Great story, thanks for sharing it!
lionfish90
Forum Replies Created
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ParticipantParticipantlionfish90 on April 13, 2021 at 2:27 pm · in reply to: Cannot yet run in Z1/Z2 for training period duration #53104
Hi. I for one would be interested to hear updates on your experiences and what your AeT and AnT were determined to be. I’m also coming back to running after pretty much only cycling for the last two+ years after a diagnosis of “early osteoarthritis” in my knees. After reading some research papers showing not much correlation with running and data indicating no tendency to make OA worse with running, I’m starting again.
My MAF HR is 127 bpm (i.e., I’m 53 yo), and I have to shuffle slowly to “run” at that HR and have to pretty much walk most inclines. And this is all in central Texas, so not much above sea level. My long bike rides are 50-60 miles at 15 – 16 mph average, but as stated in the thread, this does not seem to have done much to prepare my legs for a return to running! My heart and lungs can do it, but my legs are still adapting.
I started out walking for several minutes then running for a minute or two and repeating that. Having done 1 “run”/shuffle/walk per week for about 3 months, my legs are finally able to handle 5 miles or so of this, but my pace is terribly slow, in the 12 – 14 min/mile range, which is very frustrating. I’m going to stick to the MAF HR training for my runs for now and am interested in how your experience goes.
I had thought my AeT was about 137-140 (on the bike, based on “talk test” and nose-breathing), but I did a run/shuffle test on a track for 3 miles at 132 bpm (MAF + 5), and my Pa:HR was >7%! Not good and not AeT, so I’ll stick with 127 bpm for my “runs” for now.
Thank you!
Rene’Participantlionfish90 on June 25, 2019 at 2:39 pm · in reply to: TP Run Summary Max HR Different from Raw Data? #23998I don’t know the answer to your question, but when I have gotten squirrely spikes like that (and they clearly did not match my effort level and were above what could obviously be my max HR) it meant that I needed to replace the battery in my chest strap. Doing that would return readings back to rational ones. (YMMV, of course. And strong work on the PR!)
Best,
Rene’ParticipantDo you know the intensities you are hitting on those long hikes? Are you staying at or below AeT, particularly when it gets steep (and do you have long sections of vertical (I’m jealous of that, living in flatlands but training for peakbagging)?
All I’m responding to is the comment of adding multiple hours to sessions without mentioning the intensity prescription for them, although it sounds like you’re up to speed, so to speak, on that info, given that you read TftNA and trained based on it. Presumably, the goal of those long sessions is to stay <AeT, and maybe even Zone 1 if your AeT is within 10% of your AnT.
All the best,
Rene’ParticipantI’m an oldish, constantly re-booting noob, but it seems like your Z2 top should be AeT, so 166, not 168. The other instruction I’ve read here is to see how close your AeT is to your AnT (by %), and training at <Z1 (instead of <Z2) once that difference reaches 10% or less.
There are a couple of ways to calc this, but they’ll all be close enough, as I understand it. So 194/166 = 1.17, meaning that your AeT is about 17% lower. (Or off of max HR: 194/207 = 94%, 166/207 = 80%, 94-80 = 14% difference. Or 166/194 = 86%, 1-.86 = 14%.)
So my understanding is that you can move most or all of your Z1 training to Z2 until this difference gets to ~10%, paying close attention to whether you can recover from it by the next day. (If not, it was too hard and may not have been <AeT, at least for that day. The guideline is that at ~10% is when Z2 starts to become too hard for that recovery, so the “<AeT” workouts should go to Z1, not Z2, but go by your own feelings the next day.)
Sorry for this simple explanation if you know all this already! The other stuff, I don’t know what to say.
This might be of interest:
along with this:
(which has a nice jpg with a bunch of different HR Zone methods summarized to help see what “Z3” is based on %s, which is here:
https://uphillathlete.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/06/HR-table.jpg ).There are other explanatory posts if you search for HR zones in the forum, including one by Scott Semple that was very helpful with, I think, a followup by Scott Johnston (that I couldn’t find on first pass).
—Also! Given your experience, do you know what might be the easiest or most efficient way to do a “weekend Wind River trip” if I had to fly in from out of state (to enter, say, at Big Sandy)? (Or maybe you mean you are driving in when you do your Teton/Wind River trips you mentioned?) Thanks for any tips, and best wishes for a good summer season!
René
ParticipantHi. Any updates from any of the posters here? How did your plans go? Any feedback on CTL, TSS, hrs/week, any of that?
Jay,
My understanding is that TSS is defined at 100 for an hour at AnT/LT/FTP. For example:
from here:
https://www.trainingpeaks.com/blog/what-is-tss/Once you start to understand the simple scoring system, you will even be able to assign a daily point score through perceived exertion. Here is an explanation of how TSS works and some tips if you are just getting familiar with TSS:
You earn 100 TSS for an all out, 100%, 60-minute workout. Of course most workouts are not completed at 100%, so most workouts will accumulate less than 100 TSS per hour.
