Help understanding aerobic/anarobic chart

Yes you're right ultimately I will want to achieve a balanced score by doing the short sprints.

But I thought I would - first - test the watch so that I understand better what it does and how it works. Hence those 2 tests where I test 2 different "rythms" (Zone 4 on Day 1, and Zone 3 on Day 2) to check if my understanding of the watch is correct. But it seems it isn't.

More specifically, do you understand the underlying reason why I got a higher Aerobic score on Day 1 than Day 2 ?

More specifically, do you understand the underlying reason why I got a higher Aerobic score on Day 1 than Day 2 ?

No, I don‘t.

But to be fair: Both loads are irrelevant, neither 0,0 nor 0,3 will have any kind of impact.

2 is „maintaining“, 3 will give you some progress, 4 good effect, 5 is too much load.

I will want to achieve a balanced score by doing the short sprints

Still, keep in mind that if you achieve a 4/4 training load, it will still be very strengthening. (as anaerobic load is achieved by really high pulse)
Probably this will not be possible for every single session you do, otherwise you will probably be in overtraining.

For running, some prefer the 80/20 method: 80% of training time in (low) aerobic zone, 20% in high anaerobic zone.

I don't think it should be a goal to get a balanced score for a single workout. It is more common to focus on different aspects on different days. Normally most athletes have a lot more aerobic training than anaerobic.

I prefer polarised training, and my load focus is showing "high aerobic shortage". That is exactly how I want it this time of the year.

Thanks for the responses guys.

As a follow up, I went back to the rowing machine today and got quite close to the 4 and 4 I was looking for. If I had known, I would have rowed an additional 10 minutes. I guess it doesn't really matter. I also notice the watch notified me that it increased my Maximum HR to 175. The 3 peaks are 2 minutes long each.

got quite close to the 4 and 4 I was looking for.

Good to see, that it works the way we suggested. Have fun.

rentagreement said:

I never get more than 2,5 aerobic and barely any anaerobic effect.

Yeah, of course the effect depends on your starting condition and your Max HR, Lactate Threshold etc.

If your VO2Max is already in the high 50s and you intensely run 2000 km each year (just an example), the watch will of course give you no high effect for 45 min of rowing.

My last sessions with 45 minutes of rowing on my Concept2 in January gave me aerobic effects of 2,5 - 3 and nothing for anaerobic.

Ok yes so I should have mentioned that I have not yet done a Lactate Threshold and a VO2Max test (this will come next week when I receive my HRM-Dual chest strap sensor) and for those I just use the default values given by the watch which in my case are 155 and 41 respectively. I appreciate that these are probably lower number than what they should be, I just use defaults values. I will refine this next week. Again, I am at a stage where I'm trying to understand how the watch works, and what's behind the numbers it throws at me.

My Max HR is set at 175 which seems to be realistic in my case. I tried but don't seem to be able to go higher. And I don't want to pass out .

@3541523 Thank you again for the help.

You will probably have to calibrate the HRM Pro before doing the tests. That means approximately 2 hours of outdoors GPS running in total, running at different paces.

ovekvam said:

You will probably have to calibrate the HRM Pro before doing the tests. That means approximately 2 hours of outdoors GPS running in total, running at different paces.

Arghh. Ok. The one I ordered is the HRM Dual, not Pro. Does this still apply to this version and does the manual explain how to actually do this ?

The Youtube video from Garmin themselves here  doesn't say anything about calibrating.