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Help with Max HR/Zones and VO2 Max

Panda
over 4 years ago

Hi all and thanks for all of the invaluable input on this forum.  I have had a Fenix 5S Plus for about 6 months and it is great, but as my fitness has improved, I think I need to make sure that I have it set up properly. 

As a bit of background, I am 49 and currently the device gives me a VO2 Max of 57, which I think is very good for my age.  I am doing some form of aerobic activity 5-7 days a week (cycle, swim, run - wearing an HR Strap).  Before I was doing this level of activity, when on a big ride up hills, I would regularly hit 180 bpm, so I had Max. HR set at 202 bpm.  Now I am a lot fitter, my max HR on a hilly ride is about 170 bpm.  Similarly when I run 5k pretty much flat out (for me) it is the same (173 bpm is the highest recently).

So, I have obviously got fitter and I feel just out of breath as I did in the past, but I have a lower heart rate.  I want to know if I should be changing my Max HR, the best way to do this/what to set it to and also what affect will it have on my VO2 Max?

Thanks in advance and sorry if this is too many questions in one post.

P.

  • 0 over 4 years ago

    Hi Panda,

    yes, MaxHR setting will affect your VO2max estimation, but how you set up your zones will not.

    Your maxHR won’t change with fitness level, but will slowly decrease with age. However - as you get fitter, you might find it harder to actually reach your max. (Perceived effort)

    If you regularly hit 173 when you go flat out, that’s probably close but your absolute max is likely still a few beats higher. For the max HR setting on your watch I would add 2-5 beats to what you regularly see during a really hard effort.

  • 0 over 4 years ago in reply to SAHO

    Thanks for this Saho, it is really appreciated.

    So, if I drop the Max HR to 178 (from 202), I assume that this will drop my VO2 Max?  I just looked at my last 6 months and it improved from 47 to 57.

    I have never set up zones, but looking at my watch, it is using LTHR (which is reading at 162 bpm), but I can see you can set this based on Max HR as well.  Is it worth changing the the zones and/or also doing an LTHR test?

  • 0 over 4 years ago in reply to Panda

    Yes, if you reduce the maxHR setting - VO2max will also drop, but then again if your maxHR was wrong then your current VO2max is also wrong. An important input to the VO2max estimation is how hard your body is working, which essentially is current HR compared to maxHR. Hence, if you decrease maxhr setting and work out at the same hr as before, the watch will think you are closer to max. (Which is true if the initial setting was wrong)

    How you set up your zones is more a matter of what you prefer. I assume your current LTHR is detected during runs with chest strap? If so there’s no reason to do the guided test. (Unless you believe the last detection is wrong or it’s getting old and you struggle to get updated values during normal runs).

    I prefer having my zones based on LTHR as well, since that makes the division between zone 4 and 5 based on an actual measurement of my fitness level instead of a percentage of maxhr which is more of a general rule of thumb for the average of people.

    Unlike MaxHR, your LTHR will also change according to your fitness level, which then will mean that your zones will stay up to date as long as you have automatic detection enabled.

  • 0 over 4 years ago in reply to SAHO

    Great, so I have reset my Max HR and I have checked the setup for LTHR (it is set for automatic - so I assume that I don't need to change this).

    The Zones are set 

    Warm up 72-90

    Low Aerobic 90-100

    High Aerobic 100-107

    Threshold 107-112

    Max >112

    I don't really know much about LTHR, but these look odd.

    Thanks again, it is really appreciated.

  • 0 over 4 years ago in reply to Panda

    Hmm.. yes those zones sounds a bit strange. (low)

    I believe LT is typically somewhere in the range 85%-95% of maxHR.

  • 0 over 4 years ago in reply to Panda

    Hi i have set my max heart rate to default 220 - age. (which is very low) but the watch detects your max heart rates and corrects them if you reach higher then that. LTHR is based on your Lactate threshold which in your case is very strange because your max Zone should start at 100% (100% should be your threshold) afaik LTHR does not care about your highest heart rate. it only shows your range till it. the percentage above i think depends on your resting heart rate

  • 0 over 4 years ago in reply to Mistamb

    The 220-age is often quite far off for most people. Because of that I recommended to use the HR that you normally are able to reach during a really hard workout and then add a few beats to that.

    Yes, deliberately setting it too low and then enable auto-detection of MaxHR is also a way to go, but remember that your actual MaxHR is the absolute highest rate your heart is able to reach, and that rate is very hard (and painful!) to reach during normal excercise - hence the auto-detection is probably going to give you a value that is slightly too low. - OR, actually it could also detect a false peak (measurement error) and report a value that is too high. That's my reasons for disabling auto-detection.

    I agree that the MaxHR setting doesn't affect LTHR directly, but I believe I've read somewhere that it affects the range the watch expects to detect LTHR, hence if MaxHR is wrong, the watch might also struggle to detect LTHR.