I'm always fascinated by exercise; that's part of why I do it, and it's definitely why I decided to study it in grad school. There's always something new to learn, and I find lots of interesting articles on The Science of Sport. Recently I was reading about limiters in exercise, specifically pace limiters. And then Damie wrote about her latest 5k pace. If you were starting a 5k race, you'd run at a faster pace than if you were starting a half marathon, right? Ok, that's obvious, but why do you do this? It had been theorized that pace was based on feedback from your body after exercise had begun, such as lactate levels and body temperature, but new research will hopefully be updating us on how this is not the whole story. Part of why you run the pace you run is based on your experience at those specific race distances, but there seems to be much more going on than just that. Your Central Governor is a part of your brain that monitors and controls your exercise to make sure you don't do damage to yourself (a topic about which I am also very interested). Your brain will recruit more muscle fibers at the start of that 5k race than a half marathon by knowing only your race distance.
So my question is this: can I teach my body to override my brain's governing signals so that I run a faster marathon, for example? It's all mind over body anyway. Manipulating your brain takes training to a whole new level, but it sounds like a good non-impact form of training for the off-season.
Yes, this is something I wonder about as well! I'm so pain adverse I really need to learn how to trick my brain into going faster than it wants to.
ReplyDeleteThis is a cool way of thinking about it. I noticed that my governor's a bit out of calibration yesterday when I went out at what's probably my current 5k pace yesterday for the first 4 miles of a half marathon. Since I hadn't really run more than 4 miles at once in the last ~4 months (since July 20, whatever happened then) I was totally uninformed about my abilities. I went out just to kick off my winter running and see what my legs could do.
ReplyDeleteI went out for what felt like a conservative pace based on what my body expected itself to be able to do. This was about 20-30-s/mi slower than I was running a half in last year. Interesting that it took so long to reign itself in. I ended up settling into a pace about 2 min/mile slower than last year, but I think that was about right for me just now.
I usually race by gps-indicated pace or heartrate and this was purely by feel. It didn't lend to even splitting, but I think this is mainly because the governer's out of calibration. It's pretty amazing that I was able to find a reasonable pace based on the distance I was expecting, again with no real experience as to what I'm capable of these days.
As for overriding this mechanism - isn't that what we do every time we race where we can sprint the last mile of a marathon and cross the finish line only to feel weak in the knees and unsure of even standing, much less that 7:30 final mile we just did? Look at some IM finish videos where people proudly stride across the line, do the Toyota commercial 'jump for joy', and promptly collapse into a convulsing mass of spent nerves and damaged muscle. It seems the governor kicks back in quite quckly.
We talk about this in yoga as well. Bikram was excoriating some student for being lazy and the woman said, "Bikram, the mind is strong, but the body is weak." To which Bikram replied, "Bullsh*t! Your body is so strong and your mind is so weak! This is why you do yoga. Make your mind stronger, match your body." (You have to say that quote with an Indian accent to make it work.)
ReplyDeleteMind over the matter. What's the matter? You're the matter.
Now to make me faster at track...
Yikes. What a mess. Sorry for rambling. I think the take-home points were intended to be:
ReplyDelete-This regulation needs to be calibrated by at least doing a couple of workouts near race conditions.
-We override the mechanism when we push hard and then it kicks back in really fast after the finish line.
-I'm slow.
Joy, You don't have any sort of central governing monitor anything. That is why you can run your tortured body so fast though an Ironman. Now I have the answer I have always looked for- this solves every question I ever had about you. JK! Love ya my little researcher!
ReplyDeleteYay! I'll look for you this weekend!!!...but if I'm making a funny face, don't take it personally. My "race face" gets pretty ugly. Damie documented all my greatest moments in a blog post sometime in the middle of the summer, so try not to laugh too hard. haha.
ReplyDeleteGo read this on chuckiev's blog.
ReplyDeletehttp://chuckiev.blogspot.com/2008/10/youre-not-slow.html
Read the rest of october discussion on pacing as well.
pretty much read all of chuckies blog its entertaining and informative.. I'm going to his camp for 4th year in a row this march in solvang,ca theres link to the camp info.
and read the hadd discussions heres first one links on same page to the rest:
http://chuckiev.blogspot.com/2007/08/hadds-approach-to-distance-running-part.html
It's not only place for hadd discussion just only place I know right now. Its This most likely from all accounts fictional coach named hadd some believe it's really llyiard etc but was a post on some running forum a while back.
Read the hadd thing talking about running consitant and training for muscle recruietment for various speeds..
Joy -
ReplyDeleteRead Noakes Lore of Running (the first couple of chapters). He details his training theories on the central governor and the problems with the cardio-respitory model he sees.
Maybe just as interesting is a theory that muscle "integrity" (not so sure what he meant be this) and enzyme dynamics that determine the limits on our performance as well.
The reality is that some types of training work regardless of the physiological explanation (and have for 80 years), but the new theories suggest that some "tweaks" could be made in the methods and inclusion of interval/tempo/race specific training and time spent in the weight room that could improve performance.
I'm not intimately involved in the sport science world, but manage to make it a pretty good hobby!
Best
Peter