wow… this thread exploded on the one day I didn't get back here…
Just a quick support statement: Yes, I was at Cortland when quik was working with Nick. There is no doubt that quik is a large part of the reason nick was as good as he was that season. Also, quik and I have had many, many convo's about topics such this, as well as every other aspect of sprint training. He's part of the reason why I am where I am and have the ability to coach the level of athletes I am coaching.
Now, back to the thread…
I think some of the benefits, some that have been mentioned here, come when you may not have the perfect facilities to work with (small/tight indoor track, no indoor track). Plus, I think everyone who has been a sprinter and trained with this kind of program knows that you're not always going to have that 'pop" you need to do true max V work. SSE is a great substitute.
I like quik's suggestion about progression of rest intervals, going 6,7,8 minutes for 80's is probably a good place to start. I would almost say that you could go farther than that, maybe going 8,9,10 mins between sets, with going 2',90",1' between reps. My reasoning behind this is that even 10 mins is not all that much rest. Doing 3×80 with 1' rest is certainly a form of a split run, running a split 240.
Think about it… if you were going to do 2 or 3 x 200/100 with a min rest, you'd take at LEAST 10min between runs in order to finish the workout with quality. Even then, that last rep hurts. So I think that the rest intervals between sets can easily be longer if the rest between runs are so short.
Quik, Irish, thoughts?