When to Use Hiking Poles in Ultrarunning With Nicola Giovanelli, PhD | Koopcast Episode 61

Trail and ultra runners, what is going on? What's happening? Welcome to another episode of the KoopCast. As always, I am your host, coach Jason Koop. And this episode of the podcast is all about trekking poles. I have on the podcast today, Nicola Giavinelli, who has a PhD in exercise physiology and biomechanics, and is quickly becoming one of the foremost experts in the entire world and how poles affect running economy, hiking economy, and performance. We discuss when, where, and how to train with poles and how to make your races more effective with the use of trekking poles. Nicola currently resides in the Dolomites region of Italy, which is a perfect training ground to practice what he researches. Okay, let's get right into it. Here's my conversation.

With Nicola Giavinelli, all about how to use poles to better your performance. All right, so we're gonna talk about poles, right? This is all gonna be about poles. We are, you mentioned earlier that you live in Dolomites, which is, I'm sure, ripe terrain for a lot of pole use. But I want to start this whole kind of conversation off with some of the traditional ways that we look at endurance performance. Because I think the way that we think about poles, excuse my pun, might be like the polar opposite of how we traditionally view endurance performance.

So in traditional marathon running, there's been this very classic equation that's used to predict and determine performance. And it's been put in the spotlight a whole lot more recently with Nike's sub-breaking tube project and the subsequent Ineos 159 project. And it simply states that the velocity in a running event that you can achieve or the speed in a running event that you can achieve is a product of the fraction of VO2 max that you can sustain for that duration divided by the cost of running. So how much oxygen or energy it takes to go a given distance. And it's simply math, right? You have the fraction of oxygen that you can utilize, fraction of your maximum oxygen that you can utilize. You know how much oxygen it takes to go a given distance. You know, you have time and then distance and therefore you have speed. It's actually really elegant. It's pretty easy. It is pretty elegant and easy. And the reason this was brought to the forefront for the listeners out there in the Nike and the Ineos project is that they were looking at optimizing all of these three variables.

And my listeners will remember I had Brad Wilkins, who was the head of Nike's Breaking 2 project on the podcast several weeks ago. And we went over some of this in terms of how they tried to optimize those three variables. They brought in the best athletes. So they had the highest VO2 max and the lowest cost of running. And then they worked on different aspects that could further reduce the cost of running, i.e. drafting and the now infamous shoes that have come into the debate and things like that. But traditionally in running performance, we've always kind of looked at this equation that governs how fast you can run. But when we look at it in an ultramarathon situation, that equation, while still true across a certain component of ultra running, it starts to fail.

And that's where I want to start to talk about the use of pulls is where that equation starts to fail when we start to talk about ultramarathon performance. So to start out with, what is your viewpoint on that and what those failure points start to look like? Oh, well, yeah, you're right. This equation is pretty easy. And it seems easy to predict velocity, running velocity for an event like marathon or semi-marathon or something like that. But in trail running, it is a bit different. I mean, yes, the VO2 max on the fraction and the cost of running or walking because in trail running, you walk a lot. They are important, but they are not the only three factors that we have to take into account for the final performance. A few years ago, a group of scientists published a nice graph in which they put all the factors that affect the ultra endurance, ultra marathon performance. And they included the motivational factors, equipment and meteorological factors, running patterns, muscle damage, any type of factor in a long event can be very, very important.

Of course, physiological factors are important as well. Or better, we can train these physiological factors. So we can adapt them, we can affect them with training, with specific training. And for an athlete who has the aim to win a big race, for example, the ultra-fail du Mont Blanc or the Tour de Géant, it is important to maximize all these factors, to have an higher VO2 max, to increase the fraction of the VO2 max during the event, and to decrease the cost of running and walking.

But not everyone goes to UTMB for winning. But 99.9% of people are going there for finish the race, to arrive in Chamonix within the time limit. So for this, for these people, it is important not only to train these factors. They should train a lot with their mental factors, because they have to stay around for 30-40 hours by walking like zombies, sometimes with some problems.

So they have to be very, very strong. So you can have a high VO2 max, but if then your mind, your brain is saying that you have to stop, there's nothing to do, you have to stop. So these physiological factors are very important, and we can train them, but they are not everything. And regarding the use of pause, it is important to say that it affects one of these factors, the cost of running or walking. or walking? Well, my research started some years ago with one question, and it was, if is it better to run or walking during uphill locomotion?

And because after this question, we can say that we should use the poles or not. I mean, if running was better than walking, probably you don't need to use poles. Because everyone who runs, if tried to run with two poles in their hands, say, oh, I can't use them during running, I don't know, 10 minutes per kilometer or something like that. So the first problem was to understand if it was better to run or walking during these kind of races. In particular, during uphill sections, because in downhill, it's easy to say that I have to run.

