Iron World. No. 1.2014
We have all heard about the undoubted benefits of running. In Ancient Hellas, the following words were carved on a high rock: “If you want to be strong, run, if you want to be beautiful, run, if you want to be smart, run!” Running as a species motor activity, extremely popular in the world. The media broadcast about its benefits, books are written and republished. There are a huge number of running enthusiasts in the world. All of them are deeply convinced that only running can help overcome all physical and mental ailments associated with age-related changes and emotional overload. Running is positioned as the most beneficial form of health-improving exercise. And for harmonious development, it is enough to do only one thing. Fans of running on various forums aggressively attack those who have the audacity to doubt its benefits and do not want to listen to any arguments. Mass races are held all over the world. The New York Marathon, Boston Marathon, and Moscow Peace Marathon attract tens of thousands of participants. True, during each mass marathon there are at least three deaths among participants, but the press tries not to focus attention on this, although this information is not hidden. They just try not to write about it. Modern science also does not share the extremely enthusiastic attitude towards running. Let's try to figure it out and give running an objective assessment, noting its good and bad sides.
Firstly, we have to admit that running is not a physiological mode of physical activity for a person. Humans are not anatomically predisposed to running. Quadrupeds are predisposed to running fast. They have four limbs involved in the process of movement, and the body weight is distributed between them. The spine does not experience a vertical shock load, since it is located in a horizontal position during running. The structure of the skeleton of the human leg, in contrast to the structure of the hind limb of all fast running mammals, has noticeable differences. Both predators, ungulates, and rodents have a similar structure. If a person has a long thigh and lower leg and a short foot, then in fleet-footed animals the length of the foot does not differ much in length from the thigh and lower leg. Their support is their fingers, not their feet. And the length of the metatarsus is not much shorter than the length of the tibia. Therefore, to people who are not familiar with these features of animal anatomy, it seems that their hind limb bends backward with the knee. In fact, it is not the knee, but the heel. What gives this limb structure? The length of the thigh in animals relative to the length of the entire leg is much shorter than in humans. Shorter lever coupled with greater muscle mass back surface the hips provide a more powerful force and, accordingly, a relatively longer stride length. The center of mass of the hind limb in animals is much higher than in humans. All their muscles are located in the upper half of the leg. The metatarsus is dry, there are no muscles on it. Thanks to this, animals are able to develop a cadence that is inaccessible to humans. In terms of running speed, we are inferior to most mammals. We are unable to escape from a predator. They are sometimes able to run to a tree and climb onto it, thus saving themselves. We are not able to catch up with any animal that could serve us as food. We are not anatomically designed for this. By the way, the ostrich, capable of running at a running speed of 60 km/h, moving, like us, exclusively on its hind limbs, has a leg structure identical to the structure of the hind limb of fleet-footed animals. Maybe we are much more resilient than animals and are capable of long running journeys, like horses, or bison, or dogs? No. A dog, for example, has 100% OMV, while a person’s legs have an average of 50%, or even less. That is, already by anatomical structure it is clear that a person is initially incapable of either fast or long running! The maximum speed achieved by elite sprinters wearing spikes on tartan surfaces is just over 43 km/h. And they can only hold it for a distance of 20 meters. These are top-class sprinters who have been training for at least 10 years and use competent pharmacological support. And an ordinary person can reach a maximum speed of just over 20 km per hour. Even 43 km/h is an absolutely ordinary speed in the animal world.
If we look at the history of the Ancient World and the Middle Ages, we will see that, in practical terms, running was developed only in a military environment. In the practice of destroying their own kind, warriors had to surpass their rivals in the ability to move mobile. And then this applies to infantrymen. The cavalry did not need to run. And in the infantry it was used mostly in those countries where there was no heavy armor, mainly in Asia. The population not associated with military activities did not use running. During mass migrations, people moved at a walking pace. This form of movement is physiological for humans. Even without special training a person is able to walk several kilometers. And it can be difficult to run even 400 meters without preparation.
Running was included in the program of the Olympic Games in Ancient Greece. In the first thirteen Games it was only entered in the one furlong event (192.27 m). In the fourteenth Olympiad (724 BC) the program of the Games introduced double, i.e. two stages, running - diaulos, in the fifteenth (720 BC) - long running - dolichos (from 7 to 24 stages ). And for three hundred years of the ancients Olympic Games the number of distances did not increase. From the time the ancient games ended until the resumption of the Olympic movement by Baron Pierre de Coubertin, running was not particularly popular anywhere. At the first modern Olympic Games in Athens in 1896, Tom Burke became the champion in the 100-meter race, who, by the way, was the first to use low start. His result of 12.4 in the modern classification corresponds to the third sports category. Most long distance The marathon race was won by the Greek postman Spyridon Louis, who became a national hero in his homeland. Louis finished in 2 hours, 58 minutes and 50 seconds. The length of the distance then was about 40 km, and not 42 km 195 m, as it is now. This result is also at the level of the third sports category. More than half of the race participants dropped out of the race. By the way, let us remember that the Greek warrior, who ran from Marathon to Athens with the joyful news of the victory of the Greek army, proclaiming: “Rejoice, we have won!”, fell dead.
