Coach Jeff ROC wrote:
Did no one read my post?
The Apple Watch VO2max ONLY GOES TO 60! If you're running VDOT 68 paces and/or testing on a genuine VO2max test at 70, the Apple Watch can't help you. You are off the charts, so to speak.
Don’t worry I saw it! I think that’s an interesting theory. I’d think it would put me right at 60 though right? Unless I’m somehow breaking the equation they use.
Jack Daniels Calculator wrote:
Coach Jeff ROC wrote:
Did no one read my post?
The Apple Watch VO2max ONLY GOES TO 60! If you're running VDOT 68 paces and/or testing on a genuine VO2max test at 70, the Apple Watch can't help you. You are off the charts, so to speak.
Yeah, that's good info to know, if one has a VDOT that high. Regardless, I think I prefer my Garmin (with buttons) over an Apple Watch for training purposes.
Agreed. I should probably invest in a Garmin soon. If you get sweat or rain on the touchscreen it’s game over and honestly a big pain. I’ve never been a super technical guy with running, it’s been more of a “if you run a lot, jog a lot and sprint a lot, you’ll get faster” type attitude, but now that I’m getting a lot faster and a lot more competitive I’ve found myself becoming a lot more of a technical well planned out runner.
Might be time for an upgrade.
No worries, friend. I just hate to see people trying to figure out how to fix something that technically ain't broke. Unfortunately for my race results, the Apple Watch VO2max calc still has quite a bit of room left for me. Have fun with that engine.
All these pages....
VO2Max doesn't matter.....
Alan
Runningart2004 wrote:
VO2Max doesn't matter.....
A nonsensical post on a running forum; you want a cookie?
It might never hit 60 because there is probably some history and averaging in the calculations. Plus when you account for inaccuracies in GPS and HR data, every run is not getting data that is 100% "correct". It's fascinating to me to be chasing such an arbitrary metric when we don't really even know what's being measured.
CopperRunner wrote:
Don’t worry I saw it! I think that’s an interesting theory. I’d think it would put me right at 60 though right? Unless I’m somehow breaking the equation they use.
Bullet the Blue Sky wrote:
It might never hit 60 because there is probably some history and averaging in the calculations. Plus when you account for inaccuracies in GPS and HR data, every run is not getting data that is 100% "correct".
It's fascinating to me to be chasing such an arbitrary metric when we don't really even know what's being measured.
CopperRunner wrote:
Don’t worry I saw it! I think that’s an interesting theory. I’d think it would put me right at 60 though right? Unless I’m somehow breaking the equation they use.
like I said, I dont care a whole lot about my Vo2MAX value. I was offered a free test and thought, "sure, why not?", and here we are.
My Suunto 9 is similarly bad with it's VO2max estimate. I did a long technical trail run and my watch told me my VO2max dropped from 59 to 50. I guess I really detrained on that one 3 hr run. If you ignore the V02max estimator I otherwise love the watch.
Suunto_Guy wrote:
My Suunto 9 is similarly bad with it's VO2max estimate. I did a long technical trail run and my watch told me my VO2max dropped from 59 to 50. I guess I really detrained on that one 3 hr run. If you ignore the V02max estimator I otherwise love the watch.
Thanks for the confirmation. As I suggested earlier, I think Garmin's VO2max estimator (and evidently Suunto's as well), as well as the Race Predictor, sometimes gets a bad rap for the reason you and I cite. I wonder if Garmin had an option for the user to remove (or keep) certain runs (e.g., run on slow terrain, in slow shoes, in bad weather, etc.) from the VO2max estimator and Race Predictor algorithms would be beneficial; it would at least be interesting to compare their results with and without.
What makes you think the results you got from your testing are accurate?
Of course, it is Velocity at VO2max (rather than VO2max, per se) that is of ultimate importance to competitive runners. Nonetheless, I find the Garmin VO2max estimate, and Race Predictor, as a useful tool for relative fitness evaluation, rather than its absolute value. That said, per the principle or 'garbage in <> garbage out, they will be more accurate with more accurate HR measurements (i.e., using a strap rather than optical wrist measurements during higher intensity activities), and with a accurate (or pretty close) HRmax input and weight input, and some understanding of their limitations (e.g., performing measured runs over consistent conditions, etc.)
josh1988 wrote:
What makes you think the results you got from your testing are accurate?
Recent race times, (earlier mentioned 9:31 2 mile) along with my 1:22 600m time trial suggest a Vo2Max around 70. I was offered a free university test, so I took it, and got a result of 70.3.
My watch giving me an estimated 56-57 predicts a 2 mile time as slow as 12:40. That’s decently slower than half marathon pace for me.
Jack Daniels Calculator wrote:
Of course, it is Velocity at VO2max (rather than VO2max, per se) that is of ultimate importance to competitive runners. Nonetheless, I find the Garmin VO2max estimate, and Race Predictor, as a useful tool for relative fitness evaluation, rather than its absolute value. That said, per the principle or 'garbage in <> garbage out, they will be more accurate with more accurate HR measurements (i.e., using a strap rather than optical wrist measurements during higher intensity activities), and with a accurate (or pretty close) HRmax input and weight input, and some understanding of their limitations (e.g., performing measured runs over consistent conditions, etc.)
Yes, to me it’s just a factor in training. I see it as a similar value as something like my 100m time or top end speed. It’s good to know where I’m at, but overall doesn’t effect my day to day training all that much.
Thank you for all the contribution you’ve given to this thread so far! Very informative.
CopperRunner wrote:
josh1988 wrote:
What makes you think the results you got from your testing are accurate?
