Is your training program Pisa or Giza?

The 5 principles of Lydiard Training

1. Maximize Your Aerobic Capacity

Bigger Oxygen uptake = More Energy = Better performance

Is your training program Pisa or Giza?

 

Would you consider building a house without a solid foundation? Of course not! There are laws against it for good reason – the building would be unstable. Take the Leaning Tower of Pisa for example. I remember standing at the top of it frozen with the fear of falling. My point of reference was all askew because it lists precariously. All because the ground beneath it cannot support the structure. By contrast the Great Pyramid of Giza, with its wide base, is much higher but not in the slightest danger of falling over.

This is the principle behind building a base in training. Without it your capacity to recover and do the successive training phases is limited. 

For the complete article and to learn about their coaching services, please go to http://www.running-wizard.com/.  Lydiard Running Wizard is a project by my sister, Lorraine Moller, in collaboration with a small team of outstanding athletes and coaches.  Lydiard Running Wizard brings the coaching systems of the late Arthur Lydiard - the most successful running coach in history - into the digital era.

While this service principally targets runners, the programme and personalised support by professional coaches, is almost seamlessly able to be adapted to other sports such as cycling, waka, kayak, rowing and even racing horses!

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About this website

The advice in these articles is given freely without promise or obligation.  Its all about giving you and your family the tools and information to take control of your health and fitness.

Where next for New Zealand Soccer now that the Football World Cup is over for them?

Alama Moller kicking for Goal

Once the hoopla has died and the vuvuzelas of the SA World Cup are thankfully silent; where next for New Zealand soccer?

New Zealand's historic success at the tournament is brining in millions of windfall dollars for NZ Soccer and the ranks of junior soccer are already swelling to bursting.  Recalling past occasions of NZ success on the sporting stage, there usually follows much talk with little action, much expenditure and little to show once the hype has settled and the money gone.

Sports that have had their chances in the past and blown them include squash, tennis, golf, hockey, kayaking and athletics - and soccer - of course!  The outstanding exception to the sorry NZ trend to squander fantastic opportunities is rowing (I hope).

Millions of dollars are coming into Soccer's coffers and it looks like millions will quickly go out in what may be vain efforts to retain the services of Coach, Riki Herbert, and the core of his All Whites team.  And I suppose the swelling leadership ranks will need hefty pay rises, new cars and then there are all those first class flights getting to talkfests to figure out what to do with all that extra dosh!

How much will be left over for developing the sport at the grass roots?  If we look to sports like tennis and rugby, we can see the damage that is done to their grass root support when the professional side of the sport receives a disproportionate share of the limited resources.

The longterm health of a sport depends on a strong base of amateur participation, including volunteer coaching - Kill these off and you kill the sport.

I want to see most of soccer's financial windfall going into developing and supporting a strong coaching structure.  The basic resources, including courses, for coaching development are already there via agencies like Regional Sports Trusts and SPARC; but it all comes down to how well they are used by the sports code.  The club all my children have gone through (A period spanning 22yrs) relies entirely on volunteer "parent" coaching.  There is little in the way of coach education and support for these coaches through the season and, oh what a difference a little would make to the enjoyment for the kids and the quality of play!

Several good coaches can produce a dozen skilled athletes each per year for the same investment that might be made in one skilled athlete who may never come to anything.

Investment in coaching development could be as simple for a club as having one or two senior coaches (who attend the formal coaching courses, sit their exams, etc) who's job it is to circulate among the volunteer coaches during team training sessions and games.  Their job is to assist the volunteers with whatever is needed to improve their individual coaching standards, as well as to foster a positive consistency across the entire coaching pool.

If youngsters are to stay in the sport beyond their junior years they must develop is a love of the game, good basic skills and fitness - and the thrill of winning which will come as a result of the former basics.

If New Zealand is to fully capitalise on its World Cup success, then we need to concentrate on coaching development.

Good coaches produce winners

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The advice in these articles is given freely without promise or obligation.  Its all about giving you and your family the tools and information to take control of your health and fitness.  Please give me your support by subscribing to my free email updates. Please shop at my Online Store. Please encourage your family and friends to do the same. While we may not always be able to compete with the big operators on price, we aim to more than compensate through personal service!
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Barking up the wrong tree seeking a cure for cyclist Sarah Ulmer's back injury

Opinion
Here is a TV3 news video about Sarah Ulmer who is still struggling with a painful back injury suffered a year ago:

I wrote about Sarah's injury woes several months ago, noting that I had predicted about this time last year that Sarah would come unstuck. My reasons why are explained in this article here. Again, my predictions appear to have proven to be true. I am convinced that seeking a medical or physical therapy solution is proving fruitless. These will not repair her weakest link.

Before I go on; let me state that this is not an "I told you so" story. This article is written out of concern that we are far too good at burning out our sporting talent, forcing them into early retirement well before their due date - just look at our rugby players - retired before they are 30 when we know that the strongest and fastest athletes on the planet are historically much older. Al Oerter, Lynford Christie and Carl Lewis, for example. How was it that Lorraine Moller was able to extend her international career for an astonishing 28 years? Sara Ulmer is just maturing as a cyclist, yet she is on the verge of being forced into early retirement through injury. This need not every happen.

We fail to learn from history - from the experience of others who have gone before. In this article, I make observations and relate them to my experience as both and athlete and as an actively involved bystander in the careers of many great sports men and women, including my sister, Lorraine. In their experiences lie the solutions to Sara's ongoing injury woes. Read on and please comment on the article, thanks.

I attended a bike coach conference when Sarah Ulmer was on top of her world. She was the guest presenter. She promotes healthy MacDonald's meals like their salads. What really struck me was Sarah's almost religious conviction that nutrition supplements were bad, to the extent I was left with the impression she had them in the same category as illegal ergogenic drugs. She expressed the view that an athlete could get all she needs from a good diet. I am assuming this includes a MacDonald's salad (Commercially grown salad plants are poor sources of minerals and other nutrients).

I do not have confidence in the modern diet. While a young athlete can get away for several years on a "normal" healthy diet, the sad fact is that our modern diet will inevitably come up short nutritionally; especially for an athlete like a marathon runner or cyclist. The body will have progressivley developed serious mineral and other nutrient imbalances due to losses from stress, heavy sweating and tissue damage. I have also found that competitive cyclists can be seriously vitamin D deficient which has all manner of ill effects, including muscle and joint pain.

Sarah would benefit from talking to somebody who has been there- done that! Like Allison Roe, or my sister Lorraine who managed to hammer her body, sometimes running marathons in less than 2:30 in the worst conditions of heat and humidity and dirty air imaginable. Yet she managed to extend her career for 28 years in an event where few come back for a 2nd Olympics. I believe this is a world best for longevity as an internationally ranked distance runner.

Lessons can be learned from runners like Kevin who has discovered how to become injury free through training and nutrition; running close to three hours at Rotorua Marathon at 50+ years old (Rotorua is a tough course, so take 5-10 minutes off your time Kevin!). Refer to this article.

It is worth noting Lorraine's advice about recovery in this video series. The rule about rebuilding for so many days for each mile raced also applies to cycling and is the basis for my prediction last year that Sarah would break down. The laws of recovery cannot be defied for long.

Following Lorraine's remarkably long running career was a huge education for me and it was fascinating to see why and how equally talented athletes fell by the way from injury and burnout. This happened time and again with disturbing regularity. An athlete would win a big event and become an overnight celebrity - they would be on the speaking circuits, doing film shoots for adverts and all kinds of interviews. These are exhausting things to do. Big sponsporships are signed and with those come the obligations to perform and to Glad-Hand. These are equally as exhausting as an ad film shoot - emotionally and physically. Whenever I give a talk I want to have a snooze afterwards - not to train. Sleep is disturbed, training is disrupted and the wrong foods are consumed. Too much time is spent sitting in cars and planes when one should be soaking in the bath, lounging about on the living room couch, or on the floor having a good stretch. Being in crowds of enthusiastic admirers and reporters is very stressful and one is exposed to all kinds of bugs and stressed athletes are highly vulnerable to the lot.

The nervous and glandular systems of any athlete, epspecially the highly strung ones are highly susceptible to chronic burnout and disruption.

Exhausted, disrupted and under-done, the athlete then attempts to emulate past performances as anxious fans, sponsors and officials look expectantly on. Injury and illness beckon, as does failure to heal.

When I carefully view the TV3 news video here I see a noticeably thinner Sarah Ulmer (Excess catabolism at work?) and she looks tired and stressed during the event, despite the smiley public persona. The body language and her voice tone are revealing. Where on Earth is the physical and emotional energy going to come from for her next quality training session? It is so easy for a gifted athlete to lose control and to lose sight of what really matters most when it comes to being a consistent performer at the highest level. Sometimes the best thing an athlete can do is disappear for an extended period of time, recharge and do nothing else later other than to gradually get back into training over the next year or so.

