00:00if you're really committed to developing
00:02your cardiorespiratory Fitness you know
00:04I think I talked about this on one of
00:06the podcasts maybe it was on Tim's
00:09you're trying to maximize the area of a
00:12triangle right so the triangle has a
00:14base and the triangle has a peak and the
00:17goal is how big an area can I get not
00:20how wide not how tall you don't want one
00:22that's this wide and this tall and you
00:25don't want one that's this tall and this
00:26wide you want the max the base is your
00:30zone two the peak is your VO2 max from a
00:34training perspective the rule of thumb
00:35that is applicable for People Like Us
00:38I.E normal people and the best athletes
00:41in the world is roughly 80 20.
00:4580 percent of your volume is down here
00:48twenty percent of your volume UPS here
00:49in fact some of the really really Elites
00:52are probably closer to 90 10.
00:54so you're saying no matter if you're
00:57just an ordinary athlete or you're the
01:00best of the best it's still roughly the
01:02tadi pogachar who's the greatest cyclist
01:06on this planet two-time winner of the
01:09um you know absolutely mopping up the
01:12field of cyclists like their children
01:14that guy's doing 80 to 90 percent of his
01:17training at zone two and I know that for
01:20a red fact because we know who his coach
01:21is so so then let's maybe talk about
01:24that pyramid so maybe let's just step
01:25back and say I didn't answer your
01:27question by the way about VO2 max which
01:28we can come to but yeah so maybe I was
01:30just going to say maybe let's just cover
01:31the whole pyramid so what's the training
01:33of the whole pyramid if you know it's
01:34kind of 80 20 let's break out so I just
01:37start with how much time am I willing to
01:38put into this now I got to be honest
01:40with you I wish I could be putting 10
01:42hours a week into cardio I do I mean
01:44historically I've put in
01:4714 to 20 hours a week into cardio up
01:50until 10 years ago so like I really miss
01:53those days I miss being insanely fit you
01:56know I miss I I'd miss that terribly and
01:59I missed I missed the joy of that much
02:01um it's simply not possible today
02:04I you know for all of the obligations
02:06that I have and there's I've done the
02:09math 10 Ways to Sunday I'd have to give
02:12up something I'm not willing to give up
02:13I heard I give up archery or give up
02:16driving or give up my kids or something
02:19like I'm just I'm not willing to give
02:20any of these things up so yeah I
02:22basically start with what's the most
02:23amount of time I can put into dedicated
02:25cardio and for me it's like four to five
02:27hours a week not including rucking I
02:29sort of keep that in its own bucket
02:32so then it's a very simple calculation
02:33eighty percent of that time is zone two
02:36and twenty percent of that time is VO2
02:39and how are you breaking out let's just
02:42start with zone two how many I divided
02:44into four workouts a week so for Tuesday
02:47Thursday Saturday Sunday
02:49and do you always recommend
02:53doing it over very like let's say you
02:56could do four hours in one day is there
02:59the same benefit of doing all your zone
03:01two in one day versus spreading it out
03:03no I think you know I've talked about
03:04this within you go his view is if you
03:07can get at least 30 to 45 minutes
03:09you should spread them out so again if
03:12you're only able to commit an hour to it
03:13it might be one hour once or 30 minutes
03:18um but I'm sort of doing
03:2345 minutes to 60 minutes each time is
03:26and are you doing zone two VO2 max on
03:30the same day one of those days so
03:33Saturday so Tuesday Thursday is just
03:37uh and then two long sessions of uh
03:42stability training so it's like called
03:44an hour of zone two an hour of stability
03:46actually why don't I just walk you
03:48through the whole week that'll be easier
03:49so Monday is just strength training so
03:52that's about uh 90 minutes to two hours
03:55when you include the stability training
03:57that I do as well so movement prep
03:58stability training strength training and
04:00that's all lower body that's Monday
04:02uh Tuesday is sewn to followed by
04:06dedicated hour of stability
04:11uh upper body strength and stability