You can earn more than 100 TSS within a single workout (as long as it is longer than an hour), but never more than 100 TSS per hour.
Think of intensity as an RPE value on a scale of 1-10, 10 being the hardest. If you exercised at a level 5 for two hours, then you would accumulate 50 TSS/hour or 100 total points. It wouldn’t matter if you were training for the Tour de France or to simply complete your first triathlon.(RPE = “rating of perceived effort”)
There’s also this:
https://help.trainingpeaks.com/hc/en-us/articles/204071944-Training-Stress-Scores-TSS-ExplainedBest,
Rene’ParticipantPS–Re: statins, you might try here:
http://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/2047487314550804
Muscle- and skeletal-related side-effects of statins: tip of the iceberg?
Johann Auer, Helmut Sinzinger, Barry Franklin, …
First Published September 17, 2014 Research Article
https://doi.org/10.1177/2047487314550804Abstract
The clinical spectrum of muscle- and skeletal-related side-effects of statins includes varied myalgias and weakness, an asymptomatic increase in the concentration of creatine kinase and other biochemical parameters, myositis and rhabdomyolysis. Currently, there is no consensus on the definition of ‘statin myopathy’. Evidence suggests that deleterious effects may also be associated with the volume or dosage of structured exercise and/or the intensity of physical activity. Moreover, non-muscle adverse effects on the joints and tendons are often overlooked and underemphasized. The incidence of myopathy associated with statin treatment typically ranges between 1.5% and 10%. Few data are available regarding the prevalence of muscle- related symptoms associated with different statins and the distribution of affected muscles. Furthermore, discrepancies between clinical trials and daily practice may emanate, in part, because of inconsistent definitions or exclusion criteria.The pathophysiology of statin-related myopathy is incompletely understood. A dose-dependent and proapoptotic effect, direct effects on mitochondria, drug interactions and genetic factors, or combinations thereof, may be involved. Recently, a rare immune-mediated myopathy triggered by statin use has been described. With the increasing number of patients treated with statins and with more patients being prescribed high doses of potent statins to achieve low-density lipoprotein targets, muscle-related side-effects will become more prevalent. Currently, the only effective treatment is the discontinuation of statin use. Further research is needed to develop alternative LDL-lowering drugs when statins are not well tolerated and to establish additional effective strategies to manage lipids and lipoproteins.
ParticipantMost of our fat is stored as trigylcerides, which consist of 3 fatty acids (of varying length) bound to a glycerol backbone. We mobilize these, the fatty acids are released, and then the fatty acids are oxidized. They are highly reduced to begin with and go through many rounds of oxidation, in the end generating ATP because the acetyl-CoA which is produced from each round enters the TCA cycle from which ATP is generated. This process of “burning” fatty acids (which is oxidation of them to eventually form CO2 and water with the energy of the their bonds converted into the energy in ATP bonds, a form the body can use) is called “beta oxidation”. So if you want to learn more on the biochemistry of fat utilization, looking that up is a good place to start.
If you want to know more about where the energy comes from, look up “redox reactions”. This Khan Academy page is a good summary:
https://www.khanacademy.org/science/biology/cellular-respiration-and-fermentation/intro-to-cellular-respiration/a/intro-to-cellular-respiration-and-redoxThere, it says, “[E]lectrons are at a higher energy level when they are associated with less electronegative atoms (such as C or H) and at a lower energy level when they are associated with a more electronegative atom (such as O). So, in a reaction like the breakdown of glucose above, energy is released because the electrons are moving to a lower-energy, more “comfortable” state as they travel from glucose to oxygen.
The energy that’s released as electrons move to a lower-energy state can be captured and used to do work. In cellular respiration, electrons from glucose move gradually through the electron transport chain towards oxygen, passing to lower and lower energy states and releasing energy at each step. The goal of cellular respiration is to capture this energy in the form of ATP.”That process is oxidative, meaning it requires oxygen, which eventually is going to accept those lower energy electrons. In other words, it is aerobic metabolism. It is also slower than anaerobic metabolism. When oxygen is limiting, we still need to generate ATP and do so using anaerobic processes, which are faster, in which carbohydrate is used in glycolysis (“sugar breakdown”) to generate ATP without using oxygen. The end product, pyruvate, can enter the TCA/aerobic cycle to form acetyl-CoA and ATP from that but only when oxygen is available. If not, the pyruvate is converted to lactate so that the anaerobic process can continue. (High levels of the products interfere with the enzymes trying to drive the reactions forward, so pyruvate is converted to lactate and the lactate is “handled” by shuttling to the blood and other cells. Eventually, high levels of products affect the system, and the athlete has to slow down because ATP production becomes limiting.)
