Testing

Lactic Acid.

This is the bane of my existence. Lactic acid is created by your body as a byproduct of your muscles burning fuel for energy. The harder you work the more lactic acid you create. It's really nasty stuff. It's what causes your muscles to tire when you sprint for 20 seconds. It's what causes your calves to to burn when you climb stairs for too long. It's what killed PFC Santiago for God's sake.

Anyway, your body produces this stuff all the time but your blood flow allows it to be flushed from your system. To be honest, I have no idea where it goes. There is this magic heart rate level at which your body can no longer flush away the lactic acid. Your body produces more than your can eliminate. This is called your lactate threshold (LT). It's important to know this number because theoretically you can work out at a heart rate level below LT forever. Knowing your LT also allows you to focus on the "zones" at which, if you work out in them, will either increase the amount of fat your burn and increase your aerobic capacity or strengthen your muscles. So last night I went in to find out my LT on the bike.

I've done an LT test many times in the past. You ride 3 x 15 minute intervals at a maximum sustainable effort with 10 minute rests in between and then you take 97% of your average heart rate over those three efforts. That should be your LT. The problem with that test is that they say no one actually works out at their maximum sustainable effort.

So in the lab they put you on your bike on a stationary trainer (boring) and set it up so that no matter how hard you pedal you generate 80 watts of power. If you've never done this I highly recommend it because I can't explain why no matter how hard your effort your work doesn't change. Anyway after a 10 minute warm up the goal is to maintain a cadence of 90 rpm while they raise the output watts by 20 every 60 seconds. Your vitals and subjective level of work are recorded each minute until you can no longer sustain 90 rpm. They use this data to determine how many watts of power you can sustain and your LT.

Results: 340 watts, LT 167. I think a power meter might go on the Christmas wish list.

Thursday: LT on the run. They say it's different, I can't say, I've never done it before.

By the way; if you didn't get it, the PFC Santiago line was from A Few Good Men.