NatNews

Many athletes constantly strive to become better in their respective sports. For runners and other endurance athletes, a common assessment for doing so is lactate threshold testing, which helps an individual learn the highest intensity he or she can sustain before high levels of blood lactate hinder performance.

Dallas resident and kinesiologist Kevin Kuhn, who coaches high school track and cross country runners, said very little of how a coach programs training or how an athlete figures out what works for him or her comes from the laboratory setting—but lactate testing is one of the biggest exceptions.

“As a kinesiologist, it is my job to utilize the scientific method to find the absolute best ways to train my athletes so that they get the maximal physiological adaptations with the least amount of risk and minimal necessary physiological stress,” he said. “The successes of [runners such as] Jakob Ingebrigtsen as well as triathletes Gustav Iden and Kristian Blummenfelt have shown the world how useful and effective lactate testing is. I want to make sure I have the most accurate data to work with when I program for my athletes so that they all reach as close as possible to their full genetic and athletic potentials. Knowing my athletes’ aerobic thresholds and lactate thresholds gives me the tools to move them in that direction in the most effective manner.”

Dallas-area resident Ivan Alonzo began performing lactate threshold testing because of what he said was a natural evolution in his training—going from unstructured to structured and running with purpose. He said the more he learned about periodizing and structuring his program, the more he realized that running at or around threshold played a key role in improving.

“I believe it’s the key not only to running ‘fast’ but also longer,” he said. “For example, if your threshold is 7-minute miles, you should theoretically be able to run that pace for about an hour. By raising your threshold, you can then either run a 7-minute pace for longer, or in a race scenario, run that hour or distance even faster. It’s an easy concept to wrap your head around, as it makes sense logically. By improving your threshold, you also improve your running efficiency.”

Kuhn said lactate testing takes out a big portion of the “guesswork” when programming intensity because it gives an athlete an accurate picture of how hard the body is working at a set pace or heart rate, regardless of how the individual may feel. It also tells a person if he or she is using high-intensity fuel for low-intensity activity.

“Many athletes base their training entirely on feel, which can be very helpful for some and very counterproductive for others,” he said. “In a team-setting, when determining how hard each athlete should go on an ‘easy’ day, I often use the Maffetone Method (185 minus your age) to give each athlete a heart-rate ceiling they shouldn’t go over, even though they could complete the whole run faster and at a higher heart-rate. For the majority of the group, this calculation is a good starting point to ensure that the run is done at an easy pace and that the adaptation to the run is actually aerobic.

If I use this method, my heart-rate ceiling for easy days would be 148 beats per minute. This heart-rate puts me around an 8 minutes-per-mile pace, which feels very easy. After lactate testing, I found my actual aerobic threshold occurs at a heart rate of about 173 beats per minute, which puts me much closer to 6:30 pace. On easy days, I can now accumulate more running volume at a faster pace than I was doing before, and I don’t have to worry if I’m going too fast or doing too much.”

After using lactate threshold testing with some of his athletes, Kuhn said he has noticed significant improvements in their training.

“The limiting factor to running a faster mile or faster marathon is rarely speed,” he said. “It is almost always an inability to maintain a set pace or intensity with lower lactate production or an inability to clear and use the lactate that is produced at a set effort. The best way to train this ability is to know how much lactate you produce and clear at set intensities and then train at specific and targeted intensities to teach the body to produce less lactate at your race pace or clear lactate as fast as it is produced.”

Like Kuhn and his athletes, Alonzo said incorporating lactate testing and training into his running has led to him becoming overall a more economical and faster runner.

“So many benefits come from training at or around your threshold,” he said. “This past year, I purchased a lactate meter to accurately test for my thresholds and help guide my training as I prepare for future marathons. If anyone is interested in taking training to the next level, feel free to reach out, and I’d be more than happy to help find your heart rate and pace lactate thresholds.”

Similarly, Kuhn encourages athletes seeking to push their abilities to the next level to try lactate testing, as it provides practical information, is relatively simple to perform, and is a smart use of time and money.

