Great run but vo2 max down and unproductive?!?

I think the watch is flawed, I still don't have any training status.

It will depend on how your HR zones are set as well. Do you know your LT and max HR? If you have only had the watch a short time, it will take time for the VO2 Max to stabilize.  Mine required a couple of months, I received the watch not long after release.

Lower vo2max and unproductive training status mean that the watch expected you to perform better at this heart rate, based on your previous runs. Without looking at your previous performance it's hard to say, but I do not see any obvious discrpancies here.

Training status and VO2Max aren't based on any one single run, but rather more of an accumulated series of runs and workouts. In other words, it's a trending type analysis rather than a judgment of the one run you just completed. Search up 'Garmin Running Science' on Google and see what is used for these data elements. You'll be better off in the long run for knowing this info, whether or not you believe it, or embrace it, etc is secondary - at least you'll see how these things are calculated. Good luck.

Thanks for all the replies. My max heart rate is set at the standard 220-age, so 175. Not sure how to test that to see true max. I felt my run was good, holding a high heart rate for time. Maybe I need to do 2-4 min intervals flat out then rest 1:1. My training status is unproductive telling me I have a low aerobic shortage. That said I bet I could run deliberately slow for 40 mins as instructed but make my scores even worse. Confused. 

7177773 said:

My training status is unproductive telling me I have a low aerobic shortage.

Your training is unproductive, but not because of low aerobic shortage.

7177773 said:

I could run deliberately slow for 40 mins as instructed but make my scores even worse.

Why do you think that a slow run would make your scores worse? That's not how it works.

I would actually say your status as 'unproductive' is precisely due to lack of low aerobic runs - I mean, that's what it's telling you, regardless of what others have posted here. Read this info and learn more about the meaning behind all those items it's telling you:

discover.garmin.com/.../

Neil_Rosser said:

I would actually say your status as 'unproductive' is precisely due to lack of low aerobic runs

Ok, so I read what "unproductive" means. Nowhere it says that it's due to a shortage of one of the load focus areas. On the contrary, the description for "unproductive" says that your load is at a good level.

An important remark: Training load is not to be confused with training load focus. "Low aerobic shortage" says that one of your load focus areas is neglected, but says nothing about general training load, which can still be optimal, despite one of the load focus areas shortage.

Now, I know that mixing various types of workouts is generally beneficial (that is unless you train towards a very specific goal), but simply adding a type of workout which your garmin says you're lacking will not necessarily have a beneficial impact on your fitness or indicated training status, at least not in a short term.

For the record, I have a permanent anaerobic shortage and yet my training status says "productive". This is simply because the watch can see that I am maintaining a proper training load and getting faster at the same heart rate. It doesn't care about load focus shortage when assessing training status, as long as it can see your pace-to-hr ratio increase.

To sum it up, for training status assessment two thing are taken into accout: training load (again, not to be confused with training load focus) and current performance. Training load focus does not matter.

Don't worry about small changes after a specific run. If you train correctly (respecting recovery times and balancing the type of workouts you do), you should see your VO2 max stabilize, and improve slowly. VO2 is an estimate on Garmin watches, and it is not lab-level perfect.

Aside from training discipline, a big factor is your HR Max setting. Aside from very hard field testing, there is no easy way to know your max heart rate. The formulas out there are only for estimates also.

Tip 1: if you have extremely hard workouts (sprint intervals, running uphill like crazy, etc.), look at your activity data for your HRMax, add a couple of BPM to it.

Tip2: if you don't have very hard workouts, do a running threshold test, and set your training heart rates based on the LTHR value, then lower your max heart rate manually by a few BPM. Your LTHR should be around 85% of your max heart rate, but this is again a rough estimate.

Finally, the starting point of your VO2 data is another big factor. When I receive the Epix, for some obscure reason, it gave me a VO2 max of 58 for running (same as for biking). Since the WKO5 software is giving me a VO2 max of 50 based on TrainingPeaks data, I knew this was wrong. Therefore, I had to go through a long series of unproductive workouts until it went down to 50. Low and behold, it is not stable at 50, sometimes dipping to 49, sometime raising to 51.

I also know that my 58 VO2 max for biking it too high, but I currently don't train hard and regularly enough on my bike. So my recovery rides are almost always productive, and support a very high VO2 for the watch, while WKO5 is using older data.