Scott Johnston
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You can have good ankle dorsiflexion and still have good calf stiffness. I would start with ankle dorsiflexion static stretches to get your heels on the ground more when hiking up hills. Having your lower legs on fire on the uphills is not ideal. When muscles relax, blood can flow into them and help with that burning feeling. But not being able to go through a normal range of motion in your ankle, you are keeping these lower leg muscles too tight for too long
Can you get into a deep squat? Butt down close to the floor, heels flat on the floor. Stay there as long as you can. This will help your hips and ankles. You must have good ROM in all your leg joints, or you will put undue stress on other joints.
Jumping rope, two feet at a time, off your toes will help build muscular endurance in the lower legs. Locked knee, toe bounce is another way.
I suggest a two-pronged approach. Increase dorsiflexion ROM and some calf ME work.
Scott
Jeremy:
The Garmin Lactate Threshold estimation will not give the same result as our HR Drift test. The HR drift test is used to determine the aerobic threshold. The Lactate Threshold, as Garmin uses it, is equivalent to our Anaerobic Threshold. If you really want to know your AnT/LT you should conduct our AnT. It’s going to be more accurate. This article will give you more information about these tests https://evokeendurance.com/our-latest-thinking-on-aerobic-assessment-for-the-mountain-athlete/.
I hope this helps.
Scott
Jeremy;
All sustained exercise in the aerobic realm stimulates many adaptations in the working muscle cells, resulting in improved aerobic capacity. I have heard some discussions that glycogen depletion in non-active muscles will also improve aerobic function. But I think the main benefit will occur only in the working muscles. Since the mitochondria are where all the aerobic metabolism occurs, these adaptations that I alluded to take place mainly in the mitochondria. Increased capitalization in the working muscles is a benefit that takes place outside the mitochondria.
In short, z1 and Z2 training improves mitochondrial function (efficiency might not be the correct term as it has several different definitions). Because this intensity is powered mainly by ST muscle fibers, those are the fibers that get the benefit. At higher intensity, faster twitch fibers are used, and those fibers see an increase in their aerobic function (again mainly due to mitochondrial adaptations).
I hope this helps,
Scott
Assaf:
Thanks for writing in with your questions about the ME workouts. You seem to understand the theory of ME training based on your listing of the 3 main principles.
Here are some random thoughts on your questions:
The weighted carry type of ME that you are doing for mountaineering will rarely give you sore legs. Whereas the gym ME will definitely make you sore. So wrecked legs may be too extreme a word to use. I doubt you’d be able to turn around and repeat that workout the next day, right?
Disregard HR for ME workouts. This is in the instructions.
You need to pace yourself since this is about sustained sub-max effort, not a 10min all-out effort. If you were on your knees after 1o minutes I think you are pushing too fast at the start on the stair machine.
The stair machine for 45-60min stair machine sessions will give a better effect than your shorter harder efforts and the less steep hill.
I’m unsure why you are seeing such a high heart rate and breathing. That is very unusual. Normally I would say the pack is too light, but 50% of BW is more than enough for almost anyone to achieve the leg limitation we strive for.
There is some possibility that your aerobic base is not yet as well developed as would be ideal, and this is causing the higher HR and breathing.
Regardless, the ME effect will be there even if you are breathing very hard.
If you use the machine, you should track the vertical distance in each session to see improvement. There should be marked improvement from session to session. If not then your recovery is insufficient.
I hope this helps.
Scott
Andrew:
I think you answered your own question. If you were forced to walk during the AnT test not because of your breathing but because of local leg muscle fatigue, then ME is the limitation for your AnT. You will benefit from adding ME training to your plan. Either Z3 longer hill reps, weighted uphill hikes or the gym ME program will all help this.
Scott
I’m so glad you have found a use outside running for the RunPowerModel. Several of the Evoke coaches are now using it as am I. Because I’m often on very hilly terrain and forced to walk, I have been pleased to see the TSS scores better reflect what I perceive in terms of effort.
Thank you Markus for hopping into this conversation. I wonder if a year we need to add a new section to the forum concerning running with power.
Scott
Josh:
I think this looks quite reasonable regarding keeping up the aerobic base training volume when doing the ME period.
Nice work on figuring this out on your own.
ScottGreat questions, and very cool that you have paid attention to what training seems to work well and which seems too difficult to recover from. I would recommend dropping the gym ME progression and substituting uphill power hiking intervals. They will have their own strong ME training stimulus but in a more sport-specific way and have a stronger cardiac training effect.
We normally find Z2-3 tempo training works very well with fit athletes such as yourself for increasing specific endurance. However, it needs to be controlled in terms of the volume and intensity. And it would also need to be accompanied by only Z1 training and some short speed. 1-2 Z2 to low Z3 tempo workouts in a week have proven very effective with our fittest athletes. Not suggesting you change your training at this point in your cycle. You’ve got something that is working well. I’m tossing that out there for your consideration in the future. Something to try.
