There’s a guy named Howard Luks on Twitter who writes/posts regularly. He’s a surgeon/Zone 2 guy who has been posting about his Covid recover for a couple of months. You might have to dig through his twitter history but, FWIW, I’ve found some of his posts helpful.
Al B
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ParticipantParticipant
It would be hard to second guess your coach so I’d recommend going with what he told you. But if I got those readings on my own I would:
1. Wonder if the reading at 30/128 was incorrect (and think about rerunning the test).
2. Wonder if there was something wrong with the warm up (and think about warming up for 40-45 minutes before I started the next step test).
3. Wonder if I was getting different lactate responses from walking and running in the walk/run portion of the test (and think about ways to even it out).
4. Wonder if there are reasons I would be more efficient at HR145 than below. (FWIW – I’ve spent a lot of training around HR145 in the last few years and become much more efficient there. So much so that my lactate is consistently lower at 145 than 140 in a step test like this).
5. Wonder what readings at 25 and 35 could have told me.Hope that helps.
ParticipantAl B on April 13, 2022 at 7:48 am · in reply to: Aerobic threshold – drift test vs DFA alpha 1 #65515The authors talk about where the .75 value came from in this paper:
https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fphys.2020.550572/full
As near as I can tell, they split the difference between a standard heartbeat at 1 and a random heartbeat at the anaerobic threshold (.5).
And FWIW, Marco Altini – one of the original proponents of tracking DFA alpha 1 – no longer recommends using it to track your aerobic threshold. (Too variable/ too many individual differences). You can find links to his work on twitter. (@altini-marco)
I still use it as a rough estimate because I also own a lactate meter and worked out that at .75 I am about 5-8 bpm under my AET during most phases of my training.
ParticipantHi Brittany,
I can’t imagine this is going to work but –
I once had a polar strap behave the same way because the battery started to move around in the casing. I fixed it by putting a small square of heavy paper on the bottom of the battery before closing the lid. Might be worth trying.
ParticipantNice catch Jon. It should be a bluetooth connection.
ParticipantHi Brittany,
Sorry that happened to you but it sounds like the strap. But if it isn’t, and you’ve configured the app to the recommended settings, I recommend:
* checking to see if your strap how your strap is communicating with the app. Sometimes you can find an option to swap between a bluetooth and an ANT connection. You want the ANT connection.
* making sure that your running motion isn’t moving the strap too much. When you get deep in the weeds on the technology there’s some discussion on how some running motions lead to lower readings (by moving the strap). The solutions were to tighten the strap or to wear a rash guard/tight shirt to keep it from moving.
Good luck.
ParticipantHi Jon,
I don’t know if this app offers anything unique but it did help me for two main reasons.
First, it showed me just how much my AeT varied day to day. Even in an average training block my DFAa1 estimated AeT varied by as much as 5 points (usually under) for reasons that weren’t always obvious. So I started capping my daily runs at HR 140 instead of (lactate tested) 145. In the heavier block I was getting readings that were consistently 7-8 points under. So I went with 135 until the numbers started to improve.
Even with a lactate test I was surprised how much I had to slow down. (Which might be a theme for this website). I don’t think I got faster faster (if that makes sense) but I had better luck adding volume sooner.
Second, because of the way I’m wired, I found it enormously helpful to check in on the numbers pretty much every day. But not everybody is going to feel that way.
That’s probably more than you needed but I hope it helps.
ParticipantI’ve used this app since February and find it interesting/useful/worthwhile. It took me a couple of runs to figure out how to configure the app/strap but once I did I’ve been using it as a rough proxy for my AeT.
I have found that:
* The DFAa1 .75 value correlated well (if a couple beats low) with the results of the 2 self administered lactate test I’ve done since February. Both lactate tests were done when I was fresh.
* DFAa1 Changed by a couple points almost every day – mostly reflected in how I was feeling.
* There’s an art to figuring how to use the data. Artifacts are an issue but you can download the data after the fact and see how many artifacts there are per two minute increment. (The app only gives you DFAa1 values in 2 minutes increments). I tended to disregard the interval if there were more than one or two artifacts.
* It was only good for consistent running. Because of the two minute reading interval, changes in pace under two minutes aren’t properly reflected in the readout.
* In my case, DFAa1 .75 heart rate value on flat ground is different than the .75 value uphill. Sometimes shockingly so. This alone makes me wonder what exactly is being measured based on my (limited) understanding of the concept.
But overall, despite the quirks, I’ve been using the app as a rough check in for a daily AeT. I think it saved me from a training mistake or two (when DFAa1 HR value tanked for a couple of days after a round of heavy training) and it gave me a good visual on exactly how much I had to warm up.
FWIW
ParticipantAl B on April 8, 2021 at 9:14 am · in reply to: Metabolic Efficiency Testing (MET) – East Coast #52914This is a link to the list on the MET website:
https://www.metabolicefficiency.org/certified-professionals
FWIW – I had a very good experience with Caroline Kavanaugh in MA but it looks like the nearest one to you is in MD.
ParticipantThis doesn’t quite answer the OP’s original question but Stephen Selier posted an interesting presentation on some of the same topics here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3GXc474Hu5U
He’s talking mostly about the relationship between %HRR and %6 min power for cyclists but it seems like the concepts are transferable.
ParticipantFor what its worth – I’ve had apps interfere with each other (and the bluetooth connections) on my phone but if you’re sure your recording equipment is OK, have you thought about something in the gym interfering with the signal? The drop is so regular it looks mechanical.
ParticipantScott – that’s a decent thing to point out about Phil Maffetone. I remember catching wind of his training methods when I was working as D1 swim coach in the early 90s and thinking that it might be a nice corrective to the high intensity volume training prevalent in swimming in the 80s.
ParticipantHi Rachelp – that’s some crazy good progress. Do you have any sense of how much time you were putting in every week to get there?
ParticipantGuys – I wanted to thank you for the quick response but it looks like I should have held onto that question for a couple more weeks.
I did my numbers last night and -surprisingly – Ive only been running for 8 weeks. I’ve made much better than expected progress (down from 14 min at AET) but the adaptions are pretty thin and I think my thresholds are still a bit of a moving target.
But I am excited to have a couple of tools in the toolbox for adding intensity (not subtracting aerobic work) to the mix. I’ve used MAF training before. I never got hurt using it – which I cant say of every training system – but I always got caught out when it came time to add intensity. So again thank you for the input.
And for what its worth – I do have problems at my current z1 running pace for mechanical reasons.I have to change my stride a lot at shuffle speed. So much so that its not always a good idea for me to run with that stride.
Viewing 14 replies - 1 through 14 (of 14 total)