The Catalyst Method is your source for information about improving fitness and health through nutrition, movement, sleep and mindfulness. Chris Cooper and the expert coaches at Catalyst Fitness bridge the gap between science and ground-level tactics in gyms and coaching practices. The Catalyst Method is perfect for coaches, trainers, nutritionists, athletes and general exercisers who want to learn more about training.
Be sure to subscribe, ring the notifications bell and drop comments on our clips!
I will test this, but I feel like I’m in zone two most of my day. As a commercial carpenter I am always moving. If this is true, wouldn’t it be good to target zone 3?
hit 185bpm today on the stair master …misery is right tried to maintain it for three minutes legs were fried! and i have been doing zone 3 and 4 training wow …
im trying to understand what would be the best zone or zones to improve my cardio for judo/wrestling? These sports are very demanding and would like to improve more my conditioning
It's not the duration, it's the intensity. You can run at a slow pace without carbs for a very long time. Our ancestors did it for days while hunting game that was faster than us: we simply stuck with the chase and wore the animal down over a full day or days. But when your heart rate goes up quickly, you need to metabolize carbs because you can't metabolize fats fast enough to meet your energy demands.
"Fasted" also doesn't mean "without carbs". You'll just break down muscle glycogen (or liver glycogen) for energy instead of burning up what's in your system. And since digestion happens over many hours, you're mostly running off yesterday's food anyway. :)
It's hard to reach and very hard to stay there. This is where Mixed-Modal Interval training (like CrossFit, for example) is really useful: in our heads, a change is as good as a rest. While I don't know anyone with the mental fortitude to spend 20-30 minutes in Zone 4 on a run or cycle, it's pretty common in your average CrossFit class. CrossFit is a good example of MMIT when it's programmed correctly, and when CrossFit is included in a broader context (as we do at Catalyst) it's a good pillar of health.
You should train in all zones. Your limitation in a weightlifting workout is probably going to be your central nervous system, which will require more rest (especially above 90% max) than your aerobic system will. Are you familiar with the 3 energy systems? If not, I can do a video on it.
Which zone do you think maximizes cardiac output and resting stroke volume? Is it more effective to increase cadence, duration, or resistance (hills for running) to maximize cardiac adaptations?
It really depends on the limiting factor for you. While the real answer is "all of the above", the precise prescription is going to vary depending on a few things. For example, stroke volume can be different based on cardiac musculature (the strength of your heart), cardiac size (the size of your heart, especially the left ventricle) , and even blood pressure. Generally, zone 4 or 5 training will improve the first 2 faster than zone 2 will; and zone 2 will improve the latter faster than zone 4 or zone 5. You really can't skip any. I'll give you an example: some elderly people might be told they have an "enlarged heart". Their cardiac musculature is larger than normal because it's forced to work harder than a young person, due to partial blockage or flaccid arteries/veins. That *should* give them superpowers, right? After all, the heart is a muscle. But instead, an enlarged heart is usually a symptom that something is wrong, because it's working harder than it should. It's facing some kind of resistance and that's making it larger. If we get in front of this and train to make the heart musculature stronger AND make the circulatory system more efficient AND improve blood oxidation, etc., then we can preempt the same problems. And the way we do that is through resistance: hard work for short periods; hard work for medium periods; less-hard work for long periods.
@@TheCatalystMethod Thank you. My limiting factor is clearly heart and cardiovascular. I run out of breath long before I ever feel burning in my legs. I reach higher heart rates more quickly with 70-80 cadence than 60-70 with higher resistance. I hear most often that Zone 2-3 at 70-80% has the most effect increasing heart size and stroke volume but I constantly debate which is more effective since you can reach that zone from higher cadence or higher resistance.
@@bmp713 You probably just need more HIIT. Don't worry about heart size or stroke volume. Find a Two-Brain gym, meet with a coach, and work out with friends to get into zone 4-5 twice a week. www.twobrainbusiness.com/map
I am running three times a week, most of it in zones 2, 3 and 4, and I try to get one entire day on the bike. Those rides are long, covering between 120 and recently from my house in Amsterdam to my mom's where I grew up near Groningen. 190 kilometers, I think I do most of the riding in zone 1, because that is the zone in which my legs seem to keep on turning forever. When there are hills or headwinds I shift down and ignore my speedometer saying that I am doing13 K/h maintaining the same cadence as I have doing 32 kilometers per hour with a tailwind over water.
have you measured your heart rate on these rides? My guess is that you're probably in zone 2 - you can go very long periods in zone 2 - but zone 1 doesn't really elevate your heart rate.
