On endless races

Earlier this year I wrote a post on the "Weekend Reads" section of the World Athletics site. Each week they present a collection of articles related to athletics. I am following the page and I must say that its content is always interesting. (Unfortunately no archive of the previous editions of the "reads" does exist: once the week is over the new content chases away the old one). 

From time to time I stumble upon an article that I find inspiring and/or worth reporting here. This is the case with an article from Globe and Mail: "COVID-19 is like running a marathon with no finish line. What does sports science say about how we can win it?" The article focuses on the current pandemic and the fact that there appears no tangible end to it. But the angle of the article was interesting: how do we tackle an effort where the end is not fixed in advance?

The article started discussing the Quarantine Backyard Ultra race, a virtual race held back in April in which runners had to complete a 6.7 km loop once every hour. That meant 100 miles every 24 hours (again, those pesky imperial measures). There was no finish line to the race: the winner was the last man standing. The authors of the article go on to discuss the analogies of this open-ended race to the current pandemic. If this is of interest to you, just read the original article. What attracted my interest was the fact that a potentially endless race presents unfamiliar challenges. How do you pace yourself in such an event? How do you motivate yourself?

But first what is happening in "normal" races, i.e. ones where the distance is fixed. I have been regularly referring to R. Tucker and his works. Tucker is not only a brilliant physiologist, he has also the gift of explaining things in a way to make them intelligible to the layman. In a work of his, in collaboration with M. Lambert and T. Noakes, they present an analysis of pacing strategies during world record performances for 800 m, 5000 m and 10000 m. 

While for the 800 m the second lap is almost always slower than the first, in the longer races the first and final kilometres are significantly faster than the middle kilometre intervals. This means that in these races there is an end spurt because of the maintenance of a reserve during the middle part of the race. They conclude that "pacing strategy is regulated in a complex system that balances the demand for optimal performance with the requirement to defend homeostasis during exercise". 

H.V. Ulmer has proposed that the self-selected pacing strategy plays a key role in a complex regulatory system in which a central governor regulates exercise intensity specifically to ensure that potentially catastrophic derangements to cellular function do not occur. What I find interesting in the work of Ulmer is a confirmation of the validity of the Borg scale of Ratings of Perceived Exertion (RPE). 

A parenthesis here: in his work Borg presented not only the scale that carries his name but also gave a formula for the maximal heart rate P as a function of age A

P=195-0.75(A-20).

Compared to the traditional one P=220-A, Borg's formula predicts a lower maximal rate up to 40 years of age and a higher one afterwards. 

The work of Ulmer presents a most convincing correlation between Borg's scale of perceived exertion and the load of an exercise.

But what is most interesting in the work of Ulmer is the questions he addresses in his article, concerning anticipation. He introduces the notion of "teleoanticipation" (from the greek word τέλος, end) which has to do with the optimal arrangement of exertion, aiming at avoiding early exhaustion before reaching the finish point. A work by Wingfeld, Marino and Skein shed some light on the question through an experiment with cyclists on a 2x30 km time trial. One group was provided with performance information and distance feedback while for the other group information was withheld. The time of the group with information was 4 % shorter than the one without, although both groups reported the same RPE. Again the group with information increased their speed over the final 2 km, just as in the studies of Ross and of Ulmer. The authors conclude that "when withholding information pertaining to remaining distance, performance was reduced due to the application of a conservative pacing strategy". 

So the question is, how do you handle a situation where the effort is a priori open-ended. Looking at the Quarantine Backyard Ultra competition it seems that people invent an end point. While only one runner dropped out after 23 hours of racing, half of the remaining competitors gave up after 24 or 25 hours. Focusing on a fictitious finish line helped those competitors hold on. But once that objective was reached they ran out of steam. (I don't know why, but this reminds me of the "birthday effect").

Experience is of the utmost importance in this domain. A study of a team of british physiologists, involving experienced and novice cyclists over the same time trial, led to a most interesting conclusion. Novice cyclists have a dependence on distance feedback: they check their kilometric progress quite frequently. Experienced cyclists are more selective and primarily look at their speed.

How does all this help in an "endless" race? Since the idea of not seeing the end appears unbearable, my suggestion in such a situation would be to fix a high objective, one where reaching it would already be a success. Once you are close to it, monitor your state and if you are not utterly exhausted fix another somewhat higher objective. Repeat this till you are really completely washed out. Only then you are allowed to stop. But, of course, a better suggestion is not to enter such crazy races and focus on more psychologically manageable situations: they are already challenging enough.