“If you think you are going easy enough on your easy days but want to know for sure, then lactate testing will tell you,” he said. “If you want to know the sweet spot for training intensity so that you improve your body’s tolerance to race-effort speeds, then lactate testing should be a priority. If you have been training the same way for months or years, and your race times have plateaued or slowed down, then lactate testing will tell you what you need to do to change that. If you want to assess your physiological ability to handle cardiovascular stress and not simply guess how you should train, then it is time to schedule a lactate test.”

The first frisbees were originally Frisbie Pie Company pie tins thrown around by college students in Connecticut in the late 1800s.

In the late 1800s, the introduction of the electric streetcar provided a new means of transportation for the city of Dallas until the automobile caused the decline in ridership and the eventual end of service in 1956. However, the McKinney Avenue Transit Authority was established in 1983 and celebrated the grand opening of the M-Line Trolley in 1989.

Currently, the trolley covers a 4.6-mile track throughout uptown and downtown and serves more than 400,000 riders per year. There are seven restored vintage streetcars in operation, each with a unique name and story. Riding on the trolley can be a special experience not only for a passenger but also for the individual operating it.

“I think the act of driving a train—even if it’s a smaller version of a train (a.k.a. a streetcar)—is pretty cool,” M-Line Trolley motorman Jacob C. said. “Not a lot of people can say they’ve done that, and there are situations that happen here that I think to myself, What other job would that occur in?, so there’s a uniqueness aspect.”

There are also a number of benefits the trolley offers those who choose to ride it, whether they are commuters, tourists, or local residents simply wanting to enjoy a leisurely way to get around the city. There is no required fee to ride, though MATA encourages passengers to make donations or drop cash or coins in the trolley’s fare box.

“I think they enjoy the fact that, unless they choose to donate, it’s free transportation, which you can’t find a lot of nowadays,” Jacob C. said. “I would say that they also enjoy the fact that they can just, for the most part, sit back and relax and take in the city from a view that they don’t normally get.”

The opportunity for such a carefree adventure is appealing to many individuals who enjoy riding the trolley on a regular basis. Dallas resident Michelle Giraudo said she uses this form of transportation two or three times each month, especially on weekends when she is trying to find something to do and when she is with her niece and nephew, who love taking the trolley to Klyde Warren Park.

“I enjoy being able to get out and see the city without having to worry about parking or driving,” she said. “I also love that it’s free and easy to get on. The different trolleys come pretty frequently, so you don’t have to wait for a long time, it’s never super crowded, and I always feel safe with them. Overall, it’s an easy way to get around.”

Giraudo is also grateful that well-behaved pets are welcome on the trolley. She has a bulldog named Puddin who typically accompanies her when she ventures on the M-Line to explore the city.

“Puddin loves it,” she said. “When it’s her birthday, we always make sure to go on the trolley for her special day. It’s on January 15, so we just had it, and she enjoyed her birthday trolley ride very much.”

The NatNews staff and some of the dear readers rode trolley car 186, called the “Green Dragon,” which was originally built in 1923 and ran near the SMU campus. It was restored in the 1980s, receiving new seats from other Dallas cars as well as running gear and electrical equipment from Melbourne, Australia. After 33 years of inactivity, it returned to the streets of Dallas in June of 1989. Jacob C. said the historical aspect of each trolley is one of the most significant parts of using the M-Line.

“It’s a way to be able to connect with the past in a more tangible way, as opposed to looking at photos or videos or browsing the internet and seeing what there is,” he said. “You can touch it. You can sit on it. You can get a little bit of a feel for what it might have been so many years ago.”

WEEKLY PHOTO OP

Car 186, the “Green Dragon,” was restored from a 1923 streetcar and has been operating since 1989

Tuesday, February 20: Free Rooftop Movie — 50 First Dates at Sundown at Granada
Thursday, February 22: Mavs vs. Suns at the American Airlines Center; National Margarita Day; North Texas Auto Expo at the Kay Bailey Hutchison Convention Center (runs through Sunday)
Friday, February 23: Bluey’s Big Play at the Majestic Theatre (also on Saturday + Sunday)
Saturday, February 24: WRRC Saturday run from Taco Joint; NOLA Nights — Masquerade Ball at The Village Country Club; Erykah Badu at The Factory in Deep Ellum