Amazing interview Stephen. Wish I had been able to listen to this 40 years ago. Loved your gob smacked expression when Nils talked about 400+ watts for 90 minutes. Thanks so much for these videos ❤️🇦🇺
I love how he beats in the “routine” made him less stressed and more mentally fit. I understand the reasons to change for adaptation, but I do think for some the routine is important.
What an unbelievably interesting story and insight. Really different from the usual "hard work and dedication" stories we mostly hear from top athletes. Thank you so much for this interview!
Great interview Stephen. I am a former inline speed skater and junior champ from the Chad Hedrick days when he was inline racing. I am a current avid cyclist that has only recently embraced "base" / zone 2 work, so, Nils' story is an inspiration and a relief to hear.
Thanks for this conversation and all the insights. I’m very glad to see, that there are people who can see beyond the “no pain no gain” horizon. Great example of a positive character development in this.
this is the one of the great mentality and clear narration in sports I have ever seen. Great interview, thanks Mr. Seiler. May be you can arrange a Q&A live session on this about your opinions.
Amazing Interview. Most people imagine Sports to be just sheer hard work. This new approach of Reward and Forgiveness gives a fresh perspective. Congratulations once again Nils van der Poel , to you and your coach.
Very interesting interview. Proof that great athletes often find unique ways to accomplish their goals, including a coach who can serve as a resource rather than a dictator.
Thanks for this deeper look into the "manifesto" and the opportunity to see more about how Nils' mind works. My own thoughts keep coming back to points I read in the document, and it was so insightful to hear more on some of the topics. It's amazing to me that someone who is only 25 years old has such a concise grasp on his own thoughts!
The clarity of his own thoughts in that "not-manifesto" was what made me so very keen to talk with him. Right after the Olympic golds were won and howtoskate.se went live, I contacted Sondre Skarli from Norway (former national team sped skating coach). He connected me to Johan Rojler. Johan talked to Nils. They agreed, according to Johan, because Nils had listened to a couple of my podcasts as he formulated his plan. But then there was the rest of the World Cup season to complete, lots of media attention for Nils, etc. So, I am very thankful that Johan and Nils made time for this discussion. I guess it was another example of them "working the plan"
The most disconcerting thing is that he did such a simple thing that we all do in life: Don’t work for two days! Saturday and Sunday..and it works for sports! I don’t know how he managed hunger these two days!
I dont think so, she is not training those really big loads right now. She is balancing school, training and coaching her way right now. BUT, I do think the 5:2 model is really interesting!
Stephen, thank you for a brilliant podcast. Was discussing this this morning with a WR holder in rowing, and so many of the details and the ethos are the same. Athletes with massive talent, yes, but also buy in and ownership of their training.
Thanks for doing this Stephen - I found it very interesting. I'm not sure how to reconcile Nils' approach with the comment from the gold medal winning coach you quoted as saying threshold work had too much cost for the benefit. It seems like Nils accumulated a ton of time at threshold intensity. Any insights you can provide on this would be greatly appreciated by many, I'm sure!
Hey Stephen, can you do a video about the norway tri-team. They mainly do LT1, LT2 sessions. To our verdant mind this might seem the opposite of polarized, but I have a feeling this is not the case exactly.
I can assure you based on direct communication with their coach that the norwegian triathletes do a LOT of low intensity volume! 25-32h per week total volume all year. high intensity running and cycling often takes the form of double threshold (z3) sessions. Their swimming sessions are often very hard z5 sessions (5 zone model)
He could afford to train in an exotic way because at some point he was already the #1 in the world in his sport, so he just kept going that way. They chose to increase duration at a given power (400-ish watts) than increase power at a given duration, as he explained. This is insane in a training context (but, well, he got his medal!). Imagine what it could be if he adjust his training, with less stimulus monotony and etc. Big Kudos to him, it was a fascinating interview! I would never do that but I loved the reasons behind such a linear/monotonous training routine.
1:26:00 I did kettlebells sports and "fun" thing for me was that if i didn't feel bad i knew i was going to under perform. I suppose that had something to do with relaxation between each repetition: i did 4 clean and jerks each minute for 10 minutes, so i was moving for 15 seconds and just stood holding kettlebells for the rest of minute. At 73kg bodyweight with 2x32kg kettlebells that alone was a task to manage. If i was on edge of "man, i don't know if i can do this." i was able relax immediately when i stopped moving the bells. If i felt fine i might remain tight for up to second after i've stopped moving, adding quite a deal of extra tension to muscles. Maybe i was just bad at it.
Thanks for the great interview! I was just wondering, I always thought you should train by applying progressive overload and by alternating periods of stress with (short) periods of rest, allowing for supercompensation to occur and then to build on those adaptations. In his approach it seems like he just kept training at the same load and without structurally taking rest, only allowing supercompensation to occur in time for competition. Can you shed some light on how such an approach (clearly) still leads to the greatest amount of adaptation?
Amazing discussion, thanks so much for your openness. In reading Nils' training guide I duly noted his choices to drop dryland and slideboard training to harvest that time for skating, power based bike training, and rest goals. I'm now curious if "traditional" dryland lacks significant relation to Nils' on ice technique. Certainly hundreds of sets of 2 or 1 leg cushions, low walk, and skating imitations make for stronger legs, core, and improved balance. But how much will it build timing and weight transfer? I can only imagine belt work at different tempos might have more relevance. Thoughts? Thank you!
I was wondering how did you decide how much base training to do (daily weekly session etc) and for how long i.e how many months ? .... was it as just try to do as much as humanly possible (and how did you know how much was possible for you) until the last possible moment while still having time for the threshold and peaking blocks just before the world cups?
How it possible to find a road to do 260w for 6 hours. I mean that’s gotta be like 36-38 km/h on flat roads. If it’s on an indoor trainer, this guy must have a butt made of steel
Physiologically how the heck did this work? Wouldn’t such a long period of easy training and threshold work reduce his anaerobic capacity to a point where he could not produce enough lactate for a 6min race? Or did the 2ish months of specific skating(Evan this wasn’t at an intensity that would have a great effect on anaerobic capacity) increase his anaerobic capacity to a useful level for a 5k?
He explains that skating at the 5k/10k pace is not particularly hard for someone like him, it's maintaining the pace that is the key. So no need for him to increase his rate of lactate production beyond what he did during his race pace sessions.
Was there a build up in the 3 periods? Or like in the threshold build, was it 8h off threshold from week 1 till like week 8. Don’t know How long it was. Was it 240 30s laps from week 1? Or did that build up as well?
Can you make a video about muscle fiber types and their affect on performance? It would be interesting to touch on muscle fiber type conversion if it is possible at all(which I believe it is up to about 15-20%). Correlation between intensity zones and fiber conversion, that kind of stuff.
the word Manifesto is the right term because it merely signals the intentions and views of the writer which is what Niels does in his. I guess you were probably referring to the association of the term with the communists which is inaccurate.
