How to increase your VO2 max | Peter Attia and Mike Joyner

so let's talk about folks who are listening to this who want to boost their V2 Max let's talk about the different protocols that exist I'll tell you what we typically uh tell tell patients to do which is kind of in my experience one of the most efficient ways that you can do it but I'm curious as to what other ways so we typically talk about a 4x4 four on four off so so we'll tell people um and again the easiest way that I personally can do this is on a on an incline and it can't be a very steep incline it's got to be like 6% grade I want to stay in the saddle and but I never want the resistance to go away and I basically want to be in the saddle climbing against resistance for four minutes and I use a power meter and a heart rate so I just want to keep the power as steady as I can invariably it dips in about the third minute and then I can recovered in the fourth minute psychologically and then the recovery is 4 minutes of literally doing nothing but rolling back to the starting line and then basically just repeat that so so so no no I'm with you what I tell people for example that have come and say I want to run a faster Marathon I want to do this I want to do that you know and they're running a lot of miles they need to get their V2 Max up and I tell them exactly what you've described sometimes I tell them five minutes and three minutes rest sometimes whatever people that are fitter sometimes only take like I would only take two minutes of rest okay and that's just but four time 4 is terrific so you would do something if you thinking about running I would tell people to do something that would be right at their sort of 5K race Pace mhm maybe a little faster or or you would do the first one a little slower than your 5K race Pace the next one you know a little faster than that the next one a little faster then the next one faster than your 5K race space And depending on how fast you're running if you're going pretty fast then you would just jog in between and if you were were not going so fast you'd walk in between so that would be the sort of thing that that I would describe to people and the classic training you know among Elite Runners is is mile repeats you know people doing you know four or five times one mile and then they jog a quarter mile or a half mile in between and I I personally have seen really good Runners I mean it's I've seen people you know do you know 430 425 420 415 410 405 which is but I mean these were people getting for the Olympics you know so so so but but those sorts of things but sort of for the average person right you know the the hard part that I think requires a little bit of coaching upfront is it's you know you and I have done this our whole lives so we sort of know what four minutes all out feels like yeah exact at 30 seconds in you shouldn't be hurting too much if you are you've gone out too hard so it takes a little bit of work to coach somebody to understand what what you're going for is a constant four minutes but the but the suffering is disproportionately in the last 90 seconds and Peter you you're you're exactly right so I describe it as you when you're done when you get done with the last one the fourth one you do not want to be bending over you if you'd have gone a little bit of faster you want to be bending over you so I call it the no bend over rule interesting and then what people have to recognize both for the four times 4 minutes and within the 4 minutes is a good interval workout and this sounds you know completely masochistic is like putting your hand in warm water and then slowly increasing the temperature in the water to where you can barely stand it anymore and then leave it in for a while and then you turn it down and let your hand cool off and do it again and and that's really the the what you described and and you know uh uh one of the things I I think we've learned from the cyclist is a terrific phrase called manage your suffering you know you need to learn to manage your suffering and and and uh and I think that's the other interesting thing about this type of training in in um is is to the extent you know people can have these sort of religious experiences exercising uh this sort of interval training is one way to get them that's what I would tell you I no I completely agree I mean obviously we're Cut From the Same Cloth in this way but but I think that um there really is something wonderful about experiencing your limits and that level of discomfort and if you're able to maintain your Rhythm and Tempo Peter while you do it that's when you can have these sorts of experiences and in um you know I mean one of the most beautiful things ever and it wasn't a total endurance ath you know even it was a little bit short a couple minutes but to watch Michael Phelps swim the butterfly and watch his stroke he was a he was good at everything but he was especially good at the butterfly and to watch you know most people stroke has fallen apart and they end up taking taking more Strokes the last 50 of a 200 met butterfly and you know his stroke count the second third and fourth lap didn't change because he had that Rhythm that Tempo and if you listen to the Old School coaches talk about interval training they're constantly talking about Tempo what is your Rhythm what is your Tempo and and why you're doing it why you're suffering Peter why you're pushing it why while while it's hurting while it's burning the goal was to not lose your form and not lose your tempo you know what's funny I used I used to watch Michael Phelps train because uh before he kind of broke out in the early 