VO2max is defined as the highest rate at which oxygen can be absorbed and utilized by the body during severe exercise (Hill and Lupton 1923). It represents one of the most important parameters for the assessment of cardiorespiratory fitness and one of the determining factors for endurance performance. Moreover, the purpose of many training protocols is to improve VO2max working at intensities close to it (Midgley and Mc Naughton 2006). Such high intensities can be maintained for only up to a few minutes and are particularly stressful for the body. This is why HIIT workouts are a great altern ..read more

Listen to the episode now or find us on Spotify and Apple Podcasts. Show Notes Sometimes you cannot change the situation or make amazing rules – quite often that is the job of the head coach. Yet, you can develop principles with your players that then can be adjusted based on individual, seasonal or other needs.  Although the club or organization may own the players performance, you can give the player full responsibility to work on themselves. If they want to consider outside help, support or professionals, then make it clear they need to set up communication channels between all ..read more

Listen to the episode now or find us on Spotify and Apple Podcasts. Show Notes Medical staff is all encompassing health – it is slightly different then “just” performance. Remember that your medical and health staff have to always put the health of these humans first. Their LARGEST responsibilities is to be AVAILABLE for any “strange” and health related issues. As a professional, all you CAN do is to try to design, implement and then do the RIGHT actions when something bad happens – it can still happen, no matter to what degree. Have a plan, have some back up plans and follow protocols ..read more

Listen to the episode now or find us on Spotify and Apple Podcasts. Show Notes World record holding age group runners were observed to barely miss any training sessions, and one of them did not even train with a “smart” device – how about that hey? An overly heavy focus on high intensity and high volume training in your years pre 50 might give you issues that will make it impossible for you to sustain adequate training stimulus when you are older. Thus, be patient and keep your training CONSISTENT and progressive over YEARS AND YEARS! If you like training indoors, especially running ..read more

Listen to the episode now or find us on Spotify and Apple Podcasts. Show Notes You CANNOT just assume that every woman has a 28 day cycle and pretend like you are doing “PHASE based training” just this easily. If you want to do it properly, do it properly: get blood or urine testing done, because individual variation is massive. (check out our ATHLETICA WOMEN’S TRAINING STUDY!). The body of literature on women’s physiology, performance and variations in menstrual cycle is SO SMALL and insignificant at this point that it simply is not enough to indicate any differences in performance bet ..read more

Aging is associated with lowered performance across most sports that include a heavy physical component, including running. Yet, an increasing number of elderly individuals engaged in running are interested in optimizing their performance. What does the science suggest? While several studies have documented the training characteristics of world-class athletes in their peak years (typically around 20-35yr), only a few have documented the training characteristics of world-class masters athletes. It therefore remains largely unknown how optimal masters athlete performance should be developed. Su ..read more

Listen to the episode now or find us on Spotify and Apple Podcasts. Show Notes Just because SOMETHING in your daily routine, especially if it is a quantifiable measure, is low (e.g. HRV), it does not mean that you have to abandon your whole play for that day. Adapt, adjust and ALWAYS consider the context, details and options. TSS (training stress score), especially for cycling, has massive limitations. You need to know them, and try to work around them if you are using this particular (OR ANY OTHER) load metric! Figure out your athletes PROFILING earlier than you think. This can easily be ..read more

Listen to the episode now or find us on Spotify and Apple Podcasts. Show Notes You don’t know what you don’t know, and that is ok. If you have no clue how to reach more women in your sport science “insert here” (conferences, team, group, research group etc.), then reach out to some of the groups mentioned by Jo, to herself or any other professional health specialist that you know that is NOT male. Diversity is extremely important for countering groupthink, developing critical work and think space that does have a variety of backgrounds, as well as directly contributes to tangible outcomes ..read more

Listen to the episode now or find us on Spotify and Apple Podcasts. Show Notes Don’t be afraid to TRIAL & ERROR, even at the HIGH PERFORMANCE levels. You don’t know what you don’t know. Find the MULTIPLICATORS and EARLY ADOPTERS in every team to spread what you want most of your players to do – they see it and want to do it too! Build a PROCESS and culture WITH THE PLAYERS, so that everyone can get into their training FLOW through some sort of routine. You cannot do that on individual levels if not EVERYONE is following along in their commitment. The post From Basics, to Fancy, to ..read more

Listen to the episode now or find us on Spotify and Apple Podcasts. Show Notes Remember what the main point of the strength and conditioning practitioner is in your sport (it is ALWAYS a supplement – but what for exactly!): you don’t need to focus a lot on classical hypertrophy, random mash-ups of different strength modalities, or even hyper specific power training (aka. too much Olympic weightlifting focus). Learn, and adapt to what your athlete and sport needs. When working with your athletes, try to find out FIRST what is ALREADY working for them. Pick them up where they are at – and TH ..read more