Lorraine shunned the spotlight. She never had a management company selling her as a product and she had very few sponsors and all of those were directly related to her performing on the road or track (eg: running shoe companies). She did very little in the way of public speaking, photo shoots and so on while she was in training and competing. She did not chase the dollars. She was an athlete proudly representing NZ and not being packaged and sold a product. She trained and trained and trained. She rested up in between, she raced and then she concentrated on recovery. She learned that even the most wholesome diet was not quite enough to sustain the punishment of elite sport. She worked on a four year cycle with the Commonwealth Games and the Olympics carefully tucked in where she ran her heart out.

Of course she made lots of mistakes and so did plenty of other very good sports people I know; but she thought about what was happening, bounced back and she learned from these mistakes that could easily have been career ending. These are the lessons they do not teach in exercise science and defintely not in medical school.

Poor Athletic Performance Linked To Vitamin Deficiency

Science Daily — Active individuals lacking in B-vitamins -- including college athletes and other elite competitors -- may perform worse during high-intensity exercise and have a decreased ability to repair and build muscle than counterparts with nutrient-rich diets, according to recent Oregon State University research published in the International Journal of Sport Nutrition and Exercise Metabolism.

The B-vitamins include thiamin, riboflavin, vitamin B-6, B-12 and folate. These micronutrients are necessary during the body's process for converting proteins and sugars into energy, and are used during the production and repair of cells, including red blood cells.

For active individuals a marginal deficiency in the nutrients may impact the body's ability to repair itself, operate efficiently and fight disease, said Melinda Manore, researcher in the Colleges of Agricultural and Health and Human Sciences. Manore analyzed the athletic performance of several elite and collegiate athletes in her research, as well as less competitive individuals.

The stress on the body's energy producing pathways during exercise, the changes in the body's tissues resulting from training, an increase in the loss of nutrients in sweat, urine and feces during and after strenuous activity and the additional nutrients needed to repair and maintain higher levels of lean tissue mass present in some athletes and individuals may all affect an individuals B-vitamin requirements, said Manore.

"Many athletes, especially young athletes involved in highly competitive sports, do not realize the impact their diets have on their performance," said Manore, who is also an Extension Service nutrition scientist. "By the time they reach adulthood they can have seriously jeopardized their abilities and their long-term health."

Current national B-vitamin recommendations for active individuals may be inadequate, and athletes who follow the recommended daily allowances set by the U.S. government may be receiving lower amounts of nutrients than there bodies need, said Manore.
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Gary Moller comments:
The B group of vitamins is especially important for any person who is under stress, be that physical or emotional - which probably applies to 99% of the population! Stress not only steps up the body's need for these vitamins, it also chews through them at a higher rate. While a wholesome diet will supply the RDA (recommended daily allowance) this is not the case when the body is under constant stress.

Stress also chews through magnesium. Organs, like the adrenals, require ample magnesium, as well as the B vitamins, to function poperly.


Let me tell you about Beriberi. Beriberi is a third World disease, causing paralysis and heart failure. It is unheard of in a well-nourished country like New Zealand (Last seen on the sailing ships that carried explorers to this far-flung land 150+ years ago). Beriberi is caused by chronic thiamine (vit B-1) deficiency. Well, I can tell you that I have seen two severe cases over recent years in older men who have been in ill health which has caused enormous stress and affected their digestion. They have suffered varying degrees of nerve damage, inclusing limb paralysis. Frustratingly, treatment has consisted of powerful medications, including large doses of prednisone. Needless to say, this has been without any benefit.

All they required was a diet rich in B vitamins and a quality B vitamin supplement. Modern medicine can be very frustrating at times. I'll write more about this later.

Running - Being good racers in training and losing the plot

I don't think a lot of NZ coaches have really grasped the finer points of Lydiard’s coaching, I’m seeing young runners grinding out over the Waitakeres most weekends going flat out, I'm not hearing the message train don't strain, I'm hearing a message of mileage instead of time spent training.

A group of young adults goes out over the Waitakeres whether they are bent on competing I’m not sure, they go out together but come back down at one hang of a pace spread-eagled possibly racing each other back down. Their best is being given on the Waitakeres.
Our best results are coming from athletes trained by overseas coaches.