Recent race times, (earlier mentioned 9:31 2 mile) along with my 1:22 600m time trial suggest a Vo2Max around 70. I was offered a free university test, so I took it, and got a result of 70.3.
My watch giving me an estimated 56-57 predicts a 2 mile time as slow as 12:40. That’s decently slower than half marathon pace for me.
Hey Copper - do you know what type of equipment your university used in testing out your Vo2Max? I only ask because it can be hard to track unless it's performed in a research setting.
From what I've been told, Vo2Max has very little to do with resting heartrate, but is entirely indicative of how well your body carries oxygen under extreme aerobic deprivation. Using your max and min heartrates shouldn't be all that useful to you, at least from what I understand.
Anecdotally - I've had a teammate (a sub 29 10K guy) perform in the high 60's; aerobically he was a tank, but he wasn't able to hold that "red-line" all that long. Once he hit his aerobic max on the incline treadmill, his body maintained it's oxygen consumption's highest level for 37 seconds before it started to decrease. He was still running just fine at 6 min pace, but his body was not pumping oxygen the same way as it had just a couple minutes before.
We had another teammate, who was aerobically pretty far behind our 10K guy, score a 79. It took him far less time on the treadmill to reach his aerobic max, but once he was there he held it for 3 minutes before he experienced the same oxygen consumption decrease.
Not a ton of takeaways outside of the fact that the higher number doesn't always mean more aerobic fitness. Undoubtedly, our 10K guy would roll over the guy who scored a 79 in anything that required true aerobic fitness - tempos greater than 5 miles - 5K and up - etc. The guy who measured a 79 and the guy who scored a 68 had very similar college careers, albeit in different events.
I will say - I had a teammate rock an 87 and he went on to make a world team in a distance event within the past 10 years. Pretty special to watch someone at that level train on a regular basis.
Good luck with the research!
Suunto_Guy wrote:
My Suunto 9 is similarly bad with it's VO2max estimate. I did a long technical trail run and my watch told me my VO2max dropped from 59 to 50. I guess I really detrained on that one 3 hr run. If you ignore the V02max estimator I otherwise love the watch.
That's right.
I've noticed the reverse, if I run a 5 race or a 3K all-out effort my VO2max number rises.
Royale W Cheese wrote:
CopperRunner wrote:
Recent race times, (earlier mentioned 9:31 2 mile) along with my 1:22 600m time trial suggest a Vo2Max around 70. I was offered a free university test, so I took it, and got a result of 70.3.
My watch giving me an estimated 56-57 predicts a 2 mile time as slow as 12:40. That’s decently slower than half marathon pace for me.
Hey Copper - do you know what type of equipment your university used in testing out your Vo2Max? I only ask because it can be hard to track unless it's performed in a research setting.
From what I've been told, Vo2Max has very little to do with resting heartrate, but is entirely indicative of how well your body carries oxygen under extreme aerobic deprivation. Using your max and min heartrates shouldn't be all that useful to you, at least from what I understand.
Anecdotally - I've had a teammate (a sub 29 10K guy) perform in the high 60's; aerobically he was a tank, but he wasn't able to hold that "red-line" all that long. Once he hit his aerobic max on the incline treadmill, his body maintained it's oxygen consumption's highest level for 37 seconds before it started to decrease. He was still running just fine at 6 min pace, but his body was not pumping oxygen the same way as it had just a couple minutes before.
We had another teammate, who was aerobically pretty far behind our 10K guy, score a 79. It took him far less time on the treadmill to reach his aerobic max, but once he was there he held it for 3 minutes before he experienced the same oxygen consumption decrease.
Not a ton of takeaways outside of the fact that the higher number doesn't always mean more aerobic fitness. Undoubtedly, our 10K guy would roll over the guy who scored a 79 in anything that required true aerobic fitness - tempos greater than 5 miles - 5K and up - etc. The guy who measured a 79 and the guy who scored a 68 had very similar college careers, albeit in different events.
I will say - I had a teammate rock an 87 and he went on to make a world team in a distance event within the past 10 years. Pretty special to watch someone at that level train on a regular basis.
Good luck with the research!
I’m not sure specifically of all the equipment that was used.
I gave a small blood sample before and after, and got onto a treadmill with an HR strap, an oxygen mask, and was pretty slowly accelerated to what felt like 4:30-4:40 pace until I couldn’t maintain it anymore. They took stuff like HR, blood pressure, height/weight, and all that jazz before as well.
From what I understand, Vo2Max plays the largest factor in races in the 1.5-2.5 mile range, so it’d make sense that you wouldn’t need to have a phenomenal Vo2Max to run some phenomenal long distance times.
It’s interesting what you pointed out about threshold and Vo2Max, because when I was in highschool I noticed the same thing. I feel like I always started hurting pretty early on in longer races, but I could still hold on for longer than those that didn’t, and still have that fifth gear at the end of races. Maybe a higher than average Vo2Max (in highschool) played a role in this.
Many of the watches/apps/fitness trackers start with the Jackson formula and then tweak it with some of their own algorithmic metrics. Garmin licenses FirstBeat technology, or used to the last time I looked years ago. You can read FirstBeat's white paper that cites the non-exercising VO2max formula, Daniels Formula, and others, here:
https://assets.firstbeat.com/firstbeat/uploads/2017/06/white_paper_VO2max_30.6.2017.pdf
I'm not sure Apple has ever put out a White Paper on how they estimate their VO2max. Apple likes to keep their information private, but as you can tell, it's not very accurate. It's for mass appeal, which in the US is a minority of people who are less fit than people like you.