Strong Endurance We are to Conduct Scientific Experiments and Write a Paper on Anti-Glycolytic Training

[Luwuwu]

Esteemed Fellow Forum Members,

I'm writing on behalf of a good friend of mine. He's a dedicated kettlebell enthusiast, serious athlete, and he's currently undertaking his master's degree at Beijing Sports University, China’s leading institution for sports studies. His specialisation lies in Sports Performance Assessment and Training, and he has taken a keen interest in anti-glycolytic training.

Having exhaustively read and tested the principles outlined in the books Q&D and AXE, he has become profoundly intrigued by this training approach. However, he noticed a significant lack of academic research and discourse on this topic, particularly on the Chinese web. Given this gap in knowledge, he’s resolved to conduct his own experiments, carry out assessments, and pen a research paper to further establish the efficacy of anti-glycolytic training.

He's got a lot of resources to aid him: top-level athletes who can act as his subjects, access to cutting-edge technological equipment, and the backing of reputable sports academics. However, he's seeking advice on how best to design and conduct his experiments. We're aware that anti-glycolytic training has been proven as a highly effective sports training modality, notably tested by coaches during the Soviet era, yet its adoption remains largely sparse in China. We're hoping this could help get the word out in Chinese sports academia.

We understand that the ideal course of action would be attendance of the Strong Endurance Seminar to gain a deeper understanding of the subject. However, the next seminar is scheduled in France, and unfortunately, no online participation option seems to be available. Considering the exchange rate between the US dollar and the Chinese yuan (CNY), as well as the associated travel costs, it is unfortunately too great a financial burden for us to bear.

Therefore, we’re humbly reaching out to all respected members of our forum for your insights on how to best conduct these experiments(We hope our plea isn't overly demanding). Any advice regarding the variables to consider, the intended targets, the structure of the experiments, or any other pertinent factors would be greatly appreciated. If anyone could point us to relevant academic papers for further study, that would be immensely helpful. I would be particularly grateful if @Pavel could share his thoughts on this matter.

Thank you kindly in advance for your time and valuable contributions!

 

[Luwuwu]

My friend, Guo, is currently preparing for a presentation to his graduate tutor and other professors, where he will introduce Q&D and delve into the science behind it that he is knowledgeable about. Any updates or developments related to the project will be posted here.

 

[Luwuwu]

We are recently focusing on the following variables:

1. Which should be used as the subject: AXE or Q&D?

2. What qualities should we consider as the benchmarks for assessing the athlete's improvements?

3. What movement should we choose to conduct the experiment? It's important to note that most athletes we have access to do not have a background in kettlebell training, ruling out swings and snatches as options.

4. What is the appropriate duration for the experiment?

5. What level of athletes should we select for the experiment? Should we target higher or lower skill levels? Additionally, what type of athletes should be preferable?

6. Which training method should be most suitable for the control group?

 

[Adachi]

as I learned in a lab experiment in Economics 101, any study of any level of rigor is an incredibly difficult undertaking.

recruiting participants, attrition, design, confounding variables; any study of any level of rigor, from which you can take any conclusions, is incredibly difficult. people gripe about studies all the time. I am not entertained by such gripes.

the costs are high, the difficulty is high, and the prerequisite knowledge and understanding are high.

So, with that in mind ...
I humbly respond to your prompt.

A few key phenomenological points of interest.

• observing the presence of oxygen.
  • myoglobin utilization?
  • oxygenation rates in the blood?
  • signs of anaerobic conditions?
• Lactate/Hydrogen Ion accumulation rates.
  • account for amounts of glycolysis involvement
• Taking note of GSH / GSSG levels. (a sign of oxidative stress)

as to your particular questions about study design ...

1. AXE step loading would be easier to study over time; I believe.
   
   
2. I would imagine the utilization of a Force Plate, would be the relevant standard. Increases in output with respect to biological markers of work: (oxidative stress/cellular byproduct)
   
   
3. It makes it tricky to study AXE Protocols without employing them uniformly, but here I go...
   
   Strength movements can be used under this AGT, A&A, AXE paradigm- the analog programming would lie in the realm of so-called strength aerobics or Iron Cardio. The Expression of Power is Key, a force plate or measurement of acceleration would be useful for this quantification. One would want to be near or at a maximal expression of power, to make the most of such training. So, in between weights would be necessary.
   