04:14again 90 minutes to two hours Thursday
04:17is a repeat of Tuesday Friday is a
04:22Saturday is zone two in the morning
04:25upper body strength repeat of Wednesday
04:32Sunday is zone two followed by VO2 max
04:37and will you ever do VO2 max before you
04:44I generally don't just because I like to
04:47have a lot of reps before I go for broke
04:50so even when I was like a cyclist and
04:54doing two Zone VO2 max workouts a week
04:57they were always preceded by a long the
05:03um on a bike was kilojoules so is how
05:05many kilojoules of work would you do
05:07before you would do the super hard sets
05:10and it had to be at least a thousand
05:12kilojoules which would translate to at
05:13least a thousand calories of work
05:17for zone two I know you said you kind of
05:21is if someone is like hey you know I can
05:24do four days a week of zone two but I
05:26can only do 15 minutes a day would you
05:29said I'd compress it I would say do two
05:31thirties so so in your zone two sessions
05:35you like to do at least 30. at a minimum
05:38yeah and now when you're in those Zone
05:42like when you hit the bike and the clock
05:45starts no I take 10 minutes I'm on I do
05:47it all mine on a bike
05:49um sometimes on a treadmill but what I
05:51do is there's a like a little it's a
05:55it's it's the the computer is
05:56programming to the Wahoo kicker which is
05:58the device I'm sitting on so it's it's
06:00taking 10 minutes to ramp me up and
06:04maybe just walk through what modalities
06:06can people do zone two on treadmill bike
06:09anything that is steady state so you
06:14swimming is a great way to do it because
06:16you can really swim in a pool at a
06:18um running is a great way to do it
06:21because you can pretty much run at a
06:22steady state cycling Outdoors is
06:25generally hard unless you have specific
06:29Fiesta Island was a great place to train
06:31I used to train a Fiesta Island because
06:33for people who don't know where that is
06:34in San Diego it's we're all with the
06:36time trial bike races where and it's
06:38just a seven kilometer Loop that you can
06:41ride on without lights or any like
06:43there's no traffic or anything that gets
06:44in your way but for the most part like I
06:47wouldn't be able to do zone two outside
06:48here in Austin it's just it's too hilly
06:51and there's too much traffic and it just
06:54it it's it's fits and starts I can do my
06:57VO2 max here because I go to a hill and
07:00that's my favorite way to do VO2 max is
07:02on a hill that's about a mile long and
07:05just do very hard up the hill and then
07:07easy down the hill but um a treadmill is
07:10another great way to do it
07:11just kind of a walking incline typically
07:15rowing machine if you're really a good
07:19um you have to be efficient enough most
07:21people are not efficient enough and they
07:23just they don't have the strength they
07:25don't have the stability to row really
07:28well for 45 minutes stair climber is
07:31another really good one
07:36depends again if you're if you're
07:38starting out brisk walking is probably
07:42yeah and we we don't have to get into
07:44all the reasons of the benefits of Zone
07:462 because we have so many podcasts
07:48within you go son Milan people can
07:51listen to but you kind of hinted at
07:52another thing there which is you know
07:54when you start your zone two workouts
07:56you'll ramp up but also a lot of times
07:59we get questions where you know hey I
08:01did a 90 minute workout and I was in
08:04zone two for 45 minutes of it is that am
08:09no I mean what I think what you mean in
08:11that question is you know like I went
08:13out for a three-hour bike ride today and
08:16um when I got back my computer told me I
08:18was in I did 44 minutes of zone two so
08:20two issues there one is that's just a
08:22zone two based on heart rate that's
08:24generally the worst approximation of
08:26zone two so zone two really is more
08:28based on lactate if we're going to be
08:30purely accurate or at a minimum rpe but
08:33even if you posit that that
08:3645 minutes of Zone 2 from your heart
08:38rate is roughly accurate it's not the
08:41same physiologically because usually
08:42you're passing in and out of zone two in
08:44that situation and so you're not getting
