More on the Dump Truck Analogy

Thanks for the feedback from the fans of the MOxy Muscle Oxygen Sensor and of this blog.  Your comments are very helpful in the process of getting this product into the hands of those trainers and athletes that need it.

In a previous blog I talked about the analogy of "Dump Trucks" where the Dump Trucks represented hemoglobin, the blood component that carries oxygen from the lungs to the tissue (muscle) that needs it.  In the blog I references a draft paper that was being prepared by Roger Schmitz, Owner and Chief Engineer at Fortiori Design (www.fortiorides.com).
As Schmitz explains, "By carefully measuring color (of the hemoglobin) MOxy measures the percentage of hemoglobin in the capillaries that is loaded with oxygen." 

The connection to exercise is that "The human body has several response mechanisms to exercise that alter the whole dump truck system. First, heart rate goes up in response to exercise. This has the effect of increasing the speed limit... all the trucks move faster. Second, traffic can be redirected at the side street level. When more oxygen is needed in a certain area, chemical signals cause more side streets to open up.

As more and more of the dump trucks in the capillaries are unloaded, it means that more and more parts of the muscle aren’t getting all of the oxygen that is needed. This is true regardless of the heart rate.

When muscles get all of the oxygen they need ... they can keep doing work for a long time (aerobic metabolism). However, when a muscle isn’t getting all of the oxygen that it needs (anaerobic metabolism), it can keep working… but only for a while. The fuel store for this type of work is limited and it causes the buildup of byproducts like lactic acid. Eventually, the muscle runs out of anaerobic fuel and the lactic acid build up causes the muscle to stop doing work."

In future blog posts I will discuss more about the benefits of knowing whether your workout is aerobic or anaerobic.  Both have benefits - but they are quite different.

Thanks to everyone again for reading the blog.  Thanks as well to Roger Schmitz (rschmitz@fortiorides.com) for his contributions to this post.

As I stated in previous posts, "The team at Fortiori Design (www.fortiorides.com) is driving hard to get the MOxy product to market, and get this tool into the hands of athletes that would benefit from seeing directly and instantaneously what is happening in their muscles during workouts. Maximizing the efficiency of their workout, and maximizing the progress towards their performance goals, will always be our priority."

That's all for now. Thanks for reading my blog!