How To Train VO2 Max

Topics covered in this episode:

• What is VO2 max?
• How much can you increase VO2 max?
• What type of intervals you should use to influence VO2 max
• Extensive vs intensive training
• Example VO2 max training weeks
• Common mistakes athletes make with VO2 max intervals
• When in the season to build your VO2 max

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Episode Transcription:

Please note that this is an automated transcription and may contain errors. Please refer to the episode audio for clarification.

Adam Pulford (00:06):

Training your VO two max is pretty simple, but it’s not easy. The simplicity is this. When you train properly, you do these intervals really hard. And then you take recovery periods. The hard part. Well, the intervals themselves, they are really hard, but the other hard part is centered around questions like, well, how hard is hard? How many intervals should I do? How long are the rest periods? What’s the exact intensity or power that I should be doing. And what the heck is VO two max. Anyway, we’ll cover all of that in more on today’s episode. So just a reminder in a few disclaimers, this is part two of a three-part how to series where the first bar, we talk about how to build FTP. This episode is focused on how to build VO two max. And finally the final episode is how to build anaerobic capacity view.

Adam Pulford (01:06):

Two training is not the only thing to consider, obviously. And I, and I talked about that in the FTP episode with FTP. That’s not the only thing, but we’re isolating these elements down to clearly identify when and how we work on developing these, these aspects in an athlete. In fact, if you don’t have a solid aerobic base training threshold or training VO, two max is not going to be fully maximized. And, you know, I’ve covered this rationale in previous episodes. So you can go back and, and look up Tim [inaudible] in some of these other like number 46, number 48, but training to a peak performance is a progressive approach. And it should be done that way. This is, this is identified in established in, in many research and, and this is how we all coach. So, um, be progressive with it, go back and look at some of these episodes, but just want to throw that out there.

Adam Pulford (02:05):

Also throughout this series and today’s episode, I pull on facts and resources from a variety of places. And I site on our landing page where some of this is coming from mentors like Tim [inaudible], Andy Coggin, Dean college, and the rest of our CTS coaches have all contributed in some form or fashion either I reach out to them before some of the episodes are in pulling on, uh, stuff that we’ve collaborated on in the past, uh, deepened my brain. So I borrowed terms and ideas from these great coaches, as well as I use the WKO five software in training peaks for some extra bonus content that, uh, will be on the YouTube version of the show. So if you want to see visuals and see the percentages and all that other kind of stuff that I’m talking about here, I suggest hopping over to YouTube. Maybe after you listen to this and just search for the train ride podcast.

Adam Pulford (02:58):

And you’ll, you’ll find me there. Okay. So to set everything up properly, I want to revisit some of the basic physiology that we were, that we covered in episode one, if you recall, there’s three energy systems in our human physiology, and that is the ETP PCR system, the glycolytic system and the aerobic system, the ATP system is used for really fast movements. So one to five seconds super fast, okay. And ATP is used all the time, uh, just like oxygen in the aerobic system. Uh, but our bodies use that for different things, but in particular, really fast movements. Okay. Uh, the glycolytic system uses glycogen for the primary fuel source. It’s for heart efforts as well. We’re talking six seconds all the way out to 60 minutes at max. So you can see that. I mean, if you think about the training that you do, you’re really always just training the glycolytic energy system with most of the intervals that you’re doing, which is why we focus a lot on that.

Adam Pulford (03:59):

And today with the VO two max, uh, training, we’ll be again talking about the glycolytic system. Now the aerobic system uses oxygen for the primary fuel source, and this is the foundation for everything that we build upon. And those are really long rides in that zone to endurance building capacity. For more on that I talk about in the previous episode, and we might even do another future forward episode about how to build your aerobic base further. But for this episode, let’s focus on VO two max. So what is VO two max view two max is the maximum amount of oxygen an athlete can use during a specific duration of intense exercise. It’s measured in two ways. One is a relative number and the other is an absolute number first for the relative number that’s in milliliters per kilogram per minute. And this, this is normally what athletes and coaches are talking about when you, when we go in and then you have the kind of that individual measurement of your VO two and its relative because it takes into account your body weight or your mass.

