 Norway has a population of just over 5 million people, which is roughly how many people live in the US state of Minnesota. I imagine the climate is probably similar as well. The population of all of Europe is around 740 million, meaning that less than 1% of Europeans are Norwegian. These numbers should provide some perspective as to how slim the odds are that Norway would emerge as such a dominant force in the world of endurance sports just by chance. With the success of Olympic 1500 meter champion Jakob Engelbritzen, Olympic triathlon champion Christian Blumenfeldt, and Ironman world champion Gustav Eden, many have speculated that there may be something particularly effective about the Norwegians training method. Either that or there's something in the water up there. This is certainly not the first time that a small country has dominated a sport, but from what I can tell the difference here is that this isn't just in one sport but multiple different endurance sports and it can't be entirely explained by culture, like with Belgians and Cyclocross for example. Uff, yeah. Maybe not the best time to bring that up. Fortunately, the Norwegian training method is well documented and as you can imagine has been gaining a lot of attention recently. Today we'll take a look at the Norwegian training method and the science behind it to try to see whether or not they just got lucky with a particularly talented generation of endurance athletes or whether there really is something superior about their training that's setting them apart. And if that is the case, is this a method that cyclists should be and will be adopting in the near future? Welcome back to the channel. This video is fueled by the feed. Let's start by addressing what the Norwegian training method is. Other viewers of mine will be familiar with the terms polarized and pyramidal, but it's worth going over them again because they're important concepts to understand when talking about the Norwegian method. If you plot blood lactate concentration on a graph, you will find that there are two important points. The point at which lactate first starts to rise and the point at which lactate spikes. For those who use a power meter, this first lactate turn point usually happens at around 75 to 80% of FTP and the second lactate turn point happens at your FTP. These two points separate the three zones used in polarized training. And as the name suggests, strict polarized training avoids this middle moderate zone and has athletes spending 80% of their time or more in zone one and 20% of their time or less in zone three. This method of training has plenty of research to back it up. At this point, if you take a look at the balance of evidence on the topic, it seems obvious that this is a superior method to threshold training. Now, when researchers talk about threshold training, they're not referring to riding at FTP like a lot of cyclists might think, but rather they're talking about spending a significant amount of training time between these two thresholds or zone two in the three zone model. Simply put, when you put polarized training up against threshold training or what some cyclists may refer to as sweet spot training, polarized almost always comes out the winner. That being said, it has been observed that most elite endurance athletes don't actually use strict polarized training, rather they use pyramidal training. Pyramidal training is similar to polarized in that the vast majority of training time is spent in zone one, again, 75 to 80% or more. But then the remaining 20 or so percent is split between zone two and zone three. For example, you might do 80% of your training in zone one, 15% in zone two and 5% in zone three if you were following pyramidal training. There is less research on pyramidal training, but the research that we do have looks very promising. Reviews on the topic generally conclude that both polarized and pyramidal are effective. It seems likely that the important part of polarized or pyramidal training is not necessarily what you do with your intensity, but rather just the fact that a large proportion of your total training time is done at a relatively low intensity. I know, sad day for your hammer, bro, who won't do a single pedal stroke below 300 watts. What? Hey, stop zooming in. This brings us to the Norwegian model. Former elite track runner, Marius Bakken, who developed the Norwegian training model writes about it in detail on his website where he refers to it more specifically as lactate threshold training and the lactate controlled approach to training. And lactate monitoring is a critical aspect of this method of training. Marius states that he's performed over 5,500 lactate tests on himself. The reason for the seemingly obsessive level of testing was to tightly control intensity, specifically on threshold days. Again, threshold, meaning zone two in the three zone model. The Norwegian model places a huge emphasis on this zone two training so much so that one of the hallmarks of this method has become the double threshold days in which athletes perform lactate guided threshold sessions in both the morning and afternoon on the same day. In this example training week that Marius provides, both Tuesday and Thursday are double threshold days and Saturday is a high intensity hill run. Now, this may seem like a ton of intensity, but this actually still falls under the umbrella of pyramidal training. In this review article on lactate guided threshold interval training, which Marius co-authored, they specified that this training is done within a high volume low intensity model that is consistent with the literature on pyramidal and polarized training. Okay, so there's nothing actually special about the Norwegian training model. It's just the same old pyramidal training that elite athletes have been using and that I've made 500 