The Science of Speed Skating
By Mike Marshall New
As I continue in my first year as Technical Director for AASSA I will be looking for different ways to interact with coaches, parents and skaters from around the province. One of these ways will be through an ongoing column here on the AASSA web site. The column will be titled “The Science of Speed Skating,” or SSS. Through this column I will discus different aspects of our sport ranging form training and technique to equipment. In addition to the chosen topic, I will take and answer questions on any skating related subject. I will post some of these questions and answers in the column, especially if they are common questions or in an area related to the weeks’ topic.
The first area I would like to discuss is LTPAD. This will be the focus for the next few installments as it is a fairly broad topic and is quite important for the development of our younger skaters.
What Is LTPAD?
We will be seeing some changes for the 2010-11 season. Speed Skating Canada will be implementing its new competition structure that is based on its new LTPAD model. It will also have implications on training, coaching and official development as well as athlete support.
LTPAD, which is SSC’s version of the LTAD model, is something that is changing competition and programming in many sports. LTAD is an acronym for “Long Term Athlete Development” or in the speed skating adapted model “Long Term Participation and Athlete Development”. It is something you will be hearing a lot more of. Many of you may know what this term entails but for some it is likely a new concept. The truth is that it will have implications on our sport in the near future as SSC adopts this model for its programming, and the entire sporting world adopts it as the model for athlete development, particularly for children.
Background
LTPAD represents an evolution in Athlete Development Models. It is the result of work done by Istvan Balyi, Cote and others. It is not new or magical but built upon a consensus of scientific research and reflects applied knowledge and experience of coaches from around the world. Much of the research had been around for a long time within the domain of medicine, but it had never found its way into the sports world. LTPAD packages complex phases of child/adult development into a simple and flexible model. Their work is being adopted as the model for many sport organizations around the world, from clubs to state/provincial teams and up to National Teams. We will see later how these different levels must work together to make this really work.
When existing athlete development models were analyzed it was found that there existed some common practices that were not in line with child development. Some of these are:
• Adult competition and training programs were being superimposed on young athletes.
• Male programs superimposed on Female athletes
• Chronological age dominated training plans rather than biological age
• Training in early years focuses on outcomes (winning) rather than process (optimal training
Keys to LTPAD
The key to this model is that it identifies what is appropriate and optimal for the development of each athlete at different levels of maturity. It is based on the importance of biological age (physical, emotional and mental maturity) as opposed to chronological age, in the application of developmentally appropriate training for athletes of all ages. It makes use of the critical or sensitive periods of adaptation when certain forms of training are going to bring about maximum gains that can not be attained at other times in the athlete’s life. There are also times in a child’s life when certain types of training will have limitations, in terms of gains or progress that can be made, and could even be detrimental to their health.
These sensitive periods or “windows” of trainability and avoidance are based on the biological (physiological, neural, emotional and mental) development of a child. Some of these factors are closely related to chronological age which is easy to chart, while others are tied to their physical maturity. For the latter, we can use their growth spurt at puberty to identify these windows. When the growth spurt at puberty reaches its fastest rate of growth, it is referred to as their PHV or Peak Height Velocity. PHV and the onset of the growth spurt become the reference points for certain windows of trainability, for example, aerobic and strength development. If we can chart their growth, we can design their training (and racing) so that we are developing the right things at the appropriate time to ensure safe and optimal development.
Below is a chart that outlines these windows of trainability. If these “windows” are missed between the ages of 6-16, this missed development opportunity can not be fully overcome (athletes will never reach their genetic potential). It does not mean that you can not or should not develop these aspects at other times (except for a couple of exceptions), but that this aspect is the most receptive to training at that time. The blue solid boxes occur on chronological ages while the red dashed boxes occur based on PHV.
You can see from this chart how the characteristics that we can develop in an adult are significantly different than those of a child. One of the biggest differences is related to the lactate system. This is the system in muscle cells that is used for sustaining high intensity efforts lasting longer than 10 seconds. This system produces high acidity in our muscles (that’s the burn we feel). This is the exception to the rule that we can develop all attributes at all times in a child’s development. It is not a system we can develop in pre-PHV athletes. There is also a health issue related to the heart with doing interval training in this intensity range at this stage of development. In addition, these younger athletes do not have the same ability to get rid of this acidity. As a result, training that produces higher levels of acidity would interfere with the pre PHV athlete’s ability to work on the areas of development such as speed and skill acquisition which are at their peak trainability at this stage. For speed skating this simply means the focus should be on technique, speed and agility for the pre-puberty skater.
Another difference seen from the chart is the difference between male and female in the timing of the factors in the blue solid boxes. These factors are timed according to chronological age. Females are generally a year ahead in the development of these factors.
The red dashed boxes are timed according to PHV or the onset and finish of the growth spurt. For example, the aerobic window (called stamina on the chart) means we should be introducing and emphasizing higher volume lower intensity training at the onset of the growth spurt. This is the best time for developing the aerobic system in a child. We can increase the intensity of the aerobic training as the athlete reaches PHV. If we miss this window we will not attain maximum aerobic development.
As I mentioned earlier, the new racing formats will reflect these developmental differences in our skaters. In particular, for the younger kids, the competitions will take on a skills component, in addition to the regular racing which is to be done in both directions (clockwise and counter clockwise). The changes in competition formats will be in line with the changes in developmental needs as outlined in the LTPAD model. There will be an exclusion of those middle distances of high intensity sustained efforts between 30 seconds to several minutes that produce the higher lactic acid levels.
I am quite sure that this will bring up more questions than answers. With the next several SSS columns I will focus on one aspect of development from LTPAD and show how this relates to what we do for training, particularly on the ice in our club. Applying LTPAD to our club training can be difficult as we usually have a wide range of athlete development levels on the ice at one time. However I would like to answer any specific questions that may come up. Please send any questions to: mikesmarshall@yahoo.com I’ll try to answer all of them and some I’ll use in the next installment of SSS. They don’t have to be related to LTPAD, any speed skating topic is open for discussion.
For more information on Long Term Athlete Development please visit this web site:
http://www.canadiansportforlife.ca
Go to Resources in the upper right and then click on LTAD Downloads. The first on the list is the “Canadian Sport For Life” Document. This goes into LTAD in more detail. There are plenty of other articles and reports throughout the CS4L website so check it out.
Next Topic:
Charting Growth
Speed Skating Strength Training for children
