I'm not saying that.

I'm saying we have performance testing, we can all do maximal tests unless ill or injured. I'm not against maximal performance tests.

I'm against discarding sub maximal tests. I'm against ignoring heart rate and I'm against ignoring blood lactate testing and I'm against ignoring lab testing if you have access to it.

I'm against ignoring or disparaging any form of testing.

I'm all for maximal testing and I'm all for specific testing over relevant durations / distances when appropriate.

But I'm also saying that sometimes you want more than maximal tests alone in isolation.

I'm also saying that it is a mistake to ignore data that is available.

Why ignore heart rate or blood lactate data if you have access to it?

I don't ignore power data, I use it. I do maximal tests. I do sub maximal tests.

It's daft to ignore available data.

I note you mention motivation - I'm aware some coaches on this forum don't see it as their concern, but motivation is a part of performance a big part. One of my earlier questions is how do you know if improved performance is due to improved fitness or improved motivation?

I ask these questions again, if you use power in isolation without heart rate and without blood lactate testing, how do you measure improvement without doing maximal tests?

When you do maximal tests without heart rate or blood lactate testing how do you know if the improvement is due to increased fitness or because you just tried harder and were better motivated?

I'm not convinced it's useful to characterise cardiovascular fitness as exclusively measured by VO2max.

Suppose we have a cyclist with a max HR of 190bpm and a threshold HR of 170bpm. Then, many years later, their max HR has dropped to 180bpm, but their threshold HR is still 170bpm. If nothing else has changed, e.g. their cardiac output at the HRs they can still achieve is still the same, their power at threshold would be unchanged. But their VO2max would have decreased, purely because their HR doesn't go as high as it used to. It's like fitting a rev limiter to a car, we wouldn't expect it to have any impact at all on the car's performance at rpm below the limiter. Sure, yes, one aspect of the cyclist's cardiovascular fitness is worse, in that their heart can't pump at the maximal rate it used to, but it's outputting just as much per beat below that HR as it did previously, and that seems to me to be a measure of cardiovascular rather than metabolic fitness.

So I don't see the above situation as demonstrating that the limiter is in the exercising muscles. Threshold may have moved closer to VO2max due to the "rev limiter" effect, but the limiter at threshold HR can still be oxygen delivery rather than the ability of the muscles to utilise it. Improve the amount of O2 pumped per beat with EPO or a blood transfusion and their power per heartbeat will increase, increasing power both at threshold and their max HR.

I also think it's misleading to talk about the scope for metabolic fitness improvements being greater than the scope for VO2max improvements based on the observation that threshold can move closer to VO2max. This would be true if the only source of improvement in threshold power were metabolic fitness improvements, but of course improvements in cardiac output will improve power at all HRs, including threshold. To illustrate, suppose we have:
Untrained state: threshold power 150W, VO2max power 190W, 78.9%
Trained state: threshold power 300W, VO2max power 360W, 83.3%
Power at VO2max has increased by 89%, and we know that improvements in power at VO2max are dominated by improvements in cardiac output. So we would expect the same increase in cardiac output to be increasing power at threshold from 150W to 284W, leaving only 16W of the increased power at threshold being due to increased metabolic fitness.

Or some data from my own training:
20 minute max effort 233W 176bpm CTL=29
20 minute max effort 322W 174bpm CTL=89
How would you determine the relative contributions of metabolic and cardiovascular fitness to that change in performance? HR is essentially identical for the two efforts, so clearly I am somehow delivering more power per heartbeat. If it isn't possible to determine the relative contributions of metabolic and cardiovascular fitness from the above data, what data would be required to make that assessment?

Trev, it's not daft to ignore data if it doesn't contribute to your understanding and you or your coach don't need it to modify training programs. You could do a hundred tests a week with every variable tracked. Is that better than doing one or two simple tests with only power data? What about just tracking training data? That is hours of sub maximal testing every week.

You've created so many straw man arguments, it's nearly impossible to respond to your posts.

FTP is a way to structure your training around a simple concept that condenses a lot of physiological and performance research. The fact that FTP might be different indoors vs outdoors is about as relevant as saying your HR swimming is different than it is running.

I'm not sure what you're trying to say, but VO2max is considered the best overall measure of cardiovascular fitness. That's why, e.g., it is used to help make important clinical decisions, such as whether or not someone goes on the list for a heart transplant.


