Lactate (lactic acid), generated by our body in the result of anaerobic synthesis during the strength training, and hydrogen ions which acidify muscles (they bind oxygen) disrupt the process of the energy formation. The aerobic process of getting energy goes during the endurance training (usually about two hours in a gym). Lactate doesn’t form much in such cases. Your activity level, when you are hunting in the mountains, is much higher than in the gym and Lactate will generate. It means that in a definite moment the aerobic actively will transform into anaerobic ones, and low level of oxygen content is one of the reasons.
If you didn’t train well before, the accumulation of lactate in tissues would lead to premature fatigue, you couldn't move. I guess most of you know that feeling when you can’t move and have jelly legs. It's dangerous because we can easily damage ligament and tendons in such moments. Next few days you feel cutting pains in muscles and it doesn’t’ add you extra speed on the slopes.
All sportsmen, engaged in sports related with endurance, have strength trainings in their programs. I won’t describe in details the program of bodybuilding but can tell that the individual who is sedentary can increase the power indicators from 20 to 100% in a year of regular trainings. Some people who have gene I2 (responsible for outstanding physical abilities) can get even better results.
The muscle memory forms on the initial stage. Each muscle consists of the thousands of muscle fibers. The percentage of innervating fibers isn’t high when you just starts to make the new exercise. Then in the process the muscle adapt to the exercise and more of them include into it. After these programs will burn into the brain, they are called engrams, and you could reach the first success in increasing of muscle’s strength. The further improvement can be achieved by training, sport feed or drugs. Engrams form when you train for endurance.
Taking into account that we go up and down in the mountains, we have to use simulators which can offer same conditions. You can regulate the angle of inclination on the treadmill and the elliptical trainer and go up on the stepper. You have to remember that all simulators work with the definite muscles while we use all of them when climb or walk. It means that when you run, jump on the stones or fall into deep snow you stimulate the muscles about which haven’t suspect before.
Some of us, who have been hurt while training, know that the injured parts lose strength and volume soon. If some of you break the arm, the most part of the muscle will atrophy in twenty day. The scientists say that two weeks without training is enough to lose the results which you’ve got training in a several months. It's proved that one strenght training per week is enough to stay in a good form. If we talke about trainings for endurance you’ll need to work harder. You have to remember about it and to find time for physical exercises in your schedule.
You also have to know that muscles are in four times heavier than fat. I’d lost weight making aerobic exercises and swimming but then added a couple of strength trainings in a week. I was highly motivated because noticed the results, the body size decreased but I didn’t weight myself for a few months. Imagine my surprise when I did it and found three more kilos. The doctor explained me that the composition of my body had changed: the heavy muscle replaced the light fat. I didn’t expect it at all.
The decision was evident to reduce the number of the strength trainings. I think to abandon them at all and practice CrossFit. This complex includes the strength part and a block of aerobic exercises. But you have to practice such sport, which are based on the training different parts of muscles in a short period of time, only after a long period of adaptation. The tempo of these exercises burns all glycogen in twenty minutes, the oxygen synthesis from fat demands time and lots of free oxygen, which isn’t in your body when we train in such intensive way. So you can fell dizziness, weakness, etc.
The adaptation period will help you to increase the number of glycogen, which is the main fuel and feed in our body. It’s the derivative of glucose.Its chemical composition is carbohydrate. So you need to eat carbohydrate when train hard or when you are in the mountains. I’ll write about it in the article “Nutrition in the mountains”.
One more advice, If you want to lose weight It’d be better not to eat fast carbs, including all sweets and flour products. They absorbed into the blood very fast and all extra energy which you don’t use are transformed into the fat. I advise to replace these products to the so called long carbs- different types of cereals. They are slowly digested and transfer to our bloodstream by doses and our metabolism works in the sparing mode. It’s known that our liver and muscles have the stored glycogen of 2000 Ccal, what corresponds to physical activity like running for 32 km. We have the stored fat for 70 000 Ccal but it’s more difficult to extract energy from fat because the one molecule from glycogen makes much more ATF ( adenosine triphosphate is an elementary energy unit in our body) than from fat. Oxygen delivery to our body in the mountains is limited by the opportunities of our respiratory and circulatory system and the low partial pressure on the heights. You have to remember that if you train regular for the long period, the glycogen level increase. It could increase in 100%.
