Heart rate based training

In article 9hXfb.683103$YN5.540465@sccrnsc01 said:

I've just recently started working with a heart rate monitor. I bought a few books by Chris
Carmichael to help me figure out how to train with it, and one thing I've been surprised about is
the low intensity he recommends.

For example, I rode my favorite hill climb for the first time with my HRM, and noted that my heart
rate was 92-94% of max for an hour (occasionally it would dip down to about 88%). When Carmichael
was talking about improving LT during climbing, he was prescribing 78-83%, which is a far lower
effort for
me. The 92-94% range about puts me at my limit, and intuitively it seems like that would yeild
greater improvements, but I'm not the exercise physiologist. Is there something wrong with
training at my limit?

Maybe someone else will provide the details, but I'll just say that in order to improve your ability
at your threshold you'll need to do lots of training that is below your threshold. Think of it as
developing the support systems that enable good results at higher intensities. Also, if you relied
soley (or too much) on training at your threshold you'd get physically burned out in 6-10 weeks.

Quoted message said:

By the way, I measured my max on two separate occasions, so I'm pretty sure it's close to being
right. Plus it's quite a bit higher than the 220-age thing so I don't think I've underestimated
it. I'm 34 and the max I measured was 197.

Not unusual.

-WG

"warren" <[email hidden]> wrote in message "]news:[email hidden]...

Quoted message said:

In article 9hXfb.683103$YN5.540465@sccrnsc01 said:

I've just recently started working with a heart rate monitor. I bought a

few

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

books by Chris Carmichael to help me figure out how to train with it,

and

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

one thing I've been surprised about is the low intensity he recommends.

For example, I rode my favorite hill climb for the first time with my

HRM,

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

and noted that my heart rate was 92-94% of max for an hour (occasionally

it

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

would dip down to about 88%). When Carmichael was talking about

improving LT

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

during climbing, he was prescribing 78-83%, which is a far lower effort

for

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

me. The 92-94% range about puts me at my limit, and intuitively it seems like that would yeild
greater improvements, but I'm not the exercise physiologist. Is there something wrong with
training at my limit?

Maybe someone else will provide the details, but I'll just say that in order to improve your
ability at your threshold you'll need to do lots of training that is below your threshold. Think
of it as developing the support systems that enable good results at higher intensities. Also, if
you relied soley (or too much) on training at your threshold you'd get physically burned out in
6-10 weeks.

Right--I don't do that every day. Over the summer I was training at that intensity/volume about once
per week. Other rides would be longer at lower intensities, or about the same time with higher
bursts of intensities. But even at once a week it seems to be above what is recommended.

Shayne Wissler

The point of training is to build up your body to do better on race day. The point of racing is to
do the best you can do. These are different activities.

Training at too high a HR for too many days in a row will not make you better, and will lead to
overtraining. Your body builds up during rest, not during exercise. The point of the training is to
convince your body that it's time to build itself up.

I don't pretend to understand the physiology behind this, but I do know that it works. Very long
periods at moderate heart rate seems to build up the ability to tolerate the later hard interval
workouts. The interval workouts seem to build up the heart stroke volume & reduce the heart rate,
but you won't be able to tolerate them without a proper base of LSD (long slow distance).

You can accomplish a surprising amount of training with intervals at less than max effort. If you
think that you aren't working hard enough, then do more intervals, not greater effort.

I've always been told that even pace is better, and that's probably true for a race, but it doesn't
seem to be the case for training.

Re max heart rate: it doesn't seem to be the constant that some books would lead you to believe.
I've found that -- when rested for several days -- my max heart rate is 5-10 bpm higher than after
several days of hard workouts. The resting HR is also lower by several bpm.

Shayne Wissler said:

I've just recently started working with a heart rate monitor. I bought a few books by Chris
Carmichael to help me figure out how to train with it, and one thing I've been surprised about is
the low intensity he recommends.

For example, I rode my favorite hill climb for the first time with my HRM, and noted that my heart
rate was 92-94% of max for an hour (occasionally it would dip down to about 88%). When Carmichael
was talking about improving LT during climbing, he was prescribing 78-83%, which is a far lower
effort for
me. The 92-94% range about puts me at my limit, and intuitively it seems like that would yeild
greater improvements, but I'm not the exercise physiologist. Is there something wrong with
training at my limit?

By the way, I measured my max on two separate occasions, so I'm pretty sure it's close to being
right. Plus it's quite a bit higher than the 220-age thing so I don't think I've underestimated it.
I'm 34 and the max I measured was 197.

Shayne Wissler

In general, this is the correct approach. There is agreat misconception that one needs to train
hard, or, specifically, spend large amounts of time at threshold to improve it. Clearly, large
volumes (ie, a lot of low intensity training) builds several key "systems" that influence LT,
including capillarization (the more you have the better blood flow to the muscles), increases in
aerobic enzymes, and improved muscular efficiency (for lack of a better term). Intuitively, this
seems counter to what we learned in gym class, "No Pain, no gain!". However, specific high intensity
training helps to "complete the picture", and too much of anything is never a good thing.

Unfortunately, HR based training that is based on HR testing is DOA, and therefore not useful for
prescribing training. As I've stated here before, I still believe HR to be a useful training tool
(power is best) when combined with a number of factors (eg, speed, cadence, perceived exertion...),
except when you're deriving your numbers from HR based tests (ie, Conconi), or even worse max HR
(BTW: Age predicted Max HR pretty useless, as it can vary by as much as 12-20 beats; case in point,
I know two Masters level athletes the same age, one's MHR is over 200, the other is 180).

Chris Harnish

<[email hidden]> wrote in message "]news:[email hidden]...

Quoted message said:

The point of training is to build up your body to do better on race day. The point of racing is to
do the best you can do. These are different activities.

You can accomplish a surprising amount of training with intervals at less than max effort. If you
think that you aren't working hard enough, then do more intervals, not greater effort.

It's very easy to get into a 'more is better' mindset and get your body into a mess. Sure, try
putting the number of intervals up, but if you start getting overtrained, go back down and don't try
again (for a while, at least).

Quoted message said:

I've always been told that even pace is better, and that's probably true for a race, but it
doesn't seem to be the case for training.

Depends what you want to train for; if you're training for a long flat, fairly windless TT (hour
record, not much else I can think of), then even-paced training is probably good. Otherwise, you're
going to be accelerating and changing the pace about in the race, and you'll need to train that way,
some of the time.

Quoted message said:

Re max heart rate: it doesn't seem to be the constant that some books would lead you to believe.
I've found that -- when rested for several days -- my max heart rate is 5-10 bpm higher than after
several days of hard workouts. The resting HR is also lower by several bpm.

That's probably an indication that you're slightly overtraining in your days of hard workouts. Those
numbers don't sound like you need to worry, though.

Peter