If maximal cardiac output is reduced, then obviously cardiovascular function isn't the same as it used to be. IOW, cardiovascular fitness has declined.


Where your lactate threshold lies in relation to your VO2max is an indicator of your muscular metabolic fitness.


I don't, as it is an irrefutable fact.


You're looking at things the wrong way. Power at VO2max has increased by 89% (yeah, right!), but threshold power has increased by 100%.


For starters, measurement of VO2max.

That's what happens to trolls: they become so focussed on winding people up that they lose track of their own positions.

The only person I've ever encountered who is 100% consistent in their arguments is 'perfection' (which leads me to think that he's either a bot, or that he actually believes the nonsense he posts).

But if max HR reduces, with everything else constant, threshold has improved relative to VO2max yet there has been no change in muscular metabolic fitness, just the addition of a "rev limiter".



But the majority of that 100% has been achieved by an increase in cardiovascular fitness not metabolic fitness. So in that scenario I would argue cardiovascular fitness has led to ~8x the improvement in threshold power that metabolic fitness has (134W attributable to cardiovascular fitness and 16W to metabolic fitness).

I'll give my opinion, and may be corrected by some of the smarter guys,

If you have an example of say an AG FOP female and VE (lung volume) at peak is for the sake of argument 100 litres then for simple math they are breathing in 20 litres of O2 (I know its 20.8 just keeping the math simple) They may hit VO2 max at 85-90 litres and then say in the last 2-4 minutes of a test, depending on how it's structured the CO2 process will become more dominant and VO2 will plateau.

If that athlete is 50 kilo and hits 3.0 litres then their VO2 is 60, but they are basically spitting out (wasting) 17 or so litres of O2 at the end of the test but maybe only 16 or 16.5 at VO2 max, and maybe only 14.5-15.5 at mid range or event specific levels. So basically 75 to 80% of the O2 delivered is wasted. In some athletes who are long trained they may never hit a V-slope, and may not hit an RER of 1.0

I think this is the debate around anaerobic vs aerobic inputs IE people are incorrectly associating (or overestimating) CO2 and or BL with anaerobic contribution (at least at sub VO2 max levels).

The improvement you stated in your scenario above is usually associated with better patterns of localized absorption IE: you want to be a better cyclist, then you train specifically in that direction and utilization and absorption patterns will (generally) follow.

Maurice

What does ventilation have to do with any of this?

It would probably help if you talked about stroke volume instead of cardiac output/cardiovascular fitness.

I take it you don't agree with Noakes about there being no lactate threshold?

Incidentally I thought you might find it entertaining that I've been training on a Concept2 for 2 months without heart rate. I've even done a few all out performance tests, one of them was a 60 minute test.

It is an interesting experiment.

+1

Andy is the one who wants to split everything into cardiovascular and metabolic fitness, in which case stroke volume is one component of cardiovascular fitness.

If we take every underlying element and decide whether we want to lump it in with cardiovascular fitness or metabolic fitness, then consider the case of someone's max HR decreasing with everything else remaining constant - this would constitute a decrease in cardiovascular fitness (but only one of the elements of it, one which has no impact on performance at threshold provided max HR is still above what was their threshold HR, while other elements of cardiovascular fitness do impact performance at threshold) and there would be no change in any of the underlying elements that we are classifying as metabolic fitness. Threshold would move closer to VO2max, but there would be no change in any of the underlying elements of metabolic fitness.

I've pointed out numerous situations in which changes in lactate threshold (an indicator of muscular metabolic fitness) and changes in VO2max (an indicator of cardiovascular fitness) can diverge from each other, not only in magnitude but even in direction. Such examples illustrate that the factors determining each are, to a greater or lesser extent, independent of each other. Moreover, endurance performance ability has been repeatedly shown to better track (correlate) with lactate threshold than VO2max. If you wish to overturn this scientific literature, I think you're going to have to marshall a more cogent/convincing argument than changes in your own personal power:heart rate ratio.

Yeah, me...and 10s of thousands of people like me (although "split" is too strong - it's more that one needs to recognize that they are different, albeit interrelated, things).

