[dazz33]

Hi i just received my lactate scout 4 and thought i would get familiar with it before actual testing. I have a treadmill and fan in my garage to test.
So at baseline my hr was 85bpm and lactate 2.0mm!
So i set 1% and some speed to warmup. 15mins WU, every 5 mins increase incline to reach 3%. Tried to increase hr by 10bpm every incline increase to get to 133bpm which is my maff.
After 5 mins second measurement 1.0mm. HR 117
After 10mins of warmup lactate 3.0mm! HR 126bpm
Not sure whats going on. Mistakes made – forgot to turn on fan and take off shirt as it was 20 celcius and 95%humidity.
Am i meant to do a new finger prick each strip? I found it hard to milk my finger to get blood out by third measure. Was using a special closedd lancet purple/white colour.
3yrs ago i got a lactate test in lab and he did one prick only.
Thanks for reading and time.

Topic

[Anonymous]

Anonymous on February 6, 2021 at 12:47 pm #50508

First thing is to read this article

Here are my thoughts:

1) with a resting lactate of 2.0 I wonder if you had eaten not long before the test? High carb snack maybe?

2)The drop to 1mMol/L after just 5 min is a good sign that that your aerobic system was beginning to come on line. Lactate was being taken up by the ST fibers and used for fuel faster than lactate was being produced.

3) It could have been the heat but it might also be that you were not well warmed up before you started increasing the HR. Your ST fibers were warmed up enough (aerobically awakened) to handle the lactate at 117 but not quite ready for the lactate being produced at 126. Try a longer warm up.

4) I doubt it was a bad reading. When they are bad they are crazy high or low or you get and error reading.

5) If you can use the same poke and still get blood out of it 3-5 min later then yes you can use the same hole. Most people will clot in that time and need a new poke. Squeezing hard on your finger can mess up the reading.

I hope this helps.
Scott

[dazz33]

dazz33 on February 6, 2021 at 1:18 pm #50512

Thanks scott. As I have had time to think some of it makes sense.
It was 5.30am so no food just a glass of water.
Without the fan my garage was quite humid and hot.
All of this was part of my warmup so may have to not increase tradmill speed/incline so much.
Good to know my meter is ok as its brand new.
Only other thing is ive trained fir 2 yrs at 133bpm maff wuth very little improvement so looking to get some data.
Many thanks

[dazz33]

dazz33 on February 15, 2021 at 12:35 am #50844

Ive managed to repeat my lactate test. The only letdown was running out of test strips.
I tried to follow the protocol and slowly creep up on my Aet.
Is it ok to say 145bpm is my Aet.
There were 2 wrong readings at 24mins i got 4.1mm. Retest straight away and got 1.0. I also removed the last sample as it was 6.4mm at 148bpm. Np more strips left to retest.
Thanks for looking

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[dazz33]

dazz33 on February 15, 2021 at 12:37 am #50847

Maybe this file works. Sorry

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[Reed]

Reed on February 15, 2021 at 1:52 pm #50870

Looks to me like you were able to hit your aerobic threshold on your second-to-last test – I’d suggest using ~145bpm as your AeT.

When you get another set of test strips, you could try again. Nice, easy 20-30 minute warmup, and then try to get a reading every 5bpm starting at ~130bpm. I’ve mainly done 3-minute intervals for a testing protocol rather than 5-minute intervals – either is OK. You might also consider tracking your speed, especially since you’re doing this on a treadmill.

[dazz33]

dazz33 on February 15, 2021 at 5:52 pm #50875

Thanks heaps. Will do. Being solo i have to remember to data collect everything. Thinking about using a voice recorder next time to minimise time off the treadmill.
Also the heart rate data is peak for each stage.

[Reed]

Reed on February 16, 2021 at 7:40 am #50889

It’s useful to have someone help, but you can do it yourself. A voice recorder sounds like a great idea. With pen and paper, you can make a little grid with a column each for time (of day, or minutes in to the workout), pace (or speed), heart rate, and blood lactate reading. See attached for a screenshot of my spreadsheet.

The 3-minute intervals make the test a bit shorter, which can be helpful especially if you end up with more stages than you anticipated. Less likelihood of muscular fatigue being a factor and skewing your results. It takes ~30 seconds to hop off the treadmill, stick my finger, jot down the time / speed / heart rate, and the lactate reading when it’s ready 15 seconds later. Then jump back on and speed up for another three minutes of running.

I’ve usually reviewed the workout data later, and used the average heart rate of the last 1-2 minutes of each stage. That helps to deal with any anomalous spikes, and has a side benefit of ending up with a conservative estimate.

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[Anonymous]

Anonymous on February 19, 2021 at 5:44 am #51004

A couple of other thoughts:

1. I would use just speed to increase the load, not speed. Increasing incline creates an exponential increase in power. (In the link, you can use calories as a proxy for power.)

2. Wipe your finger prior to squeezing for new blood. That should help remove sweat and reduce contaminated samples.

3. It’s fine to step off the treadmill to take the sample. There’s a lag between lactate in the muscle and appearing in the bloodstream roughly 45-60″ later, depending on intensity.* So if you sample in that window, it should be fine. To be consistent, try to sample at the same interval after stepping off. I usually shoot for 45″ so it’s less rushed; less chance of messing up.

* For maximal (~8″ effort) intensities, lactate won’t peak for several minutes, sometimes more than 10.