Calculating LT1 and LT2 approximately without a blood test?

Training
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Same and FWIW:

Have lactate data and a good measure of LT1 at various times and various fitness levels over a few years.

My LT1 moves between about 165w and 205w watts and FTP from 220w up to a high of 235w. But my HR at LT1 stays a relatively consistent 75% Or roughly 125-130 bpm on a max HR of 170.

By RPE, that 75% feels about right for LT1 as well. Its comfortable and not hard, but it is a bit of effort.

My MLSS HR, when in good shape, tends to sit at 88-90% of HRmax

Obviously individuals will have their own data points and heart rate responses. Due to covid I had to stop my lactate experiments on teammates so only have longitudinal data on myself. I’m a very average 55 year old cat 3.

Happy estimating!

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This is what I normally expect, and that would correlate a bit closer to the 200W point I saw yesterday right now. When I did my 35min steady effort after the ramp, it was at 195W, keeping just below my assumed/estimated/tested LT1, and HR stayed in the low 140s, albeit higher than it would’ve been at this power a month ago for obvious reasons.

Thinking as objectively as I can, and assuming I was advising another athlete as their coach, it makes sense to me to be conservative and ride at that 195-200W level as my “LT1” for now. As I start to see a return to normal HR response post-COVID, I can run this test again and see if I get a cleaner, more prominent result.

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If on Android and use a h9/h10 use fatmaxxer. Updates the number more often and gives data to place your hr strap.(the voltage to you can move your strap around to get the best signal)

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Hey Mark, help me understand what if any value you obtain from estimating LT1 from lactate data. Off the top of my head, its a marker of when muscles start using more carbs for fuel, and increasing post-exercise stress (ANS). I’ve experimented (with and without a coach) doing zone2 work at different HR / %FTP, and found better results pushing on the higher end of zone2. While I haven’t done lactate testing, using other methods I suspect my ‘z2 training sweet spot’ is above LT1. Just curious.

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Good question. I’ll give you the longer answer but will miss something(s) and likely not answer your question at all!!

I started testing to see if it mattered and would guide my training. As world turns, I became less interested in racing and peak race performance (I do mostly TT’s 10-25 miles) but remained interested in if lactate data was useful and how it moved around. Some friends wanted data as well. So we set down a path. Covid derailed the group work, but I kept testing myself just to accumulate data.

I haven’t worried about exactly what happens at LT1 in the muscles or with sugars and fat. What I noted from some coaching programs was that LT1 had received good attention as a target for training and it was lower power number than what I would normally do for “tempo”, but higher than what I would do for easy endurance.

So armed with a thought that LT1 might be a productive target to spend time in, knowledge of what my LT1 was (lactate testing definition) , I set out to accumulate a number of hours in this range as my “Z2” or endurance ride target. Along with the LT1 time, I threw in some “stuff”. Stuff turned out to be 15-25% of time between 90-100% of FTP. Specifically, I find that 90% FTP power target to be very productive.

What I found over a season was targeting that LT1 zone plus adding some stuff worked well for me. My LT1 shifted from 165w up to 200w (about 4-5 months of training) and my MLSS moved up from about 220 to 230 and with lower RPE (mental matters too). I also ran a 10 mile TT for friends every other week. So I was getting Lactate data, power data, RPE data and testing performance over ten mile race-like efforts.

My conclusion was that having LT1 and modifying my training worked pretty well. I did not reach all time career peaks, but I reached a high level of fitness and was very happy mentally as I enjoyed the training block and was having a lot of fun riding.

Did I need LT1 and lactate blood tests to get there? Definitely not, but it was fun to have the numbers.

I was somewhat surprised how my LT1 shifted to a higher and higher % of FTP. If I was guiding based on FTP I’d have undershot LT1 target as I gained fitness.

Agree that finding that Z2 training sweet spot is a useful concept. It will definitely move up with training and it will not be a constant fraction of FTP or MLSS (from what I can see in my data).

Thinking about how many folks train, we see the “twice a week hard” concept frequently. Or 80:20 or some other variation on the theme. I wonder if the twice a week hard part is less important than how we use the remaining time. I think, but can’t prove, that my focus on keeping the 80% productive with an LT1 focus worked better than worrying about the 20% That might sound backward but pretty sure it worked.

Nobody asked… but looking at the thread subject… I have not found LT2 to be useful

I have found lactate testing, FTP testing and MLSS testing to be useful. Some riders have a big disconnect between MLSS and RPE. They think they are maxed but aren’t even close. RPE has a massive effect on FTP testing. But MLSS and Lactate testing don’t lie and don’t care what your RPE is. So for riders under performing, a biomarker test (Lactate) can help them break through.

Happy to dialog on this topic. I’ve tried to use the data in simple ways more than think about the physiology. But both are of interest.

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  • My HR at LT1 has been constant for 30 years (taking into account different protocols over the years). Did my first test at 17. 30 years later, same HR. You actually don’t need to test that often.