It’s the problem when a few coaches have all the talent under their wing, if they don't do a good job all the talent isn't developed properly.

There needs to be a message of balance, knowing when to ease off and listening to your own body rather than religiously following a coach.

Wayne

Photo: 1970's Canterbury, New Zealand Korean training camp when NZ was the Mecca for runners: the long sunday pack runs were part of a carefully managed buildup plan. There were no heroics.

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Gary Moller comments:
Wayne, These observations and comments are right on the mark and get to the heart of one of the reasons why New Zealand has lost the running plot after having been consistently at the top of the running world.

If you read my articles about Kenyan running, you will realise that Kenyans commence their running from a very early age, with brief bursts of intensity when playing games like soccer. This very much describes my own upbringing in rural New Zealand of the 1950's. It is only after a decade and a half later that the Kenyans, as young adults, are subjected to big running miles at pace and gut-heaving anaerobic work.

Lydiard alway worked on the basis that it took 8-10 years to build a champion. How right he was and how right he still is.

To take teenage boys and girls with the best of just a few years of running behind them and have them racing the lenght of the Waitakeres is really dumb. It is a recipe for disaster. End of story!

"Its allometry dear Watson" - S.Holmes

In all but a few sports, there is a very good reason why we should not, as coaches, have young people overly specialise before physical maturity: the reason is "allometry".

The science of allometric scaling dictates that if an organism doubles in size, power increases only by a factor of 2/3rds. This is why an ant can lift several times its weight, whereas an elephant cannot lift its own weight. The larger the organism, the less its power to weight ratio. This is why an ant would collapse under its own weight if it were scaled to elephant size and why an elephant can't jump. The same maths applies to accelerating and decelerating a body: The more mass, disproportionally more energy is required to accelerate and decelerate it.

So a 50kg weight lifter can lift more per kg body weight that a 150kg lifter. 100m sprinters tend to be smaller than 200m sprinters because the smaller mass is more quickly accelerated, bestowing a slight advantager over a larger opponent over the shorter distance. This is why a small rugby player tends to be able out-manoever a larger opponent. Size is an advantage in sports that do not require lifting and lowering body weight. Therefore; a big rower or kayaker will have an advantage over a smaller opponent. The same applies to cycling - a big rider will have an advantage on a flat course; whereas the lighter rider will have it over a big boy on the hills. When running, a small runner has the advantage over a larger one in any event longer than about 200m. This is because each stride raises and lowers the body weight by several centimeters. Power to weight ratio outweighs total power. This is principally why the slightly built North African runners dominate world running.

The maths are simple when working out power to weight ratios: Example: a 65 kg rider with a 4 liter O2 uptake = 61.5 ml O2/Kg 85 kg rider with a 5 liter O2 uptake = 58.8 ml O2/kg On the flat, the 85 kg rider will have an advantage over the 65 kg rider, whereas on a hilly course or one that requires constant accelerating and decelerating and changing of direction, the 65 kg rider will have the edge, other than on any long descents. We see these rules of physics being played out in races like the Tour de France the 60 kg riders dominate the mountain passes; whereas the bigger riders like Jan Ullrich tend to dominate the flat sections, including the time trials.

As a young person goes through puberty, body changes can be dramatic and one can not defy physical laws such as those to do with allomteric scaling. One can get an idea what that skinny little kid might grow into by looking at his/her parents and close relatives. This is why a young person that demonstrates talent should not over-specialise in one particluar discipline until well on the way to physical maturity - about 18-20 years. This gives them the option to switch to the event that their body best suits and to also find out what they really enjoy doing. Of course, there are always exceptions to the rules of physics, but these people are rare.

Some barriers to effective injury prevention in sports and recreation

Are we losing the battle for effective injury prevention in sports and recreation? Is this because of changes that are happening in society that are beyond our control? Are there things that we can do to wrestle back control?

I do not set out to offer any answers in this article. While I have opinions as to what can be done, my intention is to add fuel to the fires of discussion.

New Zealand Society

The erosion of the traditional weekend and the 9-5 working day

With more and more parents working longer hours and not having the traditional time off over the Saturday and Sunday, organised sport suffers terribly. This means children do less after school sport and less sport in the weekends. Fewer parents are available to help out, including coaching, refereeing and officiating.