I want to go faster. So in downhill, I have to run. But during uphill, sometimes when you are racing, you are walking uphill and you are faster than some people, some other athletes who are running. So what is better? And we try to answer to this question in the laboratory of Dr. Crum a few years ago. It was five years ago, maybe six. Well, a lot of time ago. And at the same vertical speed, vertical velocity, it was better walking when the incline was above 20%, 25%.

And one point is that if you can walk or if you can run faster than six, seven kilometers per hour, you should run. But no one can run at six, seven kilometers per hour at 25% of incline for a long uphill. Okay. So the answer was that it was better during long uphill. It was better. It is better actually walking. Then if it is better walking, is it better to use poles or not? A lot of people use poles. Some of the best athletes in the world use poles.

For example, the Venard use poles during UTMB. In particular in Europe, maybe in the US, it's a bit different because also in ultra trail running race, the speed is higher. And in some parts, it is not so important to have poles, at least for the top level athletes. But in the races in Europe, when there is a lot of elevation gain and when the slopes are quite steep, so the speed is very low, very slow.

It's probably better to use poles. Why? Because we can save some energy during uphill. Maybe not a lot. We showed last year in a new study that with poles on treadmill, and this is a limitation of the study, that we use the treadmill. On treadmill, we have only a small save of energy. I mean, it was like four, five, five percent at 20 or 25 degrees that are about 40, 50 percent of incline.

That's really steep. Just to add some context to the listeners, that is an extremely steep grade. In the US, you would be very, very hard pressed to find a course that has that steep of a climb. I mean, I'm going to come up with a couple of examples off the top of my head. So the Manitou Incline, which is here in Colorado Springs, Colorado, you know it, right? It's an old railroad grade. It's an old cog railroad grade that is at about a 45 or 46 percent grade. It's just so steep, I guess, is what I'm saying. There's only a couple of people in the world that can actually run the entire few people in the world that can actually run the entire thing.

So your point with that is, is you might see some small energy savings using poles, but only in these really extreme conditions. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And this is a, this can be a problem when you have to suggest if an athlete has to use or not poles, because if I have to save only two or three percent of energy, maybe I say, okay, I prefer to, to go like there and don't have this pose that then I have to put my vest or I prefer to have my hands free. And, but the problem of our study and also of other studies that analyze the use of the use of poles is that usually they, they are performed only for a short period of time.

Only maybe five minutes because we, we want to reach a steady state in VO2 and the VCO2 to calculate the, the, the energy expenditure. And, and, uh, so it is not the real life condition. Uh, I mean, uh, five minutes is not like to run a, um, UTMP and to, to climb the last, uh, happy laughter 30 hours of, uh, walking and running in the mountains. So this is a big limitation of our study. And, uh, uh, I, I think that there are not studies in which, uh, it is measured the, the difference between the use, uh, of poles and not, um, after or during the last part of a big event.

And this is a, uh, this is a, uh, an idea for a future study, uh, because to, to understand if in the first hour, for example, maybe in the first half pill, uh, we can save only two or 3% of energy, which is yes. Uh, at top level athletes, uh, for top level athletes can be important, but for an, uh, uh, normal athlete, it's like to say, okay, um, I finished the race in 30 hours or in 30 hours and 15 minutes. It's not a pro a big problem, but, uh, maybe at the end of the race, after 20, 30 hours of walking or running this difference, maybe not only two or 3%, but.

It might be 10, 15, 20%. So it can, it can increase during the race and with the fatigue state of the, of the, of the athlete. And to try to, to answer to this question, we are planning to do a new, a new study on the outdoor. So, um, and maybe we, we can collect more information about, about, uh, this, uh, this topic. It is some, uh, or a recent, recent, recent study because, uh, in the past, uh, the Nordic walking, uh, has been analyzed, uh, for several, um, by several authors.

but you go nordic walking on the flat or hill terrain with short half hill, short downhill and not so steep so it's not the same and the technique is different when you are nordic walking use the diagonal stride like cross country skiing and when you are going to trail running event or sky running event you use poles like full gas and to push them all your weight and all your power so it is a different use of the poles so the analysis of the nordic walking can be trivial for trail running so the research that you described that you did, let's go back to that a little bit because I think this ties in with my earlier concept of trying to look at ultra marathon performance through our standard endurance performance lens so remember I mentioned earlier that in marathon performance 10k performance or any sort of other traditional endurance event we look at it through this from a research perspective through this very narrow lens of the fraction of vo2 max that you can sustain and the cost of running which is which is similar but not the same

as running economy you guys are measuring the the running or walking economy piece of it in your lab by putting somebody on a ridiculously steep treadmill 45% grade as we were mentioning earlier 40 degrees 40 degrees yeah very steep very steep and asking them to walk with and without poles for five minutes at a sub-maximal intensity and measuring the oxygen consumption and then therefore the energy production between those two two modalities and to and you'll have to forgive me for for trivializing all of the work that you've put into it but but the nickel version of that is is you're finding that poles are generally only more slightly more economical meaning it takes less oxygen less energy at the steepest of grades in almost all other conditions it's likely the same or they caught they're more expensive right they cost they cost more and therefore we have to look at ultra marathon performance and the use of poles through kind of a different lens because we're using them not for just five minutes and we're not predominantly obsessed with running economy or the economy impact of those poles we're looking at performance through a different

