Road to Recovery is proud partner with VO2 Master to bring the gold standard in cardiovascular fitness testing to Penrith & the Blue Mountains – VO2 Max Testing & Basal Metabolic Rate (BMR) Testing.
If you’re a professional coach, athlete or fitness enthusiast, you’re probably looking at and evaluating ways to run faster and farther, workout harder and push athletic limits.
VO2 Max Testing
VO₂ max is an abbreviated term for maximal oxygen consumption, which refers to the maximum amount of oxygen that an individual can utilise during intense or maximal exercise.
We measure this in millilitres of oxygen per kilogram of body weight per minutes (ml/kg/min) with essentially two determining factors:
- How much blood your heart can pump out to the muscles with each beat (cardiac output).
- How efficiently your muscles can extract the oxygen from the blood and utilise it.
VO2 max measurement is generally considered the best indicator of cardiovascular fitness and aerobic endurance. The more oxygen a person can use during high level exercise, the more energy a person can produce. As such, this test is the gold standard for determining cardiorespiratory fitness because muscles need oxygen for prolonged aerobic exercise, and the heart must pump adequate amounts of blood through the circulation to meet the demands of aerobic exercise.
The bottom line is the higher your VO₂ max score, the more aerobic potential you have. However, with the right training, you can increase your VO₂ max. And perhaps more importantly, you’ll be able to increase your efficiency at higher outputs of speed and power.
From a VO2 max test, we can determine your training zones & ventilatory thresholds. If you’re serious about your training for endurance events or in improving your longevity, a VO2 max test takes the guess work out of generalised zone training and off-the-shelf training plans.
Whats involved with a VO2 max test?
A VO2 max test is typically completed on a treadmill or exercise bike and will involve graded exercise (progressively harder) until exhaustion. Tests run for ideally 8 – 12 minutes and we recommend avoiding eating immediately beforehand, limiting caffeine consumption and no strenuous exercise on the day of the test.
Resting Metabolic Rate Test:
Your Basal Metabolic Rate (BMR) is the amount of energy your body expends just to fuel your basic organ functions like respiration and your heart beating! Your BMR gives us an accurate measure of how much energy (calories or kilojoules) you’re body needs each day and allows us to give advice on fat loss, nutritional needs and energy expenditure.
This test takes 20 mins to complete and requires you to sit or lay down, sounds great right! Whilst testing, you are aiming to be a relaxed as possible so the test can measure only the energy required to fuel your basic organ function.