Adam Pulford (05:12):

The other way is the absolute measurement of VO two max. And this is expressed as liters per minute, liters of oxygen per minute, specifically. And the reason why that is an absolute is because it doesn’t take into consideration your body weight. You’ll come across both of those measurements when you’re reading research papers and reading stuff online. But just so you know, that is the difference between the two. If you recall, from our quick physiology course from the last, uh, episode that aerobic metabolism is crucial for regenerating ATP or fuel for the body to use for all things, especially during exercise, to simplify things, the greater, the amount of auction that you can bring into your body. The more fuel you have to utilize thus allowing for greater maximum performance. Another point is VO two max is not genetically set people get this wrong a lot because, uh, historical, um, uh, physiology and the thing was that it was mostly genetically said, what we now know is that it’s a very trainable, it’s 20% trainable.

Adam Pulford (06:23):

In fact, it’s 80% genetic, which means that an untrained athlete can, can increase their view to max by up to 20%, which is pretty incredible if you think about it. So don’t get into don’t fall into that category of people that thinks that, oh, my VO two is what it is. I’m not going to be able to change it. Therefore I’m not going to train it. You’re missing out on a huge chunk of your performance training. Now I use tools, like I said, uh, like WKO five and laboratory testing to either model or measure my athletes VO two max throughout a season. I track progress and I get insights on how and what we should be training more or less of. So this is a very valuable, um, aspect to look at in your training. Now, when I talk about view to power, I refer to the power needed to train your VO two max, pretty simple.

Adam Pulford (07:19):

Right? Okay. But let me explain why typically this view to power is known as zone five. If you’re using CTS or training peaks, methodologies, and assuming that you set up your training zones properly from a done field test, which I laid out in part one, the RPE of this interval is nine to 10 out of 10. So if a max effort is 10, this is a notch below, or going up to that number. So typically, so how long are these things? So typically we’re looking at two to five minute, I’ll get more detailed later. Um, and two to five minutes in duration, and we’re looking at a low and high end of a range or a zone. Okay. So overall these are really hard intervals and they’re not super short and they’re not super long. Okay. So as long as you stay in that zone five, you’ll be doing the power needed to influence your VO two max.

Adam Pulford (08:17):

Okay. I’ll keep on expanding on this as we go. I like to make things really simple, but for a minute, let me confuse you for just a bit to explain some of my rationale of how I coach and how I work with an athlete on developing their VO two max. First, I’m going to explain to you how VO two power and how view two max are slightly different. VO, two max again, refers to the oxygen uptake at high intensity VO. Two power is the power that you’re doing to elicit that oxygen uptake. I see athletes that either can’t do the high end power in order to train VO two max properly. And I see athletes who can’t hold the power long enough to train VO two max properly. Therefore I split these training concepts in two ways when I’m organizing training first VO, two power training, second VO, two max training.

Adam Pulford (09:20):

Now, now that I’ve confused, you let me, unconfuse you by explaining how to think about these in familiar concepts that we’ve already covered in previous episodes. Let’s go back to this. This idea of intensive versus extensive training intensive training is simply increasing the power that you can produce for a certain duration. Okay? So call it a peak five minute power. If we do intensive training, we want to just increase that power that you can do for five minutes for extensive training. You’re simply lengthening the duration that you can hold a certain power. So come back to this five minute peak power. If you have a five minute peak power of say 300 Watts and you train and train and train, and we want to extend that out of six or seven minutes, you would then take that same 300 watt and try to lengthen the time that you can hold that in that too would be a performance increase because you couldn’t do 300.

