Kettlebell Decline in VO2 Max

[thegoldengod]

All,

I use an Apple Watch to track my workouts. Here is a chart of my VO2 Max over the year. Note the big decline.

While I understand that using a fitness tracker like an Apple Watch is not as accurate as taking a true lab test, it is the trend that I am more concerned about.

I was training for a Spartan race and running a lot prior to January on this chart and ran almost every other day.

Since January, I have rarely ran and have practiced S&S with a heavier bell.

Is this decline normal?

This came up because I did a 4mi run and was winded after 2 miles.

 

[Bret S.]

@thegoldengod

I personally would ignore the Apple watch MVO2 readings, they are likely irrelevant for your needs or at least not reliable or even helpful to any significant degree.

As I understand it to make running more efficient you need to run, there's no way around it.

 

[DrFierce]

Unless you have noticed a decline in your performance I would not worry about it. As @Bret S. said it is probably not that accurate.

 

[godjira1]

hi if you have not been doing any E work since January this year, it is perfectly understandable that your VO2 max is down. Heavy S&S has a different adaptation.

The Apple Watch VO2 max values might not be that accurate, a simple Cooper's test should give you a much more accurate result. If the 2 match up, then voila you know the Apple Watch values will be close enough for you to use.

If it truly is 38+ on the VO2 max, I reckon you can easily improve it with a 4 week basebuild/aerobic training program that should see minimal deterioration for 4-5 months. I am assuming you are sub 50 y/o, otherwise healthy etc.

 

[Al Ciampa]

All,

I use an Apple Watch to track my workouts. Here is a chart of my VO2 Max over the year. Note the big decline.

While I understand that using a fitness tracker like an Apple Watch is not as accurate as taking a true lab test, it is the trend that I am more concerned about.

I was training for a Spartan race and running a lot prior to January on this chart and ran almost every other day.

Since January, I have rarely ran and have practiced S&S with a heavier bell.

Is this decline normal?

This came up because I did a 4mi run and was winded after 2 miles.

This is a great example of how instructive it is to focus on things we can’t change.

In order to provide a comment with any substance, I’d need a report of the trends in your performance over the same time period. And since you’re tracking it, also how your HR has changed, if at all, over the same period of time.

Edit: my bad, I misread the OP. Please disregard.

 

[offwidth]

I doubt if your real VO2max has changed. What has possibly changed is your fractional utilization of your VO2max

 

[North Coast Miller]

You're losing some of the adaptive response to activities you stopped doing. Not only normal but to be expected.

You will only get so much carry-over from any training strategy, time to start jogging again or include a session of HIIT once or twice a week if you only need endurance for shorter runs.

 

[thegoldengod]

You will only get so much carry-over from any training strategy, time to start jogging again or include a session of HIIT once or twice a week if you only need endurance for shorter runs.

Simple.

I was hoping to see a WTH effect in running with daily S&S as my sole training, but my body is not good at running. Time to work on it, now that I'm going on more recreational runs!

 

[banzaiengr]

Same but different, what I think you would find is that when you reintroduce running you'll be back to where you were very quickly. I found this when I did less running but was doing 20 rep squats. That first run after not running was hard but I was right back to where I was before in about a week. Of course this was through my 20's, 30's, and 40's and not so true through my 50's.

 

[Steve Freides]

I was training for a Spartan race and running a lot prior to January on this chart and ran almost every other day.

Since January, I have rarely ran and have practiced S&S with a heavier bell.

... I did a 4mi run and was winded after 2 miles.

It makes sense to me that if you ran less, you did less well when testing yourself running.

I think it's reasonable to speculate that the carryover from S&S type practice will be less the longer the distance is.

That is not to say that S&S type practice won't help your running performance but rather to say that S&S type practice can help your running performance if you're doing enough sport-specific - in this case, running - training.

As a general rule, if the goal is perform well at an athletic activity, train that activity mostly.

-S-