lens and the impacts that they might have in other areas oh yeah it's um i think that this we find this problem in our studies or in lab conditions where you cannot measure for a long time right also on the treadmill we tried on the treadmill to walk for more than 20-30 minutes at 30 or even 20 degrees but it was very painful for the calves so it was not possible to do a long steps for long step for for this measurement so we have to take into account these things for this reason it would be very important to move out of the lab and to get data on the field during the race maybe sometimes if it is possible someone did it two or three years ago during the tour de jean one athlete who wore the metabolimeter for the measurement of the oxygen consumption in different sections of the race at the beginning and then after I don't

remember one day two day three day or four day for measuring the oxygen consumption and to calculate the energy expenditure during this race and I think the idea was very nice I think that if I was the athlete probably I'd say oh my god after two days I can't sleep I only go walking on the mountains and one researcher comes to me with metabolimeters what are you doing what you're talking about is something that's inherently problematic with ultramarathon running and this is determining energy expenditure oxygen utilization in the field and the only so we used to do this not we but physiologists used to do this a lot of time on the track so they would put an athlete on a track try to get them in real world condition and the athlete would have the gas analyzer hooked up to their face and for the listeners out there that are not watching the youtube version of this it's just a mask that covers your nose and mouth it's not it's far more intrusive than the covid masks that everybody is wearing around I mean it's heavy it's clumsy and everything like that it's not easy to breathe out of and it's certainly not natural but on the track the physiologist would follow

the athlete around in a golf cart because they could keep up with them in that type of environment but in the field the athlete has to be responsible for that piece of equipment which is normally what is it like four kilos or something like that four or five kilos one of those metabolic packs uh yeah actually the new one probably two kilos so a little bit lighter okay two to one half I think so you're asking it's not easy no it's not easy you're asking these these athletes who are trying to shave weight as much as possible because they're going up and over the mountains to carry around an extra two or three kilos and put this mask over their face while they're huffing and puffing it's an intrusive way to gather data and it's hard to find subjects that are willing to actually do that for components of the race right yeah this is a this is a big problem when you are recruiting some subjects for these for these studies because usually athletes are happy to be involved in these studies because then usually then you give them the results so they can they can see if they use more energy or less energy with or without pause they understand that when they are walking uphill they use less energy than when they are running so maybe then they change their

training sessions some kind of trainings and they adapt the training on this based on these results so it is for them it's nice to be involved but sometimes I understand I'm also an athlete so I do some races in sky running and trail running and sometimes I think someone comes to me for trying to get some data also for having my rate of perceived exertion or something like that I could say I'm tired not talk to me and I just want to go walking running as fast as possible to finish this race and then to eat a pizza and to drink a beer and to be happy with my performance but I I have a double phase since I'm an athlete and a researcher and sometimes I was in my studies I was both the researcher and the participant and usually I start all my

research by trying all the protocols several times because after the first time we have to change something to change the intensity the duration and we have to change something for better analysis and so usually when an athlete comes to our lab for a test I have already tried it about 10 15 times perfect so let's put that dual athlete and researcher hat on for a second because as we were talking about earlier it's hard to justify the use of polls when you're looking at it through a research lens if you just look at the research not that it's an impossible justification but it's a very hard justification to look at it through a research lens yet I know you use polls copiously everywhere all of your peers in the dolomites you're going to see polls everywhere you see them all over the UTMB course you see them all over Tour de Géant I used them the entire time when I did Tour de Géant so the athletes know that they're getting some benefit they figured!

it out in advance of the research otherwise you wouldn't see it that prevalent right because I would say that the the prevalency of the use of polls kind of leads us to believe that there's some benefit there in absence of the research what would you say would be the potential benefits of using polls in any ultramarathon situation well I think that a big point is played by the rate of perceived! from a scientific point of view we have only a small difference between the use and not of polls we have seen that with only five minutes of trial there is a difference in the rate of perceived excertion that is important between the use or not of polls and this difference probably is bigger and bigger when the duration is longer so from mental and also from the perceived effort it is important to use polls probably because of different reasons one is a better balance while you are walking and when

you are walking at slow speed you use more energy for balance than when you are walking at higher speed or when you are running so if you are walking uphill and in a fatigued state you are walking up at one kilometer per hour maybe two kilometers per hour sometimes during the tour de jean in the uphill one kilometers per hour if you're lucky there are many times there are many times a turn where I was well under one kilometer per hour I can I can completely attest to that yeah so at that speed 12 it's very important to save energy for balance I think otherwise if we try to stay in an upright position for doing a squat with a single leg squat with or without pose we can understand the difference we are doing if we do a single leg squat with pose it's very easy to keep the balance and to extend the leg when I have to go up if I don't have pose I have to adjust my balance so I use a lot of energy for this and

