VO₂max Training

Research summary

• Cardiorespiratory fitness (VO2max) is one of the most extensively validated predictors of mortality in the scientific literature, supported by multiple large meta-analyses spanning tens of millions of observations and hundreds of cohort studies, including a scientific statement from the American Heart Association recommending it be tracked as a clinical vital sign.
• Higher fitness is consistently associated with markedly lower all-cause and cardiovascular mortality, an association that holds even after accounting for traditional risk factors like smoking and cholesterol.
• Because this evidence comes overwhelmingly from observational cohorts rather than randomized trials of training programs themselves, it strongly supports fitness as a health marker, while the added benefit of specifically training to raise VO2max (versus fitness reflecting other health factors) is somewhat less directly proven.