Going to the Well
Grant Fisher won the 2014 adidas Dream Mile in 4:02.02. Coach Mike Scannell says he did just two hard quarter-mile efforts before the race.
So sub-four doesn't mean anything. But numbers do matter and Scannell says he knows exactly how fast all of his athletes can and will run in a workout or race situation.
Scannell, a coaching veteran for 20 years, brings a portable lactate analyzer to track workouts to test his athletes' blood lactate levels. The tool enables coach and athlete to pin down exact paces for steady-state tempos and lactate threshold efforts.
"High school boys are notorious for saying, 'I'm fine, I'm fine, I'm fine,' when they're really going to the well," he said. "That's the way you can tell."
But Fisher does not go to the well very often at all.
Below is an excerpt from a week of Grant Fisher's training this spring:
| DAY | WORKOUT |
| Monday | Recovery Run |
| Tuesday | Steady-state tempo run between 3-5 miles |
| Wednesday | Recovery Run |
| Thursday | 6x1000m |
| Friday | Recovery Run |
| Saturday | 25x Hill Repeats (20-25 second incline) |
| Sunday | Long Run - 12 miles |
Scannell somewhat infamously told Jeff Hollobaugh for the Mercury-Times that his athlete did no speed work in preparation for his 4:02 win at the adidas Dream Mile last year, or either of his Foot Locker championships.
The difference between mile-paced intervals and pure "speed work" is about five to 10 percent - or, the difference between "comfortably hard" and going to the well.
Fisher trains at 60-second 400m pace, so speed work entails quarters at 54 seconds to 57 seconds.
In 2014, he did just two workouts at that level. One workout before his Dream Mile victory and one workout before his runner-up finish at USATF Junior Nationals, which was a qualifying meet for the IAAF World Championship; both times, he ran just two quarters.
Grant Fisher finished runner-up in the 1500m at 2014 USATF Junior Nationals to qualify for the IAAF World Junior Championship.
"For me, speed work is the last stuff in the training process," Scannell said. "He only did 2x a quarter at a very aggressive speed and that's all there is to it. I could see how taxing that is on the body, so I cut it off at two because the deeper you tax, the longer you recover. For me, there is no sense in going to the well in training and then trying to get another training session in."
This year, Scannell estimates that Fisher has completed about four workouts like that already with no more than one per week.
"There's a very specific reason for that," he said. "Speed work kills. We monitor injury very closely. I monitor these guys very closely. You start really tweaking the ligaments and tendons and adding a great load to the muscles."
This while training at a regular load of 45 to 50 miles per week, which is relatively light compared to other elite distance runners. All of those miles are completed at a very specific pace, especially the steady-state tempo runs, which are always - "always" - completed within two seconds of the prescribed lactate threshold pace.
"Training is a very technical thing," Scannell said. "People think he just puts on shoes and runs fast. People have no idea the standard training we do and how controlled it is."