Scott
Andrew: Thanks for writing in with your question. This is very unusual to see AeT and AnT so close together. I normally see, in the very aerobiacally fit, a spread of 5-8%.
From your consistent historical data, I would say you have done a good job on the tests with only one possible point: Have all your AnT tests been uphill at the same grade? This could matter because running uphill requires more muscular endurance. So, local muscular fatigue in the legs could potentially limit your HR on the uphills. The steeper the hill, the more the ME and local muscular fatigue effect. A 9% grade may produce this effect depending on your specific leg ME. I hope this makes sense.
It is entirely possible to have thresholds this close together for a person will a very well-developed aerobic base. A good test of whether you’ve nailed these zones is: Can you train daily at AeT (165-168) and recover well within 24 hours? Or would it be too fatiguing to train your normal volume at that intensity? With AeT and AnT only 3-4% different, I would expect that training in Z2 would not be possible long-term without risking overtraining. Z2 is just too dang hard, too close to your maximum sustainable effort to be sustained day after day after day.
I hope this helps.
Great question for which I have no answer. I have asked several exercise scientists why in some aerobically deficient people, ventilation does not correlate with AeT. So far, none of them knew why. I’m curious about this too and when/if I find out I will let it be known.
Scott
It might be that this newfound ability to push to new intensities is what is causing the cramping. It could be muscle fatigue that is causing it. I’d try introducing some higher-intensity running to build more specific endurance. If you’ve not been doing any intensity, start with strides only 10-20 sec at a fun, fast pace, not a full sprint. I’d add hill sprints if you are not already doing them. Lastly, I would add tempo runs in Z3. Start with something like 2×10-15minutes with a 2-3 min walking recovery between. Work the tempo run volume up to 60min over a could of months. This will build a very specific type of muscular endurance that might help the cramps.
Scott
The test protocol is not critical. The goal is to provide a small load/stress and see how your body responds. It could be done on a stationary bike. Walking on a treadmill. The main thing is to be consistent in the application. Like, step up and down at the same rate for the same time and then sit down and measure your HR in a minute.
There is no way to compare other people’s data and yours. You need to establish a baseline when you are rested by testing a few times in a week. This will show the HR drop after 1 minute when rested. When the training load is high, you should be able to see a correlation between 1 min HR drop and fatigue state. If your normal 1min HR drop is 50bpm when rested, but later you see a drop of 30bpm, and on that day you have a poor workout due to fatigue, you have learned something from the test. The more data you collect, the more reliable it will be.
Heikki Rusko developed what he called the orthostatic recovery test to be used in a similar way. With a recording HR monitor, you lie quitely for 5 minutes, then immediately stand up. Your HR data will record the lowest HR, the highest standing, and the HR 1min after standing.
These all measure the balance between the sympathetic and parasympathetic nervous systems. These were more common before HRV became so ubiquitous in HR monitor watches. But I honestly think these tests are more reliable. They just take more work on your part than an HRV test.
Scott
Good question.
There is nothing magical about nose breathing. It can be a good way to get you close to and identify the intensity of your aerobic threshold. In your case, you had no upward HR drift starting at 126. I’d suggest retesting starting at 130. It is not necessary to nose breathe during that test.
I hope this helps.
Scott
Great question. Thanks for asking.
Ski touring is great aerobic base training…….provided the gear is not too heavy or trail-breaking too deep to make every workout into an ME session. You’ll know this if your legs are too shot to do again today what you did tomorrow. 1-2 of these a week, even if they slip more to the ME end of the endurance scale, is fine if you have adequate easy aerobic base between.
I hope this helps,
Scott
Thanks for writing in with your question.
I’m not a doc, but I am 69 and have undergone many significant medical set back and surgeries, mostly orthopedic repairs for injuries. All of them required a lot of sedentary recovery time with the concomitant loss of fitness. The first of these took place at 26yrs and the last one at 65. The most important observation is that the older I got, the harder the recovery became, the more fitness I lost and the slower I was to return to the same level as pre-surgery.
I do not know how the anxiety factors in other than to say: It sure didn’t help the physical stress side of things. But on the physical side: The single biggest hit to fitness during bed rest is to aerobic metabolism. Studies I put in the first book, Training for the New Alpinism, showed a 50% drop in the aerobic enzyme Cytochrome-C after five days of bed rest. In both books, I recommend 1 day of easy aerobic work for every lost day of training due to illness or injury. It takes a lot of energy to heal, and you’ve been through a major traumatic experience. Be patient, be consistent, be gentle, and your fitness will return. The time frame will be months to years, not days to weeks. Four years after my second knee replacement, I am still seeing fitness/strength gains in that leg.
I hope this helps.
Scott
