Training Aerobic Base on Short Staircases?
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I live right next to the famous Harvard stadium stairs (see picture) which consists of 37 sections of big lunging steps up and then normal stairs to jog down. I am considering getting almost all my training volume from these stairs but have some concerns that they may cause the wrong training effects do to their short nature.
At a zone 1-2 pace it takes me approximately 40 seconds to go up and 30-40 seconds to go down each section, so my heart rate rises up to close to the top of zone 2 and then falls close to the lower end or below zone 1 every section (every 120 seconds). My goal is to build a massive base, and I am considering spending 6-8 hours per week in this Stadium doing all low intensity hiking of the stairs. As an example my workout yesterday consisted of around 2 hours of these stairs, achieving around 3000 feet up and 3000 feet down total.
Is my heart rate looking like a sign wave (from top of z2 to almost recovery hr) every 120 seconds something to be concerned about in terms of building a base? Would I be much better off finding something where I could consistently go up for hours such as a stair master (easily accessible) or a mountain (not easily accessible on week days) rather than these stairs where a change direction ever 40 seconds?
How do you expect my bodies physiological response to the training described above to differ to from the same workouts on an infinitely tall staircase?
Great question. I suspect that during the down-hiking 30-40sec each lap, your HR does not drop more than 5-10 beats, which will still keep you in Z2 even though the down portions are loading the muscles eccentrically and the up bits are loading concentrically. So there will be some difference in training effect when compared to, say, spending 2 hours going up only on a Stairmaster. I’d add in one Stairmaster session a week. All that downhill that the stadium gives you is going to be very useful for going downhill in the mountains.
Keep up this training, and you will be a beast in the mountains.
Scott
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