   Here are some programming parameters.
   1. Repeat training
   2. 1-3 reps
   3. 60, 90, or 120 seconds per repeat
   4. 2 or 3 Sessions per week (but not before they've recovered from the previous session)
   5. limit volume to 100 reps or less.
   6. For the purposes of the study, pick one rep/repeat/session format and hold it constant.
   7. progression: extend session length up to 100 reps, add a rep continue to any positive failure/form compromise.
      
      
4. 6-12 weeks. or 20-40 sessions minimum. Bonus if you swap protocols across your cohort. 6 weeks on protocol A vs Protocol B.
   
   
5. the more the merrier, the more information you can provide about each cohort, the more that can be discussed about trained athletes. prior training, demands of the sport. a bunch of other stuff that's above my paygrade about what is relevant to the study about said participants.
   
   
6. as to what the control group should do - I believe this will be answered by the question that lies at the heart of the study itself.
   Consider the query: What Question does The Study dain to attempt to answer?
   

I would be highly interested to read such a study, and I find myself to be wholly inadequate to design and conduct one.

I wish you all the best. And, I look forward to hearing about this in the future.

 

[offwidth]

Which should be used as the subject: AXE or Q&D?

Pavel recommends that participants of either be proficient in and have met the S&S Simple standard. (At least swings for AXE)
Are you planning on doing this?

 

[TimothyGander]

1. Which should be used as the subject: AXE or Q&D?

Q&D demands high level of strength and proficiency with kettlebell movements. I would use AXE.

2. What qualities should we consider as the benchmarks for assessing the athlete's improvements?

I assume endurance would be a primary focus. Therefore, it should be some endurance challenge that does not directly mimic either the SE training or the control group; one that is well-recognized and appears objective. Physical fitness test administered in the People's Liberation Army might be a good idea.

3. What movement should we choose to conduct the experiment? It's important to note that most athletes we have access to do not have a background in kettlebell training, ruling out swings and snatches as options.

Some AXE protocols, like the "a single every 20 seconds) plan from newsletter, should work with barbell power/muscle cleans/snatches.

6. Which training method should be most suitable for the control group?

Preferably, some endurance training modality popular in China. Your friend might use training recommendations taught at his university, if there are any. If not, a popular Western program combining "aerobic" (LISS) and "anaerobic" (glycolitic HIIT) should be used. Ideally, there would be three control groups: one using a LISS program, one using HIIT, and one combining both.

 

[mprevost]

These types of studies are very difficult because there's an endless number of comparisons that need to be made to really assess a training method. First recommendation would be to keep the training mode and testing mode the same, otherwise, he had a very complicated factor of training transfer effects from training to testing. How would you something simple like anti glycolytic run training? And is a testing mode a 1.5 mi run for time if you're interested in aerobic capacity, or a 10k run if you're more interested in endurance. Any longer than 10k and you're going to be running into very difficult testing a logistical considerations. For comparison groups, I would compare the anti-glycolytic run training group to a group that did only zone two training, another group that did high intensity interval training, and yet another group that did nothing. As you can see, this starts to become a very complicated study with lots and lots of participants. If you can figure out how to do it, you could do a power analysis to determine how many subjects you would need in each group. If you want reasonable validity, I don't think you could get away with less than 10 per group. And already that's starting to look like a large study. If you only have one comparison group then there's a limited amount you can say about the effectiveness of anti-glycolonic training based on the study. For example, if you only compare it to high intensity interval training, then you can't say much about anti-glycolytic training versus zone 2 training for example. I think running is an ideal mode to test because you don't have to reach some threshold level of skill and a particular lift in order to enroll subjects. It's also simple, easy to administer, and relevant to lots of sporing activities.

 

[mprevost]

I forgot to mention duration. 6 to 8 weeks would be an adequate training duration. Training effects from high intentionally interval training generally plateau around 6 to 8 weeks. The story is different for zone 2 training, which doesn't seem to plateau at all. So this would produce a small systemic bias in favor of the higher intensity training, but it's impractical to conduct a study for years. 6-day weeks would be reasonable.

 

[silveraw]

Training effects from high intentionally interval training generally plateau around 6 to 8 weeks. The story is different for zone 2 training, which doesn't seem to plateau at all. So this would produce a small systemic bias in favor of the higher intensity training, but it's impractical to conduct a study for years. 6-day weeks would be reasonable.

That makes me think measuring mitocondria density and lactic acid (lactate?) production between a Q&D sprint/pushup protocol and a more traditional HIIT protocol using the same movements would make sense.
So LT pre protocol and LT after protocol which is easy enough to meaure. I'm not sure how you would measure mitochondira density other than a biopsy.
Then some more standardized performance measurements like Vo2max, sprint times, pushup endurance, etc. Depending again on what the hypothesis is.. I'm assuming it is something along the lines of "AGT is a superior form of endurance training for power athletes than traditional HIIT".