Adam Pulford (10:25):

Your max was 300 for five minutes. If you can then do it for six minutes, you improved so intensive and extensive. I covered this in the threshold or in the FTP episode as well, and the same rules and same concepts apply here. When we’re talking VO two max, for those watching on our YouTube channel, uh, I’ve got some slides up now that will help explain this a bit further. When we’re talking about intensive training at VO two, or that zone five, this is the intensity. This is the intensity that helps train the force output and the muscular system, so that you’re better able to hold power. When you transition to the longer intervals, I use two to three minute interval durations and sometimes 90 seconds at the upper end to zone five, to work on the power output and the power for repeatability. So that you’ll hold up better for main sets.

Adam Pulford (11:26):

When we get into the VO two max interval sessions, this does not train your view to max, to its fullest, but there’s a larger amount of string going on the peripheral muscles. Okay? So you’re really causing a lot of stream going on there. Okay. But there’s not, you’re not spending so much time in that that maximum aerobic state to really max out the cardiovascular system. I hope that’s clear when we moved to extensive VO to training or riding longer at the lower end of your zone, five, these are better fit for what actually increase or expand your VO two max, because they’re still intense. They’re still really hard, but you’re now going longer in long enough to get the cardiovascular and the ventilate ventilation response needed to move the needle on your VO. Two, I use three to five minute interval durations, sometimes up to six and training at the lower to mid range of your zone five.

Adam Pulford (12:30):

And here you can see, uh, on that YouTube version of where I’m talking. So now let’s take a look at a few examples of intensive and extensive VO, two max training. When we’re talking about the view to power intervals, the range is that zone five or 106 to 121% of your FTP. Again, everything hinges off that FTP. I simply tell the athlete to ride at the upper end of the zone for these sessions. If I’m working with an athlete and prescribing their training, and I have a really good historical data, I’ll actually, I’ll actually type in higher percentages in that could be anywhere between like one 15 up to 1 25, maybe just to like stretch them and really work on that intensive power, uh, demands. Okay. But from a general purpose, and if you’re a DIY, uh, coach athlete here, uh, start with this 1 0 6 2 1 21, just reach for the upper end. If you’re feeling good, uh, you can actually go maybe five Watts, uh, higher or so, but you still want to get through these main sets. You want to aim in four. That means set. You want to aim for 15 to 20 minutes of total time and zone.

Adam Pulford (13:44):

And what that, what that means is, so for the example, workouts are like an eight by two minutes with two to three minutes recovery in between, okay. Eight by two equals 16 minutes. And that’s where I’m coming up with the total time in zone. Okay. Now the recovery periods are at least one-to-one meaning if you do hard intervals for two minutes, I want you taking at least two minutes of recovery. When I’m working with an athlete who hasn’t done these for the first or who are doing this for the first time, I sometimes encourage them to take an extra minute or two, whatever it takes to produce really good power. And that’s important because that high end power is the goal. That is the main point of these intensive VO to power intervals. You want to work on producing high quality power at the upper end of the range to overload the system.

Adam Pulford (14:39):

You can do these on a Hills or flats, or you can do them inside or whatever you have to work with that percentage of FTP or the perceived effort of nine going on 10 is, is the main goal. So harder is better, but not so hard that you can’t finish the main set. Like I was saying, you’re working at the upper end of the range and it’s a hard workout. Sometimes you need to fail forward on this. What I mean when I say fail forward is if you just start with eight by two, because you heard it on this podcast and you reach for 121% of your FTP on these, and you only get through six of the intervals in the rate in that range. And you’re just struggle bus to hit that, those final two. I say, keep going in those final two, don’t pull the plug, keep going.

Adam Pulford (15:30):

But if all you got was six good ones, you’re now overloaded. You’re tired, you’re fatigued. And that is the point of training. Remember that you trained to get tired, then you rest. Then you get better. This is how it works. Okay. So at that point you go home, you get some good food. You rest, well, you sleep in the next session or in the next week. When you come back to these intervals, again, you try to do one more interval where you try to go a minute longer than you did before and you move forward from that failure point in order to achieve something that you didn’t do before. And that is progressive training. Now, some of the specifics on extensive VO, two max intervals here, we’re looking at again, zone five, 106 to 121% of your FTP. So you’ll notice the same zone on is tell athletes to hug the lower to mid end of the zone with the goal of accumulating more time in this zone.

