The Science of the Marathon — Dr. Veronique Billat - A Coaches Physiologist
This article is adapted from the podcast: Nerd Lab: Dr. Véronique Billat – A Pioneer in Interval Training Research and The Science of the Marathon book by Drs. Billat and Edwards.
Interval training and VO2 max is as fundamental to endurance sports training as putting on a pair of running shoes or clipping into a set of pedals. Yet, many of us were born before “interval training” was ever coined. It was only in the 1960s that Per-Olof Astrand started extensively studying interval training in the lab. If you’ve wondered where many of our current beliefs about interval work came from, this is for you.
French researcher Véronique Billat pioneered interval training research in the 1990s and 2000s, at a time when men entirely dominated the field, Dr. Billat, more than almost any other researcher, defined interval training. It’s important to highlight that in an otherwise male-dominated profession, in a field that often tests male subjects, her work is amazing and has been formative in physi…
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