Alternatively you can recreate one of the Russian AGT experiments since replication is a severely neglected form of research.

 

[Adachi]

Alternatively you can recreate one of the Russian AGT experiments since replication is a severely neglected form of research.

this is deeply true.

 

[North Coast Miller]

I don't even think you could just measure lactate, you need to measure ROS to verify the lactate is being consumed and not just generated.

 

[Adachi]

I don't even think you could just measure lactate, you need to measure ROS to verify the lactate is being consumed and not just generated.

Doesn't this measure lactate?

 

[ali]

What's the hypothesis? Or is it to study the effects of training....and so what effects.
The key thing to study is the outcome of mitochondria.....if there is a difference in number of and the function of mitochondria in fast twitch muscle fibre compared to other (glycolytic) interval training. So blood lactate should be measured often and accurately during training, before and after. A muscle fibre biopsy before and after training with suitable expert analysis of mitochondria.
Getting in deep now.....contact Inigo San Milan or other skilled specialist scientist who through a microscope can assess the health of mitochondria and sample area of muscle to determine the number.
No idea if that is even possible and would require specialist bio tech with expert input.
That is the question we all want answers to!!

 

[North Coast Miller]

View attachment 23023
Doesn't this measure lactate?

Its not enough to measure lactate, as was noted in the results from sprint training lactate levels. A great deal of it might be repackaged in the liver as glucose or slowly consumed system wide over a long period of time. We need to know it was being used (or not) in large quantities locally, which means byproducts - ROS.

The idea being not to test just the training methodology but also the metabolic rationalle

 

[jozko]

2. What qualities should we consider as the benchmarks for assessing the athlete's improvements?

I'd say 400 m run. I'd hire pro athletes for the experiments, but not sprinters and mid-distance runners, because I don't think they will respond well to this kind of training, since they are already very specialized. And the progress here is easy to measure.

3. What movement should we choose to conduct the experiment? It's important to note that most athletes we have access to do not have a background in kettlebell training, ruling out swings and snatches as options.

Why? Even when they do not have background in kettlebell training, swing is incredibly easy to learn. IMHO swing is easier to learn than proper clean.
But if you really want to avoid kettlebells, then perhaps dumbbell snatch from the ground is a good candidate. Or dumbbell clean and push press.

 

[TobyC]

We are recently focusing on the following variables:

1. Which should be used as the subject: AXE or Q&D?

2. What qualities should we consider as the benchmarks for assessing the athlete's improvements?

3. What movement should we choose to conduct the experiment? It's important to note that most athletes we have access to do not have a background in kettlebell training, ruling out swings and snatches as options.

4. What is the appropriate duration for the experiment?

5. What level of athletes should we select for the experiment? Should we target higher or lower skill levels? Additionally, what type of athletes should be preferable?

6. Which training method should be most suitable for the control group?

Not an expert in AXE/AGT training by any means, but do have a background in Sport/exercise science. For qualities, it would make most sense to look at something like an 800m run, as that has fairly equal aerobic and anaerobic contributions. It may also be good to look at pre/post mitochondrial density as well as function. Standing broad jumps may be a good movement if your subjects aren’t used to kettlebell movements. They allow a quick recovery (as opposed to box jumps) as well as power production. What type of athletes selected is very dependent on what you decide to test (ie. weightlifters wouldn’t be a good population for testing aerobic improvements).

 

[Luwuwu]

A few key phenomenological points of interest.

• observing the presence of oxygen.
  • myoglobin utilization?
  • oxygenation rates in the blood?
  • signs of anaerobic conditions?
• Lactate/Hydrogen Ion accumulation rates.
  • account for amounts of glycolysis involvement
• Taking note of GSH / GSSG levels. (a sign of oxidative stress)

These are indeed inspiring points to ponder! Many thanks!

AXE step loading would be easier to study over time; I believe.

Guo and I have been locked in a debate on this matter. I believe that AXE is more generalised and easier to research. Guo, having spent quite some time with 033, has been fascinated by the progress it has brought him - “I'm feeling like I can pierce the heavens”, as he put it.

I would imagine the utilization of a Force Plate, would be the relevant standard. Increases in output with respect to biological markers of work: (oxidative stress/cellular byproduct)

I concur. A Force Plate can effectively test strength performance. However, we have yet to determine the specific biological markers to be measured, as we are still reviewing related research. At the same time, we are keen to track the athletes' progress in endurance and conditioning as well. After all, our focus is on Strong Endurance.

