Watts Doc #23: Training Your VO2max, and Why Not Rønnestad 30/15 Intervals

7/20/2020

Empirical Cycling Podcast · Watts Doc #23: Training Your VO2max, and Why Not Rønnestad 30/15 Intervals

This episode is the focal point of the previous VO2max episodes. We take the physiology from the previous episodes and use it to find easy ways to improve the effectiveness of any VO2max interval set. Ways to change your cadence, interval times, rest times, and interval intensities are discussed. Then we take apart a Ronnestad study on 30/15s and put it in context of VO2max and other fitness adaptations. We conclude with a training philosophy discussion on the physiology of true long term VO2max improvements.

Show Notes
Haematological rather than skeletal muscle adaptations contribute to the increase in peak oxygen uptake induced by moderate endurance training
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/26282186/

Cycling cadence alters exercise hemodynamics
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/8775571/

Superior performance improvements in elite cyclists following short-interval vs effort-matched long-interval training
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/31977120/

9 Comments

Dave Krenik

7/22/2020 08:43:35 pm

Great episode - thanks. I appreciate y'all showing the "application" aspect after the VO2max theory.
One of my takeaways from this episode is that VO2max training could be fairly unstructured as long as one goes hard enough at higher cadences - correct?

Kolie

7/22/2020 08:51:52 pm

You're exactly right. It can indeed be unstructured!

Lenn

7/25/2020 06:56:09 pm

Hi, thanks for this great insight!

How crucial is the high cadence to this theory? Maybe I need to listen again, but for me, I breathe the hardest going uphill. No question, I would have to basically sprint to get that kind of breathing on a flat. So I am wondering if I should do VO2 sessions uphill because of the breathing, but obviously the cadence is usually much lower going up.

7/25/2020 08:19:54 pm

Hi Lenn, this is a good one. I'm going to add it to the listener questions episode, which should be coming out early to mid next week.

Tom Field

7/26/2020 10:26:38 pm

I have to say that the first thing that came to mind regarding increasing preload chronically, is that I wonder if it would lead to right heart dilitation and subsequent arrythmias

7/27/2020 12:21:46 pm

I'm not a doctor so I can't speak to anything on this subject with any authority, but my impression from reading the literature is that chronic overload without a recovery period, such as in hypertension can lead to maladaptive hypertrophy. Many of the papers I read made distinctions between athletic, adaptive hypertrophy and pathological hypertrophy.

Kevin

7/28/2020 03:39:36 am

Thanks for some interesting episodes. I understand the rationale behind the approach, but does training a these higher cadences with consequent lower power output translate to more power at realistic cadences? After all we pedal with our legs, not our ventricles!

Cheers

Pierre

7/29/2020 10:55:16 am

Hi Kolie,
Loved all those episodes on VO2max, thanks for all the research.

Two questions if I may :

1) I understand high cadence for cycling, do you see a possible equivalent for running (which also uses large enough muscles to achieve VO2max but varying cadence is not that easy !) ?

2) Also you said in a previous episodes limiters of VO2max are mostly heart & blood : does that mean I can focus on improving my VO2max in cycling only (let's say for example because it's more efficient to do high cadence cycling efforts to improve VO2max than hard efforts in running which does not offer the possibility to increase cadence for a given speed, or let's say I hate to push myself hard in running because it's hard or I get injured easily, etc.); or the opposite work on VO2max in running but not in cycling. It seems from listening to your podcasts I might need to be sport specific when working FTP, muscular endurance, sprinting but maybe I don't need to be specific for VO2max ? But then you also said you still give 40/20 for example to your athletes but NOT with a main goal in mind to develop VO2max, so maybe VO2max type effort can have benefits in a sport specific way but not for VO2max ?
Not sure I'm clear with that second question ;-) .

Thanks again !
Pierre

Kolie Moore

8/3/2020 10:58:28 am

Hi Pierre!

I see a possible equivalent for running, but only in theory as I haven't looked deeply into this aspect of running physiology. As you state, it can be difficult to vary cadence in this manner.

I think we answered many of these questions in the listener questions episode just posted (WD#24), but for heart focused adaptations one can definitely use other modes of training. This is a definite benefit of training concurrently in different sports; sometimes you must choose specificity, but other times we can find the same adaptation with less injury! I'm not certain if running or cycling can cause more adaptation for a given workload, but certainly one can't adapt if injured.

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Watts Doc #23: Training Your VO2max, and Why Not Rønnestad 30/15 Intervals

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