Associate Professor, PhD A.P. Knyazev¹
L.M. Vinogradov²
Senior Russian national cross country skiing team coach O.O. Perevozchikov^2
1Udmurt State University, Izhevsk
²National team training center, Moscow

Keywords: training process aspects, cross country skiing, athletic training, middle altitudes, hypoxia, individualization.

Background. Competitions in Olympic Games have always been regarded a climax point in any athletic career. Most of the elite ski racers are bound by contracts with employment organizations, manufacturers of sport equipment and other sponsors and have to work hard for success in the World Cup events and national Russian competitions [1, 2]. Olympic Games, however, remain the top-ranking competitions, and every elite athletic training system is designed for success in the upcoming Olympics.

Objective of the study was to analyse the key aspects of the modern training systems applied by the strongest Russian ski racers.

Methods and structure of the study. The study was designed to analyse the key aspects of the athletic training systems including training days; applied training tools; volume and intensity of physical loads; load distribution by intensity zones; competitive performance management for two pre-seasons; some aspects of the training system individualization for every elite athlete; and middle-altitude training and competitive process analysis.

Study results and discussion. Physical load volumes profiled by the key training elements comprise one of the most important characteristics of a training system. We have analysed the load volumes by the key training elements applied by the Russian national team members in the season of 2013/2014: see Table 1.

Table 1. Key training elements applied by the Russian national team members in the season of 2013/2014

When considering planned training load of every athlete, we should first specify a few aspects of influence on the training elements and load volumes being customized for every athlete.

Aspect one is the training process individualizing based on the personal preference for the skiing style and distance. In view of the athletes YD, BE and BA being more successful in classic race for the last few years, their training systems were individualized for success in the upcoming Olympic events in this preferred style. Above Table 1 shows their training loads being fairly close, with a special emphasis on the runs and jump simulation races designed to mimic the classical two-step double-pole diagonal stride. The large volumes of the run races are due to the fact that the running was combined with jump simulation exercises. The roller skiing volumes for these athletes were lower than for the others – for the reason that YD, BE and BA were expected to qualify for classic races of the Olympics and, therefore, 75% of their training loads were designed to advance this style.

Furthermore, the training process was much the same for one more group of athletes, namely GK, LA and VL. Knowing their performance for the pre-Olympic season and current ratings in the Olympic season, these athletes were expected to qualify only for the long-distance Olympic ski racing events. This was the reason for their individual training system being designed to include large volumes of roller skiing and ski races. Since the longest Olympic ski racing event was 50 km ski-skating-technique race, the individual training systems for these athletes were 65% dominated by the ski-skating and roller skiing practices in this style.

VM (Vylegzhanin M) is commonly acknowledged as a universal racer capable of competing with the world-best racers in any event, and this was the reason for his individual training system designed to include about the same volumes of ski racing and roller racing practices in both of the styles.

The pre-season training in the Olympic season was also specific in the sense that the athletes were not focused on success in the December World Cup events to reserve their strength for success in the Olympic Games as the top-ranking event of the four-year cycle.

In the pre-Olympic cycle, VM, BE, BA and YD won prizes in the World Cup events, but in the Olympic season till mid-January the Russian athletes virtually skipped the competition, with the exclusion of LA and CI who were trained separately by Reto Burgermeister, Swiss coach.

One more aspect of importance for the training process design was due to the fact that the ski racing events of the Olympic Games took place at the altitude of 1430 m. So the athletes’ training systems were managed to adapt them to the actual competitive conditions by reasonable hypoxic training, i.e. longer training time in the middle-altitude training camps in the pre-season and, second, the last-month prior 2-week training session at the 2320 m altitude right before the Olympic Games: see Table 2.

Table 2. Middle-altitude training days

Furthermore, the training loads were managed based on the heart rate monitoring data. The multiple study data of the heart rate variations being in correlation with blood lactate levels were used to design 5 intensity zones [4]. In practical terms, the method implied the athlete being charged with certain training task with preset training load and with the intensity range being controlled using a pulsometer.

