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Toptimum Performance, Lindenhoeve 31, Vosselaar (2026)

15/09/2026

Eighty-five elite and world-class men reported their training and their best times after three, five and seven years of systematic training. Then researchers asked which activity actually predicted how fast they became.

The famous theory says expertise comes from deliberate practice: effortful, focused, uncomfortable work aimed squarely at getting better. In running, intervals and tempo runs qualify. Easy running does not.

Here is how the predictors ranked:

— Total distance run: r ≥ 0.75
— Easy runs: r ≥ 0.68
— Short intervals: r ≥ 0.53
— Tempo runs: r ≥ 0.50
— Long intervals: r ≥ 0.22

Total distance on its own accounted for at least 57% of the variation in performance. One variable, more than half the gap.

And easy running outranked every hard session type. The activity that does not qualify as deliberate practice was, in the authors' own words, crucial to better performances, partly through what it contributes to total distance.

When all the modes went into the model together, only two still explained performance: easy runs and tempo runs. That is a short list for seven years of work.

The odd one out is worth sitting with. Long intervals — the one-to-two-kilometre repetitions runners dread and build their identity around — showed the weakest link to performance of any mode measured. Not a reason to remove them. A reason to stop building the week around them.

Protect the easy running first, raise volume before intensity, keep one quality tempo. And hold it in proportion: this describes what got elite men there over seven years, not a prescription for everybody.

Source: Casado, Hanley, Santos-Concejero & Ruiz-Perez (2021). Journal of Strength and Conditioning Research 35:2525-2531.

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15/09/2026

Your body does not count the calories in a run. It reads the run as a message — and different parts of it build different things.

Two stresses arrive in every session:
- mechanical load, from muscle contracting and bone taking impact,
- and low fuel, as cellular energy is spent faster than it is replaced.
They flip two different switches.

The low-fuel switch is the one runners underrate. As energy falls, AMPK comes on, PGC-1a goes up, and the cell starts building f.e.:
- more mitochondria,
- more glucose transporters,
- more oxidative fibre.

That signal comes from time spent working, not from how much it hurt — which is why base weeks change what you are capable of.

The mechanical message goes somewhere unexpected. A pressure-sensitive channel in bone cells opens on footstrike and lets calcium in. That is the trigger for remodelling: signalling switches turned on and sclerostin, the brake on bone building, is suppressed.
Take the loading away and the message never gets sent.

Muscle also talks to bone chemically:
it releases irisin, which docks onto a receptor on bone cells and keeps them alive. Strength work shows up in bone density, not just on the bar.

And the run reaches the brain. Working muscle puts irisin, BDNF, Lac-Phe and vesicles into the blood; these appear to cross into the brain and raise the growth factor behind synaptic plasticity and new neurons.

One caution: the pathways are the same in everyone, but how much running it takes to move them, and how long the effect lasts, still varies athlete to athlete.

So the mechanism tells you what to aim at. The athlete's body tells you how much.

Source: Ying et al. (2026). The Health Benefits of Exercise: Molecular and Cellular Mechanisms. MedComm.

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14/09/2026

Twenty trained runners, six weeks, the same weekly distance. One group ran its easy days at the top of the moderate zone. The other ran ten to fifteen per cent below it. Only the pace of the easy run changed.

They finished level. Neuromuscular and performance measures improved in both groups, with no difference between them. The slower group simply carried the block more comfortably — perceived strain ran lower on several days while the training itself landed in the same place.

What that means for a week:

— Hold the distance, ease the pace. The trade only works if the mileage stays put; the slower group spent longer on its feet for the same miles.
— The top of the easy zone is a line, not a target. Sitting well under it is still squarely inside the zone that builds the engine.
— Keep one hard session honest. Both groups trained five easy days and one hard one. The gains came from that shape, not from how fast the easy days were.

