RE: [Supertraining] More About Load: How much is too much?

Friday 18 January 2008      0 comments

A colleague of mine once said that the difference between a full time
athlete and a part time athlete is not that the full time trains more, but
that they recover more.

A previous post has highlighted the concern regarding over reaching and
overtraining, which is key. Over reaching should be viewed on a continuum.
On one side is under developed, in the middle is optimum and the other side
is over-training.

Managing training intensity is a combination of active restoration,
assessment of the holistic capabilities of the athlete (physical, emotional
& psychological) and physical training. As previously stated that some athletes
train 8 hours a day, what needs to be understood is the difference between
being in training for 8 hours and training for 8 hours. For me that may
include 2-3 hours of exercise (3 sessions), meal times and restoration
activities.

What we must consider is that whatever exercise is prescribed, it is
valueless if what follows it is garbage. During an 8 hour training day there
will peaks and troughs of player capabilities. Training sessions should be
aimed at peak times. These sessions will then be interspersed with recovery
activities (optimise adaptation to previous bout + maintain athletes ability
to perform subsequent sessions) and meal times.

Furthermore one must understand how one session will affect what is to
follow, both in the short and intermediate days. For example, DOMS has been
shown to peak 48 hours after a novel exercise which is predominantly
eccentric in nature. Therefore, if you are aware of this, don't plan
anything other than restoration in this period.

Verkhohansky's work has discussed how to train multiple biomotor abilities
at the same time. Zatsiorsky & Kraemer (2006) discussed how to calculate
training load, not to mention the excellent chapter in Supertraining, the
more intuitive programmers integrate some kind of qualitative measure into
their planning progress. Siff discusses how RPE and ratings of technique
have been used by Eastern European coaches in cybernetic planning.

What I would say is that the very first exercise of the very first session
you do with an athlete will be the only one that follows the plan you start
with. Calculating the intensity of an exercise for an individual is a moment
by moment process. Those in the UKSCA will have read an interesting piece by
Ian Jeffreys in a recent magazine regarding fatigue and recovery. In this he
says, quite rightly, that performance is affected by the physical, emotional
and psychological state of the athlete. Furthermore that problems in one
domain will transfer to others, we see this everyday that athletes when
tired concentrate less and find it hard to focus. This means that what an
athlete can do in one session, physically, they may not in the next despite
no loss of their physical attributes. Common to many athletes is an
accumulation of psychological pressures to perform which then manifest in
physical symptoms.

In short, whilst you should always have a progressive plan established for
an athlete, be aware of the state of that athlete and be able to accommodate
that within the demands of the session.

Mark Helme
Wakefield, UK

-----Original Message-----
From: Supertraining@yahoogroups.com [mailto:Supertraining@yahoogroups.com]
On Behalf Of Anthony Pitruzzello
Sent: 14 January 2008 18:05
To: Supertraining@yahoogroups.com
Subject: [Supertraining] More About Load: How much is too much?

The thread about HIT focused on a single set vs. multiple set debate. I
would like to broaden that just a bit, comparing multiple set regimens.

I'm not an exercise physiologist. However, my reading seems to suggest that
with respect to both hypertrophy and strength development, more training is
better except when it proceeds too fast, i.e., when an athlete's training
load exceeds the capacity he/she has developed to that point. To clarify,
I'm using "load" to mean (total number of repetitions) x (amount of weight
lifted per repetition). Moreover, I'm assuming a certain level of common
sense. Obviously, one can generate "load" in ways that are smart or not so
smart. But consider the following:

Zatsiorsky tells us that we make gains by forcing adaptation to greater
loads. Bompa tells us that to generate the greatest hypertrophy, we need to
handle the heaviest loads we can tolerate. On his website, Verkoshansky
states that
the volume of training loads achieved the limit of reasonableness. Today the
professional athletes are training about 8 hours per day, 2-4 times during
the day, near to 1,700 hours per year. It's quite impossible imagine any
further increase of load volume. We should look for models that assure a
most rational use of the training loads over the year cycle;
today there is the tendency to increase the intensity of the training work
to increase the effectiveness of the training process, especially for the
top class athlete. This is an expedient that needs to be used very carefully
according to the qualification of athletes, the level of their preparedness
and the calendar of competitions.
Similarly, Louie Simmons talks about his powerlifters working through 14
sessions per week.

Granted, in terms of logic alone, the mere fact that "professional athletes
are training about 8 hours per day" does not necessarily mean it's the best
strategy. However, there is certainly serious evidence to suggest that many
of the most knowledgeable and committed people think that very extensive
training regimens are worthwhile. The message I get is that the best
results are achieved when a well-prepared athlete, following a
well-conceived, well-managed program, extends his training load as far as he
can, commensurate with his level of preparedness.

In contrast, I was reading a book by Anthony Ditillo, *The Development of
Muscular Bulk and Power.* While "Ditillo" probably is not a household word,
Anthony Ditillo certainly achieved extraordinary muscular development and
strength. He worked out four times a week using basic multi-joint exercises
(squat, deadlift, bench press, press, some curls). I would estimate that
one of his workouts would take approximately an hour. Also, someone on the
forum recently mentioned Daniel Moore's Max-Stimulation program, which
involves a moderate load, certainly nothing like the 6-8 hours per day that
many elite Olympic weightlifters, powerlifters, and bodybuilders adhere to.

Yes, there are people with genetic gifts such that their strength and bulk
increase when weights just come into their peripheral vision. But are there
serious scientific arguments that explain why and under what conditions a
workout like Ditillo's or Moore's produces equal or better results than a
much more extensive regimen that involves a much heavier load?

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