Heart Rate @ Lactate Threshold - Page 3

Solarenergy...


Originally Posted by Quadsweep

So if you could only average 95% of max heart rate during the 3 mile/8 minute time trial then your threshold training rate would be 87% of your max heart rate
Which is pretty consistant with what I have been experimenting on the ground. Most athletes I have worked with have their LT zone @ 82 to 88% of max HR. Could be little more, could be little less.


Yes.....but that is a LT heart rate estimate for LT riding on the flats and not climbing. Climbing boosts your threshold training heart rate to about 90% of your max herat rate(roughly) due to more muscle mass involvement.
This is also why your LT heart rate is higher in running and nordic skiing...both sports involve more muscle mass than cycling on the flats.

So what we really need is a series of Field Tests which should be done under various conditions -- on the flats, climbing, pedalling downhill, cross-country skiing, swimming underwater, mountain climbing, etc. -- in order to determine our *true* LTHR.

I smell a book series!

Maybe it does for you, but that's clearly not true in all individuals. For example, I can sustain the same heart rate (and power) for 30-60 min regardless of whether I'm going uphill or TTing in the aero position on a flat road. In fact, you could make the argument that the inability to match your uphill numbers when riding on level ground represents a relative weakness, just as we have previously suggested that the inability to match running values when cycling represents a lack of specific training:

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/entrez/q...=pubmed_docsum

All that is much more consistant with what I know.

!

It is a proven fact that threshold heart rates are higher in running and nordic skiing than in flat cycling mainly due to more muscle mass involvement. This also applies to climbing on a bike.
I am really shocked with your statement.

Here is a quote from Chris Carmichael on the subject....
Regarding threshold climbing he says...
"Your heart rate while climbing is slightly higher than what is seen on flat grounddue to the increased muscle recruitment required for riding uphill. As a result your climbing repeat heart rate range is closer to your time trial heart rate that your steady state heart rate is." "steady state" is a Carmichael term for threshold training on the flats)

Proven by whom, and are you referring to across individuals or within a given individual? Also, are you speaking about endurance athletes in general, or cyclists in particular? I wouldn't be surprised at all if a non-cyclist could maintain a higher heart rate running, Nordic skiing, or cycling uphill versus cycling on flat terrain, but for trained cyclists I don't think you can make any blanket statements.

It would be nice to think that I could maintain a higher heart rate when going uphill than when TTing on level ground, but considering that I can sustain 96-97% of my maximum heart rate for up to ~1 h under the latter condition, I just don't see it happening...

I am referring to every athlete.

I am talking about threshold heart rates not what you can sustain for an hour all out. Your 96-97% max heart rate sustained for an hour is not threshold. In fact it's VO2 max....and if you can sustain VO2 max for an hour then you are a hell of a cyclist.

Yeah, like what Carmichael has to say on the subject is going to convince me? After all, this is the guy who's convinced that pedalling faster reduces recruitment of fast twitch muscle fibers, when the scientific literature on the subject is actually unclear.

(The above is meant mostly in jest, as for the most part Carmichael seems to have a thorough understanding of the physiology of exercise, and many of his training techniques - such as the inclusion of "stomps" and the like even in the off/pre-season - make a lot of sense to me.)

Dr. Coggan I am not a Carmichael groupie and I agree with that comment about pedaling fast reduces fast twitch fiber involvement...that's BS.

But certainly you are aware that LT heart rates vary depending on the sport and it has all to do with muscle mass involvment. For example my good buddy is a former Olympic 400 IM swimmer turned relaly gooc cyclist. His LT heart rate while swimming has been tested at 152 bpm and it has been tested while on the flats cycling at 158 and while climbing it is 162. This is an elite athlete of 32 years of age.

Here is a little something....

Training Bible Studies with Joe and Dirk Friel - Different sports, different thresholds


by Joe Friel and Dirk Friel
This report filed April 12, 2004


Dear Joe,
I am 41-years-old and I do just about any activity that involves cycling, including triathlons and duathlons. One of the things that I noticed is that I can maintain a higher heart rate running than I can while on my bike.

