Home

On a performance plateau?

Submitted by Dennis Whitby on 18. July 2009 - 14:24.
In the last three years, SportPlus runners with previous PBs in the FM have run the distance 16 times. Of the 16 marathons, 14 resulted in new PBs. The average improvement across the 16 races: 16 minutes. During the same period, another 14 runners working with SportPlus have completed the HM or FM for the first time. www.sportplus.hk
»

Re: On a performance plateau?

Submitted by ai naku on 19. July 2009 - 0:34.
Improving is good, but most people (especially beginning runners) will improve simply buy continuing their existing programme - what do you offer?
»

Re: On a performance plateau?

Submitted by Dennis Whitby on 19. July 2009 - 10:22.
Thanks for your comment. No matter what programme you are following, everyone reaches a performance plateau at some time or other because of the law of diminishing returns or, in physiological terms, the ceiling effect. It doesn't matter if you are a developing athlete or an elite athlete. Runners join us if they're on a plateau and/or they want personalized programmes based on physiological principles and data (e.g. O2 utilisation, running economy) that we collect on a regular basis; using data to guide programmes optimizes development. Some runners follow their own programmes but use our tests at regular intervals to check their progress.
»

Re: On a performance plateau?

Submitted by ai naku on 19. July 2009 - 10:58.
ok, thanks for the additional details.
»

Re: On a performance plateau?

Submitted by Virtual on 19. July 2009 - 11:31.
thought that a more appropriate subject title would be "In a performance trough"
»

Re: On a performance plateau?

Submitted by finiwufs on 19. July 2009 - 15:29.
For those who know calculus, this could be described as an inflexion point with both 1st & 2nd derivatives equal zero (on an increasing curve)...
»

Re: On a performance plateau?

Submitted by robertov on 21. July 2009 - 3:38.
Dear Dr Whitby, it would be interesting to know if you could also perform Lactate tests not only on treadmill,but also on the track, to better reproduce the real running conditions and have a reliable relationship between speed and levels of lactate in blood.
»

Re: On a performance plateau?

Submitted by Dennis Whitby on 22. July 2009 - 17:06.
Thanks for the suggestion/question, Roberto. We offer lactate testing on the treadmill and bike to athletes in various sports at the moment - distance runners, triathletes and cyclists - and plan to test some of our runners and triathletes during interval workouts in the future. If other athletes are interested in performing the test (indoors or outdoors), please feel free to contact me.
»