Heart Rate @ Lactate Threshold - Page 4

That's a damn "cheap shot"!


I was quoting authorities on the subject.

And here is one last one....

From #1 coaching LEGEND Running coach Guru and PHD in Exercise Physiology..

"In 99 out of 100 individuals VO2 max is experienced at between 95 and 98% of maximum heart rate."

"Your Lactate threshold heart rate is be between 2 and 5% higher while running up a long hill than while running on flat terrian, the same phenomenon can be seen through cross training on a bicycle or on cross country skis.

JACK DANIELS PHD in exercise physiology

Sorry, I didn't mean for it to be a "low blow". It's just that you keep quoting people who, quite frankly, really have no credentials in the field in question (i.e., the physiology of exercise), which just happens to be my area of expertise. Do you therefore really think that you'll be able to convince me that I'm wrong and that you (they) are right??

What about Pete Pfitzinger and Jack Daniels PHD in Exercise physiology? Especially Daniels....the guys is a bloody guru Dr Coggan...has done tons of testing on his own...in fact the guy never stops.

Then there was Carmichael..he has a masters in exercise physiology.

I will say that exercise physiology is in it's infancy I just because some people, that are qualified, say something is a fact doesn't necessarily mean that it is a fact. Studies sometime contradict themself as you know and probably due to the subjects being tested. We are all different.

I'll say to you the same thing that I'd say to Dr. Daniels: show me the DATA.

Know what, you have a point.

Sorry I was an ass.....I don't know a damn thing compared to you.

Wow, good discussion. Quadsweep, thanks for drawing Andy out and giving all of us lurkers a ton of good info.

I'd expect his recruited muscle mass is greater in swimming than in cycling, so that example alone probably indicates that there are exceptions to the "greater muscle mass = higher HR" rule and supports Andy's statement that:

Hell no.....the recruited mass in swimming is WAY lower and is in fact the lowest out of the major aerobic sports. I'll get my Buddy, former Olympic swimmer Steven Baird to chim in if I can. It's all upper body bro. Steve has said this to me too. He says that the legs do next to nothing except in a sprint and even then it's mostly upper body. Those muscle are tiny compared to the big movers in cycling..the glutes, hams and quads.

. Even the breast stroke, which has more legs involved, can't hold a candle to the mass in cycling.
Nordic skiing recruits the most, followed by running, then cycling and lastly swimming.

That's one of the major reasons why threshold heart rates are lowest in swimming and highest in nordic skiing and running. The other reason is because the swimmer doesn't fight gravity and the body is on a horizonatal plain. Of course as Andy said there is more to it than that.

To back up frenchyge, this has been a great thread to read. Just to chime in with a slightly different question about some of the results and comments mentioned to date on higher HR's uphill vs flats:

has all the commentary so far ruled out the fact that most people tend to increase power/effort on the uphill/upwind sections without necessarily trying to do so? Hence that's why we see higher HR's in this regard? As Andy said somewhere before, he can hold constant power on flat/uphill for the same HR. I tend to agree with this - whilst i don't have a PM yet (coming in the next week so i'll test this ), i am certain my HR increases uphill/upwind because i am inadvertantly putting more power down. In fact, if i back off a bit, my HR is pretty much the same uphill/upwind as it was on the flat. Sorry if this is a bit simplistic a view, but are we talking about constant power uphill Vs flats when measuring HR response? Have i gone way off the track here ???

How do you evaluate your max hr? What is the protocol that you are using?

IOW, is it max HR you are getting the day of the time trial test, or some older data you got while being out of shape for instance?

FWIW, one of the first things I discovered when I got my PM was how difficult it was to ride at a constant power -- any constant power. It was hard to hold it back on the hills. I had to actually focus on it or I would just automatically increase power as soon as the road grade increased. I agree with Andy that my HR is (somewhat) related to power but not at all related to flats vs. uphills.

My bad.

Nope, I'm pretty sure what you're describing is what Andy's talking about (constant power @ LT on hills v. flats). You make a good point, and that might be worth wearing the HR strap once in a while just to check it out.

That is true regarding muscle recruitment, but the other big difference between swimming and cycling or running is the stroke volume. Because of the relatively horizontal position and water pressure on the body, venous return, and therefore stroke volume, is much greater in swimming than it is in other sports. At a heart rate of 152 while swimming, your friend's cardiac output is probably the same or greater than it is when his HR is 158 while cycling. Each beat of the heart pumps more blood while swimming than it does otherwise.

Well, since maximum heart rate is maximum heart rate, the precise protocol doesn't really matter (although if you exercise long enough to induce significant cardiac drift, you'll get a slightly higher value). To answer your question, though, I'm basing the percentage on what I get during a standard incremental exercise test to determine my VO2max (although in fact I see the same value when riding my bike outdoors).

Since maximum heart rate tends to decline with training, sometimes quite significantly, then using data from when I was less/unfit would make it appear that I was able to TT at a lower, not a higher, percentage of my maximum heart rate.