Fitness & Training Sports Science Fitness Health Sports
Tom Hughes πŸ’™
Tom Hughes πŸ’™

@DrTEHughes

13 tweets 2 reads May 25, 2024
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I have never been convinced by the trend of using lactate monitoring as a means of intensity/session monitoring
I believe there is too much focus on lactate (and LT1) as a training zone event i.e. stay below, as opposed to what it is, an indirect marker of cellular metabolism.
1/
I'd even go further to say that athletes/coaches using this approach (as opposed to using lactate kinetics as an intermittent judgement of improvements in cellular metabolism correlates of performance)
are either
1) Misunderstanding the role of lactate
2/
2) Justifying the cost of the monitor
3) Copying the Norwegians
4) Jumping on the latest fad
I'd even go further to say that continuous lactate monitoring will on confuse the picture, much like Glucose monitoring.
3/
And much like CGM, create more stress and hyperfocus on minutiae rather than looking at the bigger picture.
I.e CGM for diabetics is a game changer, because they HAVE to focus on what to them is more than the minutiae (every carb counts as an insulin using diabetic)
And..
4/
For the elite athletes at the very pinnacle, who have years and years of training and are now eeking out the last 0.5% then lactate monitoring could allow them to manage their training load down to the second, and give them a medal.
But for the other 99.99% of us?
5/
No.
Why? I am not going to go into detail here, but I will in another thread. But lactate is complicated.
Far from the waste fuel it once was. Lactate in the blood is not the exact measure you think it is.
You are looking at value which represents the result of:
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The balance between the appearance and clearance of Lactate.
And what we now know (which even Brooks postulated a long time ago) lactate is the end point of glycolysis, not pyruvate.
This is a good but heavy read.
ncbi.nlm.nih.gov
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ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/P…

Lactate is always the end product of glycolysis

Through much of the history of metabolism, lactate (La[βˆ’] ) has been considered merely a dead-end wa...
Then you have shuttling out of those cells via MCT transporters, some of which is taken back up into other muscle cells.
Then some appears in the blood, did I mention that cells all around the body can use lactate including the heart?
ncbi.nlm.nih.gov
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Lactate: the ugly duckling of energy metabolism
ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/P…

Lactate: the ugly duckling of energy metabolism

Lactate, perhaps the best-known metabolic waste product, was first isolated from sour milk, in which...
See what I mean about it being complicated!!!
Far from the aerobic/anaerobic on/off switch it was once thought to represent.
And don't even get me started on 'lactic acid!'
"He/she is bathing in lactic acid" said the commentator.
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Are you starting to get my point?
Nothing truly magical changes as you cross LT1, but this marks that point where lactate rises above baseline, and it IS an important metric.
But, I don't think it's one that should be used to train by, unless you are truly elite.
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Instead, try to remain more concious of your training. Monitoring load, subjective feelings, how you feel day to day. Take rest etc.
Forget the lactate monitoring, although consider getting a properly done (the other issue with field lactate testing), lactate profile.
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Repeat the testing every 3-4 months as a 'moving in the right direction' monitor.
No, you don't need to train a tonne just below LT1 (Zone 2) to improve it.
An improvement in LT1 (more power/speed) is just a function of increased aerobic fitness.
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Improving this can result from many different types of training.
Threshold, polarised, etc.
The key is proper training load management AND adequate recovery.
Not sticking to a specific lactate.
End.
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