These results indicate that at the end of the 19th century, both in the sprint and in the marathon, the results of champions were at the amateur level, and, therefore, running was neither developed nor particularly popular. With the further development of the Olympic movement, running began to develop, but exclusively as a sports discipline. But running began to be positioned as a method of recreational exercise only in the early 70s of the last century. So run like wellness view physical culture has a short history, just a little over forty years. Running gained enormous popularity thanks to the work of the American doctor Kenneth Cooper. It was he who coined the word “aerobics”. And by that I didn’t mean gymnastic exercises to music, but prolonged cyclic loads. Until now, his books on the benefits of running are most often cited in various publications. True, not many people know that in his old age Cooper reconsidered his attitude towards running, since a huge army of amateur runners continued to die from cardiovascular diseases as often as other people. Currently, in the world, the cause of death in 70% of cases is coronary heart disease, 25% is cancer, and everything else, including disasters, wars and accidents, accounts for only 5%. Cooper himself, who ran all his life, wrote that running is harmful in old age. And in general, at any age it is much healthier brisk walking followed by training in gym. However, they also prefer not to remember this.
Let's look at the negative aspects of running.
Running is a species athletics, and he needs to learn. Watch how stayers run at international competitions. Their head moves in a straight line. That is, there is practically no vertical movement of the body. Only forward movement. This is the most rational and safe movement technique. And this technique must be learned and trained. It is ensured by rotation of the pelvis, correct placement of the foot, and shock absorption in the knee and ankle joint, respectively. high level readiness of the calf muscle. When using correct technique the harmful effects of running are minimized. Only if you don't run ultra long distances. Studies of tissue samples from calf muscles Marathon runners show significant damage to muscle fibers both after training and after competition. This is especially clearly illustrated in photographs in Hagerman’s research (1984). This is what explains the decrease in running speed over a distance in long and ultra-long distance runners, which is not observed in other cyclic sports where there is no shock load that destroys the muscles.
Professor V.N. Seluyanov wrote in his article “The Heart is Not a Machine”:
"IN cycling The 4 km and one hour race is won by whoever wins average distance. This athlete wins all distances without exception.
Here you need to take into account that cycling has one feature: athletes perform on the plain, on a track, where own weight does not play any role. Therefore, the one who is strong at 4 km is strong in everything. There are great riders, such as Indurain, Merckx or now Lance Armstrong, who win by a clear advantage at all distances, from the pursuit (4 km) and beyond. If he needs to set a world record in an hour race, he will set a world record in the 5 km, then in the 10 km, in the 20, 25, 50 and in the hour race. As a rule, all the greats who ride break all world records, and average speed they practically do not change.
It's the same with speed skaters. There are no climbs, so the picture is the same as for cyclists. If there is Hayden, he wins everything: from 500 m to 10,000 m...”
There is no such thing in running. There is a systematic decrease in running speed along the distance. But let's get back to technology. Among running enthusiasts, few people learn to run. Everyone believes that running is so natural that it does not require any training or any preliminary preparation. As a result, vertical movements of the body are inevitable. And this leads to shock loading. My knees begin to hurt, then my spine. This is especially true for people who are overweight. But they are the ones who are taught that running is the best way to lose weight. Naturally, for beginning runners, the calf muscle is absolutely not prepared for shock absorption, there is no technique for planting the foot, and when running they will stick their heels into the track. It is thanks to the vertical shock load that running is the most harmful of all types of cyclic aerobics. It’s no wonder that manufacturers of fitness equipment are developing new models of cardio equipment. Training on an exercise bike, elliptical trainer, stepper and just walking on a treadmill is much preferable to running.
