test

So today I did the 2 speed test again. I did it on March 17 and on February 26. First, a 20 minutes warming up:

Then the first 1k, at “head race pace”:

Did that in 265W, 3:39.3. Lactate was 5.0 mmol/L after one minute, 4.6 mmol/L after 3 minutes.

Twelve minutes of gentle rowing at 2:12 pace. Then the “hard” 1k.

Hard it was. Max heart rate 184, average heart rate 178. My original plan was to hold 1:41 pace. I had difficulties from 600m to go and I even saw a 1:49 at one point. Lactate reading was 8.4 mmol/L, one minute after the row, and 8.6 mmol/L three minutes after the row.

The top blue line are today’s results. No wonder I was struggling during the second 1k. I have never seen so high lactates.

I have difficulty interpreting the lactate test results. I guess I will have to reread the lactate guru’s bible. One thing I notice is that I am working in the “elbow” of the lactate curve. Any small shift of the elbow to the left or right, or a slight increase in steepness of the right-hand side will have a very noticeable effect on the lactate curve. Here is my 10′ step test from the end of the fall:

The light blue line is an extension of the >200 W points. For the 318W that I pulled today, that line is at 10 mmol/L.

Next week, I plan to do a 1k OTE erg to get a good score in for the nonathlon, before the erg season ends. I guess I will approach this 1k attempt with fear, after this result. After that 1k, I may have to think hard about the effectiveness of the training that I am doing.

Workouts this week

Monday: Waterfall 3k/2.5k/2k

Tuesday: 60 minutes of steady state

Wednesday: Nothing. Worked from 7am to 11pm.

Thursday: Strength training (45 minutes of “elasto” and body weight exercises)

Two speed test

After 4 weeks, I did the 4 speed test again. Same day of the week. Same time of the day.

The only difference being that we are in the “short final” of a very big pursuit. There was a problem with one of the partners, and I was expecting a phone call, roughly at the same time as the test. I sent my partner a message that I might be “driving” and unable to take his call, but would call back immediately.

First, a Fletcher warming up:

Then it was time for the main event, two 1ks with 15 minutes of paddling between. The first one at “6k pace” and the second one “2k pace or faster, preferrably max out”.


Workout Summary - Feb 26, 2016
--|Total|-Total-|--Avg--|-Avg-|Avg-|-Avg-|-Max-|-Avg
--|Dist-|-Time--|-Pace--|Watts|SPM-|-HR--|-HR--|-DPS
--|02000|06:57.7|01:44.4|307.4|29.6|169.9|181.0|09.7
Workout Details
#-|SDist|-Split-|-SPace-|Watts|SPM-|AvgHR|MaxHR|DPS-|Comments
01|01000|03:35.6|01:47.8|279.5|27.3|165.1|178.0|10.2|6.9? mmol/L (3.3)
02|01000|03:22.1|01:41.1|339.2|32.1|174.4|181.0|09.3|6.1 mmol/L (6.1)


I made a serious mistake after the first interval. My lactate taking routine is the following:

1. Handle down
2. Wipe hand with paper cloth
3. Wipe hand with wet washcloth
4. Wipe hand dry with paper cloth
5. Prick finger
6. Wipe away first drop with paper cloth
7. Prepare lactate meter
8. Measure using the second drop

After the first 1k, I forgot steps 3 and 4. I measured 6.9 mmol/L lactate. I presume my blood drop was contaminated with sweat.

I did the measurement 3 minutes into the break and measured 3.3 mmol/L, so I guess my real lactate was somewhere around that value, or perhaps slightly higher. Lactate values above the threshold are not supposed to drop immediately after stopping the exercise, as the blood takes up the lactate from the muscles.

After the second 1k I did follow the correct protocol and measured 6.1 mmol/L. After 3 minutes (light paddle), I measured again. Again, 6.1 mmol/L. During the cooling down, I used the two spare strips to take some more measurements. Here is the entire series:

1 min: 6.1 mmol/L

3 min: 6.1 mmol/L

7 min: 4.5 mmol/L

10 min: 3.3 mmol/L

Intriguing results. Compared to a month ago, I observe

1. High lactates (6.1 vs 4.1 after the second 1k, both at 340 W)
2. Lower average heart rates (165/174 bpm today vs 169/179 bpm a month ago)

Here is the graph:

Not sure what to think of it. It’s really a pity I missed the first measurement. In the graph, I put the 3.3 measured after 3 minutes. I think it is quite close to the truth.

On December 18th, 5 weeks ago, I did the two speed lactate test. Read my blog of 18 December about it.

Today, I planned to repeat it. I tried to copy the protocol as much as possible. So first a Fletcher warming up:

Higher heart rates than 5 weeks ago.

Then the main event, two 1k tests spaced 15 minutes apart. The first one at head race pace. Second one at 2k pace or faster (full out allowed). I looked up my stroke rate of 5 weeks ago. They were 27 spm for the first one and 31 spm for the second one.

Again, a higher heart rate in the second 1k.