videos about already. Oh boy, how much is this guy struggling to find content now that's not race season? Well, not quite. If I had to further categorize the Norwegian method, I would classify it as strict pyramidal, which is a very subtle but important distinction. While most athletes who follow pyramidal training are strict about keeping it easy on their easy days, they're not necessarily strict about keeping it in the middle on their in the middle days. Sure, their power may stay in range, but if their heart rate or more importantly, their blood lactate drifts into zone three, well, who cares? It's all just considered intensity anyway, why does it matter? The Norwegians, on the other hand, are about as strict as you could be about staying in that middle threshold zone during their threshold workouts to the point that they're using blood lactate monitors to ensure it. And they find unique ways to maximize the amount of time at this intensity, like breaking up these workouts into shorter intervals to allow their blood lactate to come down as opposed to doing them continuously at a lower pace like so many runners do. On these double threshold days, lactate is carefully monitored to make sure that athletes aren't going above their threshold zone. Not going too hard is about as important as not going too easy, which is not usually something that you hear athletes say when they're talking about intervals. So the question now is, why? Why would you be so concerned about staying within such a narrow band of intensity other than making modern training even more robotic than it already is? One theory has to do with fatigue generation. It's been shown that muscle contractions done just 10% above critical torque can generate a rate of fatigue that is four to five times greater than contractions done just 10% below critical torque. It's been hypothesized that since only recruited motor units are likely to experience increases in mitochondrial number and capillary density, it may be speculated that training at LT2 optimizes the number of motor units recruited without having to accept the consequences of elevated levels of catecholamines likely to be experienced with zone four training. Essentially, the amount of fatigue that you experience for given intensity isn't linear. There's a threshold at which fatigue ramps up substantially for just a small increase in intensity. Marius writes that you can get the huge benefits of pushing the threshold high at the least possible wear of the muscles. Therefore, you can do loads of this type of work. This intensity is one at which there are big physiological benefits with minimal amounts of fatigue, making it a desirable zone to be in if you're trying to maximize gains while still balancing recovery. Some of you fellow training nerds watching right now, which is probably most of you may be thinking, hey, this is the same reasoning that people use to justify sweet spot training. And I thought you said sweet spot training didn't work. I actually get this comment somewhat frequently whenever I post a sweet spot or tempo workout on my Strava, presumably from people who've only ever watched five minutes of any video I've ever made on the topic. The big problem with sweet spot training as it's typically used in cycling is that sweet spot training plans can often have athletes do four to five days of sweet spot training or other intensity per week. And this is in the context of a relatively low amount of low intensity training, which again has been shown to be an inferior method of training when compared to polarized or pyramidal. It's not that it won't work at all, but it won't work as well as a properly planned out polarized or pyramidal plan. And the risk of overtraining and burnout is much higher with a sweet spot plan. All of that being said, although the Norwegian training method does try to maximize time at intensity by staying in this sweet spot zone, it's still not sweet spot training as I just described it. If we look at the amount of time spent at low intensity, we can see that it provides athletes with plenty of easy work, more in line with pyramidal and keeping easy days easy is emphasized just like it would be from a strict polarized coach. The question now becomes whether or not pyramidal training or more specifically the very strict form of pyramidal training where intensity is carefully controlled on threshold days using a lactate meter is a particularly effective way to train. Unfortunately, no controlled studies have been done to test this. The data that we currently have is from observational studies and reports that examined the current training regimens of some of the best runners in the world. That being said, we do have some research that looks into this question of whether or not pyramidal training is superior to polarized training, which may give us some insight. For example, this study on half Ironman triathletes separates subjects into a polarized and pyramidal training group and found that results were pretty comparable between the two with perhaps a slight edge to the pyramidal group in running performance. That being said, most reviews on the topic have a hard time declaring a clear winner. They just agree that doing either one is better than doing threshold or sweet spot training. One factor that many of these studies don't take into account is periodization, which is how training changes over time. Almost no athlete does the exact same training every week all year long. Instead, intensity and volume is manipulated to peak at the right time. It could be quite possible that both polarized and pyramidal training need to be used just at the right time of year. This 2022 study on runners is probably the best one we have in answering this question. The study separated subjects into four groups. Two used either polarized or pyramidal training