What about the benefits? V. N. Seluyanov in his monograph “Technology of Health-improving Physical Culture” gives a comprehensive description of the main types of health-improving physical culture from the perspective of modern scientific data. He considers cyclic aerobics the least beneficial for health, and running, accordingly, the least useful view cyclic aerobics. Methodological manuals often write that aerobics should improve the condition of the heart and blood vessels, as well as reduce the amount of fat in the body. However, research aerobic exercise over the past 30 years, no significant positive effect of aerobic exercise on the heart, blood vessels and adipose tissue has been revealed. Training three times a week for two hours a day at a pulse of 100-140 beats/min, when the maximum stroke volume of the heart is observed, can lead to elongation of myofibrils in its muscle fibers, the so-called L-ventricular hypertrophy. This leads to a decrease in heart rate at rest. But this only matters for athletes of cyclic sports. For an ordinary person, the main indicator of health is the state of his endocrine and immune systems. And the impact of running on the endocrine system is extremely small. Only stress can activate the release of hormones into the blood. But it doesn’t exist in recreational running. Beginners can experience stress when it is very difficult for them to run and they run through force. Maybe while running on hills. By the way, running uphill is much more useful than running on the plain, since there is practically no shock load. When there is a state of severe discomfort in running, it is very beneficial for health. But which running enthusiast prefers this kind of running? They run at a steady pace in a comfort zone at their aerobic threshold. And the level of activation of the endocrine system, and, accordingly, the healing effect, is minimal. In a year-long experiment, running three times a day for an hour did not succeed in reducing high blood pressure. However, there is no doubt that in three to five years the pressure should normalize, this is confirmed by the practice of runners. But by working out in the gym, this problem could be solved much faster.
IN modern sports running still counts the best remedy development of general endurance and is used in almost all sports. This, of course, is a complete anachronism. First, there is no such thing as general endurance. In his fundamental work “Development of local muscular endurance in cyclic sports” (personally, I consider it the best in modern sports science), Professor Seluyanov convincingly proved through many scientific studies that the limiting link in performance is local endurance, which depends solely on the number of mitochondria in the muscle. Neither the cardiovascular nor the respiratory system can be the limiting link. Back in the 80s of the last century, scientists proved that the heart of an untrained person is capable of supplying 4.3 liters of oxygen per minute to the muscles with blood. And international-class masters of sports in long-distance running consume 4.0-4.5 l/min at the anaerobic threshold. That is, the heart of an ordinary person is already trained at the level of a master of sports. This is not surprising. The heart begins its training even before a person is born, and stops with the last breath. The level of heart fitness can never be achieved skeletal muscles. In the heart there is no gradation of fibers according to the level of excitability. Therefore, everyone is involved in every reduction muscle fibers myocardium. That is, it always works in full force. Each muscle fiber is intertwined to the limit with mitochondria. Therefore, contracting throughout life with a frequency of more than once per minute, the heart does not become acidic. And you don't need to train him. Why does an untrained person, climbing the stairs to the third floor, begin to choke and experience severe heart palpitations? Because he has few mitochondria in his muscles. We know that in mitochondria, glucose is oxidized with the participation of oxygen and during the oxidation process produces 38 molecules of ATP, carbon dioxide and water. And outside the mitochondria, without oxygen, it breaks down, forming two molecules of ATP and lactic acid. Without mitochondria, muscle cannot use oxygen. The heart drives a volume of oxygen to the muscles sufficient to run through the MS, but the muscles take from it only that part, the size of which is limited by the number of mitochondria, and the rest of the oxygen goes idle. Lactic acid, formed during the extramitochondrial breakdown of glucose, breaks down into lactate and hydrogen ions. And the high concentration of hydrogen ions in the muscle is precisely what causes fatigue and muscle failure. Hydrogen ions enter the bloodstream and cause increased blood acidity. And this is dangerous. At a blood pH of 7.3, acidosis occurs, and a pH less than 7.0 is generally fatal. It is known that hydrogen ions destroy all structures of the body. Buffer systems exist to regulate blood pH. A bicarbonate buffer is a conjugate acid-base pair consisting of a carbonic acid molecule H2CO3, which acts as a proton donor, and a bicarbonate ion, HCO3-, which acts as a proton acceptor. H+ ions interact with bicarbonate anions HCO3-, which leads to the formation of weakly dissociating carbonic acid H2CO3, causing a sharp increase in the level of carbon dioxide in the blood, which intensifies external breathing and increases heart rate. So it is the cause of shortness of breath and increased heart rate, and not weak functioning of the cardiovascular and respiratory systems. This is the body's reaction to excess lactic acid in untrained muscles. And protecting him, because against the background of severe shortness of breath and increased heart rate, a person will be forced to stop working and stop destroying the body with a huge amount of hydrogen ions.
Yes, running, of course, develops endurance, but not general, but local, increasing the number of mitochondria in the leg muscles. Nothing more. The aerobic capacity of the leg muscles is tested on a special bicycle ergometer. Hands are tested on a similar bicycle ergometer, but the pedals on it are turned by hand. In skiers, the aerobic capacity of the leg muscles is only slightly behind that of long-distance runners. But the abilities of the arm muscles are significantly superior. Runners do not use their arms when covering the distance. Therefore, there are few mitochondria there. And a marathon runner international level will be just as out of breath, rotating the pedals with his hands at the load level, an ordinary skier, as an untrained person, climbing the stairs to the third floor. International cyclists are very mediocre at middle distances on the flat. Their main working muscle is the quadriceps femoris. The muscles of the back of the thigh and gluteal muscles are less developed, and the calf muscles are not used at all, and when running on the plain they become acidic. But when cross-country running on hilly terrain, where the load is transferred to the quadriceps femoris muscle, they show quite decent results.
