Category: Training Methodology

Distance Training Simplified

Periodisation Simplified

This weeks article isn’t from some academic or coach that inspired me early in my coaching career but a coach that I’ve only discovered this year. Sean P. O’Connor was the Boys Head Coach for Lafayette High School, MO and he wrote his book Distance Training Simplified. O’Connor or Coach OC as his athletes call him doesn’t prescribe to the traditional periodisation concepts. Now I don’t use Coach OC’s methodology with my athletes, nor will I but his concept hold’s merit in certain circumstances (that don’t fit with my athletes). I’m including his concept or methodology in this series because I like his concept and believe in it (for a specific demographic).

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Periodising Swimming Successfully with Dick Hannula

Dick Hannula is arguably one of the most successful swim coaches of all time. Under his leadership the Tacoma Swim Club won 24 consecutive state championships, a total of 323 swim meets with no loss!!! He was the US National Swim Coach multiple times between 1973 and 1985, as well as manager for both summer Olympics in 1984 & 1988. He has been inducted into the International Swimming Hall of Fame and is credited with developing the modern swim paddle with holes in them to facilitate feel for the water. He has authored Coaching Swimming Successfully and edited The Swim Coaching Bible.

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The Art of Running Faster

The Art of Periodisation with Julian Goater

Julian Goater was a top British athlete winning a gold medal with the rest of the British team at the World Cross Country Championships in 1979. He has a 5,000m PB of 13:15.59 and a 10,000m PB of 27:34.58 (which to this day is a still in the Top 10 fastest UK times ever).
In more modern times Julian is now running a coaching company in the UK called Feel Good Factors for runners and cyclists. In his book he wrote with Don Melvin The Art of Running Faster Julian talks about his methodology of periodisation.

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Power to Perform

The Power of Periodisation With Jon Ackland

Jon Ackland was an early inspiration of mine. It was possibly him who first introduced me to the term Periodisation through articles in NZ Triathlon magazines in the early to mid 90’s. Then in the early 2000’s I attended a number of seminars he held about Ironman preparation and took on a lot of his philosophies from these seminars.

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Dave Salo’s Complete Periodisation for Swimmers

Traditional periodisation has four phases (preparation, precompetition, competition and active rest phases). Swimming is different to other sports because it is held in a water environment which is governed by a different set of physical rules than land based sports. For this reason Dave Salo modifies how he periodises a season for his swimmers.

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80/20 Triathlon

Periodisation in an 80/20 Triathlon or Running World

Arguably Matt Fitzgerald’s most famous books about training derive their methodology from Dr Stephen Seiler’s research. 80/20 Running and 80/20 Triathlon are immensely popular books. This is a summary of the periodisation concepts from them.

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The Runner's Edge

Matt Fitzgerald’s High Tech Periodisation for a Runner’s Edge

Matt Fitzgerald has written numerous books around enhancing performance for both runners and triathletes. In his The Runner’s Edge book that he wrote with Stephen McGregor he describes using TrainingPeak’s Performance Management Chart (PMC) to manage periodisation and also optimise performance.

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Periodisation for Swimmers

Jill Sterkel’s Periodisation for Swimmers

This weeks instalment in my series of articles about periodisation looks at how swim coaches apply methodologies around periodisation principles. Jill Sterkel was the Woman’s Head Swimming and Diving Coach for the Texas Longhorn’s at the University of Texas at Austin for 16 years in the 90’s and 2000’s. She was also a gold medal winning Olympian in 1976 in Montreal and also achieved two bronze medals in the 1988 Seoul Olympics. Jill Sterkel wrote the chapter on Long- and Short- Range Planning in The Swim Coaching Bible that is endorsed by the World Swimming Coaches Association.

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Peter Coe

Martin & Coe’s Better Periodisation for Distance Runners

Peter Coe started out dissatisfied with the coaching advice Sebastian was receiving from his local club (this was based around the methodologies for Arthur Lydiard). Fluent in German, Coe senior translated the books of prominent German coach Woldemar Gerschler. Gerschler was a pioneer and proponent for Interval Training back in the 1930’s. His methodologies called on a pace “so fast that the pace required in competition would seem moderate and achievable”, and this is a key principle that Coe senior used to build the fitness of Sebastian Coe to win Olympic gold medals in the 1,500m in both Moscow and Los Angeles, combining that with silver medals in the 800m in the same Olympics.

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Giving the Coach the Finger

I want my athletes to give me the finger, and often. Actually I look for it in about 80% of their workouts. And I encourage it. I’ve been describing it like this to myself for a few years. The idea of this article has also been floating around my head for just as long. I just haven’t verbalised it to anyone….so excuse me if this seems a bit of a weird context 😃

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