One thing moved the other way in both groups: the anaerobic reserve above threshold fell while the aerobic ceiling rose. A week built almost entirely of easy running plus a single hard session sharpens the engine and dulls the finish. If a finishing kick matters, it needs its own work in the plan.

The easy day is the pace nobody watches, and the one with the most room in it.

📚Source: Guimaraes, Foresti, Papoti & de Azevedo (2026). Journal of Strength and Conditioning Research.

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11/09/2026

Reeds gedurende enkele decennia volg ik zoveel mogelijk running relevante sportwetenschappelijke evoluties en inzichten op de voet,
en bouwde ik gedurende meer dan 15 jaar op quasi dagelijkse basis aan een kennis database bestaande uit (samenvattingen van) duizenden hoogkwalitatieve sportwetenschappelijle studies, artikels, boeken, reviews, etc…

Deze database gecombineerd met:
• een opleiding als Master in de Sport- en Bewegingswetenschappen
• ervaring als internationaal atleet in zowel running als duathlon
• lesgever anatomie, inspanningsfysiologie, sportwetenschappelijk onderzoek,
• diverse coaching diploma’s en 9 jaar ervaring als coach tot op internationaal niveau (oa titels en medailles op World Games, Europese en Wereldkampioenschappen)
• moderne software en technologie…

…laat me toe om zeer hoogwaardige sportwetenschappelijke bundels, gidsen en schema’s op maat en op basis van actuele consensussen en inzichten samen te stellen.

Gidsen en bundels over diverse topics zoals o.a.:
• aanpak langere doelen op vlak van training, voeding, carbo loading, …
• blessurepreventie en aanpak bij eerste signalen of pijntjes,
• evidence informed suppletie en nieuwe innovaties en evoluties hierin
• aanpak verblijf in hoogtetent en/of -stage
• en nog veel meer…

Door de combinatie van sportpassie, gedurende decennia geduldig opgebouwde kennis en tal van relevante ervaringen, samen met een eigen trainingsvisie en ontwikkelde methodiek (na o.a. veel sampling de maximale metabole intramusculaire quasi steady state pace intervalmethode)
…hoop ik het verschil te maken met gelijkaardige aanbieders.

En hoop ik mensen te overtuigen die voor kwaliteit willen gaan en een aanpak die op alle vlakken menselijk, op maat, doelgericht en wetenschappelijk onderbouwd is.

✉️ [email protected] bij interesse

🔸Optimize your sports performances, reach your personal top!📈🔝

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11/09/2026

Sixty well-trained male runners, sixteen weeks, four training sequences and one matched training load. The only thing that changed was the order.

Filipas, Bonato, Gallo and Codella ran pyramidal throughout, polarized throughout, and a switch at week eight in each direction.
The pyramidal week was 77 per cent below the first ventilatory threshold, 17 per cent between the thresholds and 6 per cent above the second; the polarized week was 80, 6 and 14.

In week one only Tuesday separated them: fifty-five minutes of steady tempo against four times seven minutes above the second threshold.

Every group got faster over the 5 km time trial.
• Pyramidal into polarized gained 1.5 per cent,
• polarized throughout 1.1,
• polarized into pyramidal 0.9,
• pyramidal throughout 0.6.

Velocity at 2 and 4 mmol per litre were the only significant predictors of who improved; peak oxygen uptake was not.

Where the summary departs from the paper:
• The 1.5 per cent is presented as clearing technical error. The paper gives 3.2 per cent as the smallest detectable change of a 5 km time trial and states that most of its own significant changes fall below it.
• Polarized throughout is listed at 0.4 per cent. It gained 1.1. The 0.4 is the first eight weeks of the pyramidal-into-polarized arm.
• The five seconds is the margin over the other groups, not the gain. A 1.5 per cent gain on a 986-second baseline is about fifteen seconds.
• Absolute peak oxygen uptake and peak lactate are listed as unchanged. Both rose significantly; what was absent was any difference between arms.

