VO2 Max development workout

Thank you for posting the workout.

Can you repost the link to your blog? You posted the blog before and it has a lot of good info.

Thank you, going to check into trying this one out.

nice. right now we are scheduled to be allowed to start training sept 21. meets start after 10 practices. probably tuesday oct. 6. we will run 2 meets per week through nov 6. hoping to push that last race back a week to the 13th. So i will definitely not be doing any vo2 max work!

This looks like a fun workout, I think I'll try it out next week instead of my interval workout. How many sets would your fast group be doing?

The pace charts are linked on the right hand side of the page. On a phone, it sometimes displays weird.

I started doing this Session with a couple of my alumni over the summer. They really Liked it and I feel like it was a fairly low stress way to get some vo2 type stuff in.

Don’t know why the doc won’t post, it’s just the one I used for the screencast

What is VO2 max development?

I have a suspicion that you know what it means. But here goes anyway.

Vo2 max is the maximum amount of oxygen you can consume during exercise. It is dependent upon a number of factors and most types of training will improve vo2 max, provided they provide some sort of physiological stress to the circulatory system.

A “vo2 max session” is a session done with the specific purpose of raising vo2 max by running intervals of usually 2-5 minutes at a pace near the pace that correlates to your individual max

I thought you would give the standard issue answer. I woulda put money on it.

However Sir, I do not concur. Your runners will improve vVO2max, I dont doubt, but only if they keep growing, Will absolute V02max improve.

Consider if you will, the Bioenergetic feasibility of your beliefs.

Yours most pedantically.

The Uncompromising Questioner.

Great workout idea! Looks like something we can try this week. Thanks for sharing it.

uncompromising questioner wrote:

I thought you would give the standard issue answer. I woulda put money on it.

However Sir, I do not concur. Your runners will improve vVO2max, I dont doubt, but only if they keep growing, Will absolute V02max improve.

Consider if you will, the Bioenergetic feasibility of your beliefs.

Yours most pedantically.

The Uncompromising Questioner.

Are you saying capillary density, mitochondrial density, and cardiac stroke volume don’t increase? What is your cryptic reference to bioenergetics?

As someone who’s conducted many vo2 max tests, I can tell you the value per kg of body weight can most certainly improve. So, yeah I could have my athletes do bodybuilding and put on muscle and improve absolute vo2 max, but we both know that is undesirable. And you and I both know that, on a phone, typing “ml O2/kg/min” is a pain in the ass, so nobody does it but generally that’s what everyone is referring to.

Capillary density increases with age. I will have a higher capillary density than a much younger runner

Mitochondrial density increases with volume and intensity of training to cope with increased oxidative stress, but V02 max is unchanged.

How would increasing muscle mass increase absolute VO2max? ... which leads to my point about Bioenergetics, utilizing ATP produces heat which has to be dissipated and therefore we are limited by thermoregulation, a point which nearly always gets overloked in these training discussions.

Velocity at VO2max is what you and your athletes are aiming to improve. Improving absolute V02 max is a red herring.

Running is a biomechanical skill is it not? Why are there these endless debates about training ignoring fundamental physiological issues of neural skills and repeating the same dogma about "improving V02 max"?

Look at the powerful strides that the best runners have. They haven't improved their oxygen delivery with all that training, because that concept is counter to cell homeostasis. They have enhanced elastic energy return, such that they can produce more speed and more speed endurance for the same ATP output.

This is all basic physiology. Why is it so hard to grasp?

Why do the vast majority of athletes, coaches and exercise physiologists not understand the difference between Biomechanics and Bioenergetics? Why is training not recognized as Bimechanical skills development?

UQ ...Why is it so hard for you to listen instead of run your mouth ..?! Thx you Coach B for your input , I look forward to seeing more of your workouts.

The questioner brings up a good point but that’s not to say that these 2-5 minute intervals don’t have a place in training. Whatever we want to call them, it will improve your lactate tolerance but that type of workout should be done sparingly and it’s only one piece of the puzzle. You also need to develop power and running economy to his point. You also need to develop stamina through volume and high-end aerobic stuff. In recent years I’ve moved away from 2-5 minute intervals at 3K-5K pace. I found that doing shorter reps (400s) at 5K pace were just as effective for neuromuscular purposes. But you have to do 16-20 of them and with easy jog rest. 10K-LT training is better for long intervals.

My athletes did the workout a couple of days ago.

I can’t work with them in person, but when I showed up at school on Thursday morning, there were 12 of them warming up out on the track (we’ve moved our start times for distance learning to 9:30, so I’ve been encouraging my kids to work out early. Temps are lower and for some reason, the smoke from the fires tends to be ok in the mornings). A few of them were able to do the workout as described. Most took off too fast then died.

One of my younger girls did the 400-200-200-200 version and looked great! She’s slow enough where 95% of vVO2 is close to her mile pace, so the implications for how the session will translate to a 2 or 3 mile race are not as clear. But it is clear that she is in much better shape than I thought, so that is exciting.

How are you calculating her velocity at V02?

By the way, UQ

https://scholar.google.com/scholar?hl=en&as_sdt=0%2C5&as_vis=1&q=capillary+density+increases+with+age+vo2&btnG=#d=gs_qabs&u=%23p%3DzjHW33Q5P_8J

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/12238642/

parkerjohn wrote:

How are you calculating her velocity at V02?

6 minute run for distance. I realize for younger athletes this probably underestimated vVO2, but that’s ok. I’d rather have kids hitting the workouts easily and wanting more.

VO2max development occurs mainly from long, aerobic work.

A workout run at VO2max effort stresses the anaerobic system, thereby raising blood lactate levels. A better name would be an acid tolerance workout. So anything that lowers the pH of the blood would work, ie. 12-20 x 400m, 10x600m, 4x800m etc.

I think what you are looking for is tempo work? Maybe like 4-6 miles slowly raising lactate levels, or 2-3 x 2 mile or 3-4 x 2k. Maybe even mile repeats. Lactate fueling comes to mind.