Training Baselines

On Tuesday morning at 9 am, I arrived at the Peak Center for Human Performance ready to get my VO2 max tested. The hour before my test, I ate my breakfast of eggs and toast and went over instructions and filled out the consent for the upcoming test. The instructions clearly stated to avoid intense exercise the day before which I definitely did not. The night before I rode my bike on my dad's cycle trainer for a good 30 minutes but by about the 25th minute I was dying. Says a lot about my current level of fitness. So not the best way to start the morning before taking a test to exhaustion.

As with any test, I always feel a little anxiety about how well I will perform. Once I arrived at the center a little of the anxiety was eased as I realized that this test is just to be used to set a baseline building a training program on. Rob immediately greeted me upon my arrival even as he was busy setting up other clients for a training race. Once he finished up with the set-up, he guided my into the lab where he began to set-up my bike on a trainer. After my bike was set up he took my height and weight measurements and then I was on the bike warming up. My warm-up lasted 10 minutes and included the calibration of my bike.

The most nerve wrecking part of the test was probably the thought of having my nose plugged and having to breathe through a tube. It wasn't getting pricked to draw blood to measure my blood lactate threshold, which I have to admit stung a little but that kind of stuff doesn't bother me as much as the tube. It took me a couple minutes to get used to the tubes but after that I didn't really think of them and then I was fine. Each level of the test lasted 3 minutes and then my blood lactate levels were measured right before increasing the workload. Workload was measured in watts and increased in increments of 30 at each level.

The last, I'd say 2 minutes, were very painful. I definitely felt the burning in my legs more so than my lungs. I kept going as long as I could to make sure I had reached exhaustion. Rob printed off the VO2 max results for me knowing as a Kines Major I would be able to interpret some of the numbers. After my cool down, we talked bikes, mostly about types of saddles, and then I was on my way home to shower and get class.

Rob is going to crunch the numbers and then we are going to meet up for a consultation to go over my training program for the next month or so and then build from there.