📚 Source: Filipas L, et al. (2022). Scand J Med Sci Sports 32:498-511. doi:10.1111/sms.14101. Open access.

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10/09/2026

The term “anaerobic threshold” carries a claim inside it: that the muscle is short of oxygen. Poole, Rossiter, Brooks and Gladden argue that the claim does not hold.

Wasserman’s chain ran from limited oxygen delivery, to lactate and hydrogen ions, to falling pH, to bicarbonate buffering, to carbon dioxide, to ventilation.

This review accepts every step downstream and rejects the first: insufficient oxygen is not the primary basis for lactataemia. Lactate is instead a crucial energy source, a major gluconeogenic precursor and a signalling molecule, with no ipso facto evidence of muscle dysoxia or anoxia.

It also separates two boundaries. The lactate threshold divides moderate from heavy exercise. Critical power, the threshold for a sustained ‘non-oxidative’ contribution, divides heavy from very heavy and sits often far above it.

Where the summary departs from the paper:
- It is presented as the modern consensus. Two letters challenged the review and its authors replied to both, all inside volume 599 of the same journal in 2021.
- Rossiter and Brooks, two of the four authors, published opposing essays five months later on whether the concept is valid.
- The review is said to require abandoning threshold zones. It states that gas exchange estimation of the lactate threshold remains important in training and in the clinic.

📚 Source: Poole DC, Rossiter HB, Brooks GA, Gladden LB (2021). J Physiol 599:737-767. doi:10.1113/JP279963

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10/09/2026

The ageing thermal engine, measured on the road rather than in a chamber

The source is Bambacht, Peggen, Eijsvogels, Hopman, Bongers and the Seven Hills Run collaboration (2026), Journal of Science and Medicine in Sport.

Runners swallowed temperature capsules at a 15 km road race across the 2008, 2009 and 2024 editions, giving two questions in one dataset: does age matter, and does ageing in the same body matter.

Fifty-seven runners in the cross-sectional comparison, 28 aged 29 and 29 aged 65. The older group ran slower, 11.2 against 12.3 km/h, and produced less metabolic heat, 14.0 against 15.1 W/kg, both p = 0.027.
Sweat rates were similar. Core temperature rose from 37.4 degrees at the start to 38.8 at the finish in both groups, p = 0.98. Skin temperature at start and finish did not differ.

The one clear age effect is in the kinetics. Older runners needed 37.0 minutes to reach a steady core temperature against 27.2, p = 0.003: over 15 km, most of the first half still spent climbing.

Twelve runners were measured again fifteen years on. They started colder, 37.3 against 37.7 degrees, and produced less heat, 13.8 against 15.7 W/kg, both p < 0.001. The finish temperature and the total rise did not change.

Where the summary departs from the paper:
Ambient temperature is given as 8 to 11 degrees. The paper reports 8 to 12 across the three editions.

The core-to-skin gradient chart runs to 28 degrees. Its own caption places skin about 15 degrees above an ambient of 8 to 11, which puts the gap nearer 12 to 16.

One note on method. The article carries a CC BY licence but the publisher blocks retrieval, so the sweat, fluid and thermal-discomfort figures could not be checked against the full text.

📚Bambacht RCB, et al. (2026). J Sci Med Sport. doi:10.1016/j.jsams.2026.07.001

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09/09/2026

Why a percentage of maximum is not a training dose

The source is Hofmann and Tschakert (2011), Cardiology Research and Practice 2011:209302, open access.

Prescribing intensity as a share of maximum heart rate or maximum oxygen uptake hands different athletes different metabolic loads at the same number.

The heart rate performance curve is neither linear nor uniform: most healthy people show a regular deflection as work rate rises, most cardiac patients an upward one.

So the common 85 per cent rule overestimates the individual target heart rate by at least five to ten per cent against the second turn point, and by up to forty in single cases.

The alternative is a three-phase model defined by what lactate does at a held effort.
• Phase one: it never leaves baseline.
• Phase two: raised but steady.
• Phase three: rising continuously.
The boundaries are the two turn points.