Workout Summary - Jan 22, 2016
--|Total|-Total-|--Avg--|-Avg-|Avg-|-Avg-|-Max-|-Avg
--|Dist-|-Time--|-Pace--|Watts|SPM-|-HR--|-HR--|-DPS
--|02000|06:58.5|01:44.6|305.6|29.5|173.9|185.0|09.7
Workout Details
#-|SDist|-Split-|-SPace-|Watts|SPM-|AvgHR|MaxHR|DPS-|Comments
01|01000|03:36.5|01:48.3|275.8|27.4|168.7|180.0|10.1| 2.6 mmol/L (1.9)
02|01000|03:22.0|01:41.0|339.9|31.8|178.8|185.0|09.3| 4.1 mmol/L (3.2)


So, compared to 5 weeks ago, there are the following differences:

• 2 seconds faster split on the first 1k (stroke rate 0.4 spm up)
• HR 10 bpm higher on the first 1k
• Lactate 0.4 mmol/L lower after the first 1k
• 2.3 seconds faster split on the second 1k (stroke rate 1 spm up)
• HR 7 bpm higher on the 2nd 1k
• Lactate 0.4 mmol/L lower

So I am faster at lower lactate but higher heart rate. This sounds plausible. For the aerobic energy path way, the heart rate has to go up when delivering higher power.

In a graph, it looks like this:

To be honest, I had hoped for a right shifted first point and a steeper curve. You can’t say I didn’t try. The second 1k is a Season’s Best.

I did another lactate test after a 2k cooling down. 2.3 mmol/L

So I guess my aerobic fitness has increased. Next test in 5 weeks.

Back home. Took the early flight, 6:25 from Brussels, with a long layover in Munich, arriving to Brno just before noon. Had a nice lunch with Romana. Being a geek, I chose a nice restaurant close to a car park with a fully automated car parking system. I parked the car and spent a few minutes admiring the system, watching my car disappear into the storage system.

A light lunch of salmon trout and risotto.

I have been reading the book Plannen, periodiseren, trainen, bijsturen en winnen by Jan Olbrecht. I believe it is the original version of http://www.amazon.com/The-Science-Winning-Periodizing-Optimizing-ebook/dp/B009JTJ676. As always it is interesting to read a text containing a lot of science in my mother tongue. The fate of small languages is that specialized jargon sounds quite artificial.

I was fascinated by the approach that he describes and how he builds it on sound scientific principles. I envied him a lot when he described how he, in the 199s, collected lactate statistics and built a computer program analysing the 2x400m swimming test with lactate measurements to predict swimming times of the athlete on various distances.

The kind of book that you read from cover to cover, and then start reading it again with a pencil in hand, to deepen your understanding. It definitely motivated me to do the 2-step lactate test that he described.

The book is heavily focused on swimming, but looking at the times he quotes for the various distances, I think multiplying the distances by 3 brings it close to my erg times. So on the flight home I was thinking I would do a 2x1200m test. But then I re-read Greg’s blog about the 2-speed test.  He uses a 2x1000m format which is well described in his post, and I decided to stick to it.

A 20 minutes warming up with some speed bursts:

The main event:


Workout Summary - Dec 18, 2015
--|Total|-Total-|--Avg--|-Avg-|Avg-|-Avg-|-Max-|-Avg
--|Dist-|-Time--|-Pace--|Watts|SPM-|-HR--|-HR--|-DPS
--|02000|07:06.9|01:46.7|287.9|28.8|165.1|181.0|09.8
Workout Details
#-|SDist|-Split-|-SPace-|Watts|SPM-|AvgHR|MaxHR|DPS-|Comments
01|01000|03:40.3|01:50.2|261.7|27.0|158.6|173.0|10.1|
02|01000|03:26.6|01:43.3|317.7|30.8|171.2|181.0|09.4|


I measured lactate one minute and three minutes after the events. My first measurement after the first 1k failed, so I did it again with the extra strip I had prepared: 3.0 mmol/L. Then I measured again at three minutes after the 1k: 2.7 mmol/L. During the rest of the 15 minute break I paddled slowly. I was a little afraid I would crash on the second 1k, because of the week of business travel. Fortunately, I was able to hold 1:42-1:44 without getting into trouble. I tried to measure at one minute after the row but didn’t get enough blood. A second measurement about 30 seconds late gave me a reading of 4.5 mmol/L. I didn’t have more strips prepared, so I skipped the measurement three minutes after the event.

Here is the plot:

So what does the test tell me? Even though Greg comments that the plot only has meaning when comparing different measurements in time, I believe I can already see what’s going on.

The values are quite low. In Olbrecht’s book, the first swim is done around the 4.0 mmol/L level, and the second one above 8.0 mmol/L. I have a theory that I am an aerobic diesel who re-uses lactate (as fuel) quite efficiently,  resulting in low values. However, I really need to plan to improve my lactate tolerance at higher speeds and perhaps be able to reach values above 8. The highest lactate value I have ever measured was 4.8 after 10 minutes at 250W (at the end of a 10 minutes step test). Being able to survive rowing at higher lactates should make me faster.

I am also happy that extrapolating the graph to lower power values, I end up somewhere between 1.0 and 2.0 at my steady state training power of 200W. The fact that my data seem internally consistent is a great pleasure to me.

I did a 2km cooling down at the end.