it is almost the same when you are walking at one kilometer per hour you are walking so slow that you are in a single leg stance for a long time and to have two more points it can be important for safe energy that's a really good analogy by the way I've never thought about it like that that's a really good analogy yeah and the other things is that with pose when we are walking up with pose we can share the energy the effort between upper and lower limbs I think this is important when we are going up pretty fast for example during a vertical kilometer it's 30 40 50 minutes full gas so you use actively your arms for pushing it's like cross country skiing so you can share the effort between the legs and arms and to save energy in your lower limbs so even this is important unfortunately it is difficult to quantify how much you push with your

upper limbs or with lower limbs there are some studies in which they studied the effort during cycling exercise with only legs or with legs and arms or with only arms for example you have to do 200 watts only with legs 200 watts with arms and legs and they understand that it is possible to understand that if you use pose for to do the same power output you can divide the work between upper and lower limbs so this is the second point to me balance and this work between upper and lower limbs are most important points for trail running as well for for suggesting to an athlete to use pose during long races and here's the hesitation that I think a lot of athletes particularly in North America I always get a kick out of whenever North American athletes go over to Europe for the first time this isn't happening quite as much recently because there's so much video footage that people

can get indoctrinated! They're always amazed at how much they see athletes use poles in Europe as compared to the US and like I said slowly that's starting to not be the case but they're always kind of shocked but still the athletes particularly here in the US they get very hesitant around using poles and it kind of falls into two categories that I want to explore next one is related to what we had just talked about earlier they're afraid of the economic penalty right the effort penalty either either by using their arms they think it's a less economical or less efficient source of locomotion or by just carrying them around you know and it's an extra eight ounces or six ounces or something like that and they don't want to lug that kind of up and down hills and the second one is if you don't have enough time to practice with them and this is extremely important here in the US where there's not a lot of people live in urban areas they don't have access to mountainous trails and things like that yet they're going to go over to UTMB and they're going to go and compete in this mountainous environment and should they actually introduce this additional piece of equipment when they haven't actually used it so I'm going to lead off with what I think about the first

piece and you can follow up with it I don't think that the economic penalty even if there was one and we mentioned earlier this is hard to study it's hard to get people to run around with portable metabolic analyzers in the field and things like that but I don't think the economic penalty for either carrying the poles or using the poles or both is really all that important in ultramarathon running and here's why it's because the exercise is at such a low intensity if you need even in the worst case scenario if you need to command a little bit more oxygen to use poles it's not that material at the end of the day as opposed to our marathon situation that you were talking about earlier if you're going to use 2 or 3 or 4 or 5 percent more oxygen or energy at those intensities that becomes material to the velocity that you can achieve but ultramarathon athletes when they're exercising at like 50 or 60 or 65 percent of their VO2 max they've got room to spare!

effort they're trying to command what else can we say about this potential economic penalty that a lot of runners are fearful of is it that big of a deal? actually I agree with you I think that the cost of running and walking is important for the final performance but in a long long race there are so many factors that are important that probably to have 100 grams more is nothing I mean people are going to race with a smartphone and with a power bank and with a sport watch that is more heavier than the poles yeah so what you're saying if you're really if you're really because they have to put on Strava that's correct so you're saying if people are worried about the weight they could get rid of their GPS watch and get rid of their phone I think this is the time that you have for cleaning based on the location where you live or this is a problem but you can train with poles also

in the gym if you want doing a step up and down or something after masters with poles or I don't know in the treadmill or if a person wants to try to use it and to prepare for a UTMB with poles I think you can find a way to do it so let's let's hold on let's talk about the preparation then we'll get we'll get into that because we have a race over here I don't know if you got to go out to this race when you! in the! the I did the marathon the 100 mile race has this unique feature in it that I'm not aware of another race where you can actually do this but they encourage pacers to mule their runners so they can carry everything the pacers can carry their food their water their equipment their headlamps back up jackets and all this other stuff and it's kind of an homage to the mining heritage in that area where the burrow the mule is this respected creature of the region because they were so important to the landscape and one of the things that emanates from this aspect that pacers can mule their runners is

with poles and runners can think that they can kind of get away with using poles premature to their training program so they use poles like without even having you know trained with them or anything like that because they can always give them off to their pacer and so every year I'll sit up in the middle of hope pass which is kind of the high point of the course and I'll watch these runners come up the climb! with their pacers who you can tell have never used poles in their entire life they're stepping on them you know it's going in between their legs they're tripping on it they stab their toe with the end of the pole they don't have the carbide tips put in they're using the big rubber tips that are stock on them from REI and all of these other things and they think they can get away with them carry it up the rest of the climb but there is a training implication here is what I'm saying for athletes that are realistically thinking about using poles in a race in your opinion how much should they be training with them in advance of the event and maybe what is the minimum amount that they can get away with this is a really hard question by the way to answer I struggle with it is difficult to answer to this question because first

