How Do You Skin Your Cat?

Give ten coaches the same athlete and you will get ten different training plans. The basic tenants will be the same, you have to train consistently and you have to train specifically. Other than that there are many different ways to “skin a cat”.

Training volume is defined as duration x intensity. Generally as one rises the other falls (i.e. higher intensity workouts are shorter in duration and the converse is also true). Both will produce training stress and as a result both will effect physiological adaptations. Neither approach is wrong or right but rather depends on the athlete and his ability to accept training load and recover. The mix of duration and intensity will also depend on the type of event for which the athlete is training. That is not to say that long course athletes should only do long duration workouts and not do intensity and short course athletes should only do short intense workouts and no duration. Long course athletes still need to do higher intensity workouts to raise their thresholds (aerobic and lactate). This makes their “slow” pace faster as they are able to operate at a higher percentage of aerobic  capacity. Short course athletes benefit from lower intensity/longer duration athletes which serve to train the aerobic engine and train the body to burn fat more efficiently.

The mix of duration and intensity will also be determined by the athlete’s ability to recover from the respective workouts.  Shorter higher intensity workouts are harder on the body and can take 48-72 hours to recover.  For masters athletes this recovery can take even longer due to the fact that we lose our ability to recover as we age. Longer workouts at lower intensity can incur the same training “cost” but don’t take as long from which to recover.

No two athletes are the same and what works for one may or may not work for another, keep that in mind when you are deciding how to “skin your cat."