What is a good VO2 max?

VO2maximum wrote:

nothing gained wrote:

Except 30m sprint time and vertical leap distance - i.e. measures of explosive power not aerobic capacity - predict 5K times way better than VO2max does.

That's plain goofy...do you have any scientific references to support that? In all my years of research I've never, ever, heard of explosive sprint power & vertical leap ability being predictors of maximum aerobic capicity for the 5k. I really think someone is giving you the business. 😉

"Predict 5K time" (note I said predict 5K time, not predict VO2max) means strength of correlation. Correlation doesn't imply causation, but there are links. On the correlation, VO2max correlates quite poorly with race times (within groups of roughly similar runners. Across the spectrum from coach potato to elite of course it correlates better). Sprint and vertical leap performance however correlate better (much better) with distance performance.

Is it a causal relationship though? Will sprint/plyometric/explosive training - done in order to improve sprint/leap/etc. performance - by itself improve, i.e. "cause", your endurance performance to improve? Yes, it will - there is a causal link. And yes, football & basketball players will do better in distance events than other people with the same VO2max for this reason. They won't necessarily beat you, because you've got other advantages from your distance-speciific training, but they've already got quite a lot of what's needed for good distance running.

vvO2max (minimum velocity that elicits VO2max) is the best predictor (something like 95% correlation with race times) as it combines VO2max with running economy. You could have huge VO2max but shit running form/economy and max out at a slow speed (i.e. big engine but inefficient), or vice versa. Speed at lactate threshold also predicts race times well for similar reasons based on economy.

So economy matters and is a good predictor of performance, and it's best trained at high speed, goal pace or faster e.g. sprint reps and vvO2max. That's one of the links.

I've got most of this from Owen Anderson's Running Science, and I'm summarising it badly here - there's a ton of stuff in the book. He quotes hundreds of studies - just one for example:

Sinnett, A. et al. The relationship between field tests of

anaerobic power and 10-km run performance. Journal of

Strength & Conditioning Research, Vol. 15 (4), pp. 405-412

2001.

He quotes the regression equation from that study that relates vertical jump and 300m performance to 10K time. This equation explains 78% of the variation in 10K times, just based on those two metrics (i.e. the regular correlation coefficient is really high - 88% (sqrt(78%)).

10K time = 57.22 – (5.15 × plyometric-leap distance in meters) +

(0.27 × 300-m time in seconds)

Are they testing people who are already trained as runners?

I went to one of those Fitness Wave places about 5 years ago (in my running prime) and got a body composition via dunk tank test and a VO2 test.

Here's the results they provided, and the subsequent charts showing where my results fit:

For a 43 year old man (then), I had a peak VO2 of 60.2. For a man in his 40's anything from 43.8-48.0 was considered "Excellent," and everything above 48.0 was "Superior." In fact, anything above 56.0 was considered "Superior" for a 13-19 year old male, so I was feeling really good about my 60.2 !!!

Aragon wrote:

The first fallacy is that "nothing gained" referred to "5K times" and you substituted it in your mind to "maximum aerobic capacity", which is a different concept.

Nothing would be gained over superior genetics. Genetics have too strong of an influence over VO2max, running economy & biomechanics. Kiprop could likely run a 3:59 mile in 8th grade wearing untied tennis shoes. Many of us could train for years under the best coaches, even doing those "vertical jumps & explosive sprints" and never break 4:30. All because of genetic differences...nothing new there. In fact, I just saw some genetically gifted runners from Kenya go one-two-three-four in the Bowerman mile yesterday...imagine that.

Aragon wrote:

If you spend your "all years of research" reading the McLaren report and getting excited about OFF-Scores, you fill not find the information..

I thought you only surveiled the EPO threads, ever so ready to pounce on those who believe that EPO is performance enhancing with elites? 😁

FitnessWave wrote:

For a 43 year old man (then), I had a peak VO2 of 60.2.

What are your PRs? If your running economy is about average, should be around 17 5K?

nothing gained wrote:

And yes, football & basketball players will do better in distance events than other people with the same VO2max for this reason. They won't necessarily beat you, because you've got other advantages from your distance-speciific training, but they've already got quite a lot of what's needed for good distance running.

One of the many problems with what you wrote is a statistical problem called "restriction of range." You cited a study whose participants were exclusively "trained runners," and are trying to generalize it to draw conclusions about how football and basketball players would perform in distance events. That's simply wrong.

Similarly, did you know that there's a weak negative correlation between height and scoring in the NBA (i.e. the taller you are, the fewer points you score)? It's true. But generalizing those results outside the NBA population would be a very big mistake. Height only doesn't matter once you assume that everyone is already very, very tall. Similarly, VO2max only doesn't matter for distance running performance once you assume that everybody in the conversation has a high value. At that point, lesser factors like plyometric strength (and many others) emerge.

I believe that the study concluded that if trained equally those with better power and speed would run faster 5k times than those without power or speed

Nothing gained, my PRs are not good. I'm a hobby jogger. I've got 3 Half-marathons under 1:45, and a 5K PR of 21:24.

I only show my VO2 testing scores to add to the conversation.

I've actually found that the accuracy of the VO2max readout is very dependent on what you input as your maximum heart rate. I've had it be off by ~10 points when it assumed my max heart rate was higher than I was able to test to. Once I had my real max heart rate in there it's been a very good predictor for my fitness and useful for setting my expectations for races and workouts.

stats refresher wrote:

Similarly, VO2max only doesn't matter for distance running performance once you assume that everybody in the conversation has a high value. At that point, lesser factors like plyometric strength (and many others) emerge.

I don't think he understands that.

Just Amazed wrote:

stats refresher wrote:

Similarly, VO2max only doesn't matter for distance running performance once you assume that everybody in the conversation has a high value. At that point, lesser factors like plyometric strength (and many others) emerge.

I don't think he understands that.

That was the point I was making ("VO2max correlates quite poorly with race times (within groups of roughly similar runners. Across the spectrum from coach potato to elite of course it correlates better)"). I was typing hastily so probably didn't get it across well.

nothing gained wrote:

That was the point I was making ("VO2max correlates quite poorly with race times (within groups of roughly similar runners. Across the spectrum from coach potato to elite of course it correlates better)"). I was typing hastily so probably didn't get it across well.

That wasn't the point you were originally trying to make. You're back peddling now that someone called you out on that. Btw, those explosive drills & vertical jumps, etc. don't work for some of us Senior runners. Maybe for the young cats out there, but not me - I got hurt trying those stupid excercises!!!

You got called out! wrote:

That wasn't the point you were originally trying to make. You're back peddling now that someone called you out on that.

No, I don't see any disagreement. But I have rather lost the thread with this conversation so let's leave it.

You got called out! wrote:

Btw, those explosive drills & vertical jumps, etc. don't work for some of us Senior runners. Maybe for the young cats out there, but not me - I got hurt trying those stupid excercises!!!

They hurt me too, always the calves. I want to try and make them work though.