Or, for example, I had the opportunity to work with hockey players. Now at club teams In hockey, one of the standards is Cooper running. You need to run 3 km in 12 minutes. What should this test reveal in a team candidate?
Have you ever seen a player skate around the court at a steady pace for 12 minutes during a game? In hockey there are very short and sharp accelerations. And no one is kept on the field for 12 minutes. This is the first thing. And secondly, why does a hockey player need to run? Hockey players and speed skaters, like cyclists, are poor runners. Their main muscle is the quadriceps femoris. And for runners - the back of the thigh and calf. There are a number of athletes who have achieved outstanding results simultaneously in speed skating and cycling: Canadian Clara Hughes has two olympic medals in cycling and four in speed skating, 3 times Olympic champion in speed skating, Evgeny Grishin was one of the best cyclist racers in the country. Japanese Seiko Hashimoto participated in four Winter Olympics in speed skating and three Summer Olympics in cycling. We can continue for a long time, but there is not a single (!) skater or cyclist who would show good results on the run. And not a single runner who showed good results in cycling or speed skating. Lance Armstrong once decided to try himself in the marathon. Everyone thought that he was about to break records, but he couldn’t even meet the second-class standard. The third one is awarded if you simply reach the finish line. There is such a sport - triathlon. There is running, cycling, and pull-ups on the bar. So there, international triathletes run the CMS, sometimes the MS, and in cycling they show results at the level of the third, or at most second category. Different muscles work!
It’s especially funny to me when arm wrestling coaches force their students to run to increase endurance. Yes, mitochondria in the back of the thigh and lower leg are, of course, extremely necessary in this sport... As an example, we can cite the brilliant performances of disabled athletes: Roman Sedykh, Ruslan Mamedov, Vladimir Krupennikov. These athletes won Russian, European and world championships among able-bodied athletes thanks to their endurance in extremely protracted fights. Although due to illness they could not perform any work aerobic exercise. They simply increased the mitochondrial mass in their arm muscles by training and beat their healthy opponents, who regularly used running to develop endurance.
In the literature, non-existent advantages are often attributed to running. For example, the once popular publicist Dr. Yuri Bulanov published a collection “Anabolism without drugs”, which contains the article “Running is an anabolic”. I must say that I have an ambivalent attitude towards the doctor’s written work. He has some really good articles, but he often writes confidently about things he has absolutely no understanding of. Basics strength training were clearly not within the scope of his practice. With his characteristic confidence, the doctor cited “reliable” facts that a number of athletes, without using pharmacology and not particularly paying attention to their diet, gained 20 kg of muscle mass per year (!). These were former runners, skiers, etc. And this incredible growth occurred due to the fact that they had a lot of mitochondria in their muscles, and the main factor limiting the growth of muscle mass is energy, and hypertrophy of muscle fibers is impossible without previous hypertrophy of mitochondria (!). And another 10 pages of similar illiterate information. Gaining 20 kg of muscle per year without following a diet and without pharma is impossible in principle. Especially for former athletes specializing in endurance sports, who mostly have IMM. Former athletes(one of the examples in the article is a 58-year-old former speed skater) after leaving the sport, he lost all his mitochondria in fast fibers and in some of the higher threshold slow fibers. After all, the half-life of mitochondria is only 7 days. They do not have any particular advantage over other athletes in this aspect. And most importantly, the growth of mitochondria has nothing to do with the growth of muscle mass. For bodybuilders, the training system involves constant muscle acidification, and mitochondria are regularly burned. And, conversely, training aimed at mitochondrial growth reduces muscle mass. Therefore in power types sports related to the manifestation of endurance, you must first build muscle mass, and in the pre-competition period, fill it with mitochondria... But people read Bulanov and believe. After all, the doctor wrote it!
It is often written that running improves posture. This is not true. Exercises on the back muscles improve posture, but they are not involved in running. Moreover, if you run and do not train your back muscles, your posture will worsen due to impact loads. They write that running is the prevention of osteochondrosis and arthrosis, this is not true, and we looked into it. They write that running normalizes the hormonal system. As we see, this is also not true. They write that it involves and trains all the muscles of the body, and we have dismantled this myth. Why does running have so many supporters and fans who, foaming at the mouth, are ready to defend running from all, even well-founded claims? During long running at or below the aerobic threshold, endorphins begin to form in the human body. This is a group of polypeptide chemical compounds, structurally similar to opiates (morphine-like compounds), which naturally are produced in neurons of the brain and have the ability to reduce pain similar to opiates and influence the emotional state. Therefore, running improves your mood to the point of mild euphoria. Endorphins, although they are essentially drugs, do not have a harmful effect on the body. On the contrary, they are indicated for depression and nervous fatigue. Therefore, running addicts simply become addicted to it and lose objectivity in their assessment of running as a type of physical activity. Naturally, they will also react with hostility to this article.
