So do these breaks prevent the maximization of aerobic capacity? Good question. Half lives of most physiological changes that occur whilst training aerobically is ~30s. If you make a rest interval around 15-20s, your aerobic metabolism barely notice that you actually stopped. Does this help clarifying a point on the difference between steady effort and interval work for training aerobic metabolism?
Note that this very important principle is what helps us to design any sort of set, using intervals to train any type of metabolism. You can train at threshold on reps of 25m without a doubt, as long as the overall set's duration is long enough (>10min) and that the rest is always kept well below 30s and that the overall intensity level over the total duration of the set puts you in the right zone.
Would one long easy continuous swim improve aerobic capacity? As much as Base is made of everything, just about any aerobic effort will contribute to improving your vo2max. However to develop it to its full potential, 5min bouts at max velocity for the duration is what works best. Lower level endurance does a great job at, for instance, developing your network of capillaries, but it will have a much lower impact on what's required to improve your cardiac output. That is better improved during max efforts.
At this point it is worth to remember that aerobic capacity, or vo2max has two bottlenecks.
1) The ability to the working muscle to deoxygenize the blood (use the o2) and
2) The ability that your system has to provide this o2, which is conditioned mainly by the volume of blood your heart can process.
The former needs a strong capillary network as well as good mitochondira employees (enzymes). The later requires a stronger cardiac muscle as well as an increase in your plasma volume.
During the time course of vo2max adaptation, early in their career, athletes are often restricted by the former, but passed a certain point, the heart itself becomes the bottleneck. You probably understand now that once you reach this step, the HR obtained at Vo2Max is very close too if not spot on your maximal possible hr value.
Designing an aerobic capacity set that doesn't bring you close to your max hr is kind of missing the point somehow. During a full blown 400free, you definitely reach near max HR values, by the middle of the distance roughly.
Can hard anaerobic interval training along maximize aerobic capacity? If you refer to reps of ~1min with a lot of rest: No, it will likely impair it. If you refer to longer intervals ~>2min or to shorter intervals with ~'t really matter too much, I lack the willpower to train anaerobic every day anyway so I will just make my easy swims continuous just in case :) +1
So do these breaks prevent the maximization of aerobic capacity? Good question. Half lives of most physiological changes that occur whilst training aerobically is ~30s. If you make a rest interval around 15-20s, your aerobic metabolism barely notice that you actually stopped. Does this help clarifying a point on the difference between steady effort and interval work for training aerobic metabolism?
Note that this very important principle is what helps us to design any sort of set, using intervals to train any type of metabolism. You can train at threshold on reps of 25m without a doubt, as long as the overall set's duration is long enough (>10min) and that the rest is always kept well below 30s and that the overall intensity level over the total duration of the set puts you in the right zone.
Would one long easy continuous swim improve aerobic capacity? As much as Base is made of everything, just about any aerobic effort will contribute to improving your vo2max. However to develop it to its full potential, 5min bouts at max velocity for the duration is what works best. Lower level endurance does a great job at, for instance, developing your network of capillaries, but it will have a much lower impact on what's required to improve your cardiac output. That is better improved during max efforts.
At this point it is worth to remember that aerobic capacity, or vo2max has two bottlenecks.
1) The ability to the working muscle to deoxygenize the blood (use the o2) and
2) The ability that your system has to provide this o2, which is conditioned mainly by the volume of blood your heart can process.
The former needs a strong capillary network as well as good mitochondira employees (enzymes). The later requires a stronger cardiac muscle as well as an increase in your plasma volume.
During the time course of vo2max adaptation, early in their career, athletes are often restricted by the former, but passed a certain point, the heart itself becomes the bottleneck. You probably understand now that once you reach this step, the HR obtained at Vo2Max is very close too if not spot on your maximal possible hr value.
Designing an aerobic capacity set that doesn't bring you close to your max hr is kind of missing the point somehow. During a full blown 400free, you definitely reach near max HR values, by the middle of the distance roughly.
Can hard anaerobic interval training along maximize aerobic capacity? If you refer to reps of ~1min with a lot of rest: No, it will likely impair it. If you refer to longer intervals ~>2min or to shorter intervals with ~'t really matter too much, I lack the willpower to train anaerobic every day anyway so I will just make my easy swims continuous just in case :) +1