Adam Pulford (16:33):

Total time zone should be 15 to 25 minutes. Sometimes up to 30 minutes, if I have an experienced fit athlete, recovery periods are, uh, of one-to-one is, is sufficient here. So some example, workouts are five by four minutes with four minutes recovery in between, or sometimes five by five minutes with five minutes recovery in between, et cetera. The goal is to extend the time that you can ride at zone five and eventually increase your VO two max by training your body to take in more oxygen at that high cardiovascular response, you can do these on any terrain, as long as it’s consistent. Some listeners may have long climbs that they can do them on so that they’re not super steep, but good, long climbs that are consistent. Sometimes you’ll have longs, a flat stretches or loops where you can do the intervals. And then some may have to go inside to get that full five minutes full tilt.

Adam Pulford (17:28):

Okay. Either way. The percentage of that FTP is a key aspect and longer is better here. Okay. You’re still going hard, but pace accordingly so that you can get through each interval of the main set, a couple of talking points, because I know that there’s some very fine lines of what I’m talking about between VO two power and VO two max training. And this, this is a little bit of maybe my, um, particularities and also some of the coaches I work with, but you know, that that upper end versus the lower end can be as much as a third or, you know, as, as little as 30 and is up to 60 watt difference between the two. Okay. And when you’re already above threshold and what we call it, like on the limit, you know, 30 to 60 watt, that’s going to be a big difference.

Adam Pulford (18:16):

Okay. And ultimately, depending on the specificity of the athlete or their strengths and weaknesses, uh, they may not be able to handle really high end power just yet. So you have to, you have to acknowledge that either in yourself or with your athlete and get them to produce really good power before they can handle longer power intervals. I want you to continually come back to that intensive versus extensive training concept, uh, to help you understand how we’re setting up the training here. Okay. And finally, just a quick summary on all that is training VO. Two power is a focus on the pure power production at the high end of zone five. And the athlete that helps make the athlete more durable for the longer we go training VO, two max is the focus on the cardiovascular output that will actually increase the amount of oxygen that you can take in. It’s very important to know the distinction so that you can do the right training for the desired outcome of your own training.

Adam Pulford (19:21):

And I would say that the most, one of the more common mistakes of these is athletes go too hard. And they think that they’re doing VO two training, but they’re not going long enough to elicit the VO two response. So I see a lot of athletes doing one minute VO, two max intervals, and they’re not actually doing VO two max intervals. You’re doing VO two power work. Okay. Conversely, people will do five minute efforts, but it’s maybe just a notch above threshold. And they call that VO two. So two. And it’s not to say that you’re not touching on, you know, those aspects of training. I’ll admit. I mean, you’re, you’re, you are influencing them, but to do it right, to do it properly and get the most out of it, here are the specifics, okay. Going through all of that, now it’s time to plan your plan.

Adam Pulford (20:11):

Ideally, you start building your VO two max after a solid base period. And after a solid threshold period, as I covered in part one of this series, it doesn’t really matter. Again, if you choose intensive or extensive first, if you’re early in the season, I choose whatever is a limiter or weakness to develop. First. If you’re close to a racing block, choose what’s more specific to the event. And usually that’s intensive. If you don’t know, I advise simply starting this time with intensive, then move to extensive again, because that rationale of producing really good power in order to hold the long power. When it’s time for training blocks, I’ll walk you through what are good starting points for training, uh, for training in this view to, uh, interval or zone five realm. So let’s, let’s begin with intensive. First. I advised two to three weeks in this video to power or intensive focus block that adds up to about four to six sessions total, uh, maybe up to eight, depending on how you, how you lay it up, how you structure it, and then you’ll have one week easy to recover.

