ADVANCED FITNESS PERFORMANCE
Why should I take advantage of this technology and perform an incremental exercise test?
1. Evaluate your cardiorespiratory fitness.
2. Use your fitness level as a baseline for future improvement
3. Compare your aerobic fitness percentage and your VO2max to others your age.
4. Know your zones. Use your heart rate zones to develop the best possible exercise program to meet your needs.
What are heart rate zones and why are they important?Over the past 25 years exercise physiologists and medical researchers have taught us about the physiology of exercise.1
We have learned that exercise is the combination of many bodily systems (lungs, heart, blood,vessels and muscles )working together to convert Oxygen and glucose or fats into energy and motion. As we progress from rest to extreme exercise there is a predictable order that our metabolism follows. This progression has been separated into zones or stages using different methods. The classic method of separating the stages of exercise has been through blood lactate levels. Advanced Fitness Performance uses the measurement of exhaled CO2 and O2 to define the stages of exercise without blood testing. Since your heart rate rises in proportion to your work rate and consumption of oxygen your metabolic stages can then be defined by your heart rate.
Using a polar heart rate monitor while exercising will allow you to plan your training program to meet your needs.
By measuring inhaled and exhaled air during a progressive 8-14 minute exercise test, specific metabolic points can be delineated.
low zone middle zone high zone
rest -------------------------------------------------------------------- maximum
AT VCP VO2max
60/min heart rate 115/min 145/min 161/min
Definitions
Although there is agreement in the literature regarding the physiology of exercise, unfortunately the terminology varies depending on the authors and whether the article comes from the medical literature or the sports literature. On this website I am using the terms and definitions that are accepted throughout the world based on medical research. These terms are defined in the most accepted up to date textbooks1 and the most recent guidelines by the ATS/ACCP2 and the European GICR3.
For those who would like to read the sports literature I will also explain how the terms have been arbitrarily changed.
Anaerobic Threshold (AT) - This is the point of exercise when one starts to add anaerobic metabolism to the previous all aerobic metabolism. Dictionary.com defines a threshold as "any place or point of entering or beginning". This is thus the point during incremental exercise that one begins to add anaerobic metabolism. The point of entering into anaerobic metabolism. It is the point in progressive exercise that the lactic acid level starts to rise from its resting baseline level.
In the sports and fitness community this point has been arbitrarily referred to as VT1 or the aerobic threshold.
Ventilatory Compensation Point ( VCP) - This is the point of exercise that the body adds respiratory (breathing) compensation to protect itself from the increasing lactic acid production and acidosis. It is the point that ventilation increases to not only remove the CO2 produced from metabolism but also to reduced blood CO2 and compensate for the increasing acidosis.
In the sports and fitness community this point has been arbitrarily referred to as VT2 or the anaerobic threshold.
VO2max - This is the maximal or peak oxygen consumption at maximal exercise. It is only reached if a maximal effort is given during the test.
click on reference for link to article or abstract
1Wasserman K, Hansen J, Sue Y, Stringer W, Whipp B, Principles of Exercise Testing and Interpretation ; 2005 Lippincott Williams and Wilkins, 4ed.
2 ATS/ACCP Statement on Cardiopulmonary Exercise Testing
3 Statement on Cardiopulmonary Exercise Testing, the Italian Working Group (GICR)