We know that oxygen, glycogen, fat, amino acids and proteins are important parts of the nutrition system but all chemical reactions are done with the help of enzymes – catalysts. The sportsmen have such active compounds in 2-4 times more than untrained people.
The nutrition for our body is glycogen (carbs derivatives), fat acid (fat), amino acids and creatine phosphoric acid (as the part of protein).
Biosynthesis-oxidation and energy production in mitochondria (energy station in the body cells), is due to oxygen and enzymes. The oxidative potential of slow twitch muscles (STM) is higher than the fast ones. It depends on the number of mitochondria’s because the all processes are in them. If you practice the endurance training the number of your STM and mitochondria’s would increase and the oxidative potential too.
Oxygen is the main energy source in our body. It directly connects with the oxidative metabolism. The right level of O2 in our body will influence to the process of nutrition synthesis. And it depends on the respiratory and circulatory system.
The optimal ratio of nutrients, enzymes, oxidative capacity and the amount of oxygen give the main indicator of physical capabilities, which is called maximal oxygen consumption (VO2Max). The scientists say that the muscle metabolism grows during the training process. The only limit of its growth is the lack of oxygen.
Your body needs more oxygen for producing energy when you train. The respiratory and circulatory systems with the help of endocrine (controlling the release of hormones) and nervous systems increase the heart rates
The changes in the circulatory system are quite significant. They tough the heart rate, cardiac output (the volume of blood transported by the heart per unit of time), blood flow (the capillary network), blood (volume and composition), systolic blood volume (the actual volume of the left ventricle), blood pressure.
Maximum heart rate is a constant, calculated by formula 220 minus your age. It means that HR max for twenty years old men is 200 bpm but for the 40 years old man, it’s 180 bpm. When you train, the systolic blood volume and the volume of ventricle increase, the walls of the heart muscles thicken and the cardiac output grows and tissue are supplied by nutrients and oxygen. The output of metabolic products also grows.
80% of blood goes to the internal organs and 20% to the muscles when we are in the dormant state. When we are active, the blood formula changes and 85% from the whole blood goes to the muscles using the capillaries’ system. Trainings help to increase the network of these tiny vessels.
Long-term endurance training changes the blood composition. At first the total blood volume grows due to the plasma. The total volume can increase to 30% or to 1.5 L. The athletes can notice the increase in the level of red blood cells especially if they train on the heights in the mountains. Our body reacts to the low partial pressure of oxygen at altitude.
When we are actively move, the body produces lot of heat and part of our blood reallocates to integument and goes to the capillaries’ system. All of these factors plus the high oxygen ions , acidify the muscles, they don’t have enough nutrients. That is the reason why the sportsmen show not good results in all kinds of sports when it’s hot. Don’t be shy to take off warm clothes and membranes which slow the ventilation of your body. The overheat deprive of strength ourselves.
Overheating leads to the heat stroke and it’s dangerous to the health and life. That’s why we don’t advice to use rubber clothing if you want to lose weight. Sweating isn’t the right way to do it. We have to lose heat by the conversion and emission. We lose not only water but sodium ions, chlorine and potassium when sweating. It has negative influence to our body. The blood thickens, the metabolic processes slow down. If you train regulary, your body adapt to it and release the hormones which delays the excretion of water through the kidneys, and binds sodium and chlorine. The professional athlete lose in 60% less of ions than the beginner.