of all we have no data for answering to this question so I think it is a matter of experience by the athletes and also by the coach usually with my with athletes that I'm coaching if they use poles I suggest them to use during the long training in the mountains when they go for more than two or three hours so usually they use once a week once every two weeks and I have also some athletes who started to use poles after I started to coach them and this is a bit different because they think that it is very difficult to use poles because usually they look at Nordic walking techniques so they think that they have to do a perfect diagonal stride and to stay upright but it's not like that usually when they start they have to go walking in the mountains with poles every time that they can go in the mountains and then after probably one two months

that they use poles they are pretty economic I mean if I have to race tomorrow and I have never used poles in two or three months and I start today to use poles and I use them two three times a week for the next two months I think that the day of the race I can use poles maybe I'm not so nice to see for a photographer or for the video maker during the race but probably my walking is pretty efficient so my suggestion is to use them at least one a week during long training and sometimes during the winter during the general preparation I use poles also for some specific training for example jumping with poles during uphill or something like that but it's just for doing something different and just go running and interval training only by running or walking uphill so I say okay go with poles and go to do 10 times

30 seconds by jumping with your poles uphill and then you go for one hour of trail in the mountains but what you're saying is for the people who probably don't have access to use poles a lot even if you can get in one to two sessions per week for six to eight weeks in advance of the race you might not look pretty it might not look that good in a photo or in a video but still it would be a good intervention to put in for the race and I generally agree! that because I coach a lot of athletes that live in the Midwest they live in a lot of flat areas and they get opportunities to use poles like when they do training camps or races or things like that and so if they get out to three or four races a year before their big race and we can use poles either in a training camp or at those races those serve as enough minimum like enough of a and they're still going to serve some benefit from it and I also kind of salient to how athletes should actually incorporate like the use of poles that aren't used to them I also completely agree with you that when you start out just use them

don't worry about how I need to time my foot strike or am I going to use a double pulling technique or whatever just get out in the mountains and use them and try to get it to the point where you're comfortable enough that it's not a negative and then once you've gotten used to that then you can work work on really specific and efficient steep uphill techniques steep rocky techniques and things like that but just don't over complicate it at first I guess is what I usually advise people yeah also because when you use poles during trail running it's not like to use poles during cross country skiing it's not like double poleing during cross country skiing where you have to push with all your power and in trail running poles are light and you can't use them like that because they crash so it's too much torque I mean you have to use more for balance that's kind of the intimidation factor though Nicola I mean when they look at really experienced trail running athletes that have a cross country skiing!

use poles it's so fluid and elegant and they look at that and go oh I can never do that when the reality is it doesn't have to be that elegant and fluid at least in our opinion we'll let the research tease this out 15 years from now in our opinion it doesn't have to be that elegant and fluid to have a positive benefit on their performance yeah to be elegant is nice for pictures! some subjects that are running or working with pause and you say why is he using pause and then probably is one of the fastest guy in the world with pause and is so ugly to see because that's not the problem the point you know this just from your biomechanics background we already overanalyze running technique to ad nauseam like okay your foot should strike in exactly this pattern and your heel should come up this way and this should be the angle during flight and all this stuff we already get way too OCD about having perfect running mechanics especially in the road running world just wait till that comes

to using pulse it'll never be able to find the those answers but I think the bottom line is it can be a little ugly it can look a little ugly on the surface and it's probably of a benefit still at the end of the day yeah okay so we've got this training component where we're saying okay if you are going to use poles and you don't have a lot of availability to use them a minimum of about six maybe eight weeks a trick what are some of the advanced types of training techniques that you're either using with your athletes or that you think might start to emerge that could be important for ultra marathon performance like what are those things that maybe the top level athletes are doing with poles that could be the difference in them winning a race and them not winning a race you mean with the athletes that are coaching yeah either the athletes that you're coaching or something at like the very tip of the spear the most elite of the elite athletes that are out there and I'm thinking things like using them on the downhills or being more selective or using a different type of technique depending upon the terrain like

what are some of the things that you're using for the very experienced athletes that are out there okay first of all it's important to say that when we talk about technique in trail running it's not so easy because it depends from the terrain from the trail if it is uneven terrain or smooth terrain if it is rocky or if it is grass terrain so it is difficult to say what you said earlier about the technique of trail running it's not like road running in which we have a lot of information to use for going faster or to be nicer to see and so I think this is the first point and the technique during training is important and the best practice I think is to train on the terrain I mean that if an athlete from US has to race the UTMB he can prepare the UTMB in US but the specific terrain that you find in UTMB is not the same or maybe