This means we are producing unfit, poorly skilled kids who are at much serious risk of injury doing disorganised activity, like jumping off rooftops and riding bikes at breakneck speed down mountain-sides

The Break up of the family

This causes huge financial stresses on the family which means the children caught up in the mess are less involved in organised sport and recreation. The single parent charged with the bulk of care is pressed for time. Even if sport was an option, this may not happen because the weekends are the usual time for being shipped off to the non-custodial parent. A treat at MacDonald’s is more likely to happen than participating in obesity fighting organised weekend sport.

Absent fathers

Each day when I run alongside my little boy as he rides his bike to and from school, I ask, “Where have all the men gone?” Are they invisible? There is only one male teacher at his school and he is the Principal. Boys and girls need male role models, starting with fathers who are active, daily participants in their lives.

Fathers tend to do more rough and tumble activities with their children than their mothers. Like little bear cubs, little kids need this kind of boisterous activity to develop essential motor skills, as well as learning when to back off to avoid hurting themselves and others. It is all too common to see both young men and women who have not learned these essential behavioural limits. Fathers are very good at teaching this. But they have to be around.

Fathers are more inclined to throw a ball and to be involved in sports teams, clubs and coaching. Fathers are essential sports and recreation safety management role models for their boys and girls. Too many children miss out on this exposure. If Dad is not around to teach their child how to safely ride a bike down a steep slope, who will they learn from? What happens when the little boy grows up and buys his first motorbike? Mother was there but she was too busy driving them to and from school, doing the laundry and attending the second job to pay for the babysitting.

Coaching

The demise of the club

I was once told by a senior sports and recreation official that one club or society closes every day in NZ. This is disastrous. For example, the majority of tennis courts in New Zealand now sprout weeds or are now dotted with cheap apartments. Where have the children gone who used to populate the tennis courts after school and weekends?

As clubs disappear, so does organised sport and coaching structures. It is replaced by disorganised sporting and recreation activities that are without proper coaching programmes and safety management.

Busy parents and expensive programmes

Stressed, busy, financially pressured parents are not available to help organise sporting and recreation activities. This is causing an ongoing erosion of the volunteer base that is the backbone of NZ sport and recreation. It is being replaced only where those parents can afford it, by professionals, including commercial programmes. Many parents cannot afford to have their children participate in these programmes.

The dismantling of generic coaching certification

As of December 2006, SPARC shuts down the Coaching New Zealand Level One and Two coaching education and certification programmes. (It scrapped the impressive level Three course in 2002 and the rest is in a state of disrepair).

The responsibility for coaching education is being shifted from a centrally administered generic coaching course to individual sports codes to organise themselves. I do not agree with this. In SPARC’s defence, they did inherit a programme that had been steadily run into the dirt over many years and efforts to resuscitate it were going to require considerable time and effort. Effective coaching, including sports injury prevention, requires an army of volunteer coaches who have demonstrated competency in the basics of coaching. Shutting down this generic coaching programme is a mistake.

90% of coaching is generic. So, a good swimming coach could be a good rugby coach so long as he or she completes a couple of modules on the specifics of rugby. Clive Woodward, coach of the victorious English World Cup Rugby team, is switching to professional football. There is no need to repeat the educational modules on child development, nutrition, physiology, and psychology and safety management – other than the 10% that is specific to the sport in question.

Parents follow their children as they move from one sport to another and it is these parents who become the volunteer coaches. If parents are going to have to attend and pass (and pay) a coaching course that takes several days of their time each time their children swap sports, they simply won’t do it. They may be prepared to do it once and then give up a few hours once or twice a year to learn the 10% that is specific to the sport they are switching to.

The big sports like soccer and rugby have the size and the resources and international supporting structures to be able to look after their own coaching programmes. The same cannot be said of the majority of NZ’s sports codes which struggle just to survive. Coaching programmes that are developed today will mostly fall into states of disrepair as time passes. This is the nature of NZ sport, unless the programmes are maintained and driven by a central authority that also exercises responsibility for quality control.

I have had a lot of contact over the years with coaches and athletes in the USA. From what I can gather, the USA is a coaching disaster because there is no centralised structure. Everybody does their own thing and this applies to most sports. There is no consistency in practice, or in the way that knowledge and experience is passed on. They have serious problems and these show in their performances on the international stage. Outside of a handful of sports, the USA punches way below it weight for its population and rich resources. And where it does excel, this success is often reliant on talented imports.

