The Alpinist Fitness Assessment

By Rob Shaul In November 2015, I began working with two groups of alpinists on pure climbing events. I designed “event-specific” training plans for each, including initial assessments, and this started me thinking about what an “Alpinist Fitness Assessment” would look like. By “Alpinist” I’m speaking here in terms of an athlete who climbs high, […]

Does Load Carriage Affect Lactate Threshold (LT) Heart Rate?

by Jordan Smothermon and Rob Shaul Lactate Threshold heart rate, commonly known as LT, is the rate at which an athlete’s body switches from mostly relying on their aerobic energy system for fuel, to mostly relying on his/her anaerobic energy system to fuel the effort. This is a high heart rate, around 88% of max […]

ATHENA STUDY: Redefining knee injury prevention Training for Adolescent Female athletes

By Jordan Smothermon   Female adolescent athletes are three times more likely, on average across all high school sports, than their male counterparts to suffer an anterior cruciate ligament (ACL) tear. The severity, cost, length of recovery, and emotional and mental toll ACL tears (and other knee injuries) take on young, developing athletes provide considerable […]