some more technical races for example in sky running or maybe in trail running also the Lavaredo ultra trail is a bit more technical not too much but more technical than UTMB so you have to take this situation into account when you are designing the training sessions and when you are approaching the race it is not easy because it depends even from where you live and it is not easy to find a top runners that can move for going to the mountains every week if they live in the flat so I think that even with top runners it is difficult to sometimes it is difficult to find the best way to train them for a specific event and it is important to have a lot of feedback from them and yeah to see maybe them to see them during a video analysis or doing a race and to see some videos of the race to understand if after three hours or four hours of race they can do down in an efficient

way as the first hour they were doing so and then we can adopt some strategies to improve that for example the downhill pattern running pattern for improving the performance but it is not easy to have these informations and I think that it is important to get these informations from after the trainings or races of this happens and about the use of posts I think another point it is okay I train with posts for going uphill but I have to bring them downhill as well so is it better for example to carry on the vest or to keep in my hands and for example if I am a good runner in downhill sections and I want to take some more risk in downhill sections I cannot have my hands like that with posts and I need to be free because if I want to run faster I need to have my hands free if I fall down or if I have some problems and so it is important to understand that pulse and training it is important

to do trainings uphill but we have to take into account the downhill as well and sometimes athletes don't think about this and downhill is the terrain where you have more muscle damages you have more fatigue in your muscles both central fatigue and peripheral fatigue so we have to put all together and to analyze what is better for an athlete and which points which factors are important to train more than others so you bring up a really good point about when to use when to stow and when to put the poles aside one of the things that I found that I have found really fascinating particularly over the past few years with the incredible video coverage that they do at UTMB they do it better than any other race where they have cameras on the runners across almost all of the races all the more in particular the lead runners that know the course really well they know exactly when they're going to use their poles for the uphill when they're going to just store them by their

side and just carry them because they're going to use them again very quickly or when they're going to fold them up and store them somewhere else to your point earlier because they want to take a little bit more risk on the downhill you can if you look at it through a really keen eye you can see they know exactly what to do in all of those situations in order to maximize their time however most runners we keep coming back to like the most normal runners! They're not in that situation they're not in the risk taking situation that a lot of elite! They want to bomb their quads or whatever other phraseology that we use for that and part of the way that or one of the mitigating strategies for saving your legs is to use poles on the downhill and particularly the smoother steeper downhills where there's not a lot of obstacles in the way and things like that where you can use the poles as almost like a shock absorber against the eccentric activation of the muscles and back to our earlier point where do we incorporate that into the training strategy personally I always leave that last if I have a new runner with poles I just use them on the uphills and use them where you're comfortable and then once you're comfortable we'll think about using them on the

downhill because it's one of those things where your penalty! for failure is high but it's also the most demanding from a coordination standpoint because you're moving faster you have to reach the pull out a little bit more to actually get the shock absorption and things like that what do you think about that what do you think about introducing downhill pulling technique to runners usually I don't I don't want to touch it I mean I think that as you said it's sometimes it's more dangerous to use pulls downhill than to go without them so I think that when an athlete is familiar with the pull with the pulls and with its use he started to use them during downhill without my suggestion I think I could do it only if I see and I train with my athletes every day or every week but I'm coaching athletes from North Italy South Italy from the islands so I can't see them during training and when we do some training camp

we try to do pulls uphill and downhill and we try different techniques different coordination exercises something like that but then if they don't feel safe to go downhill with pulls I don't say them use them because you save your legs or so I remember five or six years maybe six years ago I was racing in Trumso for the Sky race and Sky Marathon and I liked the technical terrain the downhill and I was doing a great race I was fifth in the middle and then after one step downhill when I started the final uphill I stopped I completely stopped my legs were out of my muscles didn't work anymore and when I reached the top I sat down I drank and then I started again and every two minutes every 50 meters of downhill I had to stop to sit down and I

was crying and I was thinking why I didn't use poles during this race during in these sections and it was crazy it was like I had a big training volume on uphill and downhill but I didn't train a lot on very very steep downhill it was like I don't remember the incline but I think it was like 50 or 60 percent of downhill and my legs were out at the end I was only crying and I said okay I don't come back here I thought to be good at training and racing and running but then I understood that I said okay maybe I have to train more in a different way and by using maybe poles sometimes well and that I mean using kind of the opposite end of the analogy spectrum as you as you did so I used a pair of fixed length poles the entire time for two de giant so I never put them fixed length poles so yeah one length for the listeners out there you can't fold them up and stow them away so I always had them out I used them uphill downhill there was one 50 kilometer section where I didn't use them at all but that's a very small part