It makes it tricky to study AXE Protocols without employing them uniformly, but here I go...

Strength movements can be used under this AGT, A&A, AXE paradigm- the analog programming would lie in the realm of so-called strength aerobics or Iron Cardio. The Expression of Power is Key, a force plate or measurement of acceleration would be useful for this quantification. One would want to be near or at a maximal expression of power, to make the most of such training. So, in between weights would be necessary.

Here are some programming parameters.

1. Repeat training
2. 1-3 reps
3. 60, 90, or 120 seconds per repeat
4. 2 or 3 Sessions per week (but not before they've recovered from the previous session)
5. limit volume to 100 reps or less.
6. For the purposes of the study, pick one rep/repeat/session format and hold it constant.
7. progression: extend session length up to 100 reps, add a rep continue to any positive failure/form compromise.

Many thanks! We had not previously contemplated strength aerobics. We'll certainly explore the possibilities!

6-12 weeks. or 20-40 sessions minimum. Bonus if you swap protocols across your cohort. 6 weeks on protocol A vs Protocol B.

Here's a conundrum: as I see it, a few sessions of HIIT can yield significant improvement, whereas a few sessions of AGT barely move the needle. On the other hand, glycolytic peaking isn't sustainable, but AGT proves beneficial in the long run. For validity and reasonableness, we hope our programming doesn't overly favour one approach.

the more the merrier, the more information you can provide about each cohort, the more that can be discussed about trained athletes. prior training, demands of the sport. a bunch of other stuff that's above my paygrade about what is relevant to the study about said participants.

I couldn't agree more.

as to what the control group should do - I believe this will be answered by the question that lies at the heart of the study itself.
Consider the query: What Question does The Study dain to attempt to answer?

At present, we have a broad thesis: to authenticate the supremacy of AGT. This will undoubtedly become more refined as we progress.

I would be highly interested to read such a study, and I find myself to be wholly inadequate to design and conduct one.

I wish you all the best. And, I look forward to hearing about this in the future.

Thank you very much, Adachi!

Pavel recommends that participants of either be proficient in and have met the S&S Simple standard. (At least swings for AXE)
Are you planning on doing this?

We have a jest at Beijing Sports University: any tourist could run into a stray dog on the campus, and that dog would qualify as a national 2nd-grade athlete. Most athletes here may not have a kettlebell background, but they are unquestionably capable for AXE or Q&D, given that a good number are national 1st-grade and national elites are hardly a rarity.

For those unfamiliar with the Chinese athlete ranking system, here's an example:

Event: 100m Sprint. Gender: Male.
Elite: 10.25 sec
National Elite: 10.5sec
National 1st-grade: 10.93sec
National 2nd-grade: 11.73sec

Q&D demands high level of strength and proficiency with kettlebell movements. I would use AXE.

Couldn't agree more.

I assume endurance would be a primary focus. Therefore, it should be some endurance challenge that does not directly mimic either the SE training or the control group; one that is well-recognized and appears objective. Physical fitness test administered in the People's Liberation Army might be a good idea.

This is a splendid suggestion! It hadn't previously crossed our minds.

Some AXE protocols, like the "a single every 20 seconds) plan from newsletter, should work with barbell power/muscle cleans/snatches.

Currently, dumbbell power snatches and barbell cleans are our primary considerations.

Thank you very much, Timothy!

These types of studies are very difficult because there's an endless number of comparisons that need to be made to really assess a training method.

Indeed, the complication is evident. Yet, this is precisely the challenge we aim to tackle.

First recommendation would be to keep the training mode and testing mode the same, otherwise, he had a very complicated factor of training transfer effects from training to testing.

In fact, we prefer to keep the training and testing modes distinct to avoid disturbed results. We believe an athlete should train in three main areas: general physical quality, specific event skills, and competition tactics. Our training will focus on general physical quality, and we'll examine its impact on both their general physical quality and competition results.

For comparison groups, I would compare the anti-glycolytic run training group to a group that did only zone two training, another group that did high intensity interval training, and yet another group that did nothing.

Agreed. We could indeed benefit from additional control groups if another viable option presents itself.

And already that's starting to look like a large study.

We're not concerned about scarcity as we have adequate high-level athletes at our disposal. Hundreds are feasible.

I think running is an ideal mode to test because you don't have to reach some threshold level of skill and a particular lift in order to enroll subjects.

I agree.