Adam Pulford (21:30):

So if you notice I’m, I’m, I’m seeing two to three weeks of focused training. That’s really not a lot. That’s a short cycle compared to say the threshold block that we were talking about in episode one. That’s because these are really intense. Okay. The higher, the intensity, the shorter, the cycles I normally go, especially with working with an athlete for the first time or advising a general population to go and do, because it’s in the reason is the risk of overdoing is quite high. Okay. You can either cause too much fatigue or you just run out too much to the point where, uh, the training is just not as effective. So again, quality or quantity here. And, you know, I’d rather you do two weeks, well, rather than a third week, just like very medium. And when I’m working with an athlete, I’m always scanning, especially in these two blocks, I’m always scanning to see how they’re holding that power in what the comments are in training peaks to say, well, are they just blowing out?

Adam Pulford (22:35):

Do we need to, um, do we need to not proceed with more VO two or, you know, are they getting stronger as they go, okay. But this all in approach being very on very high quality, that’s what we’re talking about. If you think about two to three weeks in two sessions per week, you know, again, that’s only four to six sessions total, but it can, as I said before, it can move the needle, uh, for that video to power that we’re talking about for the extensive block we’re talking, I’ll go three to four weeks on that. And that adds up, you know, with two sessions per week to about six to eight sessions, total, sometimes up to 10, if I have an experienced athlete. And of course I’ll follow that up with one easy week, uh, to get the fatigue out of the system. And this is kind of the more of the normal three to four week build a cycle of that athletes should should use, or I shouldn’t say should use that.

Adam Pulford (23:31):

Normally we have found to, to produce good results. Now with that said, these are still super aggressive intervals. So again, I’m always scanning to make sure that he’s holding up as we go. Now, a few caveats is I don’t hold hard and fast to this as I kind of just even tripped over my own words as I was describing, because my own methods are very individualized with my athletes, but these are very good. Um, these are very good bullet points if you’re looking to set up your own training. Okay. And you know, maybe, you know, a few other things about the caveats is, you know, maybe you miss one of the key workouts in week one, you know, I simply will then push that to week two to make sure that we’re hitting it and that could extend the week. Um, at the same time, maybe you just like crush, you know, the, the, the sessions so much that you can just get a recovery block and then move on to the extensive.

Adam Pulford (24:28):

Okay. Also if I’m training VO two only, meaning I’ve got a lot of time to work with before we race or do anything, I may then cycle to another intensive block of two to three weeks to build on that. Um, that VO two power before I move into the extensive period. So this would be somebody who maybe can’t produce the VO two power very well, and we just need to spend more time doing that. Okay. So all cycle through until I see what I’m S what I want to see out of that, and that’s just really high quality power over and over again, so that I know that they will be more durable as we move forward.

Adam Pulford (25:12):

Additionally, uh, if we’re coming into a racing season, I would probably start with extensive before going into intensive, like I said before, and that’s because that’s more of a specific lead into a race period. Okay. And I really want to develop the VO two max, so that it’s there for the athlete when they need it cyclist or mountain bike. It works really well to do it in that progressive matter. Finally, we’re looking at a shorter time period to build up your view to relative to FTP as I covered in episode one, okay. We’re looking at six to 12 weeks as opposed to that, like 12 to 14 weeks in total. So again, the more intense you go, the, the quicker, the response from the body and the less total time that you really need to get that ability up there. And so now that we’ve covered the training blocks, let’s establish your training pattern or your rhythm, uh, covered the importance of training pattern rhythm in an, in depth in episode number 46 with Tim Cusick.

Adam Pulford (26:23):

If you haven’t listened to that, I suggest doing that because it does clarify some aspects that we’re going to talk about now. And if you are watching on YouTube, go ahead and check out this, um, these couple of slides that I’m posting now, because I really thought it was important to show how I actually build these workouts on training peaks. So let’s first start with intensive. I like to use a polarized training modality during this period, and that’s because these intervals in the, in these days are so intense. Uh, I also, if you want to learn more about, uh, the polarized training and check out episode 48 with Dr. Stephen Seiler, and to get that rationale, it’s really important. It’ll help you bring the rationale of contrast to, uh, why we’re doing what we’re doing with a VO two session. So you can see that I’m coming into each video, two interval session fresh for those listening what’s going on here.