The finding that carries furthest is borrowed. In trained rowers, two constant efforts just below and just above the second turn point differed by five beats a minute, and the growth hormone response was close to twice as large above it. The threshold behaves as a boundary, not a gradient.

Standardised programmes have produced anything from almost no change in VO2max to a doubling across large groups. That spread is what the argument rests on.

Two things worth knowing. The lactate spread shown at a controlled 70 to 75 per cent of VO2max is labelled unpublished. And the paper states that at the time of writing, no study had applied the protocol it recommends.

Mapping the three phases onto a running week is a translation of the model; the paper measured cycling and clinical groups.

📚 Hofmann P, Tschakert G (2011). Cardiol Res Pract 2011:209302

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09/09/2026

Eight kilometres of hard running can be structured as
• a tempo run,
• as long intervals
• or as short intervals.
A new study measured what each version leaves behind for the six hours that follow.

Dutra et al. (European Journal of Sport Science 2026, open access) had twelve male recreational runners cover 8.1 km on three separate days:
• 5 x 8 min at the respiratory compensation point,
• 10 x 3 min at 30% above it,
• and 20 x 80 s at 50% above it.

Knee-extensor function was tested at baseline and at 0, 1, 2, 4 and 6 hours.

What the study reports:
• Maximal voluntary force fell about 10% and was still depressed at six hours after all three protocols.
• Voluntary activation was depressed to four hours and had recovered by six.
• No time by protocol interaction was found for any neuromuscular marker. The protocol differences come from aggregate data over the six hours.
• Neural drive to vastus lateralis lowered most after the tempo run (-20%, against -3% and -7%), despite that protocol having the lowest lactate (4.6 against 9.0 and 11.2 mmol/L).
• Rate of force development at 100-200 ms and potentiated twitch force dropped most after the short intervals (-18% and -8%, against -8% and -2% for the tempo run).
• Leg pain stayed higher after the short intervals for up to four hours and tiredness for at least six. Perceived recovery showed no effect of time or protocol.
• Session length differed: about 42, 70 and 80 minutes, since the rest intervals added to the total.

Twelve men, isometric knee extensors only. No subsequent session, injury outcome or countermeasure was tested.

📚Source: Dutra YM, et al. (2026). Eur J Sport Sci 26:e70176. doi:10.1002/ejsc.70176. Open access.

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08/09/2026

Thirty-two Kenyan and twenty European professional marathon runners, measured with calipers and tape in one session.
The Europeans carried ten kilos more, and almost all of it was muscle and bone.

Spataro et al. (J Funct Morphol Kinesiol, July 2026, open access) applied the full ISAK protocol to 52 male professionals.

Body mass 55.0 vs 65.3 kg, muscle mass 23.2 vs 27.9, bone mass 6.95 vs 8.10.

Every skeletal breadth was wider in the European group: shoulders 39.2 vs 42.5 cm, femur 9.09 vs 10.2, ankle 7.00 vs 7.90.

Kenyan runners had a lower Cormic index (shorter trunk relative to height) and a higher intermembral index.

Across all 52, bone width tracked fat-corrected muscle girth: ankle to calf r = 0.72, femur to thigh r = 0.66, humerus to arm r = 0.41.

What is remarkable in the summary:

- “Big bones mandate big muscles” and “you cannot train a European runner to have the leg volume of a Kenyan runner”.
A cross-sectional correlation is equally consistent with one body building both. The paper’s own conclusion is that Kenyan runners show a lighter, more linear profile.

- Running economy was never measured in this study, so the inertia argument on its coaching slide rests on other papers.

One more thing the summary shows correctly and then argues against: the principal component analysis separated the groups more clearly on the modifiable traits than on the structural ones.

📚Source: Spataro F, et al. (2026). J Funct Morphol Kinesiol 11(3):292. doi:10.3390/jfmk11030292

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