CONDITIONING METHODS WE USE AT ETHOS
At Ethos, we use a variety of conditioning (both on and/or off-feet) methods to get our athletes competition ready. Prescribing conditioning can get confusing at times, so this blog will highlight some guidelines on getting the most out of each session and what parameters to abide by.
A lot of the recent talk on conditioning has been about whether certain methods are better than others. I think this misses the point as most of them do have their own advantages and disadvantages. The analogy of a mechanics ‘toolbox’ serves us well here. Different tools work more effectively for different jobs, and this is a lens through which we can view various conditioning methods.
Long Steady State
First off, let’s talk about long steady-state efforts. As the name suggests, this involves a continuous effort that lasts longer than 30 minutes. Using a low intensity such as keeping HR between 60-70% Heart Rate Reserve can be a good way to monitor the session. Well-known Conditioning Specialist, Joel Jamieson, identifies these as Zone 2 type sessions, OR Cardiac Output efforts.
At ETHOS, this is generally used for athletes after a hard fight camp or post-season where the goal is to return the athlete back to training as these sessions tend to have a low psychological and physical cost on the athlete. These stages for us are termed ‘regeneration blocks’. It can also help to build overall endurance by improving cardiac output which helps the athlete’s ability to deliver oxygen around the body more efficiently (The long standing notion of increasing an athletes ‘Gas tank’).
Long Intervals
Long intervals involve intervals that are greater than 2 minutes in work and less than 2 minutes of passive or active rest. This rest is required to ensure that there is time accumulated at VO2max (T@VO2max) during the session, which is the main proponent behind adaptations in interval training for improving VO2max when compared to continuous training. The intensity of these sessions is going to be low to moderate using 1-2 sets of 5-8 repetitions. Due to the length of the intervals, which involve time above the lactate threshold, there tends to be more muscular fatigue accumulated during the session. Therefore, these sessions are best completed after hard training where extra work can be done and where it would not affect the performance of important technical training sessions. These long interval sessions are great for developing central adaptations and because they are done at a higher intensity than steady-state training, it is more relative to an intensity that might be experienced in competition.
Short Intervals
Short intervals involve intervals that are less than 1 minute in work and less than 1 minute in active or passive rest. For intervals <30s, active or passive rest can be used. For intervals >30s, active rest should be used to increase T@VO2max to exercise time ratio. The intensity of these sessions is going to be high using 2-5 sets of 4-12 repetitions. The unique aspect of short intervals is that you can target higher power outputs due to an increased contribution from the neuromuscular system and from the function of myoglobin, which can reoxygenate within 10 seconds. It is possible to simultaneously achieve the same T@VO2max at a higher average power output. These sessions elicit less muscular fatigue than long intervals so typically these sessions are best completed as the athlete is getting closer to competition and management of fatigue is a priority. Due to the intensity of these sessions, you’re more likely to see greater peripheral adaptations ultimately improving the athlete’s ability to work and recover repeatedly.
Repeat Sprint Training
Repeat sprint intervals involve the use of less than or equal to 20s of all out maximal sprints interspersed with incomplete active recovery of less than 20s. Prescription can be 1-3 sets of 2-5 repetitions. It is suggested that athletes will spend around 2-3 minutes at >95% VO2 max provided they repeat sprints 2-3 times in a session. This is going to be like your “worst case scenario” type of training and will be extremely challenging physically and psychologically. This type of training is going to have a high neuromuscular component and is going to challenge an athlete’s ability to tolerate higher levels of accumulated lactate. These sessions can be used for athletes who are 3-6 weeks out from a fight to expose them to uncomfortable situations and improve their ability to recover from maximal efforts quickly. In saying that, sometimes the inclusion of these types of protocols is not always necessary as a fighter’s skills volume generally increases dramatically during these stages of the camp.
Sprint Interval Training
Sprint Interval Training involves the use of 10-30 second maximal effort sprints interspersed with full recovery periods >120s. General prescription guidelines would be to use 1-2 sets of 4-6 reps with total work time equating to a minimum of 1 minute (e.g. 1 set of 3x20s efforts) At the local muscular level, there is going to be an extremely high muscle oxygen demand and high neuromuscular and lactate load. These types of sessions can be used year-round, especially for athletes who have crazy training schedules or athletes who need to improve their overall power output. The great thing about this type of training is that the total session volume can remain quite low meaning that athletes don’t have to do long conditioning sessions to get similar adaptations as other forms of interval training. Typically, what we see on our NIRS devices is the greater the intensity of effort, the greater the amount of muscle deoxygenation. The adaptations that you can elicit from this training include improved mitochondrial and capillary density which ultimately influences the ability to utilise oxygen quickly.
A NOTE:
One challenge that comes with prescribing conditioning to athletes in the private sector is that each athlete has a different schedule. Combined with what we’ve found they need to work on based on their “physiological limitation,” (see our previous blog on this), we also need to understand what sort of work is being done in their technical training. For example, if an athlete is already doing long steady state runs at their fight gym, they don’t need to be prescribed another long steady state conditioning session at our gym. In this instance, you’d want to work on some short interval or sprint interval sessions as this is something they might not be getting already.
Another side note is that conditioning does not have to be periodised equally for all athletes. For example, if you identify an athlete’s major limitation as utilisation then it is suggested to also target improvements here out of camp, even though historically out of camp stages were always associated with more ‘aerobic’ type interventions.
Hopefully, this provides a brief insight into the types of conditioning methods that we use at Ethos and how we prescribe conditioning to our athletes at certain times of the year.