<p>From time to time we see people post their track workouts at some blazing speed faster than their fiveK pace, while I was always coached to do more volume of work but at a bit slower than fiveK, say 15-20 seconds per mile. In discussing this with other runners I often hear, "How can you expect to better your fiveK times if you do intervals at a slower pace?"</p>
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<p>Here is another Lydiard quote, specifically on this subject, that I thought you would enjoy:</p>
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<p><span style="font-family:'times new roman', serif;"><span style="color:#000080;"><span style="font-size:12pt;">"Now when we are going to train the athlete, and train him to develop the anaerobic capacity to maximum, we have to understand exactly what we are trying to do. To bring about the low pH level of the arterial blood, we have to do a lot of (volume of) anaerobic training.</span></span></span></p>
<p><span style="font-family:'times new roman', serif;"><span style="color:#000080;"><span style="font-size:12pt;">So if I put an athlete out on the track and say, “I want you to go around that track five times, and every 100 meters I want you to sprint 50 meters as hard as you can,” every 100-meters, he sprints full-out 50 meters; sprint, float, sprint, float. So in 400 meters he sprints 4 times; around the track 5 times, he sprints 20 times. The athlete will probably be out there for about 8 or 9 minutes. By then his legs will be getting very very tired and start to get neuromuscular breakdown; muscles no longer contract. Now if we bring that athlete in, and took the blood from the leg muscles, and took the blood from the ear lobe for arterial blood, we are getting two different readings. We are going to get a very low pH reading in the leg muscles, but it’s not going to be very low in the arterial blood. Just like; if I get down and do 50 push-ups, after 50 push-ups my arms get tired. I’m not tired doing it, but muscles no longer contract. So if we are going to get an effective reaction, we have to do longer training.</span></span></span></p>
<p><span style="font-family:'times new roman', serif;"><span style="color:#000080;"><span style="font-size:12pt;">So if I said to the same athlete, I want you to go out and run 800 meters several times, like six times, run one, jog one, run one, jog one; he’s running at a lower anaerobic effort, but he’s incurring an oxygen debt, which in turn will create lactic acid and start to lower the pH level of blood, but his legs won’t be getting so tired quickly, muscles won’t be getting so tired generally; because you are getting recovery, because you are not trying at such a fast effort and you are getting longer recovery coming back. So if that athlete runs down six times 800 meters fast and six slow, he’d be out there for a half an hour or more. If we bring him in then, and take the blood from the ear lobe, we will find we got lower pH level of the blood which is what we are trying to achieve.</span></span></span></p>
<p><span style="font-family:'times new roman', serif;"><span style="color:#000080;"><span style="font-size:12pt;">So if we are going to do anaerobic training, we have to do a big volume of it to be effective, and it can’t be very very fast; can’t be at the top speed with all those short intervals.</span></span></span></p>
<p><span style="font-family:'times new roman', serif;"><span style="color:#000080;"><span style="font-size:12pt;">So through trial and error, we found that if we did hard anaerobic training three days a week for a period of three-and-a-half to four weeks, we’d develop our anaerobic capacity to exercise to near maximum." Spareribs</span></span></span></p>
