How much cardio?

K!LL!@N

I was having a chat with a friend earlier in the week.

I was telling him about a new running program I've started ( see Fitness Logs ).
Without going into too much detail it's 3 days a week 30 minutes per session.
The guide I'm following says to take rest days between sessions.

My friend recently joined a new gym and had a talk with one of the personal trainers.
He was told that he should be looking to do cardio 4-6 times per week at moderate heart rate.

I'm determined to progress with the running program and want that to be the priority.
Would I be ok to add in some other cardio on the off days?
I'd either be getting out on the bike or using the crosstrainer.
So it would be low impact.

Any thoughts?

Killian

quozl

No harm at all as long as it's non-impact and not too strenuous. Some easy cardio will increase blood flow and may even help speed up recovery from the running.

One problem with running is that when you're starting out you really can't do very much of it without a fair likelihood of injury. So it's good to be able to do something else while you slowly build up the running.

K!LL!@N

Cool, well that's good to know.

Killian

netman

When I was training for the marathon I did 3-4 sessions a week, and on my rest days I was in the gym but I contained the cardio to the bare minimum, 5 minutes or so to warm up and then just did the upper body work.

I wouldn't suggest doing cardio for 30 minutes as your "rest day" that makes no sense. Some runners go swimming on their rest days, some use the gym but work on the upper body.. Some just rest

quozl

He's talking about 4-6 times a week Netman, so he'd still have at least 1 complete rest day a week. If he has 4 days of complete aerobic rest then he's not going to get fit as fast as if he does some aerobic cross-training on those days. If the OP is happy with 3 times a week then he should stick with that, that'll get you fit, but if he wants to do more then you're definitely wrong if you're telling him he won't get fitter for doing it.

Check out http://www.pfitzinger.com/labreports/crossbenefits.shtml

From that link:
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If you increase your training volume by cross-training you can improve your running performance. The improvement, however, will not be as large as if you had increased your mileage. This point goes right to the heart of the mileage versus injury trade-off. Sure, you would improve more by increasing your running, but you would also increase your risk of injury.
[/bold]

Basically, you run as much as you can without excessive injury risk. After that point you can't add more miles running but you can still improve your cardiovascular fitness through other aerobic activities. This is because your cardiovascular system is not the limiting factor - it's going to be able to take more training after the point where your legs have taken too much of a pounding. Your legs are involved in a high impact loading bearing sport, your heart and lungs aren't

Also, check out http://sportsmedicine.about.com/od/tipsandtricks/a/activerecovery.htm
You'll see in a typical high-mileage schedule that a sizeable proportion of the runs are easy recovery runs. To provide a mild aerobic stimulus which increasing the blood flow which can help recovery. They also add to the runners total hours running and a lot of adaptations are related to training volume.

As to 3-4 days being a good maximum for aerobic activity I wouldn't agree with that either.
Check out http://www.pfitzinger.com/effectiveplan.shtml (i'm a big fan of pfitzinger's books and he's kind enough to put some articles on the web so i don't have to type stuff from memory:) )
He suggests 3 HARD sessions a week and then to pad out the rest of the week with the rest of your aerobic sessions. Which will be runs or aerobic cross training. He himself says in one of his books that running less than 5 times a week is pointless if performance is a goal of yours. He was more of a 13 times a week kind of guy himself and two-time olympic marathoner.

In the OP's case, his 3 runs a week are hard sessions because he's new to this. So if he wants to improve his fitness as quickly as possible he should pad out the rest of his week with other easy aerobic sessions. He can't do easy running (as they're all hard at the moment) so it'll have to be aerobic cross-training. For a more experienced running then a slower paced run is an easy day - Hal Higdon even suggests light jogging as a possibility for his 'cross-training' days.

3-4 aerobic sessions a week is very few for the marathon. Even Higdon's Novice schedule, one of the lightest I've seen and meant for people who want to go the distance but don't mind about how fast, has 4 days + another day of an hour of aerobic training. Other beginners schedules have 5 days( http://www.coolrunning.com/engine/2/2_4/130.shtml) or the FIRST schedule whose defining characteristic is just 3 hard runs a week

"recommends that runners cross-train (bike, swim, cycle, etc.) two or three days a week."

http://www.furman.edu/FIRST/fmtp.htm and they're the low mileage kings of the marathon training world

People run marathons on 3 aerobic sessions a week but they're not trying for performance they're trying to get around. Which is a fine goal but it means you can't use that as a basis for what's optimal training.

hunnymonster

some people run a performance marathon on 3 runs a week but they are experienced runners who for wahtever reason cannot devote more time to running. Each of the sessions is damn hard work though, usually one long run slower than race pace. One medium run (maybe 10-13 miles) at race pace and one speed session. There is quite considerable evidence that this produces better results than a program with many "junk" miles. It does depend on wher eyou are starting from. Someone with a low fitness already really does need time on their legs.

quozl

True, people do run with time goals on 3 times a week, but I don't believe that they wouldn't do even better on more runs a week. There's a reason that the performance orientated people who do those plans are those with other time commitments or who can't run more without injury (and the injury limited ones do other aerobic sessions). There's also a reason that elites run more than 7 times a week.

hunnymonster

no neither do I. I'm currently doing about 100 miles a week. I'm the first to admit though, some of these are pure stress relief, get out of the office miles. I think I would do better on less but more focused runs.