2000s yeah um I lived in Baltimore because I did my residency at Hopkins and he used to train at a place called North Baltimore aquatic yeah right nbac yeah so so watching now Michael of course within the swimming world was already an unbelievable Prodigy because he he had gone to the Olympics in Sydney placed like 15 or something which is quite young for a man that's right he was actually the youngest uh he he became the youngest male to ever set a world record in a Time sport in early 01 correct when he set the record yeah set the record for the 200 fly so so watching this 16-year-old swimming at uh North Baltimore aquatic nbac um which his signature event of course was the 200 fly now it's 200 long course butterfly I would put that up there with the 200 breast and the 400 im as the three worst races in all of swimming to me it's like doing an 800 meteor intermediate hurdles on the track that event doesn't exist yeah yeah yeah it's just it's just it's pure it's insane suffer but here's the thing Mike his training was almost never you never once saw him do a 200 uh fly it was lots of 75s right lots of 75s and uh his coach Bob Bowman was really adamant about perfect form because if I recall Michael had an unusual Rhythm which is that he breathed on every stroke and usually like when I swam butterfly when most people SW butterfly it was every other you would you head underwater for one stroke head up for one down for one and and Michael I I'm pretty sure he would Breathe every stroke but as you pointed out no one's form could rival his and that's why he he was usually the last guy to hit the wall at the 50 and and and yet would come back and just devour everybody well and you see that with Edwin Moses 13 steps between hurdles and the 400 hurdles in the late 70s with that Innovation and and again you you see these people you saw with Kip chogi doing it for two hours their ability to maintain this form and Tempo and as you watch it as you watch it Peter you you are AED by this sense of great effort and simultaneous relaxation it's really it's a real paradx and and and and well and again you see that you see that in other sports too you see it when the when the golfers get hot how how far they hit the ball but it's it's both violent and relaxed at the same time you you certainly uh you know you sit there and watch Steph Curry or Klay Thompson start launching balls and and and and it's just incredible the tempo the Rhythm the form and and and but and the effort but again just how relaxed they are it's just wild to think about even now going back to our very very recreational person who's never trained in their life we we don't even we don't use lactate testing on people at that level we basically do the whole thing off RP and we try to get 80% of their time which might start out at two to three hours per week as we want you to be able to talk but not enjoy it right I don't want you to be any I don't want you to be any higher than that right and then once we build up a bit of a reserve in that after maybe six months of that kind of training we're sort of ready to move them to that next phase of hey once a week I want you to do kind of four on four off corre four rounds um do you think that once a week doing those four hard intervals is sufficient to boost V2 Max it will increase it for sure yeah in that vast majority of people especially if they're doing the other stuff you're talking about and and I think that that what I really like about what you describe and what people don't realize especially when you're going to Advocate relatively hard training for Citizens is that sometimes you have to train before you can really train yeah that's right you got to train to train yeah yeah you you got to get and you certainly seen that in some some uh studies with with older you know people that are really you know 60 70 years old is that they almost have to do three or four or six months of sort of pre-training before they are fit enough to train hard so I think you're spot on there and I my guess is after they they've been able to do it for you know once a week for a while you build them up to two times per week I I think the one thing that people need to recognize and this comes from a man named Stan James who I think is still practicing medicine he's in his 90s was a one of the pioneers of Sports Medicine orthopedic surgery and he's not operating anymore but he the last I checked he was alive and well out in Eugene Oregon and he he worked with coach Bill Bowman you know the the great Oregon coach found one of the founders of Nike the waffle shoe guy you know and they got into this hard easy thing which is is sort of what I do and I and and uh you know Dr James would tell you that once people start doing more than about five or six hard hard sessions every two weeks you're beginning to ask for some sort of load management issue whether it's Orthopedics whether it's just you're fatigued whether it's this whether it's that so I do think that that um you you want to do something literally I mean I can't remember the last day I didn't do anything you know it's probably been you know years but but but my guess is the the number of times I do something hard is you know 120 130 times per year and I and my guess is I I never go more than a week without doing something relatively 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Channel: Peter Attia MD

Views: 125,546

Keywords: Peter Attia MD, Dr. Peter Attia, Early Medical, The Drive Podcast, The Drive, Longevity, Zone 2, mike joyner, vo2 max, zone 2, cardio, heart health

Id: sqsuJML2dkI

Length: 11min 19sec (679 seconds)

Published: Tue Feb 20 2024