[Coach]

Hello All,

Carolyn and I are excited to see you all again on Tuesday! We will be going over any questions that may have come up since last week along with focusing primarily on the Aerobic Threshold Test! We already have some great questions coming in on the forum about the test. We will be covering how to do the test, how to read the results, set zones and any other general information about Aerobic Threshold. We will be using the same zoom link from last Tuesday it can be found in “Welcome to Female Uphill Athlete 4”.

If you can’t make the zoom or you have questions you don’t want to forget please put them below on this post!

Best,
Maya and Carolyn

Topic

[Sheila Sturm]

Sheila Sturm on January 10, 2022 at 4:03 am #61837

Good morning,
I am a little confused by the various information I’ve obtained from the website and the book, Training for the Uphill Athlete (1st edition I think. published 2019). I’ve got the link from the website to conduct the Heart Rate Drift Test, which I believe will give me the upper limit of my AeT. However, the book does not discuss this test under Aerobic Threshold Testing (page 152) I was confused by the Lactate threshold test (page 155) which seems similar. But I think they are all different things.
Would you clarify?
Thank you.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous on January 10, 2022 at 7:36 am #61852

Good morning!
The Heart Rate Drift test is the same as the Aerobic Threshold test. The % HR drift is the measurement used by TrainingPeaks to calculate if you are aerobic or not. We are looking for % hr drift of less than 5%. If you follow the instructions in the AeT test workout we can discuss the data and how that looks for calculating %HR drift in tomorrows zoom. A good reminder as well, you may have to do the test more than once to find your aerobic threshold, and you can always begin with the conservative estimate MAF formula 180 – age = AeT.

Your aerobic threshold test will give you top of Zone Two.

Then Anaerobic Threshold test will not show up in many plans as you need to have a significant base of training to do this test properly. Anaerobic threshold a.k.a Lactate Threshold is top of Zone three. Do not worry about this test currently. We can estimate zones once we have the AeT with an estimate of 10% increase or decrease per zone.

I hope this helps!

[Natalie Keoleian]

Natalie Keoleian on January 10, 2022 at 8:51 am #61858

Hi @Coach Carolyn – my pa:hr is -3.01%. Is that acceptable? It’s less than 5% of course, I am just not sure how percentages < 0 are handled. Thanks!

[Natalie Keoleian]

Natalie Keoleian on January 10, 2022 at 10:23 am #61864

Disregard! The question was answered in https://uphillathlete.com/forums/topic/aerobic-threshold-test-resources/.

[Erin Bates]

Erin Bates on January 10, 2022 at 10:46 am #61868

Hello! I am struggling to find a way to do this test at the moment. With recent covid restrictions put in place, all gyms in our region are closed so I don’t have access to a treadmill. Also, my area (Nelson, BC, Canada) received over 160cm (63 inches) of snow in town over the past week, and all my normal flattish running areas are a complete mess. I could try it with cross country skiing but the amount of flattish terrain at our local trails is pretty limited so again, would be tough to carry out the test properly.

At this point I am thinking of using the basic estimating formula for the first few weeks of the program, since I don’t have much of a training base (last year mostly not training). From what I’ve read it sounds like this should be ok, and I can do the test later once conditions allow.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous on January 10, 2022 at 11:49 am #61872

Hi Erin,

Yes using the estimated AeT for you is perfect. Especially since you don’t have a recent base of training that is a fantastic way to restart. There’s no rush on that test, get it done when it’s reasonable.

[Jenna Dodge]

Jenna Dodge on January 10, 2022 at 3:25 pm #61883

Some questions that come to mind that I’m sure you will address but I’m jotting them down here anyway.

I did the HR Drift test today and my HR drift was 7.5%. How many BPM should we subtract from our starting HR if our drift is more than 5%?

I’m not sure how much I can trust my data b/c my HR monitor wasn’t connected for the first 34 minutes (it was reading wrist data!) but it looks ok to me, so I think maybe it’s ok?

Since the HR fluctuates a few BPM even in the beginning of the test, how do we determine which HR we really “began” at? Maybe an average of the first 5-10 minutes?

How often should we re-test?

[Jacqueline Burkett]

Jacqueline Burkett on January 10, 2022 at 6:03 pm #61889

I use a polar chest strap that connects to a polar app on my phone. I am unable to link this to training peaks with the instructions given here. Has anyone else found a way to link the two?

[ashco.thompson]

ashco.thompson on January 10, 2022 at 7:38 pm #61891

Hello! I’ve had this struggle in the past so started early this time, alas. I’ve taken the test 2x (each Monday) and have yet to see a HR drift of >2%. I bumped up test #2 by 5BPM to start as advised if drift is less than 3%, and still only had a +2% drift over the hour. If I add another 5BPM as the starting point for test #3, I imagine that will do it (?) but this is a fairly high HR and I’m skeptical of the “should feel easy and relaxed – a conversational pace”. Curious about your take – should I retest x3 next week just to see what happens?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous on January 10, 2022 at 8:29 pm #61894

Hi Jacqueline,
We are definitely not the experts on all the different technologies an athlete can use to capture HR data and upload to TrainingPeaks. If you are having an issue with data syncing the TrainingPeaks help desk is the place to go, or some similar TrainingPeaks/Polar App google searches is the best way to go, when the data uplaods then we can help talk you through the analysis of the HR drift. In the mean time, use the MAF formula of 180-Age for the AeT – top of Zone two for your training. Even if conservative that is always better.