How do you know if you are Aerobically Fit?

OR

How I Nearly Died Running My First Mile

Comments? e-mail me!

Back to Table of Contents

I've gotta start out with a story.

In about 1978, when I was building the very first versions of the now-HoloBarre, I was a student at The City College of New York, and I was taking a mandatory gym class. One day, the class goes down to the track, and our task of the day is to run a mile. I felt this was going to be one of my lesser days, but I had no idea...

Through supreme effort I managed not to come in last, but not by much--out of about 20 guys, I was about 15th. I would have been last, but terror over the humiliation of last-hood spurred me on. Now bear in mind that at 5'11" and about 150#, I was by no means overweight, like a lot of the fellows. So I had no great excuse, especially having been a bit of a runner as a kid.

After the immediate ordeal was over, I was walking around in a semi-daze, and sat down on a log. My head slumped towards my knees, I had no strength to get up, my jaws locked in the open position, and saliva was flowing out of my mouth like a water fountain--a continuous flow, that could not be stopped.

And I couldn't talk. There was an ache in my chest so deep and wide I was waiting for my breathing to stop, even though there was no difficulty breathing. But the overall reaction of my body was so severe that I thought I was ready to go to a hospital, quite remarkable given my jaded opinion of doctors.

I could hear people talking to me, but it seemed like they were at a distance, and, I could not respond, not that I was in any mood to. It was sort of like being in shock. Perhaps it was.

I knew I had to get home, and fortunately (at least for this crisis), I lived right across the street from City College, and I skipped the rest of the class, as well as my other classes, and successfully recovered in bed. But the sensations, like a whole-body/multiple-organ. DOMS remained for days.
The Point.... The point of this story is that there is likely an aerobic equivalent to the muscular phenomenon of DOMS. Aerobic activities also have tell-tale signs of when the body has adjusted or not. The details of these signs will be upcoming. For now, view it as a general distress, which you will likely know when you experience it.
How do you know if you're aerobically fit? So the question remains: How do you know if you are aerobically fit? Is it being able to run 1 mile, 5 miles, 10 miles? In what period of time? The answer is, None of these! The answer is similar weight lifting, where I pointed out that if you can MAXIMALLY exert yourself with no ill-effects, during or after, YOU ARE FIT! That does not mean you might not need to be a little stronger, but from a physiological point of view, you are OK.

Ditto with aerobic exertion. If you can run a mile, and for some reason you must run it twice as fast, or run 2 miles, your performance per se does not matter--it is the reaction afterwards. Not to say you shouldn't be winded...but that there should be no after-effects
The beauty of this definition
This notion of fitness is my notion. You may not like it, and you may challenge its basis. Its basis is:
That it is an INTERNALLY generated "standard", that has nothing to do with times, performance, or anything else. It is the result of my philosophy that health and fitness is
The fundamental Definition of Health/Fitness That state which minimizes risk of injury, and maximizes longevity (which may not be one and the same!).
The Bottom Line Bottom line: Choose the distance (or length of time; should be at least 1/2 hour, they say) you want to run, for example. You should feel no ill effects (to be discussed), AND be able to push for a number of extra minutes, with no ill-effects.
Epilogue Eventually, I was able to readily run 5-10 miles, but I never liked it. It was kind of a macho thing. I always felt the need for sleep afterwards, which makes sense to me. I never understood how these people get in a "quick" 5 mile run at lunch and come back refreshed! It's gotta be a macho thing!
MMMMMMMMMMMMM MMMMMMMMMMMMMM