Thus, the mantra here (my current understanding of it, anyway) is to train in order to optimize your ability to mobilize fats and oxidize them during exercise. By training in that state where your body can use these processes, you stimulate adaptations to improve their use and efficiency. If you train in states where your body needs to mobilize other resources (such as high intensities requiring much glycolysis to supply the ATP needs), the body will adapt by increasing that anaerobic side of the house. The aerobic side gets relatively neglected because the stimulus saying, “We need more of this” is reduced compared to the stimulus for anaerobic adaptations. Generating all these enzyme systems is somewhat “expensive” to the body in maintenance terms, so the body has evolved to respond to stimuli with upregulation of those enzyme systems which are needed and downregulation of those which are not. Thus, the neglect is not just passive, in which you would keep whatever level of enzymes you previously had, but you will lose some of the existing capacity if you do not provide a stimulus to maintain it. What a bummer in our current environment where we are not energy-limited, but we are never that far from famine, so probably a good thing overall.
A key insight to have, in my view, is the one about what “training harder” means. One wants to train each state “hard”. But when someone interprets “training harder” as that overall feeling of training “hard”, that person exits the aerobic state and starts training the anaerobic state hard. The aerobic state is actually getting a much lower training stimulus than is needed to make (or even maintain) the aerobic adaptations. So train hard, but know which system you are training. Preaching to the choir, but there you go.
(I don’t know how statins interact in these processes, sorry to say!)
Best,
Rene’ParticipantAwesome work! Congratulations. When my Garmin HR strap and watch read like that, it usually means I need to replace the battery in the strap, so you might see if that fixes it if washing it doesn’t.
Best,
Rene’Participantlionfish90 on May 29, 2018 at 8:26 pm · in reply to: So, I borrow friends www.lactateplusmeter.com… #10102Yes, I would think chin-ups and knee bends would be more anaerobic for the muscles involved, relying on fast-twitch fiber recruitment and preferentially producing lactate. Those kinds of contractions (strong, lots of recruitment) will also limit blood flow to the working muscles (by squeezing the vessels shut during the work), which will also make it more anaerobic work. The contractions also last a relatively long time (compared to, say, running), which will also limit the blood flow (and so oxygen supply) during the contraction (several seconds).
Given that you are strong, it could take a lot of reps (relatively) to cause HR increases and to keep HR steady, which will also start to fatigue the fibers and so tend toward more lactate production. The blood flow needs of the working muscles might not be that high relative to total cardiac output, especially for chin-ups (because of the relatively limited muscle mass being used), so you could be sending those muscles into full-on anaerobic energy production without making big demands on your heart (HR) to supply blood. Meaning that it could take a LOT of work from those muscles (meaning a lot of lactate production) to get the heart rate to respond because you are not making large oxygen demands on the rest of the body, while asking the working muscles to do work that they can only do with a big anaerobic contribution. (So the HR might not reflect the anaerobic state of the working muscles.)
What I don’t get is why the rest of the body could not sufficiently deal with the generated lactate, taking it up, using it, storing it. But I suppose it could be that without more work to the other muscles and the rest of the system, there is not much stimulus for the lactate to be cleared by other systems (other muscles and the heart, neither of which are working that hard and so don’t need the lactate as an energy supply).
What is your breathing like at 110 or 125 bpm when using these movements to get the HR there? Are you easily nose-breathing, or are you breathing pretty hard (which would suggest oxygen debt and anaerobic work)? I don’t really know if it works that way when the debt is pretty local, such as just to pulling muscles in chins at a relatively low HR.
Thanks for posting the data and description; interesting to think about.
RenéParticipantI recently watched this talk by Scott Johnston posted on Facebook here:
[Direct link not working. Try this one after removing the spaces:
https :// http://www.facebook.com/ uphillathlete/ videos/ 1207164636050638/
]It addresses several of your questions. Unfortunately, I can’t remember exactly where in the talk they occur, but you might skip through until you see graphs showing lactate curves and also X-crossing blue and red curves of fat vs. carb utilization in the latter half.
Nice VO2max! I’m jealous.
Best,
Rene’Participantlionfish90 on March 20, 2018 at 8:52 am · in reply to: No Aerobic Base. Increase number & duration of long runs? #8747Instead of testing, I’m trying to monitor my nose-breathing pace, which matches my HR Zones (based on the TftNA zones), where I can nose-breath comfortably in Z1 (135 bpm top) and still nose-breath but forcing my mouth shut up to top of Z2 (144 bpm).
Does your tested AeT match nose-breathing/ventilatory thresholds pretty well in your experience?
My AeT pace with any uphill drops quickly and was in fact 13 min/mile yesterday b/c of uphill sections. But I do that without being very strong! I’m sure a lot of people would say they want the Type II fibers you talk about and to be stronger (ask a CrossFitter…). I’m here in a similar place as you aerobically but without that strength! My squat/dead/bench/press maxes are truly pathetic.
