This guy looks to be following Jakob's lead in every sense - 7:59 indoor 3K this year at the age of 16.
"When I was 14, I did 120 kilometres per week and at 15, on a summer camp, I had one week with more than 150km. These days 160km a week is pretty normal and in training camp I can even go up to 180 per week."
The question is if a) he will be able to keep this up without getting injuries and b) ho much quality units can be added (obviously not much quantity) to improve in his early 20s.
Cranking up the mileage obviously helps a lot but when you do this so early, there is not so much you can add later on to further improve.
Great news for Axel is that his biomechanics are sound... super smooth, lithe runner.. I don't see massive injuries in his future. He looks like the real deal and hopefully has a great network of support to remain on top of the sport.
Great news for Axel is that his biomechanics are sound... super smooth, lithe runner.. I don't see massive injuries in his future. He looks like the real deal and hopefully has a great network of support to remain on top of the sport.
No sure that’s how it works - just because someone looks smooth, doesn’t necessarily mean they are less injury prone.
Definitely the same with running economy - studies have shown that coaches couldn’t predict someone’s running economy by looking at their gait.
He is awfully good already. He just looks powerful and almost like he was running another race than the field. At this point, he has 7:59/30:50 at 14/29:xx, and 13:44 this summer, but here he crushed some 13:40s types, so I think he is already in 13:20s shape (he also ran an 8:44 steeple). Not really like Jakob who has much more speed, but he'll be a many time European champ up the ladder and in xc.
"Cranking up the mileage obviously helps a lot but when you do this so early, there is not so much you can add later on to further improve."
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That statement is just completely and fundamentally wrong!
You can improve your aerobic capacity for many, many years as long as you train right. And this improvement doesn´t stop because you reach your maximum mileage per week early.
It is a sheer physical process: As long as your training is mainly aerobic (without overtraining) you improve the work of your heart and lungs and importantly you continue to create tiny new capillars in the working muscles to distribute an ever increasing higher load of oxygen. And you continue to develop your distribution of oxygen even though you at some stage have hit your top mileage.
I have before pointed out Gebrselassie, Bekele, Mo Farah and Kipchoke as runners who succeded to improve aerobically up in their thirties because they continued to train in an efficient, aerobic way.
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This is also why the claim that Jakob will peak early because he has already trained seriously for many years is fundamentally wrong. At least from a training point of view. Jakob has reportedly several time hinted that he might finish his running career early to do other things in his life
Most of what I wrote follows from a general truth about marginal benefits. Keeping a high mileage and benefitting from it does not contradict my statement that he obviously would have comparably little benefit from increasing another 50 miles. The person who ran 50 miles/week as a teenager will benefit a lot from increasing to 100 miles whereas going from 100 to 150 would a) be only an increase in 50% and b) probably not help that much compared to the increased injury risks.
I don't deny the benefits from early high mileage you mention. But there has also often been a "debt" acquired by extensive early training that eventually led to more injuries.
Just look at all the teen phenoms without survivor bias. And even discounting the ones who peaked as teenagers, there will be plenty who were "caught" by others who had not run a huge mileage as teens as soon as the latters increased theirs.
Sure, there are counterexamples like the Ingebrigtstens and maybe Christensen is another one. But there were also good reasons why traditionally one first developed middle distance speed and form with teenagers before cranking up the mileage to professional levels.
Why would that even be relevant? What time improvement do you attribute to EPO: .10 seconds in a 10,000m? Have you looked at performance lists lately? Performances 119 all-time to 563 all-time are from 3:30.00 to 3:31.99. That's over 400 performances within 2-seconds of a 1500m race. Are you getting it now?
w0efuu wrote:
You neglect to mention that Geb, Bek, Mo and Kip were on epo...
"Just look at all the teen phenoms without survivor bias. And even discounting the ones who peaked as teenagers, there will be plenty who were "caught" by others who had not run a huge mileage as teens as soon as the latters increased theirs." And
"But there were also good reasons why traditionally one first developed middle distance speed and form with teenagers before cranking up the mileage to professional levels."
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Can you mention a few of "all the teen phenoms"?
So we can see if theese teen phenoms are relevant in this discussion where we talk about early AEROBIC development.
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In my opinion the most important thing for a young runner who want to compete in the middle and/ or long distance races is to develop the aerobic capacity (contrarily the young athlete shouldn´t do too hard anaerobic exercise before his is physically matured).
That is why Jakob and now Axel are so good: They have a superior aerobic foundation.
Of course they must also do some speed work now and then but the focus should be on steady aerobic development.
Last weekend Axel - still only 17 - won his second Danish title in a row in the 10km road.
Axel ran 29:01 on a slow course with many turns. No. 2 was 44 seconds behind and no. 3 was 1 minute behind.
No. 2 ran 28:41 in the Valencia 10km in January 2022 and no. 3 ran 28:38 in the same race.
So Axel can possibly go well under 28 minutes on a fast 10km course
To go under 28 minutes would mean Axel would need approx 13.25-13.32 capacity for 5000. This in turn, would probably require close to 7.50/3000 speed. Going further, this would require close to 3.43–3.45/1500 speed in a race or time trial.
Everything is related, but there are outliers, and he (Axel) may be one.
Last weekend Axel - still only 17 - won his second Danish title in a row in the 10km road.
Axel ran 29:01 on a slow course with many turns. No. 2 was 44 seconds behind and no. 3 was 1 minute behind.
No. 2 ran 28:41 in the Valencia 10km in January 2022 and no. 3 ran 28:38 in the same race.
So Axel can possibly go well under 28 minutes on a fast 10km course
To go under 28 minutes would mean Axel would need approx 13.25-13.32 capacity for 5000. This in turn, would probably require close to 7.50/3000 speed. Going further, this would require close to 3.43–3.45/1500 speed in a race or time trial.
Everything is related, but there are outliers, and he (Axel) may be one.
Axel said after his Monaco 5km win earlier this year that he thought he was in sub 13:30 shape but that the initial pace (up to 3000m) was too low.