Finally, I would like to summarize everything that has been said previously.
Aerobic exercise is ineffective health training, used solo, since they have a very weak effect on the endocrine system, but can be used as additional remedy when doing health-improving physical education.
Running is the most harmful of all types of aerobics due to the presence of shock loads that adversely affect the muscles, joints and spine. At overweight and in old age it is recommended to replace it with walking, swimming, cycling and other types of cyclic exercise.
Running is not a universal means of developing endurance; it develops endurance only in certain areas. muscle groups, therefore, there is no need to include it in the training process in those sports where these groups are not involved.
You have to learn to run, and if you still want to do it, work with an athletics coach so that he can teach you the correct technique.
You need to run in shoes with thick, wide (so that the foot does not roll in) and soft soles, especially in the heel area.
Especially for the RIA Science section >>
Chris Gorski is a senior editor at Inside Science.
Skiers at the end of the race often simply fall from exhaustion, but after a day or two they return to the track and compete again, showing simply superhuman results. Skaters, running around the traditional large oval at speeds of about 50 kilometers per hour, compete day after day throughout the Olympics, despite the pain. How do they do it? And why do the elite run on summer games not involved in as many disciplines?
Physicists have revealed the secret incredible speed runner Usain BoltJamaican runner Bolt, nicknamed "Lightning Bolt", is considered the fastest sprinter on Earth. Mexican physicists built a model of the Lightning's run and found out some of the secrets of its record speed.Scientists say that requiring endurance winter views sports are more like cycling or swimming than running. For example, the impact load on the joints and muscles of athletes is simply less. And therefore they recover faster and participate in the Winter Olympics more races and over longer distances than athletes at the summer games.
Skiers and skaters have the advantage of being able to glide on their skis and skates. Athletes in some events may run more heats, and with each step the athlete's foot hits the track harder.
“When they plant their foot, the load is enormous,” says sports physiologist Robert Chapman, who works at Indiana University in Bloomington. — In skiing the situation is somewhat different, for speed skaters everything is also different, because the shock load on the muscles is not so strong. Theoretically, they can recover... a little faster and come back to compete in other competitions.”
In addition, skiers are more versatile athletes than their counterparts from summer species sports
“There are skiers who have won both the sprint and the 50-kilometer race. Skiing is a strange and incomprehensible sport, because running doesn’t have that, says sports physiologist Stephen Seiler, who works at the University of Agder in Kristiansend, Norway. - If you have good technique running 1500 meters, this means that you have good technique for 50 kilometers. So the difference in speed at these two distances is much smaller than it might seem.”
Speed skaters are also much more versatile than Summer Olympians. One reason is that the difference in distances in skating is much smaller than in running. World-class runners run a hundred meters in less than 10 seconds, and 200 meters in less than 20. And the shortest distance in speed skating, 500 meters, takes athletes much longer. The winning time in Sochi for men was more than 34 seconds, and for women more than 37 seconds. The longest speed skating distance for women is 5,000 meters, and for men 10,000 meters, and it takes them seven and 13 minutes, respectively.
The energy system that fuels athletes' muscles at these distances is roughly the same, Chapman says. But in running everything is different.
At the 1980 Winter Olympics in Lake Placid, for example, American Eric Heiden took all five gold medals in speed skating: 500, 1000, 1500, 5000 and 10,000 meters.
“It's the same thing as an athlete running equally well in a 200-meter sprint as well as a 400-meter sprint, as well as a 5,000-meter sprint or a 10,000-meter sprint, which you never see,” says physician-researcher Michael Joyner, who works at the clinic. Mayo in Rochester and specializes in the physiology of endurance athletes. — The fact is that skating is aerodynamic and depends on technique. You see this in swimming."
At the Olympics, the shortest ski race is called the sprint, although the distance is 800 meters and the running time is more than two minutes. All other individual races are more than 10 kilometers, and the time spent on them is at least half an hour. There are numerous competitions for men and women at a variety of distances and styles. But physiology best athletes can explain why many of them win medals in different disciplines.
“When you have about 10 minutes to run a race, the physiological factors that determine who can run it the fastest are pretty much the same,” Joyner says.
But one of the long-standing mysteries of skiing is that skiers maintain a faster pace over long distances than would be expected based on physiological characteristics of this sport, Seiler says. In his opinion, as the sport develops, research may lead to the creation of special teams of ski sprinters who will train differently than long-distance skiers.