  • For high volume athletes LT1 provides a nice cap for not overdoing it. I go by feel (in my legs) but cap at HR@LT1. Endurance rides can turn out quite long and intense this way. Very frequent La testing during long rides gave me a very good understanding on how well HR and feel match La (and sorry, I know DFA a1 is everyone’s darling currently, nope). This allows me to tolerate a very high work load, currently my main metric for training. I look at the 7d rolling sum of work. Compared to previous years it is at higher boundary. What’s different, I never feel that tired despite doing so much work. This is such a notable difference. However, I also eat a crap load of carbs this time. this has such a huge effect on recovery.

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People with a H10 and an Android phone and who like to watch alpha1 while training would do well to download the Fatmaxxer app, preferably use the .apk install from the Github site. A recently added feature is the max voltage ref the ecg signal, this can help enormously with sensor placement, for me I get best voltage and ecg trace when the sensor is directly under my left nipple, this seems to be common.

I’ve been using Fatmaxxer to monitor my heart as I start to do rides post Covid, I’ve been back riding since 23rd December and I deliberately set my FTP low so I didn’t overdo things. I did Glassy today and I could see from my alpha1 values that my FTP is set too low, virtually then entire workout (sweetspot) was done above 0.75, a lot of it above 0.95. I’ll slowly increase FTP until I get the appropriate reaction then, when I’m more confident of my heart health I’ll do a Ramp Test.

Hope this helps.

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Yes, I absolutely understand that line of reasoning and from my point-of-view it is the lower stress bullet point from above. I’m not at the same volume, my mid-week rides are between 1000-1500kJ with one long 1500-2500kJ ride on the weekend. That is about half your volume, at least on a kJ basis. What I’ve found thru trial and error, is that on 8-11 hour/week, and dependent on focus, I can do 2 and 3 hour endurance rides week after week during base at the 68-75% range. At least during early to mid base. That changes during later base, and I find myself needing to dial down power on the endurance rides.

I have too, however it didn’t involve lactate. Part of the reason I went with FasCat for coaching was they had a long history of doing lactate testing, and then for practical reasons went to power based analysis. I’m cost conscious because blood draws make me faint and would potentially impact testing, and relying on power/HR has worked well for me so far.

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I did a test for the Runalyze website. Progressive RAMP starting at 100W and increase 6W per minute. Stopped at 20min on 220W?
When I launch the results in the website, my LT1 is 145bpm and 220W. Maybe I stopped to early (not much time) because I also got the message that the estimation results are not feasible. SO maybe do the test again, with extra 5 or 10min?

FTP indoor is around 250-260 (also recovering from covid in december with higher heart rates then before as a result).

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I think you went wrong with 1 min intervals. General advice is minimum 2 minutes and preferably much longer - you need time for the response to stabilise at each new intensity and 1 min probably isnt enough for that. I do 6 min intervals for mine and got very clear obvious data and results.

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Thx. What I did was a zwift warmup workout starting at 100W and ending at 220W in 20min (so this is 6w a minute). I got my info from this topic Muscle Oxygen Training: Best practices for Runalyze and DFA a1 thresholds.

*Suggested Runalyze ramp:
Between 5 and 10w per minute rise over 10 to 20 minutes. This can be done manually as “step” intervals (130, 160, 190, 210w …etc) with a change every 3 minutes or just use Zwift to create a incremental ramp (example - 130 to 230w over 20 minutes = 5w/min)."

So I did the second approach. Maybe I can try the first approach also. What increase did you use? 30W per 6minute? But normally that is the same dan 5w/min? I will try again :wink: And longer then 20min

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I did 7 mins at 50-53% FTP warmup then 6 min steps increasing by 3% FTP each time, so about 7-8w per step. Key thing being there is plenty of time in the 6 min step for HR to settle and DFA readings to respond.

Marco is very clear that it should be at least 2 min steps and in his suggested protocol he says hold a certain intensity for 6-8 minutes.

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What is the benefit of knowing the LT1 value (+/-). Can you base your endurance rides on this? Because if it is 145bpm for me, that is not my endurance zone (normal I guess). How can you implement this in your training? Short endurance rides just below LT1? Longer just cruising endurance pace?

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Some (e.g., Inigo San Millan) would argue this is the most productive way to ride endurance/Z2 - right at LT1.

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I’ll admit to wasting a lot of money on bike stuff over a long period of time.

The lactate investment was a minor effort compared to some (LOL). It has been fun and me and the boys enjoyed it. The fellow who benefited the most was the one who was having an excessive RPE compared to power. I always knew he was under performing but that data gave us clarity and gave him the push to improve. I wrote him out a 12 week plan and we put a good 20-25 watt improvement onto his career best FTP. That’s not an LT1 anecdote but it was pretty cool and showed that different data and different tests can be useful.

Most of the guys though, we didn’t learn more than we knew from power curves and longitudinal data.