For the sake of injury prevention, let alone anything else, let’s not go down the same treacherous path that has been taken by the USA.

Pushing the limits - Too far

"The most important of the neurotransmitters from a sports performance perspective are Dopamine, Epinephrine and norepinephrine and acetylcholine. As Dr John Berardi explains “Some evidence exists showing that when neurotransmitters like acetylcholine, dopamine, and norepinephrine get depleted, physical and cognitive performance suffers. Since these neurotransmitters can be depleted from intense repeated bouts of strenuous exercise, this is bad news. " Read the whole article by clicking on the title link above.
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Gary Moller Comments:
This is an interesting article that is put out by the people of IRule. While I can see where they are coming from and while I do not have a problem with the science, I do worry that many multisports atheltes rely too much on various performance supplements, ranging from energy drinks, to caffeine to ephidrine-type chemicals. This especially so for ultra endurance events that sometimes go for days on end.

Why, oh why does the good doctor believe the depeletion of neurotransmitters is "bad news"? I think it is good news.

The need for sleep and the tiring of nerves so that muscles begin to fail is natural and there for a purpose: without periodic breaks for repair and replenishment, the body breaks down. The consequences of ignoring Nature, or trying to circumvent her can be catastrophic. Muscles and tendons like ropes eventually fray and break; joints like bearings will seize if not resurfaced and lubricated; and the brain becomes hopelessly muddled if not rebooted now and then. This is not rocket science. The body's parts all interact perfectly. To fiddle with one part of the body or its physiology in order to get an artificial performance gain risks acute and lasting damage.

What I am beginning to see nowadays is "mature" multisports athletes who are suffering early onset of arthritis and permanent muscle and tendon damage. Without question, this is the result of overdoing events that go on and on and on, well past the point where one would normally call it a day. I would like to see a shift back to events that last just 3-5 hours. Like old elephants whose time has come, the multisporters who have worn themselves to a standstill, quietly slip away unnoticed into the shadows. I would like to see some research of the musculoskeletal health of multisports veterans.

I competed in the very first multisports races back in 1977. They lasted 3-5 hours and the courses were determined by the rugged terrain in which they were typically held. Many of those who embraced this new sport did so partly because they were sick and tired of over-regulated sports like athletics and cycling and the cheating that was going on with performance enhancing drugs. It was a sport that was one with nature and almost without rules. Has it lost the plot?

Training for a Mountain Bike Race

Start 'em young: Alama Moller (centre) lining up for the NZ Championships

If you have not read this yet, here is the link to my latest E-Publication.

What is your Weakest Link?

New injury low for Sarah UlmerOngoing injuries mean Sarah Ulmer has been ruled out of next month's world road cycling championships8 August 2006

"The leg and lower back problems which forced Sarah Ulmer out of this year's Commonwealth Games time trial have now put paid to her world road cycling championship aspirations.

Ulmer says she can still ride but only to a certain level, which is about 15 percent below what she needs to be competitive, and she has confirmed she will not be competing in Austria next month.

....Ulmer is heading to the Australian Institute of Sport this week to see if they can shed any light on the problem."

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Gary Moller comments:
I personally doubt if the experts at the Australian Insititute of Sport will shed much light on her back pain. Sometimes such experts can be the worst to consult.

Here is what I wrote in an article about knee pain and it could equally apply to other health and injury issues, including back pain:

So, your knee(s) hurt for some reason? If you go to a surgeon, you will be operated on. If you go to a rheumatologist, you will be prescribed a powerful medicine. If you go to a physio, you will be given utra-sound and strange exercises. If you go to an osteopath, you will be massaged and manipulated. If you go to a podiatrist, you will be given $500 orthotics, if you go to a personal trainer, you will do lots of funny exercises and go on a diet. Sounds uncomfortably like a lottery to me, I reckon! Currently, in NZ, if you have a knee problem, you will probably be sent to the surgeon. Heaps and heaps of knee ops are happening.

Often the solutions are right under your nose. An expert or specialist on, say, back pain, or bike setup, weight training or nutrition probably knows their topic so well because that is the topic that has consumed their energies. However this may leave little over for the study of other disciplines. They may not notice the obvious. Nor may they see the big picture.

I watched Sarah win the final stage of the international women's road cycling tour here in Wellington. This was just a few weeks before the Melbourne Commonwealth Games. She was on her own from 1/3 of the way and went on to produce one of the most emphatic wins one would ever see in international cycling. As the race was proceeding, I commented to another bystander that this stunning performance could be her undoing at the Commonwealth Games. How right I was and her injury problems continue.



