Renato Canova – Marathon Training (Mileage)
Traditionally, it has been thought that a marathoner must always run prodigiously high volumes—upwards of 20 miles a day for the top athletes. In contrast, James Kwambi and Duncan Kibet only run 80-90 miles a week, often only running once per day. However, other elite marathoners like Martin Lel and Robert Cheruiyot maintain 135-150 miles per week.
Whereas low-mileage marathoners run 60% (50 miles a week) of their mileage near marathon pace, higher-volume runners do less than 37 miles per week near marathon pace, and the proportion is much smaller—only 25-30% of the weekly volume. Why is high mileage not necessary for Kibet and Kwambi to run 2:04 marathons? To answer this, we have to return to Canova’s thesis—all non-specific training exists only to support the body’s ability to do race-specific training. Canova acknowledges that high mileage training and long easy runs can promote capillary growth and mitochondrial growth, but he points out that this cannot continue indefinitely—once the athlete has maximized his or her mitochondrial density and capillary beds, there is no reason to continue to do high volume. If an athlete repeats the same training over and over, the result will be stagnation. Training must evolve—always, a runner must be learning to run fast for a long time. “Really, somebody can suppose that, for an athlete able running 42 km under 3′ / km, RUNNING AT A SPEED OF 6:00 per Mile can be a useful training?” writes Canova. To him, high-volume training for marathoners exists only to support the ability to complete the long fast runs of 15-25 miles at a high percentage of marathon pace. Once the athlete can complete these workouts, there is no reason for the mileage—the focus is making the long-fast run faster or longer. Mileage must increase for the first 3-5 years of a runner’s career; after that, it is not so important, according to Canova.
Renato Canova credits the inclusion of long-fast runs in long-distance training programs (incorporated into his fundamental and special periods) as the reason for faster times today in the 5k, 10k, and especially the half-marathon and marathon. While Peter Snell’s 1:44 800m in 1964 would still be world-class, the 10k world record at the time (28:15) would be considered rather paltry by today’s standards. According to Canova, Ron Clarke was the first to employ long-fast runs of 9.5-12.5 miles, eventually becoming able to run them at nearly 3min/km. The result? An improvement by over 30 seconds in the 10km world record.
In the marathon, the long-fast run plays an additional role—training the body to burn fats as an efficient fuel during fast running. In this case, if an athlete does a 19mi long-fast run and slows considerably after 17mi once he runs out of glycogen in his muscles, the important training is in the final two miles—it is only when the body is put into crisis that it can learn to burn fats as a fuel to run fast. So the real training is the last two miles—not the 17 that came before. A long slow run cannot accomplish this, because it does not deplete muscle glycogen and it is too slow to put the body in crisis. This new style of training, coupled with young sub-27:00 10k athletes running the marathon in their prime, has resulted in the surge of sub-2:07 and sub-2:05 marathons in recent years.
Clearly, Canova takes a significantly different approach to training than any other well-known coach. Bettering personal records is simply a problem of mathematics—how to sustain the proper pace for a given distance. The solution, according to Canova, is the gradual convergence of extension and speed, supported by a strong base of general fitness which enables the race-specific work. The introductory period builds general running fitness, which supports the long-fast running in the fundamental period. The extension of endurance at slower than race pace is supplemented by shorter work at faster than race pace during the special period. These converge towards race-pace work during the specific period, which is the most important work an athlete does. The race-specific work must be focused on extending race-specific endurance, so workouts are always progressing in this direction.
Finally, Canova does not replace old workouts with new ones, but adds new workouts to the training program. “Training is not to replace, but to ADD,” says Canova. Though the individual workouts that make up Renato Canova’s training program are by no means new, they are organized and developed in a novel way, with a philosophical underpinning that is radically different than most coaching philosophies. But the results speak for themselves—Renato Canova has coached dozens of athletes to world-class performances and he is arguably the most successful coach in the world.
[An excerpt from Something New In Training, The Methods Of Renato Canova by Josh Davis.]
To learn more about Renato Canova’s training philosophy (in detail), read Training for a Sub 2:05 Marathon
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