I have no problem with anything I have ever read in the scientific literature on this subject, only your characterisation of it. I have described a scenario where threshold can move closer to VO2max without improvement in any of the underlying elements of metabolic fitness. I do not agree that the fact that lactate threshold and VO2max can move in different directions shows that the factors determining each are independent of each other. It shows that there are some factors independent of each other, but the size of the common vs independent factors is important. An increase in stroke volume will increase both VO2max and lactate threshold, thus a change in lactate threshold cannot be said to be purely a measure of metabolic fitness, as it also reflects elements of cardiovascular fitness. So I still do not see anything in what you are saying that backs up your statement that metabolic fitness is more important than cardiovascular fitness for endurance performance, in that nothing that you have said shows that the influence of metabolic fitness on lactate threshold is greater than the influence of cardiovascular fitness. Perhaps you could point me to a paper that took untrained people, trained them, and analysed the underlying adaptations they experienced to quantify the relative contributions of cardiovascular and metabolic fitness to their increase in lactate threshold?

Maybe I'm just not understanding what you mean by the terms metabolic and cardiovascular fitness. When I first saw you make the statement, many years ago now, that metabolic fitness is more important than cardiovascular fitness for endurance performance, I looked up what you might mean, and the definition I found was that metabolic fitness is simply everything that isn't cardiovascular fitness. I tried for some time putting your advice into action by focusing on training that would be expected to primarily improve metabolic fitness rather than cardiovascular fitness, and the results were as poor as they were for the animals in the studies this refers to:

You inhale 20 litres and exhale ~15 litres. So what do you breathe?
Apart from that - what it got to do with anything?

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My Blog

Apparently not. The "take home" message is that the key determinants of endurance performance reside within the exercising muscles themselves, in particular the ability to balance aerobic ATP production to ATP demand. This is something not entirely reflected in the measurement of VO2max, and in fact is to a greater or lesser extent independent of VO2max (cf., for example, our 1988 study).

I have been reading papers and listening to lectures by top sports scientists for almost 20 years and never heard this before.

I guess all those mitochondria in the muscles, capillaries, enzymes etc in elite marathoners are a waste of time. They should have been focusing on metabolic fitness whatever that is. Oh, wait, what is the definition of metabolic fitness? Is it strictly those with a high LT. I guess all those sprinters of the world are headed for metabolic oblivion.

Here is a study published a couple years ago about the effects of low intensity training on the metabolic fitness of a world class runner. His VO2 max and LT went up at the same time after changing his training approach.

Ingham, S. A., et al. (2012). "Training distribution, physiological profile, and performance for a male international 1500-m runner." International Journal of Sports Physiology and Performance 7(2): 193-195.

A summary of this is on our website on our lactate threshold page. Anyone who wants to know what causes the LT curve should read it. It includes training advice on how to change it.

http://www.lactate.com/...hreshold.html#vo2max

The VO2 max referred to in the above model is the VO2 max of the day of the race. In practice over a season, measured VO2 max varies quite dramatically, and as just pointed out varies from sport to sport with the same athlete. It changes from time to time, due to training, racing, illness or inactivity. But a performance during a race will depend on what it is the day of the race.

A recent research presentation at ACSM 2011 showed the variability of VO2 max during a season and from season to season with an elite 1500 m runner over a 2 year period.

VO2 max varied from a low of 4.8 l/min to a high of 5.6 l/min in a 18 month period which is a 16.7% improvement, hardly a trivial change. Within the first year, the change went from 4.8 l/min to 5.16 l/min. Using ml/kg/min the low was 70.5 ml/kg/min and the high was 79.6 ml/kg/min. Performance changed substantially as the runner's best time in the 1500 m race went from 3:38.9 to 3:32.4 min:s from the beginning of year 1 to the end of year 2 (3:32.94 was the winning time at the Beijing Olympics in 2008.)

Ingham, S. A., B. W. Fudge, et al. (2011). Training monitoring; training delivery; middle distance running. American College of Sports Medicine, Denver, CO.

So training to raise VO2 max is very rewarding. This study has several interesting aspects and will be referred to at other parts of this page and in other sections on this web site.

As the athlete's VO2 max goes up or down the lactate threshold will do the same. In the above study, the velocity at the lactate threshold went from 16 km/hr to 18 km/hr over the two year period, a 12.5% improvement. These corresponded to increases in VO2 max. So improvements in VO2 max will also affect the threshold positively.

