Sharla's Log

[Sharla]

Um yeah my whole abstaining from the forum thing didn't last long!

I think i'm going to stick to the Ask The Trainer Board for a while though and mostly on weekends.

The reason I'm posting is I'm coming up with some new (to me at least) ideas / understanding of exercise physiology and i'm keen to hear opinions from others who are into this side of things like Scrap and Salty.

1) I happened to read that women tend to increase their VO2 max more by increasing oxygen uptake capacity in their muscles by capillarization more so than men. Apparently men will increase their heart stroke volume more than women. That's over time as a result of training i think.

2) Acidity in the blood is a consequence of exercise and i think if i understand it correctly it will signal the process of capillarization (forming new capillaries).

3) Apprently a study with swimmers having a dose of bicarbonate soda pre-workout increased their performance by decreasing blood acidity. I think this is for one workout - sort of like taking glucose right efore a workout - not going to improve your ability to mobilize energy stores in training probably but great for a good one off performance.

4) Apparently stroke volume is limited when tested while cycling due to the way blood can be pooled in the legs. Apparently trained cyclists don't have this problem though and will show the same exercise induced increase in stroke volume during a workout as they will over activities

5) The supine position as in swimming (and Scraps thing ) does not limit heart stroke volume at all.

6) Women begin to outperform men in ultra marathon endurance efforts beyond the 66 km running mark.. This is attributed to lipid metabolism but I'm also wondering if since capillarization is triggered more so by endurance training this has something to do with it.

Another observation was that women do not over-heat as much in these long events - perhaps because our heart is not generating as much heat due to increased heart muscle action associated with increased heart stroke volume.

I imagine capillaries existing in muscles which are able to allow more blow flow and therefore O2 reaching the muscles is a fairly passive mechanism not producing any real heat or using as much energy as increasing heart stroke volume. Perhaps part of the reason in ultra long running (higher heart rate than other sports) distances this mechanism of O2 uptake could become increasingly more important.

7) I never felt like endurance training decreased my power unless I was trying to make weight and not getting enough protein or suffering from te effect of impact. I would still make strength gains with resistance training and adequate nutrition. Apart from that i felt stronger for it .... coincidence or not?

So I'm trying to nut out basically if I should be tayloring my workouts to increase VO2 max in a couple of different ways in different workouts.

For example using either acidic or basic food/drink intake pre-workout and workout methods designed specifically to target or not target capillarization.

As a female capillarization will likely yield better results more easily for me. I'd definately aim to get the most out of that in some workouts.

Perhaps I should also try to design some sessions that will target my stroke volume more specifically since that is a weak point probably not well trained especially by me with my love of endurance training.

Ok enough blabbing from me! Thoughts, suggestions? Do you think it's possible to target these separately to a significant degree?