficient (although there
might be players who are more efficient in using what they have, and ones that
are less efficient in using what they have, but they have better potential –
training them might be different).
Improving their
capacities might involve too intense training or too much volume that might
yield no further benefit in terms of improvement of game related performance
and that might make them too tired and drained. With these guys the key is to
make them able to play year round without injuries and allowing them and the
clubs to make God-knows how much billions $$$.
Even with those
characteristic some things can still be improved. The problem is that their
competition calendar (problem of
context) is so dense that it is hard to improve anything in terms of
physical quality to a higher degree.
Strength and conditioning coaches that work with highest level clubs
(especially soccer), and with the exception of the few, actually don’t do much
serious physical preparation work – mostly prehab/rehab stuff, monitoring,
warm-up, cool-downs, recovery sessions and everything else low intensity and
low volume.
Sometimes the exceptions
are off-season, pre-season and bench guys. But this depends on the sport, where
soccer is the most notorious for such an example. If you are interested in
hearing more about the problems of training in these situations please refer to
the following article.
These are extreme
cases, but coaches tend to pick them to rationalize their training methods
(e.g. Messi is not doing squats, why should my players?). They forget how much genetically gifted these
guys are, and how technical they are. Sport is full of example of the elite
players that did jack sh*t in terms of physical preparation and were still
dominating due their great genetical traits and supreme technical and tactical
skills (and especially in sports that are more technical and tactical dependent
than physical – rugby vs. soccer). It is erroneous to base our training to the
few extreme examples.
That’s why the
guys stuck in the middle (and that’s
like 80-90% cases) can drain the most potential (training transfer) from more
general activities, in this case running-based conditioning.
Principle
#6: Specific chronic load syndrome
Specific chronic load syndrome is nothing else
that saying differently that too much of
a good thing is a bad thing. First time I’ve heard this concept formulated
into ‘specific chronic load syndrome’ term was by Dan
Pfaff
We can see this example popping out
everywhere. In powerlifting, the debate variety vs. specificity gets another
twist – by performing only (or having a great focus on) specific lifts (squat,
bench, deadlift) ala Sheiko, one tend
to ramp up the ‘groove’ or the skill part of those lifts, but also one tends to
overload specific tissues that might needs some ‘rotation’, especially when
done with high intensity, intensiveness and/or volume. This might results in
chronic injury.
Going back to the running-based conditioning -
if these are performed coaches tend to make them more sport-specific: a lot of
start/stop and change of direction. Nothing wrong with this approach, but one
needs to put things into context.
If the sport practices involve a lot of
start/stop, change of direction done at high intensity, then putting more oil
on the fire might end up with injury. I will get back to this idea in volume
vs. intensity principle as well.
That’s why all general activities, involving
running-based conditioning should supplement and complement sport practice.
For example, during the off-season when there
is no or minimal sport practices, after one deals with injuries from the last
season, it might not be very wise to base all of your conditioning to long slow
running. Some more specific, higher intensive running with start/stop, change
of direction might also be needed.
In pre-season where there is a lot of sport
practices and small sided games, speed work and change of direction work, it
might be wise to lower the number of running-based conditioning that involves a
lot of start-stop and cutting action.
During the in-season, maybe all that is needed
is high-intensity cross
training on the bike or in the pool
(non-impact). Yet, again this depends on the sport and athlete in question.
Make sure to pay attention to acute
relieving syndrome and work
capacity as well.
All that is mentioned revolves around importance
of context – thus there is no ideal solution without considering
context.
Another aspect of Specific chronic load
syndrome involves smart planning and variety. People tend to ‘adapt’ to certain
type of exercises/method/load, both in physiological way and psychological
(boredom?). This comes back to ‘periodization’ of training and smart
rotation/modification of means, methods and loads to avoid Specific chronic
load syndrome and avoid adaptation
stiffness (term coined by late Charlie Francis)
Principle
#7: Volume vs. Intensity
To improve one’s endurance, should one focus
on long slow activities, or focus more on intensity activities? I don’t know
any better free sources about it than the following ones:
Methods
of Endurance Training by Lyle McDonald
Intervals,
Thresholds, and Long Slow Distance: the
Role of Intensity and Duration in Endurance Training by Stephen Seiler
Quantifying
training intensity distribution in elite endurance athletes by Stephen Seiler
Science
of Running Literature Review
by Steve Magness
Crossfit
endurance, Tabata sprints, and why people just don’t get it by Steve Magness
What is the simple conclusion of these
articles is that both extensive and intensive methods are important. It appears
that elite endurance runners tend to distribute their workloads in polarized manner.
I don’t remember if the following
research/case study is mentioned in the above links, but in a group of
endurance athletes the improvements in performance correlated with increase in
the amount of low intensity training rather than increase in high- and medium-
intensity training.
There are two published papers on the subject
of training distribution in soccer in this case, as far as I know:
Quantifying
Training Intensity Distribution in a Group of Norwegian Professional Soccer
Players. International Journal of Sports
Physiology and Performance, 2011, 6, 70-81
Effect
of Training Intensity Distribution on Aerobic Fitness Variables in Elite Soccer
Players: A Case Study. J Strength Cond
Res. 2011 Jan;25(1):66-71.
