Amplify your fitness - V02 Max

If you are following my blog, I believe you understood the importance of staying physically activity. Being active, perhaps doesn't amplify fitness beyond a point. What is the best way to measure, train and amplify your fitness. The magic word is Vo2 Max. 

What is Vo2 Max

Body inhales oxygen and pushes into blood stream during breathing. Heart pumps the blood into muscles, oxygen gets converted into chemical reaction which eventually fuels the muscle to do the work(Wow, Energy). Vo2 max is the amount of oxygen your body can intake and pump them into muscle as energy during a hard workout. More the V02 max, more is your fitness. During hard workout, many of us would do heavy breathing. This is simply because, body needs to pump more blood into muscle as energy however soon you will realize your system is drained and ready to crash. While crashing is absolutely normal, the duration of crash is different for different people based on their fitness. Vo2 Max is the measurement  that shows how well your heart and veins work and helps us to focus on improving it over time.

Ways to improve your Vo2 Max

There are two ways you can improve Vo2 max. One by performing short interval heavy workout as popularly know as HIIT(High intensity interval training) or performing low intensity prolonged workout like walking, cycling, swimming popularly known as endurance sport. 

HIIT - Best way to improve your fitness

Dedicate 21 mins a day

• Perform 30 second on/30 second off workout - 3 reps(Each rep is 4 circuits(30 on/30 off) with 3 min recovery in between reps) with a total work out time of 21 mins
• Use your activity tracker to measure heart rate. Your heart rate should be 160 to 180 beats per minute (BPM) during 30 second on period and 120-150 BPM during 30 second off period
• During 3 min recovery in between every 4 circuits, perform a mild activity to bring your heart rate to less than <120 BPM. You can even stop/pause the activity if it helps to recover to desired heart rate

Endurance - Low intensity prolonged workout 

Dedicate 90 minutes during weekends

• Perform one prolonged workout preferably with a heart rate of 130 to 160 BPM for 90 minutes during weekends
• Activity should be enjoyable that you wont quit after 1 week :)
• Add 5 minute recovery for every 30 minute prolonged workout. During recovery period, either completely pause the activity or perform very low intensity to keep the heart rate at recovery zone of 120 BPM or less

Time to measure again and repeat

Beauty of V02 max improvement regime is body very quickly adapts to this combination of  short interval. prolonged interval workouts and your neuromuscular capacity amplifies slowly over time. What is the best way to measure this Vo2 max. Perform above workout for 6 weeks then simply perform the hardest workout(heart rate >160  and <180 BPM for 30 minutes. If you are able to sustain 30 minutes then you have successfully completed stage 1 of your Vo2 max improvement program. Wow easy right, Nah, you got to repeat this for 6 to 8 months to see a considerable improvement in your fitness.  Believe me if you are able to do this consistently, it not only makes your belt line slim but amplifies your energy level, cardiovascular health, sleep cycles, positivity. Benefits are far beyond comparison that you shouldn't feel quitting. 

Effort only fully releases its reward after a person refuses to quit

~ Napoleon Hill

Let's sweat now !!!