What happens for me is that my HR increases but doesn’t run quickly or straight into Z3; rather, I ramp up steadily through Z2 but can easily tell and back off without going into Z3. However, if I kept running (slow jog really) I would still get to Z3 pretty fast. Not sure how quickly you mean you cross into Z3, or if that’s a distinction without a difference I’m trying to make!
I also am watching my HR like a hawk but am fairly used to that now.
Thanks for the info on what’s working for you. I’m also trying to extend my run/hikes while staying below AeT. I’m also trying to add doing these fasted but haven’t managed that too well yet b/c of my schedule/poor habits. So I’ll keep on sticking to the program for this year.
Good luck with your goals!
Rene’Participantlionfish90 on March 14, 2018 at 7:48 pm · in reply to: No Aerobic Base. Increase number & duration of long runs? #8691Did you manage to stick to training at AeT, and have you seen any improvements by doing so? My MAF is 130, but I use 135 as top of Z1. Even after many weeks of this, I’m still quite slow in Z1 (11 min/mile, depending), but I’m going to stick to the plan and see how it goes.
Thanks for any reports on what has worked or not for you,
Rene’ParticipantThat’s a bummer, but it’s good to notice a pattern b/c then you can fix it!
What is your volume increase from week to week during the ramp up before getting sick during the recovery week? (Meaning percentage increase in volume, presumably in total training time)
Material here and in TftNA recommends increases of 10% or even 5%, with a general upper limit of 15% (in the forums somewhere here), so maybe check if you are surpassing that.
Another thing to check would be: Of the week’s volume, what percentage is at what intensity (Z1 – Z4)? Maybe you’re putting a lot of your Z3/4 work in that final week before recovery week?
A third thing to check would be: How are your sleep and nutrition during the work periods?
Good luck!
Rene’ParticipantHi, Matey:
Total amateur here and also a desk jockey as a worker. From my point of view, yes, your job is base training, as I would think you are way fitter than I am as I struggle to do my 5 or 6 hours per week of training! (And as I also struggle to adapt to even that and so will need to over this year before I increase the volume for next year.) I also see it as a more specific and appropriate than, for example, what I do—Z1/2 jogging and Z1/2 cycling, doing strength work, and now entering the part of my base phase where Z3 is prescribed. From my point of view, carrying and tossing around trees, working a chain saw, and in general the climbing and carrying of stuff you do, is more appropriate training for general mountaineering than what I do, for sure! Your overall work capacity is bound to be miles above my own.
Or at least the job WAS base training for you, up until the point where it no longer provided a training stimulus, given that you are now adapted to the amount of work (and have been for a long time), as the coaches in this thread say. So the point also holds that the job does not have progression and so is exercise instead of training, to put it glibly. And the work capacity may need to be sharpened and re-stimulated for your larger goals.
Maybe what you need is some data on where you are with your fitness. Have you done the “alpine combine” test in TftNA, and where do you stand with it? Have you tested your AeT and AnT? In terms of heart rate, are they within 10% of each other as TftNA prescribes reaching before doing more AnT training? Maybe that is one way to gauge whether your after-work training should be only more Z1/2 base or is OK to be Z3/4 intervals or other high intensity work?
Maybe lactate testing in a lab would help making that determination. Maybe you could consider ways to make your work progressive in terms of training. I don’t know how that could work, maybe adding a weight vest with just a little bit of weight (5 lbs?) and then increasing that–over the course of, what, a year?—in small increments, monitoring HR and sleep/fatigue to avoid overtraining and to keep it Z1 instead of turning into muscular endurance work? Of course, the job likely keeps you at some level fatigued and beat up all the time that a long-time desk jockey (such as myself, ahem) can’t imagine, and makes this kind of suggestion naïve and ridiculous. Which is partly their point of not considering work like this training but more like work capacity maintenance that may be fatiguing enough that makes other, more specific training difficult to do.
An opposite tack would be to consider ways you could make your job LESS physical work. Are there any efficiencies you have been avoiding because you are trying to use the job as training? I don’t know what these would be; something like having a young(er) hired hand doing more of the lifting, delegating more (maybe you work alone), cutting trees in the back yard before moving to the front to lift lower weight. I don’t mean shirking duties! Just to consider ways to make it less fatiguing so you can put that energy to training outside of work. Maybe it’s obvious that you would have or can’t do this already, and I’m mostly showing my own ignorance of real physical labor here.
Again, I have very little experience in what I am blabbering on about! These are just some things that occurred to me when I was reading the thread as someone on the opposite end of the spectrum who wishes he were as fit as you likely are just from your job. And who mis-spent his youth not exercising and lifting enough when the hormonal environment was such that the gains would still be with me to this day (50 years old now).
Good luck!
Rene’