I forgot to mention duration. 6 to 8 weeks would be an adequate training duration. Training effects from high intentionally interval training generally plateau around 6 to 8 weeks. The story is different for zone 2 training, which doesn't seem to plateau at all. So this would produce a small systemic bias in favor of the higher intensity training, but it's impractical to conduct a study for years. 6-day weeks would be reasonable.

This is exactly what we've been pondering over! 6 weeks seems reasonable.

Thank you very much, mprevost!

That makes me think measuring mitocondria density and lactic acid (lactate?) production between a Q&D sprint/pushup protocol and a more traditional HIIT protocol using the same movements would make sense.

These are good, but we're uncertain if they are sufficient.

So LT pre protocol and LT after protocol which is easy enough to meaure. I'm not sure how you would measure mitochondira density other than a biopsy.

Guo's University has the means to accurately measure any internal information, all of which are accessible for his research.

Then some more standardized performance measurements like Vo2max, sprint times, pushup endurance, etc. Depending again on what the hypothesis is.. I'm assuming it is something along the lines of "AGT is a superior form of endurance training for power athletes than traditional HIIT".

The hypothesis is pivotal. It essentially shapes the entire experiment. We're still in discussions and seeking guidance from his mentor.

Alternatively you can recreate one of the Russian AGT experiments since replication is a severely neglected form of research.

We never found a Russian AGT experiment in sufficient detail for us to replicate. If anyone in our forum could provide guidance, we'd be extremely grateful.

Thank you very much, silveraw!

I don't even think you could just measure lactate, you need to measure ROS to verify the lactate is being consumed and not just generated.

Agreed!

What's the hypothesis? Or is it to study the effects of training....and so what effects.

This is yet to be decided.

The key thing to study is the outcome of mitochondria.....

I agree!
We've indeed been delving deep into research on everything related to mitochondria.

Getting in deep now.....contact Inigo San Milan or other skilled specialist scientist who through a microscope can assess the health of mitochondria and sample area of muscle to determine the number.
No idea if that is even possible and would require specialist bio tech with expert input.

We'll be seeking advice from our professors.

That is the question we all want answers to!!

We'll do our utmost to provide an answer!

Thank you very much, ali!

I'd say 400 m run. I'd hire pro athletes for the experiments, but not sprinters and mid-distance runners, because I don't think they will respond well to this kind of training, since they are already very specialized. And the progress here is easy to measure.

Yes. Specialisation is something that we try to avoid.

Why? Even when they do not have background in kettlebell training, swing is incredibly easy to learn. IMHO swing is easier to learn than proper clean.

Training a hundred athletes in the kettlebell swing and ensuring their technique is sound is rather impractical for us.

But if you really want to avoid kettlebells, then perhaps dumbbell snatch from the ground is a good candidate. Or dumbbell clean and push press.

Exactly what we are thinking about!

Thank you very much, jozko!

For qualities, it would make most sense to look at something like an 800m run, as that has fairly equal aerobic and anaerobic contributions.

We've been considering the 800m/1km/3km/5km/10km runs. However, we're still undecided on which would be best. Given that we're yet to finalise our thesis, this decision is rather challenging.

It may also be good to look at pre/post mitochondrial density as well as function.

Good point!

Standing broad jumps may be a good movement if your subjects aren’t used to kettlebell movements.

A full-body movement would be ideal, although we're open to implementing more than one exercise.

Thank you very much, TobyC!

 

[Luwuwu]

Greetings! Guo and I have established a timeline for our experiment and subsequent paper. We're posting it here to keep everyone in the loop.

At present, we're still immersed in literature review and consulting with his mentor to finalise our thesis. Guo is preparing a presentation to introduce AGT to his mentor, which is our top priority at the moment.

Our thesis will be finalised before the beginning of the winter vacation.

By early April 2024, we'll have all the experiment's structure, rules, and details in place.

The experiment is set to run from April until the end of June. If needed, we're prepared to conduct additional experiments.

Provided everything proceeds smoothly, we'll be drafting the paper by September. Guo will complete the Chinese version, and I'll handle the translation.

That's our plan so far.

 

[Anna C]

This is impressive, @Luwuwu! I'm excited to hear more about this as it transpires.

 

[Paotle]

@Luwuwu I think it's also important to take a look at the many studies on SIT (sprint interval training) which in protocol is very similar to AGT (<5s effort, 1 minute rest). The main difference is that modality is sprinting and not lifting.
I can't remember the details of the studies, but it seems that the conclusion was that there were some aerobic improvements, but that the stimulus was less effective and the results less optimal than protocols with longer intervals.