First of all, you need to decide what an athlete is and what a cross-country skier is. If we consider the processes that unfold inside an athlete, be it a runner or a skier, then for all distances, starting from 1.5 km for skiers (conditionally) and for track and field athletes from 1500 m, the energy supply mechanism is the same. Therefore, we need to talk not about a skier or a runner, but we need to talk about what ensures the achievement of the highest results in middle-distance running (in skiing this is a sprint) and in stayer distances. So, it turns out that if you go into another sport altogether - cycling, then starting from a distance of 4 km (roughly corresponding to 1.5 km for runners), there is no difference. In cycling, the 4 km and hour race is won by whoever wins the middle distance. This athlete wins all distances without exception.
Here you need to take into account that cycling has one feature - athletes perform on the plain, on a track, where their own weight does not play any role. Therefore, the one who is strong at 4 km is strong in everything. There are great riders, such as Indurain, Merckx or now Lance Armstrong, who win by a clear advantage at all distances, from the pursuit (4 km) and beyond. If he needs to set a world record in an hour race, he will set a world record in the 5 km, then in the 10 km, in the 20, 25, 50 and in the hour race. As a rule, all the greats who ride break all world records, and their average speed remains virtually unchanged.
It's the same with speed skaters. There are no climbs, so the picture is the same as for cyclists. If there is Hayden, he wins everything from 500 m to 10,000 m. In speed skating (as in skiing) you don't have to be a sprinter. There are, of course, pure sprinters, but they don’t run more than 500 m, because they become so acidic that they can’t show anything at 1000 m. And Hayden is a stayer. Our Zhelezovsky is also a stayer, but he ran 500 m because he took fewer steps along the distance, he pushed off slowly, but very strongly. And now, when they introduced the detachable heel, it became even clearer why force was needed. The results increased by 3 - 5 seconds because another muscle was added - the calf.
The picture is approximately the same for skiers if they run on the plain. Although there are differences in the classic and skating strokes, the load on the muscles is distributed differently. But in the sprint, since for skiers it is new look, it is immediately clear that someone is losing, someone is winning, and therefore it seems that there is some kind of specialization. We will try to catch these differences and features using the example of athletics. Because everything is simpler there - the legs run and run (the rest is not significant).
What is a middle distance runner? This is a person who, in terms of aerobic capacity, is as ready as a marathon runner, that is, at the ANP level, he consumes the same amount of oxygen in absolute value as a marathon runner. But for a marathon runner, when he runs his distance, all the oxidative muscle fibers that he has are turned on, and he has no right to turn on additional muscle fibers. If they exist, he is a bad marathon runner, a bad stayer, he has half GMV, half glycolytic, and if he runs with these GMV, then he is lucky overweight about 6-8 kg. You can’t turn on these GMVs, it will become sour and get tired, but you can carry them on yourself. That is, a bad marathon runner is an average runner who does not have high speed 100m races, he has GMV, but they are slow. Therefore, when he has to run 1500 m, he also runs at the expense of oxidative MVs, gradually connecting glycolytic ones, and then he needs to finish at the expense of BMs, but they are not there. Therefore, the one who came to the finish line with a spare BMW will win. All 800 and 1500 m runners are different in that their quadriceps femoris muscles consume a lot of oxygen, there are only OMVs, and the back of the thigh has a BMW, and they can also be oxidative. It turns out that they are sprinters on the back of the thigh and can run 20 m faster than 2 s (we have such a test), their running speed is like that of real sprinters, but the starting acceleration is not possible because the quadriceps muscle is weak. What is middle-distance running - you need to run at cruising speed, gradually including additional muscle fibers, and 150 - 200 m before the finish line there should be a reserve of muscle fibers that can be connected, and they should be fast. Any other person who does not have this will be able to increase speed, but not enough to beat a born “average person.”
Classification of muscle fibers. Changes in muscle composition due to training
Now let's take a closer look at the classification of muscle fibers. The first way is to fast muscle fibers (FMF) and slow muscle fibers (SMV), this classification is based on the enzyme ATPase of myofibrils (contractile elements), the type of which can be fast or slow. Hence the fast-twitch and slow-twitch MVs. The ratio of fast and slow fibers is determined by hereditary information, and we practically cannot change it.
The second method is the division of MV into oxidative and glycolytic, and they are no longer divided by myofibril, but by the number of mitochondria (cell structures where oxygen consumption occurs). If there are mitochondria, then MV are oxidative, few or almost no mitochondria are glycolytic. The ability of CF for glycolysis is also inherited and is determined by the number of glycolytic enzymes. But the number of mitochondria changes quite easily under the influence of training. And with an increase in the number of mitochondria, CF, which was glycolytic, becomes oxidative.