By getting a healthy balance between the things that wore her down and those that built her up, Lorraines Moller's running career spanned a breath-taking 28 years of international competition.

This reminds me of the time I was down at a sports medicine course at Otago University several years ago. Attending, as well, was one of the sports medicine minders of our best fast bowlers - if only he were not forever injured! This bowler has suffered just about every injury known to fast bowlers, including heat exhaustion. His minder was seeking expert assistance with the heat exhaustion problem. To my horror, he was wanting to fry this fine young bowler in the university's climate chamber! I thought the poor guy's body was pleading for a break!

What would you rather: a fast bowler who bowls at 90% pace 100% of the time, or the same bowler who bowls at 100% of the time; but is unavailable because of injury for 75% of the season?

What is your weakest link?
We all have a weak link - some obvious, many not so obvious. I have two: For me, it is my low back and my tendency to get colds when I am pushing too hard. Back pain, colds, stress fractures, tendonitis, bursitis, glandular fever, anaemia, foot pain and hamstring pain are among the most common weak links that abound. No amount of physiotherapy, anti-inflammatories, manipulation, surgery or massage will restore the weakest link, unless the underlying causes are dealth with. The problem is a coaching and lifestyle one. These are not sexy and they take time and effort.

Anabolism and Catabolism
Vigorous exercise breaks our bodies down (catabolism). The body responds by building new and stronger tissue and larger energy reserves (anabolism). Training, competition, rest and nutrition must all be perfectly balanced to ensure that the anabolic processes are always a step ahead of the opposition (catabolism). For more information about anabolism and catabolism read the relevant sections in Training for a marathon.

If we do something especially exhausting, like a hard marathon in the heat, a multi-day cycle or several days bowling at pace; then we will need as long as several days or several months before we do it all over again. In the case of the marathon, the break may be as long as 6-8 months. During the intervening period, however long that may be, the athlete goes back to doing the basics and gradually rebuilds to another slighlty higher peak. Fail to do this procedure of recovery and rebuilding each time and the weakest link in the body will fail.

I like to use my sister, Lorraine, as an example of an athlete who got the balance right. Despite being a full-time professional distance runner, her annual weekly mileage was only about 80 miles and she only ever ran about 2 marathons really hard per year. In fact, she had a 2 year cycle that actually ran into 4 years - 2 years to the Commonwealth Games, a recovery year and then another year buildup to the Olympics and then a rest year, and so it went on.

Why did Myra take up mountain bike racing?

Wayne asks the following:
I was looking at Myra's CV, it was interesting to note that she was a high achiever in running, given the discussion that went on about the drop in numbers of runners, I wonder if a blog should be done about how Myra made a choice on to favour cycling over running., I"m sure that athletics is losing big numbers to other sports, obviously mountain biking was never a competing sport against running, there are so many other sports around now that never used to be around. what was it that Myra was looking for in a sport that mountain biking had that running didn't?

Gary Moller comments:
While I can't speak for Myra, I can offer a parent's viewpoint.
Yes, Myra was a talented runner and, like her brother and sister, were regular place-getters in junior athletics. This was with little in the way of hard training. I concentrated on giving the kids the skills to do a sport well and refrained from any hint of heavy duty training. The number one priority was to instil a love of physical activity - not to put them off for life as so often happens!

This development of skills included the use of professional coaches. However, the moment a coach started to get serious and begin asking the kids to start doing, say, early morning training sessions, I would ask them if they would like to do another sport. Their response was always highly approving. So, despite being proficient runners and swimmers at a young age, I switched them back and forth between various sports, including spring board diving, biking and soccer, to name some.

In addition to the development of a skills base at an early age and a love of sport, I also worked on the basis that a young person will gravitate to the activity that most suits them - so long as they are given a sufficiently rich sporting experience as youngsters. This is what happened.

In Myra's case, she showed a talent for riding bikes and, despite my competitive background as a cyclist, she was soon making me struggle to keep up when climbing steep Wellington hills. Myra is simply doing what she loves and what she is very good at.

I would add that this approach that I have taken with my children is in stark contrast to so called "talent identification" programmes that are getting much attention nowadays. Personally, I am sceptical about their suitability for the NZ temperament. Children will only stick at a sport if they love it. Otherwise, they will give it away first chance they get.