The ventilation increases in proportion to exercise. The ions H and CO2 inhibit the synthesis of ATF and the reduction of muscle fibers. We breathe more often to normalizes the process of metabolism. The sportsmen, who make breath exercises, have the increased chest and lung volume that grows their physical ability and endurance.
The volume of respiratory ventilation of the professional sportsman, for examples the rower, can be more than 240L per minute. It’s in two times more than the untrained person has.
All these changes, which happens with us when we regular train, come to the positive results and increase our cardiorespiratory endurance. You can’t get the progress without it, even if you have trained muscles. The right way to increase cardiorespiratory endurances is to train in the pulse zone, which is 70-80% from maximum. You need to make it not less than two times in a week. If you go to the gym, visit the high intensity group lessons such as trekking or RPM. You can also use any of the cardio machines and choose the effective load.
Cardiorespiratory endurance allows our body to withstand long-term load. I prefer to visit the group lessons because it’s difficult enough to boost the pulse to 170 bpm when you train alone.
The scientists suggested to use the maximum oxygen consumption (VO2max) to estimate the endurance. This the objective indicator shows your cardiorespiratory endurance and the speed of your metabolic processes when you are active. The high level of VO2Max means that you are more durable and your body needs less effort to satisfy the increasing demands of your body when your train or work hard. The untrained man could increase by 95% his VO2Max if he start to exercise.
Six month training process, which includes three 30 minutes endurance trainings per week, will grow your VO2Max to 20-25%. In practice it means that your heart rate will be down. You will lose less calories training on the high heart rate because the cardiovascular and respiratory system will quickly restore after exercises (heart rate will decrease faster). After six month of active aerobic exercises I lost calories in two times less than when I started, but the intensity and maximum pulse didn't change.
You can see on the Garmin diagram that I rode the bike in August in Spain and wasted in 40% more energy than when I rode the same route (similar time and speed) later. It’s not the limit. On average a man reaches his maximum is 18 month of regular trainings.
You can see the progress if compare the heart rate in the resting state. The untrained person has about 70 bpm. I had 72 bpm when I’ve started and 56 bpm after the six month of trainings. The professional sportsmen have 30 bpm!
But there is one unpleasant nuance. You would gain weight faster if you use to overeat because the hard trainings stimulates your body to hold fat. And you’ll need to work in two times harder if you want to lose calories. We know about fat guys who have been fitness gurus not long time ago. You need to adjust the diet if don’t want to gain extra kg. There are some exceptions but I’ll tell about them later.
The highlands with its low partial oxygen pressure influences on VO2Max. The scientists with Griffith Paf have established empirically that the height to 1600 masl don’t influence to our VO2Max but every next vertical km deducts 11% from our VO2Max. Good news is that our body can adapt to it but not in the gym.
I fully agree with the scientists physiologists Saltan and Rowell who say that the growth of our the capillary network in the muscles will lead to the enhancement of VO2Max. It happens because the muscles are provided by oxygen and nutrients. The adaptation of the skeletal muscles is the results of the increase in the number of mitochondria’s. The additional bonus is the reduction of the heart pressure, it’s very important for hypertensives because of increasing the capillary network and, a greater outflow of blood into the tissues.
The adaptation speed depends on genes. Choose the right parents if you want to become the Olympic champion! The international group of scientist researched genotypes of three different groups of people: stayers, sprinters and non-athletes. They found the clear difference in gen NRF2 in one of this gene’s alleles. No sprinters, no ordinary people didn’t have such allele.
I’ve mentioned above that we all have different numbers of slow and fast muscle fibers. But don’t despair we can improve our endurance by regular trainings. Probably you won’t become champions but feel better in the mountains.
Differences in susceptibility to the training process depends on our individual features. The same exercises will have different effect to different people, that’s why we need the coach who can help and correct the process. Don’t forget about the “the principle of specificity». The test group swam in the pool for one hour several times per week during the six month. The average swimming increased to 18% while the running just in 2%.
Train the muscles which you’ll need in the mountains, I talk about legs first.