In the study by Algroy the concluded that “present results demonstrate that soccer
players do not employ a training intensity distribution typical of high-level
endurance athlete training more total weekly hours. Instead, their training is
marked by most training sessions having significant
periods of time at or above the lactate threshold intensity.” (p. 79)
In a study by Castagna et. al they concluded that “Training
spent at high intensity was significantly related to relative speed
improvements at 2 mmol · L(-1) (r = 0.84, p < 0.001;) and 4 mmol · L(-1) (r
= 0.65, p = 0.001). Players spent almost two-thirds of their training time at
low intensities. However, only the time
spent at high intensity (>90% of maximal HR) was related to changes in
aerobic fitness. These results support the usefulness of the quantification
of aerobic training load using HR. Furthermore,
it stresses the effectiveness of the high-intensity training in soccer”
(abstract)
There is an apparent difference in
distribution in percentage (based on the data from the studies, without going
into different methods of calculus):
Soccer players
|
Elite endurance athletes
|
|
Zone 1
|
73
|
75
|
Zone 2
|
19
|
8
|
Zone 3
|
8
|
17
|
As can be clearly seen from the table, soccer
players spend a lot more time in Zone 2 (lactate threshold, around 80-90%
HRmax, or 2-4 LA mmol/L) and a lot less time in Zone 3 (a.k.a. VO2max zone,
above 90% HRmax and above 4 LA mmol/L). What does this tell us? Is increasing
Zone 1, decreasing Zone 2 or increasing Zone 3 yield better endurance
performance in soccer players?
One thing is sure – we need more data on this,
especially longitudinal and how it relates to endurance qualities (VO2max, MAS,
Yoyo, etc) and match-related performance.
What seems like an apparent conflict between the
results of the studies it is actually a matter of context and level of the
athletes. With high level endurance runners further improvements comes largely
by increasing the amount of low intensity activities (aka junk miles) with
intensification yielding some benefit as well (make sure not
to ditch the medium ground
completely).
Since they don’t need the extreme levels of endurance qualities nor any other quality
in general (as explained in THIS article), mixed-sports like soccer players would probably
beneficiary react to increasing the (absolute) amount of time spent in Zone 1,
but that kind of endurance focused training will probably move them away from
more important goals (see the transfer
principle). What’s probably a good strategy is to avoid pounding more in
the Zone2 and increasing the workloads in Zone3, at least when it comes to
running-based conditioning (with the goal of improving aerobic capacities and
endurance).
As study done by Wong et al. (2010) compared effects of concurrent training involving serious
strength training (4 sets of 6RM on high-pull, jump squat, bench press, back
half squat, and chin-up exercises) along with high intensity interval training
15/15 (15sec run, 15sec passive rest) at 120% MAS on the vertical jump, 10m
sprint, 30m sprint, YOYO test and MAS test. There were also control group that
only did usual soccer training. The results speak for themselves (page 657).
Does this (improved MAS, YOYO) directly
transfer to game related performance, like distance run, or number of sprints? As
Mendez-Villanueva and Martin Buchheit concluded this is “simply, more complex”
(Eur J Appl Physiol. 2011
Sep;111(9):2387-9). You can read more about this in RSA
is Overrated article.
Long story short, this is also a problem of develop vs. express principle. Having
improved MAS and YOYO scores means having a higher potential, but finally the game constraints like tactics and skill
level, limit your expression of this
potential. Where is the tipping point, where further increase doesn’t bring any
transfer to Production nor Production Capacity is yet unknown.
Even if the recent studies showed that higher
ranked teams actually run LESS
in a game (see study by DiSalvo in RSA
is Overrated), they also tend
to have higher potential (in a form
of YOYO score) as shown in a study by Ingebrigsten et al. (J Sports Sci.
2012 Sep;30(13):1337-45), even if
they are not from the same league.
One thing is sure – we lack longitudinal
studies, where we compare training interventions and improvements in both potential and it’s transfer to
game-related performance and injury tendencies (since Low injury rate strongly
correlates with team success. Br J Sports Med. 2012 Sep 15)
At the moment I hold the following position –
since both the extensive work and intensive work are important in improving
endurance, in mixed-sports most of extensive work comes from practices and thus
running-based conditioning should take care of higher intensity part of the
equation. There are numerous studies to back up this claim (recent one by Gunnarsson
et al.), along with opinions and work from experts like Dan Baker (see THIS and THIS), Inigo
Mujika and many others.
Please note that the higher-intensity
intervals doesn’t necessary involve ONLY glycolytic/anaerobic work (as
excellently said in this article by Steve Magness), as aerobic training doesn’t only involve low
intensity long duration steady state activity.
Most notably, they (higher intensity
intervals) involve intervals above (or closely around) MAS. There are a lot of
ways to program and individualize higher-intensity intervals based on MAS score
or 30-15IFT and for this reason I suggest checking linked article by Dan Baker
and the review
paper by Martin Buchheit.
Another important thing to consider in this
case is the context. If the sport
practices are mostly extensive type work, then running-based conditioning (or
general conditioning) should take care of higher intensity. If sport practices
are very intense, then running-based conditioning (or general conditioning)
should take care of lower intensity. If there are no practices, for example in
off-season, then running-based conditioning should take care of both extensive
and intensive aspects.
I would love to finish with modified Raymond
Verheijen in-season periodization (that a lot
of coaches are following at the moment). I basically reduced some of the volume
in SSGs (small-sided games) and put some running-based conditioning of higher
intensity. If the SSGs are of extensive type, then running-based conditioning
is of higher intensity. If SSGs are of intensive type, then running-based
conditioning is more extensive (but still intense). Please note that this is
only an example.
Conclusion
Hopefully I succeeded in an effort to explain
why it is important to implement some form of running-based conditioning into
your training system, as long as you choose the best possible option by
understanding the mentioned principles, your context, goals and players. This
could be applied to all types of general training
components as well.
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