My Garmin connect app makes a VO2 calculation higher than my watch and then the watch vo2 ends up overwriting it. I connect the watch to hrm and power meter and iPad to power meter, trainer and hrm. I discard the ride on watch in order to not have duplicate rides but still get the training stress on the watch but it calculates it lower. Today the tr app and Garmin connect gave me 69 which then got overwritten by watch as 66?
I realise the Garmin vo2 isn’t the end of the world or probably v accurate but I like to track it. I have a Garmin fenix 6 pro for reference.
I’ll do a full performance analysis later this year and finally get to compare how close the two figures are for me.
I hope it won’t bump down the number too much :
I get similar results from doing TR workouts using the PC app and doing the workout in Zwift. TR will get one VO2, and Zwift with get another. They’re about the same each time, but I just keep deleting the TR rides to, like you, not have the double training load in Garmin. Also, I notice the TR VO2 is just general VO2 vs Zwift coming up as cycling VO2.
I was up around 70-72 at my peak before my A-event. Back down to 60-62 nowadays without doing a training plan. I want to get a lab test one day (when I’m reading high again haha) to see how far off it is. It seems high considering my lower FTP, but who knows.
Lol, it dragged me into the youtube click phenomena. I quite like this video which says similar and explains how it can be skewed but not significantly
I have an actual gas exchange reading from May 2018 and assuming my fitness it pretty close to then my vo2 max estimate from HRV4Training is pretty spot on.
I tend to see the number as a relative number as it relates to health outcomes. It serves me no purpose in shaping my training.
Yip I’m skeptical of mine; it does show a general trend relating to health if you ignore the numbers. Just now I’m slightly above my readings 5 years ago when I got a power meter/ started structured training. It rose gradually as I started training then fell significantly in 2018 when I had cancer (alarmingly if you did pay attention to numbers it indicates that I was still healthy at 49 ; I prefer just to consider it a significant drop ). As I got healthy and motivated I pushed the number up to a higher number before a gradual decline this year but as said still slightly above 5 years ago.
Another n=1 data point. I did many lab tests and consistently recorded in the 64-65mL/kg/min range.
My watch tracks very closely to this and seems to track well with my fitness.
I think it really needs the Garmin recorded data, same as the auto FTP detection etc. It doesn’t get the same quality of information from the TR ride sent across.
FWIW my Garmin 530 bike computer gives consistent estimates with Intervals.icu which is based on recent 5 minute power, and WKO5 when I have enough hard efforts (short, medium, long). All three are using different ways to estimate, and all three give the same number +/- 1.
WKO requires an power curve with max efforts short/medium/long.
Intervals uses that paper where VO2max = 16.6 + (8.87 × 5-min relative power output). Example: for 80kg rider and 5-min power = 320W:
VO2max = 16.6 + (8.87 x 320/80)
VO2max = 52.1
The ACSM formula on Allen’s blog underestimates mine by a LOT. To be within 1 ml/kg/min of the other estimates, I’d have to either gain 60W on my FTP, or keep ftp and lose 15kg.
Garmin’s estimate are pretty much way too optimistic based on my experience.
Me and a friend volunteered in a sports study at a Québec University and it involved a full ramp test with a mask to measure gas exchange and some crazy expensive pedals for power measurement. Our Garmin estimates were ranging from 62 to 66 and we received some pretty ego crushing results at 53 (him) and 46 (me).
For those that it migh interest : TrainerRoad AI FTP test was totally off at 338… The real test gave me 311. One likely explanation is that I have a better anaerobic system (1350 peak, 800 for 30, 600 CP1), which skews the estimate when I do trainings that involves a lot of anaerobic efforts.
I know its only a n of 2 but I didn’t expect it to be that close.
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). As I got healthy and motivated I pushed the number up to a higher number before a gradual decline this year but as said still slightly above 5 years ago.