Tapering

Most endurance athletes accept that tapering before a competition is beneficial, but few understand why.

Research

A trial was conducted back in the 1990's by a group of Canadian researchers at the McMaster University in Ontario (Shepley et al. 1992)^[1]. The trial was conducted for a one week period, with a group of experienced endurance athletes who all run approximately 50 miles a week in training. The athletes were split into 3 groups, with each group working a different training program for the week. At the end of the week, the performance improvement for each group was checked. The results were as follows:

Group	Training program	% reduction in training load	% improvement
1	No training	100%	0%
2	18 miles (easy running)	64%	6%
3	6 miles (500 metres sessions at max effort)	88%	22%

As it can be seen from the table, group 3 achieved the best improvement in their performance (22%). In addition group 3 enjoyed four advantages over the other groups

More glycogen in the leg muscles
Increased density of red blood cells
Increased blood plasma
Increased enzyme activity in their leg muscles

Similar tests have also concluded that as well as achieving the above advantages there is also an improvement in the neural system. The result is that the athlete has an improved ability of a better rested nervous system to control and co-ordinate better rested muscles at faster running speeds. These are all very desirable in an athlete's preparation for a major competition.

What to do

If your total mileage is less than 50 miles a week and your event is less than one hour then:

taper for 7 to 10 days
reduce the total mileage by 80%
training intensities high interval sessions (90% VO2max)
reduce frequency of training by 20%

If your total mileage is greater than 50 miles a week and your event is greater than one hour, then taper for 14 to 20 days otherwise use the same strategy.

Tapering in training

If tapering in this way can have this effect on your performance then perhaps you should consider including tapering weeks in your season's training programs. With all my athletes, I use a four week cycle, where the fourth week is an active rest and test week. In this fourth week the training load is reduced by 70%, 2 or 3 tests at max effort are performed and light sessions are included between tests. The tests are used to monitor progress made in the proceeding three weeks of training and the results are considered in the planning of the next 4 week cycle.

The following are examples of taper programs:

Referenced Material

SHEPLEY, J.D. et al. (1992) Physiological effects of tapering in highly trained athletes. Journal of Applied Physiology, 72 (2), p. 706-711

Page Reference

The reference for this page is:

MACKENZIE, B. (2000) Tapering [WWW] Available from: http://www.brianmac.co.uk/tapering.htm [Accessed

Associated Pages

The following Sports Coach pages should be read in conjunction with this page: