Lactate follow-up #2

A reader recently posted a comment/question regarding lactate training that I thought would be good to answer as a post. It brings up a good point that could use some clarity. 

"Brian, I was browsing through Mark Twight's Extreme Alpinism book the other day and was reading up on his lactate training section. In it, he recommends keeping the rest period low (30-60s) to prevent full recovery. I've also heard that same thing that you mentioned above about threshold training, which is to fully recover between intervals. Obviously, neither one is always the right scenario, but I was curious if you favor one over the other?"

I have discussed this point with Mark (who now runs Gym Jones) in the past and totally agree on the modality for specific goals. I think for rando racing, building lactate tolerance is key to surviving the downhills. These sections can last up to 5 minutes in most races and more in longer events in Europe. Obviously, preparation for that kind of duration is the goal of a gym-based program. The 30 rep sets seem to do this nicely. They will load you up like a draft horse  by the end of the first set. Lunges are okay but there is a definite break for the alternate leg during execution of each step so they are not as effective. Keeping the recovery low as Twight suggests ensures a continued and ever elevating lactate load early into the second set and even more so into the third. Yes, there will be some recovery in between but it will seem completely inadequate as you move into subsequent sets. This is the training stimulus you are looking for and will feel similar to the unrelenting burn of a downhill during a race.

The leg blasters offer a similar experience that transfers over. Perhaps the one thing they are missing is the load experienced when skiing through a hard turn. You can fix this by wearing a weighted vest or carrying dumbbells. However, you may find yourself unable to complete the exercise with the additional load. Embarrassing, to say the least! Work into this gradually, for sure.

The other thing about reducing the rest period is that it comes with a need for a concomitant reduction in barbell weight. Ideally, you use the most weight you can handle for 30 uninterrupted repetitions. After a brief rest, this weight is going to be too heavy for a second  and third set. Doing "strip sets" is the remedy here and with some experimentation you can come up with how much to take off between sets. For me, doing the first set with 145 lbs is hard and dropping 10 lbs for the second set is about right. Dropping another 5-10 lbs for the third allows for an unbroken set. I really do think that pausing during the set even for only a couple of breaths changes the experience and, perhaps, the stimulus significantly.

So, that's skimo lactate training. What about for cycling? Well, here the demand is different and the application of weight training in preparation is also different. It's not that cycling does not require a high lactate tolerance, it's just that it is very easy to train this on the bike. One could make an argument for not even bothering with this is the weight room. I mean, how hard is it to set the bike on the trainer, get a good warm-up and then do 5 all out, gut-busting 20 second efforts? Or any other length effort for that matter. The lactate load is there and it's very sport specific. I guess I don't really have an answer to that. Perhaps it's just that in the early season you are going to be in the weight room anyway doing max strength development and plyometric training anyway. Why not add some real suffering under the barbell? Good for the soul.

Although I'm not sure I can fully justify this bias, I feel that using higher loads and getting full recovery between 30 rep sets makes more sense when training this way for the bike. I have had this discussion with a pro cyclist who happens to sprint very well. We both agree that the reason to do this type of weight room training is to specifically address the demands of the finish of a race. Although there are times when you are completely loaded coming to the line prior to launching your sprint it is more often that you are not completely in the "red zone", as Paul Sherwin likes to say. Because of this, I use a higher load and do the work sets with good recovery in between. It is still damn hard but definitely different. The first 15 reps are harder with the heavier weight and it continues to suck even more until 30. The stimulus is different than the shorter rest variety.

Ultimately, it is all good. The demands of racing are so variable that creating similar variation in training is the best way to prepare. All training creates demand which results in some sort of physiologic adaptation that will then be used at some point in competition. Long intervals, short ones, full recovery, little recovery...variety is key. Certainly, there can be too much of any one kind but with adequate doses of several types of demand coupled with appropriate rest and recovery, we can be well-prepared for whatever our competitors dish out. - Brian