This was later published in a journal. Here is the cite.

Ingham, S. A., et al. (2012). "Training distribution, physiological profile, and performance for a male international 1500-m runner." International Journal of Sports Physiology and Performance 7(2): 193-195.

Shows the value of polarized training.



Yes, a well recognized result but there is a reason for this. Some types of training will affect VO2 max in a negative way while raising the threshold. Here is a visual from our website which reflects this. See the lower right hand box. I can point you to the type of training that does this. It is highly recommend on Slowtwitch.



Here is another visual which we are now trying to get animated which also shows this issue



From Olbrecht's book

Shift of the Lactate Curve: Interaction of the Aerobic and Anaerobic System on the Lactate Curve

there are not 3 but 13 ways to explain the shifts of the lactate curve, making the interpretation much more intricate, complex, and delicate but actually more accurate and reliable

I know he is such a crank, advising all those world championship and Olympic medal winners (over a hundred). But maybe he needs to know what metabolic fitness is. I know, I know it is not published in the literature except it is. See Mader.

I suggest you read Olbrecht's book.

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Jerry Cosgrove

Sports Resource Group
http://www.lactate.com
https://twitter.com/@LactatedotCom

You just contradicted yourself.


I would agree...and since lactate threshold (a surrogate measure of muscular metabolic fitness) can move closer to (or away from) VO2max, it follows that there is more room for improvement (or reduction) in it than in cardiovascular fitness (i.e., VO2max).


You need to learn to think in both absolute and relative terms.


There are literally dozens of studies out there showing performance is more highly correlated with lactate threshold (expressed as power or pace) than with VO2max. Indeed, in fairly homogeneous groups of subjects there is often little-to-no correlation between VO2max and performance. (Our study just takes that a bit further by matching subjects on the basis of VO2max and finding that performance still varied 6-fold...and was highly correlated with lactate threshold.)


While (again) there are dozens of such studies that speak to this issue, here are a few that leap to mind:

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/6725086

(Longitudinal study showing lactate threshold moves closer to VO2max with training)

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/1385806

(Longitudinal study showing relative magnitude of changes in parameters of the cardiovascular Fick equation)

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/1474063

(Cross-sectional study showing that metabolic responses are more closely related to lactate threshold than to VO2max)

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/6373687

(A bit dated, but still excellent, review of the role of skeletal muscle adaptations in training-induced improvements in endurance performance)

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/17901124

(A more recent review that approaches the question from a slightly more whole-body/applied perspective)

Your study missed an underlying cause for your findings. If you had read the literature, there were publications indicating why your findings were perfectly reasonable if you considered the right variables.

Mader's ideas explain the findings in the 1988 study and your MMP curves etc. You may reject them but at least admit there are concepts that explain all these findings.

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Jerry Cosgrove

Sports Resource Group
http://www.lactate.com
https://twitter.com/@LactatedotCom

The Dudley study, while done on rats, is one of the original basis for polarized training. It started people thinking about just what affected adaptation to the different muscle fibers.

They then began to apply these concepts to the training of athletes with great success. But not in the US. We were more influenced by the Rocky movies.


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Jerry Cosgrove

Sports Resource Group
http://www.lactate.com
https://twitter.com/@LactatedotCom

Then with all due respect, you must have wax in your ears or something, because such concepts have been discussed for a long time. For example, they are considered in this review article by Holloszy and Coyle:

http://jap.physiology.org/content/56/4/831

which is the single most frequently cited non-methods paper ever published in the Journal of Applied Physiology


You're confused: the very skeletal muscle characteristics you mention are critical determinants of metabolic fitness.


I've long used the term "muscular metabolic fitness" as a counterpoint to "cardiovascular fitness", as it helps move the discussion away from precisely how you measure/define lactate threshold. If you prefer, though, you can substitute "lactate threshold" instead...just realize that you are referring to lactate threshold the concept, not lactate threshold the lab measurement.

Our study wasn't designed to identify causes of fatigue, and the results were not at all unexpected. IOW, the purpose of the study was to drive home the point that endurance performance is primarily determined by muscular metabolic fitness (a.k.a., lactate threshold the concept), not cardiovascular fitness (a.k.a., VO2max).

Rats, unfortunately, are not humans. Thus, basing one's training decisions on studies of rats is unwise at best, and foolish at worst.