for the entire 16 week study period. And then the other two use polarized or pyramidal training for the first eight weeks and then switch to the other protocol for the second eight weeks. Sure enough, they did find that switching from pyramidal to polarized halfway through the study induced bigger improvements than sticking to either polarized or pyramidal training the whole time or switching from polarized to pyramidal. OK, even I got lost there with how many times I use the word polarized and pyramidal. Basically, the group that started with pyramidal and then switched to polarized was the winner in this study. This confirms what a lot of coaches already know, which is that training needs to be periodized, not to be confused with polarized or pyramidal. I know a lot of multiple syllable P words in this video. I wouldn't worry about it, man. No one is even paying attention this deep into one of your videos anyway. Most coaches agree that training should go from less intense to more intense as you approach a peak, which is what this study showed. And most elite athletes tend to train this way as well. This article on how the top five Jiro finishers trained from 2022 confirmed that overall they followed a pyramidal approach with an increase in intensity and polarization in the competition period. It seems as though we shouldn't necessarily be arguing about whether or not one is better than the other. The studies that we have on that are so close that it's basically a wash, but rather we should be trying to determine how we can use both to hit a peak at the right time of year. And from the research that we currently have, it seems that pyramidal training in the preparation period, morphing into polarized training in the competition period may be the best protocol. Okay, so where does that leave us with the Norwegian method? Well, the proponents of the Norwegian method actually agree stating that some of the threshold training sessions should be removed and there should be more higher intensity sessions in the run up to competition, which is consistent with the literature that I just cited about periodization. Even the authors of the review recognize that this is not a revolutionary training model, but rather the product of a hundred years of training history and knowledge. That being said, I think there are two key takeaways from the Norwegian training model that are important for endurance athletes. The first is this careful intensity control that they have adopted to the point that they're monitoring their blood lactate to ensure that they are staying within the right zone. There's been a lot of buzz recently about continuous lactate monitors being on the horizon for athletes to further refine their training. They're the hot new thing that everyone is talking about and they're not even available yet, but with good reason. Personally, I think that continuous lactate monitors will revolutionize training the way the power meter did. That is if the data they give you is accurate, which is a big if. The reason being is that the way that the Norwegians and everyone else who tests blood lactate does it is incredibly cumbersome. Using a blood lactate meter, you need to prick your finger and you need test strips and you can't contaminate those test strips, which is already a big ask when you are in the middle of a workout, possibly gasping for breath at a very high heart rate and usually you have to stop your workout to do all of this, which is just a way bigger headache than most people are willing to deal with. A continuous lactate monitor would change all of this and make lactate guided training much more accessible for everyone. The question still remains whether or not being this refined with your training is what is setting the Norwegians apart. More research is needed to see whether or not carefully controlling intensity on these threshold days does actually lead to more gains with less fatigue as is claimed. It is important to remember though that we are dealing with such small differences between winners and losers in sports like elite track running and triathlon that if this attention to detail enabled athletes to do a bit more intensity than they otherwise would have and that resulted in even a fraction of a percent advantage this could still be significant enough to make that difference. The second important takeaway is this idea of clustering or blocking hard work in the training week together as opposed to spreading it more evenly throughout the week. I bring this up because this is something that I see a lot of athletes and coaches get wrong. The reason for the double threshold days is to get in all of the intensity work in one day and then have days that are nothing but easy work. You could technically be following a pyramidal or polarized training distribution but doing just a little bit of intensity every single day or every time you ride or you could be disciplined about keeping your easy days easy so that you get the most out of your hard days. The reason why the latter is far more preferable is because you aren't constantly stressing your autonomic nervous system every single day. There appears to be a threshold for autonomic nervous system recovery at the first lactate turn point. The Norwegian method applies this principle very well. Easy days are easy so that more work can be done when it really matters on the hard days. It may be possible that even though most elite athletes are already following this basic principle even stricter adherence to it is what is giving them an edge as well. Thanks for watching. If you wanna step up your own training I have online training plans and coaching available and they are linked down in the description below. If you enjoyed this video be sure to give it a like, subscribe and share it with your cycling friends. I'll see you in the next one.