High VO2 Max But My Resting Heart Rate Spiked

Week of June 8 - weekly fitness and wellness check-in. This week I ran 6 days straight, Monday through Saturday, hitting at least a 5K (3.1 miles) each run. Blood pressure is great. VO2 max is trending up. Weight is moving in the right direction. But my resting heart rate went UP and heart rate variability went DOWN. The culprit - sleep. I keep waking up around 3-30 AM and cannot get back to sleep until almost 5-30 or 6 AM. Training hard while recovering poorly is a disaster combo. More workouts plus less sleep equals worse metrics, not better. The big lesson this week - stress and cortisol management. You can train every day, eat clean, and push your VO2 max, but if your cortisol stays elevated from uncontrolled stress, your performance suffers no matter what else you do. This is the theory of constraints. One weak link - sleep or stress - and everything else crumbles. My goal is to run a sub-20-minute 5K. Only about 3 percent of runners can do that. At 51, hitting that mark takes focused training, good diet, quality sleep, and a curated environment that keeps stress at arm's length. This week I focus on sleep discipline, stress control, and getting back to 6 training days - Tuesday through Sunday. Cheers. Have a great week. admin at leekariuki dot com