Due emphasis in the training systems was made on the strength training tools in view of the rapidly growing requirements to strength in modern competitions, and the relevant applicable tools have been persistently reconsidered and perfected for the last few years. For the two years prior to the Olympics (in pre-season and regular season), the hours allocated for the strength training were significantly increased (see Table 1).

Elite ski racers have increasingly applied special practices to develop muscular strength with due emphasis on the relevant maximum-effort practices and static/dynamic exercises. The maximum-effort practices were seldom applied in the elite ski racers’ training systems before, and the modern static/dynamic exercises were never reported in the training systems till the recent times.

Conclusion. The study reports the key aspects of the Russian national cross-country skiing team training for the top-ranking event of the 2014 season including the following: competitive environment modelling (distance, terrain of the track, snow conditions, air temperatures, sport equipment etc.); the key cyclic training loads were reduced in the pre-Olympic period by 12-15% versus the previous years; the top sport shape was reached in the World Cup events i.e. using the events for the final conditioning purposes; the training process was duly customized to the individual style- and distance-related preferences of the athletes; the middle-altitude training days were increased by 40%; the final pre-season training session took place at the 2320 m altitude that was much higher than the competitive one (1430 m); the strength training was stepped up in the pre-season by the maximum-effort practices and static/dynamic exercises; and the physical loads were strictly managed in the training process.

References

1. Vyalbe E.V. Sistema sorevnovaniy i struktura etapa neposredstvennoy podgotovki k glavnomu startu vysokokvalifitsirovannykh lyzhnikov-gonshchikov. Avtoref. dis. kand. ped. nauk [Competition system and structure of pre-season training stage of elite cross-country skiers. PhD diss. abstr.]. Moscow, 2007, 23 p.
2. Egorova L.I. Osobennosti podgotovki elitnyih lyzhnits-gonshchits v sorevnovatelnom periode. Avtoref. dis. kand. ped. nauk [Training program specifics for elite cross-country skiers in regular season. PhD diss. abstr.]. St. Petersburg, 2003, 22 p.
3. Popov D.V., Grushin A.A., Vinogradov O.L. Fiziologicheskie osnovy otsenki aerobnykh vozmozhnostey i podbora trenirovochnykh nagruzok v lyzhnom sporte i biatlon [Physiological basics of evaluation of aerobic abilities and selection of training loads in skiing and biathlon]. Moscow, 2014, pp. 20-21, 25.
4. Seluyanov V.N., Kalinin E.M., Pak G.D. et al. Opredelenie anaerobnogo poroga po dannym legochnoy ventilyatsii i variativnosti kardiointervalov [Determination of anaerobic threshold based on pulmonary ventilation and RR interval variability rates]. Human Physiology, 2011, vol. 37, no. 6.

Corresponding author: fizkult@uni.udm.ru

Abstract

Objective of the study was to outline a variety of specific aspects of the Russian national cross-country skiing team training for the top-ranking event of the 2014 season. With this purpose in mind, the authors analysed the key performance indicators in the training process prior to the 2014 Olympic Games in Sochi, including: the total cyclic loads for the period of 2013-2014; load profiles by the key training elements of every Olympian with due account of the individual preferences for skiing styles and distances [3]. In view of the fact that the cross country skiing events of the 2014 Olympics were run at the altitudes of 1430 m, a special emphasis in the analyses was made on the middle-altitude training time in the pre-season. Knowing that a high competitive success in the modern cross country skiing events cannot be achieved without excellent strength fitness, we also analysed the pre-season strength training volumes and the individual strength training profiles of the candidates for the Olympics. Subject to the study were 7 elite ski racers (International Class Masters of Sports) qualified for the Russian national cross-country skiing team who were trained in pre-season by O. Perevozchikov. Our analysis of the key pre-season performance data made it possible to put together the individual training profiles of the athletes with consideration for their individual preferences for the skiing styles and distances.