From the book club videos, I remember Scott J. talk about identifying when muscular endurance was a limiting factor for athletes by observing interval workouts that would result in the later intervals being both slower AND with a lower heart rate. This made me think of those interpretations for my own workouts, and I was curious about identifying weaknesses or limiting factors from some common patterns in typical intervals.
I think this is a general training theory question so I don’t have any specific type of intervals in mind or even sport. But in my mind I suppose I’m thinking of 4 to 8 intervals of 1 or 2 minutes with equal work and recovery in an amateur without ADS. Here are the patterns I feel like I’ve noticed in my own data and I’m curious about what takeaways I can gather:
1) even or slight increase in HR during each work bout – the athlete is able to complete every interval as prescribed, and the average heart rate for the first and last intervals are the same or within 5-10% of each other, and during the recovery interval the HR drops back to baseline quickly.
2) large increase in HR during each work bout – the athlete is able to complete every interval as prescribed, but the average HR during each work bout is clearly rising, let’s say by 15-20%, between the first and last interval. During the recovery interval, the HR drops back to baseline quickly.
3) large increase in HR during each work bout AND HR is also increasing during the recovery interval. Same as above, except even during the recovery interval, the average HR is increasing by 10-20%.
4) Athlete unable to complete workout as prescribed, but HR is not decreasing. – Similar to the example that Scott J talked about where the athlete is slower each interval, except the HR is just going through the roof during the work periods and lower but still relatively high and increasing for the athlete during the recovery periods until the workout is over or the plug is pulled.
So I have a number of questions – are these common patterns with other athletes? If so, what do they tell us? Are there other patterns that give us clues to our weaknesses? Also, I have yet to experience an interval workout where I’m getting slower AND my HR is not through the roof, though it’s not because I have a ton of ME work – I just think it means I have a different weakness that’s even more glaring for that particular workout (or an illness).