Unfortunately, there is confusion on this issue. Usually both classifications are mixed. They talk about slow, but mean oxidative, they mix glycolytic and fast. In fact, slow ones can also be glycolytic, although this option is not described in the literature. But we know that if a person is in the hospital during the preoperative period, and then also during the postoperative period, then after that he cannot get up or walk. The first reason is that coordination is impaired, and the second reason is that the muscles go away. And most importantly, first of all, mitochondria leave the MMV (their “half-life” is only 20 - 24 days). If a person has been in bed for 50 days, then there will be almost nothing left of the mitochondria; MVs will turn into slow glycolytic ones, since slow or fast ones are inherited, and mitochondria are created. (Fast MV at proper training may also become oxidative).
Therefore, from the point of view of the training process, the division of MV into slow and fast is not interesting for this athlete - this matters at the selection stage. The whole logic of building a workout does not come from the point of view of muscle contraction in speed, but is aimed at converting GMV into oxidative ones. Because in this case we change a specific person.
The goal of training in cycling sports is to create mitochondria. Only mitochondria consume oxygen, which means fitness increases as mitochondria accumulate. Let's take muscle fiber. It has myofibrils, each myofibril is entwined with mitochondria, and more than a certain limit they cannot be formed, only in one layer, so to speak. Eventually, these MVs accumulate so many mitochondria that they cannot add anything more. MMV quickly reach the limit of readiness, and then the whole process of growth sports uniform goes through what we convert glycolytic into oxidative. (Low-threshold MVs are therefore oxidative because they constantly operate at any intensity with their maximum power). We stop training or, for example, start training low-threshold ones, then high-threshold mitochondria are lost. The whole point of getting into sports shape is to gain mitochondria in high-threshold CF motor units, there is no other way. Everyone is doing just this, but thinking about interval training and about something else, that is, about formality. And the essence of the training is to change the content of muscle fibers, that is, to add mitochondria.
So you start training correctly and gain more and more mitochondria, the muscles move from the glycolytic form to the oxidative one, that is, with an abundance of mitochondria. And when all muscle fibers become oxidative - this is the limit of sports form, nothing else will work. There is one trick here though. The fact is that oxidative fibers only consume fats (as long as there is a supply of fats), and power is lost when fats are oxidized. This results in a kind of paradox - you don’t need to make the muscles only oxidative, you need to leave a little glycolytic, otherwise you will run on fats, and the functioning power on fats is about 15% less. Then the same muscles will work more powerfully. It is clear that to skiing this also applies.
First of all, you need to decide what an athlete is and what a cross-country skier is. If we consider the processes that unfold inside an athlete, be it a runner or a skier, then for all distances, starting from 1.5 km for skiers (conditionally) and for track and field athletes from 1500 m, the energy supply mechanism is the same. Therefore, we need to talk not about a skier or a runner, but we need to talk about what ensures the achievement of the highest results in middle-distance running (in skiing this is a sprint) and in stayer distances. So, it turns out that if you go into another sport altogether - cycling, then starting from a distance of 4 km (roughly corresponding to 1.5 km for runners), there is no difference. In cycling, the 4 km and hour race is won by whoever wins the middle distance. This athlete wins all distances without exception.
Here you need to take into account that cycling has one feature - athletes perform on the plain, on a track, where their own weight does not play any role. Therefore, the one who is strong at 4 km is strong in everything. There are great riders, such as Indurain, Merckx or now Lance Armstrong, who win by a clear advantage at all distances, from the pursuit (4 km) and beyond. If he needs to set a world record in an hour race, he will set a world record in the 5 km, then in the 10 km, in the 20, 25, 50 and in the hour race. As a rule, all the greats who ride break all world records, and their average speed remains virtually unchanged.
It's the same with speed skaters. There are no climbs, so the picture is the same as for cyclists. If there is Hayden, he wins everything from 500 m to 10,000 m. In speed skating (as in skiing) you don't have to be a sprinter. There are, of course, pure sprinters, but they don’t run more than 500 m, because they become so acidic that they can’t show anything at 1000 m. And Hayden is a stayer. Our Zhelezovsky is also a stayer, but he ran 500 m because he took fewer steps along the distance, he pushed off slowly, but very strongly. And now, when they introduced the detachable heel, it became even clearer why force was needed. The results increased by 3 - 5 seconds because another muscle was added - the calf.
The picture is approximately the same for skiers if they run on the plain. Although there are differences in the classic and skating strokes, the load on the muscles is distributed differently. But in the sprint, since this is a new sport for skiers, you can immediately see that someone is losing, someone is winning, and therefore it seems that there is some kind of specialization. We will try to catch these differences and features using the example of athletics. Because everything is simpler there - the legs run and run (the rest is not significant).
