Endurance

Medium Endurance day.

There are 4 ways to work on endurance.
1. Long – steady state or fartlek 60-180 min.
2. Medium (sub-threshold) – Interval blocks 40-60 min. with short recovery intervals.
3. Threshold Pace – Intervals of 15-30 min/workout in target power/HR zone with recovery lasting 50% of work period.
4. MVO2 Intervals
a. 3-6 sets of 4-6 min @ 90-95% MHR, rest 30-50% of work duration.
b. 2-4 sets of 4-10 min 30 on/30 active rest, then active rest 30-50% of block duration.
Depending on what the goal is and what our application is going to be we can be a little more direct in our approach as to which area we focus on. For example, since my main objective is broad based fitness and increased work capacity, I will stay around the Threshold and MVo2 with an occasional dip into medium. The problem is the 3rd wave of adaptation. Dr. Stephen Seiler point this out to us on his website here: http://home.hia.no/~stephens/timecors.htm

This 3rd wave is the efficiency wave. Meaning that we become efficient at the SPECIFIC event (duration, intensity, etc) and it DOES NOT transfer to other events very well. CrossFit seeks to avoid this wave entirely. Therefore we DO NOT spend much time in the steady state, long endurance pathway. This is one of the biggest reasons as far as I can tell, the other being that long steady state endurance can burn muscle mass to fuel the exercise. There are benefits to it, but from CrossFit perspective the cost outweighs the benefits.

Today I did a little interval session in the medium endurance pathway. My biggest weakness is endurance so I'm trying to get it to an appropriate level.
WOD:
1 mile run
1 mile row (1600m)
Rest 7'
4x through

I finished in 1:22 and change. I held about 2:00/500 on the row and about 8:00 on the run. I am really slow on the run and need some work there. I finished the work portion in almost exactly 60m which was the goal.