I suspect, but cannot prove, that if I could get some of the guys to do more LT1 (+/-) riding for longer durations, that we could find improvements to FTP and/or set the foundation for higher peaks. But its tough to get 50+ year old guys to change their training without proof.

In the end, the lactate stuff is a nice to have. Absolutely good ways to find the same place without a bunch of tests strips and bloody fingers (or ear lobes).

This year should be a good one for me. Am looking to double down on that LT1 type approach that worked before and see if it repeats or gets better.

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But is that not dangerous for overreaching? Let’s say my 70% power is about 185W. So my endurance rides should be between 175-195W. That will be between 120-130bpm for me. But If my LT1 is 145BPM and 220W and I will force myself to do my endurance rides (3hr-4hr) at about LT1 (135-145bpm) will this not lead to more fatigue?

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No. I know how to add time at different levels and what I can recover from.

It’s not 3-4 hours just sitting at LT1. Rather its accumulating time purposefully at this level. Similar to how Frank at FasCat has sweetspot group rides. It might be a 3 hour ride with an instruction to accumulate time at SST. But its not 3-4 hours at SST.

What I do is simple programming.

I pick a couple days a week to go hard. Nowadays that means getting out on my mountain bike. With our terrain we have a lot of short effort hills which are Vo2max or more efforts. 30s to 5 min gut busters. I’ll do that on a Tues or Wed and call it a nice hard day. 90-120 min usually.

My second hard day is usually a weekend also on dirt but sometimes on road. I look for 2-3 hours with some long climbs. That’s going to be threshold or SST type work.

The rest of the time I try to ride endurance and have found that pegging “endurance” right around LT1 works well.

So far I’ve tried this approach on 6-8 hours a week. What I aim to do is bump that to 10-12 consistently. No expectations that this will be over reaching at all.

Hope that helps.

On Edit…

If I was programming “base” for someone with a road focus, the keys would be some VO2 type work and then I would add SST or threshold work on a second day. Those efforts build over time and fitness. We don’t just start with 5x5 and 3x20. The rest would be endurance and LT1 focused stuff as described. I just happen to be into mountain biking.

Also - long rides matter. Folks doing time crunched and avoiding those regular 3-4 hour rides with “stuff” build brittle fitness. That’s fine if its all you can do and I’ve been there as well. But having regular rides over 2 hours and some in that 4 hour range add another dimension to training and resulting fitness. But not everyone has those hours available.

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Cool; Thx for the long reply. I am in the ball park of 10-15hrs a week training. And I am already convinced that Z2 rides work. But because I mainly focus on gran fondo’s I seek the most benefit to increase my endurance level. So maybe, I will incorporate some more time at or just below LT1. Maybe more in the shorter endurance rides. Also I can watch some HR:PWR decoupling…

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10-15 is a good number of hours. Understand your concern on over reaching because might already to be close to “too much”. That’s an individual thing though and am sure you have a good feel for it.

In terms of boosting endurance, my N=1 anecdote is focused riding at LT1 resulted in the LT1 point moving up nicely. In say 4-5 months of this type of programming I went from an LT1 of 165 to an LT1 of 200-205w. FTP (MLSS) went from say 220 to 230. My best ever 40K TT was 238w and I was in phenomenal shape and 100% dedicated at that time.

I didn’t do a TTE test at 200w, but one of my favorite things to do is an hour at 200-210w. That’s how I test my overall fitness year on year and I do it about once a month. When my LT1 hit that 200w mark, the “test” was easy. I stretched that ride out to about 90 min and felt little additional stress. RPE was 4-6. You know that zone where you are putting some pressure in the pedals but it just feels good?

Today (literally today), my FTP is about 220w. LT1 about 165-170w. I’m in good shape but not in shape to push pedals hard for longer periods. If you asked me to do an hour at 200w I could do it but RPE would be 7-8. 90 min I’d start to be unhappy.

Now that we are chatting here, wish I had stretched that 90 min 200w ride out even further just to have the data.

About a month or two after that ride, I did an MLSS test. I held 225-230 for 50 min and it felt good. Really good and much better than I expected. True MLSS was probably 230-235 at that point which would have been in line with my 40k TT all time bests.

Regardless of what we call it, Z2, LT1, etc, this type of riding is the backbone of really good, durable fitness on the bike. Particularly if you are doing longer races. For 20-25 min TT events, or an 45-60 min criterium, a decent rider can sneak by with 4-6 hour time crunched programming. But this thread, I think we are talking about how to train for more durable and longer rides and how to get the most out of it. That’s where LT1 comes into the discussion.

Sounds to me like most everyone that tries this, with enough hours, reports pretty good results. So that’s something. Maybe !!

Also, this probably overlaps with the Mafftone (sp?) type stuff and the ISM stuff as noted above. I really like ISM’s thinking on this but admit the bias.

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Guess which base season I’ve spent more time at LT1…
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Z2 power increase a fair bit since this time last year - works for me at least (slow twitcher)