Okay, others are free to comment but I would love to hear from all the coaches.
Regarding PERIODIZATION I say.....
It seems that the modern approach in the west is to work on endurance first, with some strength work like power starts, for several months BEFORE moving on to a period of training that focuses on developing sustainable power at threshold. Then one limits or drops the threshold focus to do a VO2 focus, anaerobic intervals and high speed sprints etc etc.
A cycling coach comments....... "Fergie"
"This is actually the old form of periodisation that came from Matveyev in Russia. It was quickly superseded by Zatsiorsky who included all factors of training (Peter Coe father to Seb Coe called it multi tier training) but most Western coaches adopted the old format of training."
Paraphrasing Fergie....
Interesting to note how many Western coaches still try and apply this. Especially when the Eastern sport scientists stopped doing it in the late 70s and adopted a more multi tier approach. In this approach a trainee includes all aspects of training at any time during the year but has different training priorities depending on where they are in relation to goal events.
Paraphrasing Fergie again.....
As mentioned above Peter Coe did this with his son Sebastian with great success while running. In his training text it's called the Multi Tier Approach to training and makes sense. So in this approach riders still do a large volume of endurance work in the off season yet they still need to do some high intesnity work. It should be noted that even super high milage advocate Arthur Lydiard had his athletes do sprints all year round.
Quote from Fergie...
"All for planning out ones training and racing for a period of time. Classic periodisation was where one did one type of training and then moved to another form. Interesting to note how many Western coaches still try and apply this. Especially when the Eastern sport scientists stopped doing it in the late 70s and adopted a more multi tier approach. I call it prioritisation of training where one includes all aspects of training at any time during the year but has different training priorities depending on where they are in relation to goal events."
More evidence of the greatness of a multi-tiered approach can be seen starting in about 1978 just as classic periodization was on the way out in eastern europe.
Here we see Cyrille Guimard, the coach of THREE tour champs, Hinualt, Fignon and Lemond., use a much more multi-tiered approach?
This multi-tiered approach can be seen in Lemonds book in which he does NOT advocate working on primarily ONE energy system at a time. ie: He says that the focus of the base period is to not only build an aerobic base with lot of endurance hours but also to improve ones "anaerobic threshold". He also advocates sprint work year round.Yes, he advocted lots of endurance miles at this time but also TWO days per week of threshold work including threshold work on the flats and hills. The threshold work becomes more "structured" as time goes on but was not dropped or even reduced when VO2 work started several weeks before the first races of the season. As the season begins he advocates adding the more "anaerobic" intervals of 30-45 seconds.
The base is then aerobic AND threshold work done at the same time, and then everything else is added on to this in a multi-tiered approach.
Then all of a sudden classic periodization is all the rage in the west with the huge success of Lance Armstrong and his coach Christ Carmichael.
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QUESTIONS FOR THE COACHES on this forum
Why is periodozation so popular in the west. Is it simply because coaches like Carmichael and Friel, who are pure periodization coaches, have had success with it in their genetically gifted athletes in the past 10 years?
MAYBE, the classic periodization appraoch works best for the rider that wants to peak for ONE long stage race, like the tour. We see Armstrong doing just that and following the CTS(Carmichael) classic periodization approach.
Coaches your thoughts.......