@@TheCatalystMethod My heart rate watch sucks badly, it says for example 187 while casually discussing the new government with my running mates, so I don't have objective data, what I do know is that when running and breating 5 steps in and 5 out, that is about zone 2, The zone where I can still talk, but with some planning the breaths between sentences, The level of breating while cycling is more difficult because I have plenty of gears. Maybe my easy running and cycling at cruising pace are both in zone 2 but hthere is a big difference. On the bike I can roll endlessly on the sugar in my morning coffee, and I hardly notice my breathing most of the time. I promise I will come back on this topic as soon as I have aq better watch.
@@klaasdeboer8106 I haven't found a watch that's accurate - most are consistently high or consistently low. Heart rate straps are still the best. I haven't found the 'conversational' recommendation useful, because I talk too much on rides. :) And talking about the government usually puts me in Zone 4--#stressismycardio The best thing I've heard recently is that you should be able to breathe through your nose in Zone 2.
I also do zone 4 and can sustain it for more than 30 minutes. Tested with both my apple watch and my Garmin watch and dedicated Garmin HRM. So yeah, either he's talking about a completely different thing or he's just plain wrong.
Playing ice hockey and reaching zone 5 is easy. Staying there is not, but reaching zone 5 pretty much every time you're working a shift in a game. You'll probably average solid 15 minutes in zone 5 during each game. This is one trick to work out in zone 5 without really dreading it.
After about 2 hours of cycling with 50% zone 2 training and 30% zone 3, upon finishing and then relaxing (after shower etc 30 min later) I get very dizzy if I stand up almost like I’ll pass out, do I need to eat immediately after my ride ? If so is my body looking for carbs or sugar?
Probably. If your need for blood sugar exceeds supply, you'll have a dip of low blood sugar while your body catches up. No worries - it's probably time for a meal (2.5 hours since the start of exercise, and probably a few hours before that since eating.) Right?
Worth adding (sorry if you said that and I missed it) that you can do zone 2 with weight lifting BUT BEFORE, not after. Seems counter intuitive but remember that for zone 2 your heart needs to be calm at the start. Recovering from weight training in order to do zone2 takes so much time you'd need hours between those two workouts if done in the opposite order.
Kinda depends, but in general, I'd agree. The bodybuilders who are walking to the water fountain between every set are probably not elevating their heart rate much - but even longer sets will flip the carb switch. This is a good point many miss.
Most of the time people think they're hungry, they're really not - they're bored. It's also okay to feel hungry without immediately eating. "Feeling hungry" is not a negative.
@@markotrieste I get it. Part of your journey will be mental. I recommend the book "Already Free" by Bruce Tift. Zone 1 and Zone 2 exercise will also provide distraction and satiety.
AND: Maybe there is a different mentality here in Austria, but I for myself and many other athletes that I know have no problem at all to get to Zone 4/5 by intrinsic motivation.
I gave this video a like, but I was already thinking about reversing it 😒! What is this permanent talking about that people don't like to train at max intesity or even hate it? I like it very much to get to the limit and I know others too. And it is also not true, that you need someone from outside to motivate you! People are very different and many have this intrinsic motivation. In addition you just talk about only 30 seconds - that is really not hard! Real suffering would be to run for 20 minutes at HR > 95; I already did that and yes, there is a lot of cruelness to it, but not to 30 seconds! 😒
There's no way you're running 20 minutes at >95% max heart rate. You literally can't metabolize energy fast enough to go that long. Your max is probably higher than you think! Congrats.
For those who run by pace, what is a z3 run called? Intervals? Z2 is called easy, zone4 is called tempo, what is z3 called? Is running strictly in z3 for 45min a good workout? Do you need time to recover?
Z3 is tempo/ first threshold/long distance race pace z4 is threshold as it trains your second lactate threshold. Intervals are switching between fast and slow paces. As for your next question it depends. What are your goals? Age? Running experience? What does your base look like? How about your speed? How often do you do base training? How about time training in zone 4 and 5? How often do you train? What does your rest look like? 45 min may be perfect, it may be too much, it may be too little, it may also be the dreaded grey zone if zone 3 is all you train at. Zone 3 gets a lot of flack because the new trend is doing zone 2 for 80% and 20% in zone 4 or 5. Zone 3 is phenomenal if you use it right the problem is most people only train at zone 3 and neglect building their foundation and also their top speed.
