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VO2 Not Being Measured on my Forerunner 255: Totally Frustrated by This Watch

Pepe_Casa
6 months ago

Hi,

I am at a loss to understand why my Forerunner 245 measured my VO2 accurately and consistently. It was a very accurate assessor of performance that peaked at 56 and never went below 47 for me. Yet, when I upgraded to this version it just stays locked on 51 `Superior' whatever that means. 

Can someone at Garmin please explain why I have lost this functionality? It was clearly advertised and described as part of the new watch's capability. It has been stuck on this number now, without change, over varying conditions, gradients, training and competition challenges since April 2023 when I purchased it. 

I do think there must be a rational explanation. Can someone at Garmin please advise what the issue with regard to my current watch and setup?

Thanks 

Doug 

[email protected]

  • 0 6 months ago

    Is the watch calculating new VO2 max values and it is just the same value every time? Check the 4 week VO2 max graph. You might have reached a plateou if it always logs the same value. If you want to test if you get new values you can change the max HR to a lower value and log a few runs. That should give you a lower VO2 max. Then change back and see that the VO2 max value goes back to the previous value. Then the calcuation works.

    If you don't see any values at all:

    Are you logging activities that will calculate your VO2 max? Running outdoors or biking on a bike with power meter? You can get it from walking outdoors as well, but running and biking will give you are more accurate VO2 max.

    Note that you need to keep your HR at at least 70% of your max HR for at least 10 consecutive minutes for running and 20 for biking. If your max HR is too high you might not reach 70% of your max HR for that duration, so double check that you got the correct max HR set.

    What Is VO2 Max Estimate and How Does It Work?

  • 0 6 months ago

    The numerical VO2 Max that’s displayed and graphed in Connect is actually rounded. Internally, Garmin records a number to at least 2 decimal places.

    You can see a graph of the unrounded value if you open the Training Status glance on your watch and select VO2 Max. This way you can try to determine whether your VO2 Max is truly staying exactly the same, or whether there have actually been slight changes over the last 4 weeks.

    In this example, the rounded value of my VO2 Max has stayed the same for the past 4 weeks, but you can tell from the graph that the unrounded value has been going up and down over time.

    If you want to see your VO2 Max after each running activity to 2 decimal places, you can also use the free site https://www.runalyze.com, which syncs with your Garmin account. (Add the “VO2 Max (file)” column to the activity list.) I can use runalyze to see the actual numerical values corresponding to various points on the graph, after any of my outdoor running activities. For example, it tells me that my current Garmin VO2 Max is actually 53.75.

    Something definitely sounds wrong if you’ve been running regularly for over a year and your VO2 Max hasn’t changed at all, though. I would contact Garmin at [email protected] or https://support.garmin.com/en-US/ql/?focus=topics.

    Side note: “Superior” is a classification of your VO2 Max compared to other people your age and gender, according to the Cooper Institute. Specifically, it means that your VO2 Max puts you in the 95th percentile for your age/gender group.

    https://www8.garmin.com/manuals/webhelp/GUID-676967A0-1B23-4384-9BC9-76F3D643F1C8/EN-US/GUID-1FBCCD9E-19E1-4E4C-BD60-1793B5B97EB3.html

    EDIT: I will say that I've had a 6 month period where the unrounded value of my VO2 Max stayed the same. I wasn't training well enough to improve it, or poorly enough to make it go down. Seeing the same number for 13 months of constant training seems unlikely to me though, unless you really have plateaued.