vo2 max intervals. - Page 7

Hi

If that's the case, and as you say it is it must be, and if you have nothing in reserve and your HR is miles below your HRMax your legs are your limiting factor. They are either too weak (untrained) , too tired, or have gotten too anaerobic too quickly (likely and common) to allow you to continue to work hard enough aerobically to raise your HR further and reach a higher % of your available cardiac output.

My gut feeling, again, is that you may have not got your intensities right to effectively, consistently, and repeatably target your VO2 max, which is I think what your are trying to achieve. I'd go back to the drawing board and rework your training zones from recent, controlled, and reliable tests and relaunch

But then, I like relaunches

Cheers,

PBUK

__________________
What do you mean your legs are hurting? Give it some welly man!
Visit My Training Weblog
Follow Me On Twitter

Hi BW

With the exercise open in WKO+ go to "file" - "export copy as", and save as a WKO file.

PBUK

__________________
What do you mean your legs are hurting? Give it some welly man!
Visit My Training Weblog
Follow Me On Twitter

For the same wattage and perceived exertion, high HR = fresh, low HR = tired. And there are all those in-betweens. Trust your PE more than your HR. Since your PE seems to be high I would venture to say that you might be fatigued and may need an easy week or two. How's your resting HR upon waking? If it's higher by a few BPM than your normal RHR then again you may need some rest.

__________________

I feel that my legs right now are limiting me. I've noticed similarly low HRs relative to max in my L3 and L4 sessions as well. FWIW my max HR was achieved on the bike about...wow... two years ago (seems like yesterday), I know I have seen 190-192 this year though...

If my legs are the limiting factor, what should I do to remedy this?

I know when I am riding well it seems that my heart/lungs and legs are at parity, now it seems my hrt/lungs are stronger than the old legs...

__________________
-Meek
"Some people train to look pretty. I just train so I can be the strongest man there is. And then again, I'm already pretty." -Magnus Samuelsson

Hi M-O

I have no idea of your training history or objectives which makes this difficult/impossible!

With no other information available if someone came to me and said they were trying to do L5 intervals and their legs were holding them back I'd first of all be trying to establish whether they were overtrained and also what their reason for targetting their VO2 max with L5 work was.

If they were not overtrained I'd then want to establish whether they had a very good base of L3/SST/L4 work under their belts and in their legs, if they had fine, if they hadn't I'd start there.

If there was no evidence of overtraining, if there was a good base of L3/SST/L4 work, and if there was a good reason to be doing L5 work I'd do the following:

1. Have 48 hours rest, a high carbohydrate diet, a proper hydration strategy, and plenty of sleep.
2. After warming up well for about 20 minutes ride 2x5 minute TTs on a turbo with a 5 minute recovery period between them, producing the best average power for each TT, save the data.
3. Establish the average power for the 2nd TT and use this as the target power for future L5 intervals, initially these L5 intervals would be done for 4 minutes and I would suggest starting with 4x4 minute intervals.

So, that's what I would suggest as a way of starting L5 work BUT my gut feeling from what you have said is that you may well need to do a good solid block of L3/SST/L4 work first, I just don't know. You may also need more rest or even be CHO deficient or dehydrated.

Oh yes, and I'm no expert so treat my advice with caution and take it with plenty of salt!

PBUK

__________________
What do you mean your legs are hurting? Give it some welly man!
Visit My Training Weblog
Follow Me On Twitter

Thanks. Been playing with my diet lately . Got any proven numbers for pro/carb/fat per kg? I thought I just needed to http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=unkIVvjZc9Y

__________________
-Meek
"Some people train to look pretty. I just train so I can be the strongest man there is. And then again, I'm already pretty." -Magnus Samuelsson

I guess we'll be beating this dead horse well into the next century, but it's highly unlikely that either your heart or your lungs are limiting your performance in any way. Heart stroke volume increases are one of the fastest and earliest adaptations to endurance training and if you've been riding with any regularity (gotta guess you have been if you're doing L5 intervals) then that particular adaptation has long since happened. And short of some serious respritory issues it's very unlikely that your lungs are a limiter.

The limiter is almost always in the working muscles themselves (your legs) and in the O2 transport (hence the incentive to blood dope) but not your lungs or your heart.

Don't start messing with your L5 efforts because your HR did or didn't match up to some preconceived expectation or someone else's experience. Do your L5 efforts on steady power or lacking a PM do them based on steady efforts for 3 to 5 minutes each. It doesn't matter whether your HR hits a certain level, what matters is how much O2 you exchange, how far you push your muscles into oxidative stress and how close you toe the line to purely anaerobic metabolism while still stressing the high end of your aerobic energy systems. You've gotta walk that fine line, really close to blowing and you've gotta hold the effort for at leat 3 minutes at that level to push your muscles to adapt.

The discussion entropy in these forums is fascinating. Everyone can agree, sure HR doesn't matter. Then someone says "gee your HR didn't behave like mine" and next thing ya know you're looking to alter your workouts to get a certain HR response. Work these intervals on power if you can and simply on steady hard efforts for the duration if you don't have a PM. Make sure you're breathing absolutely maximally for the last minute or two of each effort (you're trying to stress VO2 Max after all). They won't start with maximal breathing but you should reach that point after a minute and a half to two and a half minutes and that's one of the best indications that you're stressing the right processes and encouraging increased mitochondrial and capillary densities.

Good luck,
-Dave

If you wish for your hrt/lungs to have a harder time of things, then you can accomplish this by riding on a trainer inside a sauna or steam room at a very high cadence. Suddenly your legs will feel like a million bucks compared to your chest.



Disclaimer: The above was for entertainment purposes only. DO NOT actually do this. It's not healthy and doesn't accomplish anything useful.

Hmm..

Methinks you probably already knew that your weren't eating right to train optimally?

Recommened CHO intake for daily recovery, moderate duration/low intensity training 5-7g/kg/day. 7-12 for moderate to heavy training.

Recommendation from the IOC consensus on sports nutrition. Remember that a high percentage of athletes in training are chronically energy deficient. Sad, but true.

PBUK

__________________
What do you mean your legs are hurting? Give it some welly man!
Visit My Training Weblog
Follow Me On Twitter

Dave I like 'most all of what you say all the time so sorry to quibble, but the heart is intimately connected with O2 transport. Peak cardiac output is a strong determinant of VO2max, which puts a ceiling on aerobic workload. (I'm sure you already know this... but it isn't evident from your phrasing).

More subtle:
(i) Early adaptation of a parameter (eg cardiac output) does not mean that parameter is not a limiter to exercise capacity.
(ii) Early adaptation is not the same as maximisation.

There are too many frickin' sandbaggers around here, and I wish the ACA would endeavor to do something about it (especially on the TT side). It's demoralizing.

__________________

'07 S-Works Tarmac SL, Polar CS600+Power
2008 Cervelo P3C, Zipp 900c+808

'07 Specialized Epic Marathon w/Crossmax SLRs
CycleOps Pro 300PT Indoor Cycle Trainer (my winter ride)