Hello Reader,

A very Happy New Year to you! We're thrilled about what 2024 has in store.

For those of us bracing against the cold in the northern hemisphere, it's a perfect time to set personal milestones. At Athletica, our resolution is to help you achieve your peak in health and performance this year.

Here's what's new to help with that resolution.

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Release #1: Recovery Profile Chart

As we speak, I’m literally on my way out the door to the Endurance Exchange conference to speak about the topic of heart rate variability (HRV) and how athletes and coaches can analyze and use the feature to gain insight into how they are responding individually to training. That presentation aligns seamlessly with our latest feature — Recovery Profile.

I will be elaborating on this topic at the conference; however, to summarize, HRV serves as an indicator of the parasympathetic branch (the 'rest and digest' response) of your autonomic nervous system. When you're well-rested and healthy, your body is better prepared to handle training stress and adapt accordingly. Assessing this involves a nuanced approach, with principles adopted from HIIT Science. To simplify, we compare your usual normal (60 day) HRV with your 7-day rolling average. This comparison provides a gauge of your recovery status in relation to your baseline, with an example shown here.

One thing to note is that It's critical not to react hastily to isolated low or high HRV readings. Instead, we advocate for a long-term analysis, looking at 7-day trends (dark blue line) in the context of a 60-day period (red band), which offers insights into significant changes. For instance, as I prepare to present at the conference, I anticipate my HRV will reflect the physical and mental toll of the event. This response will inform how I manage my training during and after the conference.

Key takeaways:

1. This is just the beginning of the process. If you own a contemporary Garmin device and wear it to sleep, your 'Recovery Profile' is available, displaying your HRV data alongside resting heart rate and sleep duration. Future updates will include proactive notifications about your recovery status in your calendar and training sessions and eventually automated adjustment to load.
2. Currently, we are only integrating Garmin data, but plans to incorporate data from other popular HRV-measuring devices are underway. We encourage you to participate in the ongoing Forum discussion on this topic.

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Release #2: Edit Session Details

True to HIIT Science philosophy, context is key. Now, you can tailor every Athletica session—adjust intensity and duration as needed. Remember, once edited, the session becomes non-adaptive. Just hover over any session detail to adjust. One thing to note however is that once you’ve chosen to adjust an Athletica session, it no longer will be ‘adaptive’ in your future plan.

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Release #3: Ability to Swap Weeks

Regarding context, there are times when a glance at our calendar suggests we should insert a recovery week or alternate between build and base weeks. You now possess the flexibility to make these changes. Simply access your Plan Overview, and navigate to the date field on your weekly roadmap to exchange weeks or opt for a recovery week.

Envision the potential for combining features from release #1 with this latest capability.

So there you have it. Three new innovative releases to explore on Athletica. As always, please discuss these in our Forum where I’m very much enjoying the sharing of ideas and experiences with you all.

Look out for my updates from the conference on our social channels.

Best wishes,

Paul

Paul Laursen, PhD

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