of that race 150 kilometer section that's kind of dumb now that I know that I'm hearing myself say that but my point with that is is I viewed the inconvenience that I would have to that that I was taking on by not being able to! stow the poles being outweighed by the fact that I was just going to use them the whole time uphill downhill it's not the most technical course in the world I very rarely had them out to my side and was just kind of like you know bombing downhills because the event was so long I viewed that through the lens of as I wanted to save my legs as much as possible I think that longer is the race and better is to use poles I mean during a even during downhill you go very slow so you can use poles like break to help you to break your muscles and so if you go slow you should use them for example the opposite is in sky running if you do a race like up and down during the downhill you go full gas even for the normal athlete they go run downhill fast so during this downhill it's not a

good idea to have poles But during long long events definitely it's better to have them well and thus wrapping it back around to UTMB where a lot of those athletes are finishing in over 30 35 40 hours they're not going that fast on the downhill with all due respect to those athletes they're trying really hard they're doing their best but from a speed perspective they're not going that fast downhill and therefore it just presents a better opportunity to use poles on the downhill because the coordination that it requires is just less the coordination and yeah and in the trays like UTMB trays are pretty nice there are not a lot of very technical parts so you can use your poles during downhill yeah okay so let's wrap it up this has been fun we're going to keep going down the anecdote rabbit hole if we did this any longer let's kind of wrap it up with a few key points that we went over when using polls so first off let's focus on the trade off so fundamentally we might be trading off economy for some other ultra running benefit I'm going to leave that category really broad right whether it's you're saving your legs or it provides an additional propulsive

force or whatever some other ultra running benefit and the longer and slower that the race is the more those benefits will outweigh the costs what do you say to that I think that longer is there is more hard benefits of using them and then you can save energy with other things for example don't use a power bank of 500 grams or you can save energy maybe by having some technical equipment that is lighter or also by using a vest that is comfortable and there are some studies in which the auto studied the different vest and where to put the bottles for water here or it's better the camelback in the back or so I think that every athlete has to use something for doing his best but

without thinking about the absolute performance I mean if I go to UTMB I don't go there for winning I go there for having fun but I want to do a good race so I use poles but I take the lighter poles maybe because I don't want extra weight or I use some shoes that are better for me because I tried and I found them beautiful for running many many hours and so if we put all together we can optimize our performance independently from the level of the athlete 100% one athlete that complete the UTMB in 40 hours can be happier than one that complete in 25 hours but having problems with nutrition with equipment and with a lot of things so I think the first goal for every athlete is to find the perfect combination between training equipment and race duration because

some athletes prefer longer races and shorter races and to keep all these things balanced to have fun at the end you're contextualizing the use of the equipment based on the specific situation which I think we should do that with every piece of equipment to be honest with you that's the first piece longer you have to think about the benefits in terms of the specific context of the event and the athlete and their goals the second piece on the training doesn't take a whole lot of more is obviously better right more training is obviously better with polls but it doesn't take a lot of initial training to get an athlete used to polls several weeks two to three times a week that's probably enough in our estimation in our opinions our humble opinions to gain the skill necessary to use polls effectively yeah once a week it is probably enough I don't think that more is better in this case if we talk about an athlete racing in vertical kilometer more is better because he has to push with a lot of power in

the arms but for training I think that more is better but not too much so what you would say is there's like a point of diminishing returns that you get to really quickly sorry sorry oh yeah so what you're saying is there would be a point of diminishing returns that you get to really quickly meaning it's almost like a threshold once you get to this threshold of pole use or pole adaptation anything above that is only fractionally more very very fractionally more beneficial to the runner I think it is difficult to find that threshold for this but I think that probably one training one training per week is enough even because I don't want to use the time that I need for improving other aspects of my training for example I don't want to use time for pole walking in an athlete who can use them well if I need to improve his aerobic threshold for example so then I can combine these aspects to train the anaerobic threshold with poles but I think that if I have to suggest a duration

or training volume with poles I suggest once a week three hours two three hours during the long run and then it depends because if the long run is on an easy terrain with not a lot of uphill or steep uphill go without poles if you have if you go for only maybe one hour but you do 1000 meters in four kilometers then you use poles also during this training because it is steep you will go slow so it is necessary to train by walking with poles but if you go for a run on when I was in Boulder I thought that yeah in US it's very easy to run on trails because they are being it's like to be on highway compared to dormites so it depends even from the terrain right well okay so let's we're going to be we're in the wrap up but we're going to go down another rabbit hole if you'll indulge me for a little bit on this I can totally get on board with once a week we can there's a minimum threshold and I'm probably overstated the more is better I'm thinking more of an context of an athlete who doesn't have a lot of but

you brought up a point that I absolutely agree with that the adaptation process to using poles shouldn't interfere with the rest of the work that you're doing so if you're working on their threshold or their VO2 max or overall this that or the other you shouldn't be incorporating this piece of equipment to the detriment of those areas because they're still important 100% agree! But I will have the athlete do some intensity sessions and it's hard to contrive this because you've got to have the right environment with the right athlete and things like that but some sessions add intensity with the poles and in full admission I don't know how much of a difference that makes I don't know if it's detrimental to their aerobic capacity or their aerobic development that they're trying to seek but I do it not solely from a fitness standpoint I do it so that they can be more versatile with the poles under different conditions because in a race especially for a really good athlete they still have to be able to use poles from a coordination standpoint at higher levels of intensity it's a skill that they have to acquire so that's more my rationale behind that philosophy versus anything else