Adam Pulford (27:25):

And what I built out is Monday kind of a typical rest day. Tuesday’s the VO two intensive day or VO two, a power day Wednesdays zone to endurance. Thursday is VO two intervals again, Friday is zone one recovery, and then Saturday I have group ride or endurance as an option. Sunday is just pure zone to endurance. So that’s the rhythm. Okay. That’s the pattern basically Tuesday, Thursday hard, uh, with kind of easier moderate on Wednesday and definitely easy on Friday and completely off on Monday. So just a very contrasted days that are going on. And this allows for a full 48 hours between intense exercise sessions so that the body can fully replenish glycogen, plasma electrolytes, and any mental fatigue caused by these intervals. Quick note on, on that, I say mental fatigue or cognitive fatigue. And I don’t know, I don’t know a great way of measuring this, especially remotely right now, but it’s real.

Adam Pulford (28:34):

Okay. What we’re actually talking about is motivation to perform or the absence of mental stress. And in that mental stress can come from so many different realms, right. You know, from, from work stress to relational stress, to, uh, complex systems stresses, whether whatever you’re working on, be it a podcaster or something that work, but, you know, basically your, your mind can be fatigued just like your body can be fatigued. Okay. VO to interval training causes a lot of fatigues for the both systems. And I find that contrasting days with just, you know, an easy day in between alleviates that cognitive or mental stress in, uh, in conjunction with the physical stress for better overall training. Okay. Now you can still do block training. Like we were talking about in that, uh, in episode one where you’re going, you know, hard days back to back and sometimes back to back to back.

Adam Pulford (29:35):

But I will say this is a very aggressive way of building VO two power or building VO, two max, if you back, or if you block up days like that, you’re going to have to block up recovery. Otherwise you’re getting get blown out pretty quick. Uh, in in fact, I did this, um, with an athlete recently and I blocked it up. I wanted aggressive and, and we got through like we too. And she’s like, man, is there a reason for doing this? I’m really tired. That was like the comment on train piece. I’m like, oh man, I did not fully explain what I’m doing. So of course had call her up, explain my rationale. And she’s like, okay, now I get, I just need more recovery. And that’s how the coach athlete, uh, communication works. But it’s a great example of how it can cause a lot of fatigue versus slotting in an easy day in between.

Adam Pulford (30:27):

Now let’s look at a few example weeks of extensive. And again, you can see this on, um, on the YouTube version. And for those just listening, where, where I’m looking here again is basically Mondays that rest day Tuesday is the hard interval day. And there, you can see the four minute interval durations five by four minutes with four minutes, recovering between Wednesday is the endurance day. Thursday is another hard day with four by four minutes of recovery in between. And then Friday is recovery miles, Saturday, option of group ride or endurance Sunday, again, a zone to endurance, same thing for the following week. And it just builds on itself five by five on Tuesday, five by four on Thursday, and the same pattern throughout the week. I give, I give an endurance both of those days, just, just to make sure that I have contrasted training because sometimes a group ride can be really intense.

Adam Pulford (31:28):

You know, that’s the kind of the third hard day per week. And if I’m doing a lot of time in zone or just really intense VO, two training, I’m not going to hit a group ride every single weekend. I’m going to change it up as we go. And that’s to again, offset some of that physical as well as cognitive fatigue. So the athlete doesn’t think that they always have to be on and or that it doesn’t build up in the system as much, again, polarized training modality works here again. We’re so, you know, we’re still in zone five, we’re just hugging the lower end of the range here. The intervals are two to three minutes longer than they were in the intensive phase. Okay. And I might’ve even skipped over that intensive, but again, reminder two to three minutes total during intensive, maybe even as short as 90 seconds and then extensive, we’re looking at four to five minutes, some words up of six minutes of the athlete can handle it.