Is there a different lactate threshold heart rate (LTHR) for running than there is for cycling?
Thank you,
Steven Crane


Dear Steven,
Yes. Actually, this is quite normal for an athlete to have differences in heart rate at lactate threshold for different sports.

Part of the answer involves the amount of muscle fibers used within different sports. Running simply uses more muscle fibers when compared to cycling, and, as a result, your heart rate tends to be higher when running. .

The same rule of thumb generally holds true if you, for example, compare cross-country skiing to cycling. The involvement of your arms, back muscles and other elements not used in cycling will result in higher heart rates, as well.


Joe and Dirk Friel

I think you need to go read the papers of ours that I cited previously, along with studies such as this one:

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/entrez/q...=pubmed_docsum

If you do, you'll see that there's considerable specificity to "threshold" however you choose to define it, such that it is not at all uncommon for cyclists to be better when cycling on level ground (or on an ergometer) versus during other modes of exercise, and equal to what they can do when cycling uphill.

As for my abilities as a cyclist, I was a cat. 1 at one point, but no better than that. TTing was/is my strong suit, though, so being able to sustain 96-97% of maximum heart rate (which equates to ~95% of VO2max) for 40 km isn't all that striking. If you doubt my claims, just take a look at the data in that first paper I cited...I was subject #1 in that study, and was able to maintain 88% of my VO2max for 75 min despite the fact that I hadn't trained much in the preceeding few months (having just started on my PhD).

I am certainly aware that heart rate at lactate threshold (as well as maximal heart rate) can vary depending on the mode of exercise - what I dispute is your blanket assertion is that it will always be lower when cycling versus other modes, and in particular lower when cycling on the flats versus uphill.

As for the role of muscle mass, that's a gross oversimplification of a very complex problem, but the explanation nonetheless thrives even in undergraduate exercise physiology classes because people find it understandable, even if it isn't fully correct.

What the heck?

You reach VO2 max at between 95 and 98% of your maximum heart rate....and not any higher!

"You reach your VO2 max at 95-98% of your heart rate reserve or maximum heart rate" Pete Pfitzinger, national level marathoner and exercise physiologist.

A quote from Lemond on the subject,....

...if you are pushing hard on a hill your anaerobic threshold heart rate will be about 5% higher than the same effort done on the flats"
Greg Lemond.........taken from Eddy B and Cyrille Guimard

Here is another one...

"Your climbing lactate threshold heart rate is slightly higher than your individual lactate threshold heart rate on flat terrain."
Mike Koeing exercise physiologist

The cardiovascular Fick equation is:

VO2 = heart rate x stroke volume x arteriovenous O2 difference

Thus, by definition, VO2max and maximal heart rate occur simultaneously:

VO2max = heart rate max x stroke volume max x arteriovenous O2 difference max

In reality, of course, during an incremental exercise test heart rate may continue to rise by 1-3 beats/min even after VO2 has plateaued. Nonetheless, it is incorrect to conclude that VO2max is always achieved at significantly less than 100% of maximal heart rate.

As for my own data, I have obviously directly measured the % of heart rate max that I maintain during TTs, but can only estimate the % of VO2max (since I don't - yet? - own one of those portable VO2 systems). However, you would expect the percentage to be higher than the 88% that I sustained for 75 min in that one study (since a 40 km TT takes me considerably <75 min), but lower than the 96-97% of maximal heart rate that I maintain. This is since there is always an "offset" between % of VO2max and % of maximal heart rate, due to the fact that at rest we're operating at 5-10% of VO2max, but 25-33% of heart rate max (and if you look at Table 3 in that 1991 paper, you'll see that when I exercised at 80% of VO2max for 30 min my heart rate was 86% of my maximum). Thus, ~95% is a reasonable estimate, and is in fact consistent with my TT power, efficiency, and VO2max both back then and now.

http://www.nizkor.org/features/falla...authority.html