What is a middle distance runner? This is a person who, in terms of aerobic capacity, is as ready as a marathon runner, that is, at the ANP level, he consumes the same amount of oxygen in absolute value as a marathon runner. But for a marathon runner, when he runs his distance, all the oxidative muscle fibers that he has are turned on, and he has no right to turn on additional muscle fibers. If they are, he is a bad marathon runner, a bad stayer, he has half GMV, half glycolytic, and if he runs with these GMV, then he is carrying around 6-8 kg of extra weight. You can’t turn on these GMVs, it will become sour and get tired, but you can carry them on yourself. That is, a bad marathon runner is an average runner who does not have a high 100 m running speed, he has a GMV, but they are slow. Therefore, when he has to run 1500 m, he also runs at the expense of oxidative MVs, gradually connecting glycolytic ones, and then he needs to finish at the expense of BMs, but they are not there. Therefore, the one who came to the finish line with a spare BMW will win. All 800 and 1500 m runners are different in that their quadriceps femoris muscles consume a lot of oxygen, there are only OMVs, and the back of the thigh has a BMW, and they can also be oxidative. It turns out that they are sprinters on the back of the thigh and can run 20 m faster than 2 s (we have such a test), their running speed is like that of real sprinters, but the starting acceleration is not possible because the quadriceps muscle is weak. What is middle-distance running - you need to run at cruising speed, gradually including additional muscle fibers, and 150 - 200 m before the finish line there should be a reserve of muscle fibers that can be connected, and they should be fast. Any other person who does not have this will be able to increase speed, but not enough to beat a born “average person.”
After superhuman efforts, skiers and skaters return to the start line a few days later. Why do winter endurance athletes compete so much?
Skiers at the end of the race often simply fall from exhaustion, but after a day or two they return to the track and compete again, showing simply superhuman results. Skaters, running around the traditional large oval at speeds of about 50 kilometers per hour, compete day after day throughout the Olympics, despite the pain. How do they do it? And why aren't the elite running teams at the Summer Games competing in as many disciplines?
Physicists have revealed the secret
Scientists say endurance winter sports are more similar to cycling or swimming than running. For example, the impact load on the joints and muscles of athletes is simply less. Therefore, they recover faster and at the Winter Olympics participate in more races and over longer distances than athletes at the Summer Games.
Skiers and skaters have the advantage of being able to glide on their skis and skates. Athletes in some events may run more heats, and with each step the athlete's foot hits the track harder.
“When they plant their foot, the load is enormous,” says sports physiologist Robert Chapman, who works at Indiana University in Bloomington. “In skiing, the situation is a little different, and in speed skating, it’s also different, because the shock load on the muscles is not as strong. "Theoretically, they can recover... a little faster and come back to compete in other competitions."
In addition, skiers are more versatile athletes than their summer sports counterparts.
“There are skiers who have won both the sprint and the 50-kilometer race. Skiing is a strange and incomprehensible sport, because this doesn’t happen in running,” says sports physiologist Steven Seiler, who works at the University of Agder in Kristiansend, Norway. “If If you have good technique in the 1500m, that means you have good technique in the 50km, so the difference in speed at the two distances is much smaller than it might seem.”
Doctors advise beginners
Speed skaters are also much more versatile than Summer Olympians. One reason is that the difference in distances in skating is much smaller than in running. World-class runners run a hundred meters in less than 10 seconds, and 200 meters in less than 20. And the shortest distance in speed skating, 500 meters, takes athletes much longer. The winning time in Sochi for men was more than 34 seconds, and for women more than 37 seconds. The longest speed skating distance for women is 5,000 meters, and for men 10,000 meters, and it takes them seven and 13 minutes, respectively.
The energy system that fuels athletes' muscles at these distances is roughly the same, Chapman says. But in running everything is different.
At the 1980 Winter Olympics in Lake Placid, for example, American Eric Heiden took all five gold medals in speed skating: 500, 1000, 1500, 5000 and 10,000 meters.
"It's like an athlete running equally well in a 200-meter sprint as a 400-meter sprint, as well as a 5,000-meter sprinter or a 10,000-meter sprinter, which you never see," says physician-researcher Michael Joyner, who works at the Mayo Clinic in Rochester and specializing in the physiology of athletes involved in endurance sports. “The fact is that skating is aerodynamic and depends on technique.”
At the Olympics, the shortest ski race is called the sprint, although the distance is 800 meters and the running time is more than two minutes. All other individual races are more than 10 kilometers, and the time spent on them is at least half an hour. There are numerous competitions for men and women at a variety of distances and styles. But the physiology of the best athletes can explain why many of them win medals in different disciplines.