08:46kind of that constant steady state churn
08:49which you're looking for we're really
08:51kind of looking for is the harnessing of
08:53mitochondrial efficiency and to do that
08:56you just you have to be able to push
08:58oxidative phosphorylation right to its
09:00limit before you trip into glycolysis
09:03and you're just you're at the limit of
09:06that glycolysis being the dominant
09:09energy source whereas if you're on that
09:11ride you're going into and out of
09:13glycolysis constantly so it's not that
09:15you're so much in zone two for 45
09:16minutes as that you passed through zone
09:19two for a sum total of 45 minutes which
09:21again that's still there's still value
09:24in that but not for what we're talking
09:26about yeah and what about VO2 max what
09:30modalities can you do VO2 max training
09:32on uh you know here I think it's it's
09:34probably easier in a way right because
09:36it's pretty much anything that gets your
09:38heart rate up and gets you very tired
09:42um so you know look it could be a you
09:45know an air bike it could be a regular
09:47bike it could be a stationary bike stair
09:50climber treadmill running outside you
09:54know the sky is almost the limit you
09:55know it's it's hard to do it on you know
09:58it's hard it would be hard to do it
10:01I'm trying to think I mean heck you
10:03could probably do it with
10:04something like burpees is probably
10:06pretty tough once you get into something
10:08that intense like jumping because the
10:11sweet spot for VO2 max is kind of three
10:13to eight minute intervals so you don't
10:16want to be doing things that are so
10:18intense that you can't do them for at
10:21um and and so that's why I'd kind of
10:23hold off on that stuff I mean when I was
10:25young and I was really fit I did I did a
10:29lot of it with jumping but like those I
10:32mean I can't jump for three minutes
10:33anymore like I don't have it's just that
10:36you know I'm not that fit anymore so I
10:39have to rely on easier things and so
10:41what's your what's your current VO2 max
10:43workout so you mentioned kind of three
10:45to eight minutes on is it typically I do
10:48four on four off is sort of where I
10:51spend most of my time sometimes three on
10:53three off on a rowing machine I got into
10:56that quite a bit last summer but these
11:00um and sometimes by the way I just am in
11:03a bit of a rush and I'll just do
11:05one minute on two minute off at a much
11:09higher intensity on this air climber so
11:11I have one of those like industrial
11:13grade strength climbers and sometimes
11:16I'll just go Sprint for a minute up the
11:18stairs and then it takes me two minutes
11:20to get my heart rate back down to about
11:22a hundred and then repeat that for 20 to
11:2530 minutes so that's kind of like my
11:28poor man's cheating VO2 max workout
11:31um but what I really like to do is four
11:34minute repeats four minutes on four
11:36minutes off and on the four minutes on
11:38are you going a hundred percent for the
11:40full like how how should someone think
11:42about yeah this is one of those things
11:43you have to you have to play with this
11:45there's a this is years and years of
11:48practice to know what that feels like
11:50um so again I'm doing this on a bike so
11:52I'm looking at wattage and my watts are
11:55so low now I'm embarrassed so I'm not
11:57going to tell you what the watts are
11:58because they're so much lower than they
11:59used to be but I know
12:01I have a sense of what I need to average
12:04my wattage over those four minutes
12:07so I might go out at 105 of that wattage
12:13and it feels pretty easy for the first
12:15minute if it doesn't I've gone too hard
12:19by three minutes I'm very uncomfortable
12:24and at a minute I'm I mean with at that
12:27in that last minute I.E at four minutes
12:30I'm I don't have much left
12:33so that's you know if you go out all out
12:36in that first minute you're not going to
12:38get to four minutes you're you're just
12:39gonna crash and you're you're sort of
12:41not in that zone you wanna so it's not
12:43there's no question I positive split the
12:45thing meaning I do more work in the
12:47first half than the second but I don't
12:49want it to be more than about 10 percent