I don't know if you want to interject there in terms of what you think about using poles with intensity at the same time in a training environment! poles and it's important to remind that when you use poles at the same vertical speed you can have a higher heart rate because you use more muscles so the work that you are doing the internal workload that you have can be higher so you can obtain benefits from some specific training with poles in particular in those athletes who are not able to run fast on flat I mean if an athlete cannot run fast because for example he has some kind of pain in his legs and

he say okay I cannot go to my 90% of heart rate or 95% of my heart rate maximum heart rate and but he said I can do the same work cardiovascular work during uphill with poles I say okay let's do it we can do this work uphill during uphill with poles compared to the running interval training but the cardiovascular stimulation maybe it is even higher so you can obtain the same or maybe even better it is difficult to compare I think there are not studying with this compared the training with poles and without poles the same type of training and to say which one is better but for my experience I say that it is easier to reach a higher heart rate when you use poles so and the rate of persiva session is lower so you can give to your body a higher stimulation a higher stress with low rate of with low persiva

effort so I think for this reason it is important and it can be important to use poles for interval training and for high intensity sessions then for elite athletes it's important for the reason that you said that during their race maybe they have to be able to coordinate during a full gas sprint or something like that so they have to be able to use the right coordination between arms and legs we see this phenomenon that you mentioned where the athletes speed capabilities limit their cardiovascular output at the kind of the recreational or the everyday athlete all of the time in ultra running situations they're not fast enough on flat level ground to elicit a very high vo2 response or that speed limits the amount of time that they can spend at those intensities or the absolute intensity that they can achieve and or both simply because they just don't have the foot speed we see that all the time in the lab in the real world setting so to slow the speed down just by introducing an uphill condition either with poles!

is a good work around to achieve those cardiovascular benefits or that cardiovascular output without having speed be the limiting factor because it's normally not a consequence like somebody's raw foot speed in an ultramarathon event even a 50 mile or 50k ultramarathon event for an everyday runner their raw foot speed is normally not that big of a limiting factor so your consequence isn't that great so the fact that you're saying that it would be reasonable to look at doing uphill work with poles and that eliciting a more robust cardiovascular response higher heart rates higher VO2s could potentially lead to better adaptations I think that that's a reasonable extension as well yeah the difference in this case is the biomechanical work that you are doing the range of motion of the ankle or the knee or hip that work in a different way between uphill walking and flat running level running so we have to take into account this we have maybe the same or a better cardiovascular stimulation and adaptation but then we have to adapt even for by a muscular point

of view because the muscles have to work in the right elongation and so it is important both training on level and uphill but during uphill we can use a pose for to reach a point target that athletes can reach on level running good I'm glad we went down that cardiovascular rabbit hole a little bit it was actually in my notes but I totally spaced on bringing it up so the last piece in terms of the practical take home for the athletes that are maybe not used to using poles but they are going to be in a race situation where it might be advantageous for them it's okay if it's ugly it's okay if you feel maybe a little bit clumsy or you don't look so great in pictures the efficiency or the economy will gradually improve over time but it doesn't have to be perfect you don't have to look for perfect technique yeah and in the picture it will be perfect in a couple of years look at the long term I love it all right man all right we're gonna let you go that was really fun we're gonna have to bring you back on train for your picture yeah there you go train for your picture have it have it be like an olympic

cycle like a four-year process right all right man hey if people want to get in touch with you Nicola how can they do that where can they find you where can they find more about your research they can find me on Facebook on my page Nicola Giovanelli and also on Instagram or I have a website with my email info at nicolagiovanelli.com so they can find every information out there and they can contact me whenever they want awesome man well I'll have links to all of those in the show notes thank you for learning out with me a little bit on polls I'm sure it's going to be the first of many I hope once the COVID fog lifts over everything I can get back out to your neck of the woods and we can go out for a trail run somewhere with polls yeah yeah of course thank you all right there you have it there you go much thanks to Nicola for being on the podcast today always appreciate your expertise and your passion for trekking poles and I hope to get out to the dolomites soon and check out your stomping grounds big thanks to Jackson Brill for this podcast and connecting Nicola and I really appreciate that Jackson that helps me out tremendously and on that note we have a couple of new coaches

joining the CTS staff including Jackson Brill who's been on a previous episode of this podcast if you think that one of our coaches that have been featured on this podcast or any one of our coaching staff is the right coach for you to get you ready for one of your audacious goals this summer hit me up on social media or go to our website trainright.com you can find out information about all of our coaching packages there that's it today for this episode of the KoopCast appreciate everybody listening and as always we will see you out on the trails video