3 Part Series with Dan Pfaff

I like Martin Bingisser.

In a way, we have parallel lives, living a double life by day and by night. From 9-5 you’ll see us in suits and behind computers (i.e making money), but from 5pm to 9am, you’ll see us training, coaching or “working” on our websites. In a way, our day job subsidizes and supplements our passion: Track and Field (or Athletics).

Who the heck is Martin Bingisser?

In the 2008 season, Martin was selected to join the Swiss National Team and represented them at the European Cup in Istanbul in the hammer throw. He also has a law degree in 2008 and lived in Kamloops, British Columbia to train full-time with Dr. Anatoliy Bondarchuk. He is still active as an athlete and starting out as a coach for the past few years (We’ll have more stories with Dr. Bondarchuk, Derek Evely, and Dylan Armstrong in future articles)

Interview with with Dan Pfaff

(This is Part 2 from Martin’s website, copied with permission)

Martin Bingisser: Something I’ve noticed and Derek Evely pointed out in our recent training talk is that quite a few elite athletes seem to be doing high concentration of maximal intensity work and a high concentration of very low intensity work. Work in the middle is often left out. This is a broad question, but what are your thoughts on that observation?

Dan Pfaff: I think it is a trend and I think what we are touching on is sympathetic versus parasympathetic responses, pathways, and stimulations. For me, a lot of circuits are done for multiple reasons whether they are with medicine balls, hurdle mobility circuits, general strength circuits, or specific strength circuits. At first these are loads; when they first learn the circuit it is a sympathetic response since it is hard and new and novel. There is a lot of focus on trying to learn the task. But after a while it flips biochemically and with the brain maps to become parasympathetic in response. I don’t think we have the technology yet to define and measure this. But if I had a hunch, in ten years we will see how that this breaks down into creating sympathetic and parasympathetic responses.

Martin: That’s quite interesting. I’ve been reading a lot recently regarding the sympathetic/parasympathetic topic in the context of recovery, but it sounds like there are even more interesting research possibilities regarding its interaction with training too.

Click here for the full articles [registration required]… worth reading (though part 3 is heavily focused on hammer throwing)