Adam Pulford (32:24):

That subtle difference between 106% in 121%. Let’s talk about that for just a second. The example that I have here, and I’ll pull up another slide YouTube, just to show, and this is just showing an athlete who has a FTP of around 300 Watts, and then it shows their zones in particular, it shows zone five, and I have that highlighted and there, you can see the low end of the zone is right around three 18 or 3 2320 Watts at 106% of their FTP. And that’s what I would tell this athlete to hug for the extensive view to max training. Then you see at the upper end or 121% is 360 Watts. And that is what I’m going to tell his athlete to target for intensive training. And you look at that that’s 40 Watts again, and go back to generally, it’s 30 to 61 spread between the two.

Adam Pulford (33:22):

And that is a great visual example of how, you know, the difference between each edge of the range and why we’re targeting one end versus the other relative to what we’re trying to get out of this. Now I use models and WKO five to ensure that the power efforts we’re doing during a session is giving the proper view to response to the system. I don’t have a slide of this, but it’s, it’s, it’s something that I use just to verify and double check. And I’d say when you’re at the upper end of the range in ind, assuming that you have, you know, current body weight in their current FTP and things like this, um, it models it out really well. And when you’re at the upper end of that range, it’s about, you’re utilizing 90 to a hundred percent of that VO two max, sometimes over if you’re overreaching and when you’re hugging the lower end, you’re right around 85 to 90, 95% of that VO two max.

Adam Pulford (34:17):

So again, it’s a tight tight window, but I verify that using these models in the software to make sure that we are moving the needle. So as long as you’re in that zone five, you’re still going to get the benefit of VO two max. Okay. The thing here is knowing why you’re doing the intervals and the interval durations of what you’re doing and understanding, or just having a simple plan of what you’re trying to develop. So now it’s time to sum this up and bring this home, uh, for those on YouTube, I’ve actually got a summary slide in there. And then for everyone listening, I’m going to read these bullet points off. Um, and again, just to, just to kind of package up everything that we talked about. So VO two max is a maximum amount of oxygen. An athlete can use during intense exercise.

Adam Pulford (35:11):

The O two power is a power output measured in wattage needed to train VO two max. We can build VO two power in two ways, intensively or extensively, it’s best to know your current threshold so that you can set your own individual training zones before starting on a program to train plan out your training ahead of time. So you can stay focused on why as well as what you’re doing in your training. Additionally, if you want to plan and build your CO2 power and your VO two max, you can find training programs specifically for this, uh, on training peaks, uh, built by me. You can just go to train peaks.com search for my name. Also, if this really excites you and you want to get more into it, I suggest trying out the CTS membership where you’ll get fully built plans based around your goal events and specific physiology, or heck you can hire a coach if you’re super into this.

Adam Pulford (36:08):

And I know again, shameful plug, but I will admit in, in be honest with you, that’s the fastest way that you can educate yourself on how to do this. Also, it’s a great way to figure out problems as they arise, because they always do. We’re humans, we’re filled with problems and, uh, self included. So, but someone to help you navigate those problems is, is really important. Okay. Cause that’s that individual aspect of it. Also, you might, um, you know, by doing that, you might find out, uh, having someone there in your hip pocket when life goes sideways, it can be pretty darn worth it. Okay. So that’s, that’s it for today. These solo episodes are always a bit more challenging for me. They actually take longer to produce and put together than most of the interview shows that I do. And that’s because I’ve really tried to have specific numbers in methods and concepts that I’ve mentioned in previous episodes and that we can build upon so that you can learn as we go. I wanted to show you today how to build VO to power and how that influences VO two max, and ultimately equip you our listeners with the tools that you need to develop your highest potential in your athletic goals. Thanks again for listening and be sure to come back to part three, how to build anaerobic capacity that should launch here in another couple of weeks until then train hard train smart train, right?