What does your body actually do during a long ride — and how do you find out?

In this episode, Svein sits down with performance physiologist Steve Neal, who traveled to Nelson, BC with his full metabolic cart setup to put the Svein through a comprehensive testing session ahead of the BC Epic 1000 — a 1,040 km ultra-endurance race.

This isn't a standard VO2 max test. Steve's protocol goes far deeper, measuring fat oxidation, carbohydrate crossover, ventilatory thresholds, muscle oxygen (via Moxy sensors), spirometry, and recovery response — all in a single session. The result? More actionable data than most world tour riders ever receive.

In this episode, we cover:

• Why shorter ramp tests miss most of what matters — and why longer protocols reveal the full picture
• Fat max vs. metabolic efficiency: what they are, how to improve them, and why the difference matters for multi-day events
• VT1 and VT2: the ventilatory thresholds most coaches ignore, and what it means when they collapse together (hint: you're probably more tired than you think)
• The Moxy muscle oxygen sensor — what it shows on a working muscle vs. a non-working one, and why the bicep reading can be more revealing than the quad
• The recovery test: why your heart rate recovering doesn't mean your respiratory system has
• Spirometry and FEV1: how lung function testing on the bike reveals a limiter almost no one is training
• Breathing mechanics — nasal vs. mouth, diaphragmatic vs. chest, and how slowing your respiratory rate at a fixed wattage can change your metabolism in real time
• Respiratory training devices: SpiroTiger, Breathe Way Better, AeroFit, and the Go2 mouthpiece — what each does and when to use them
• The zone 2 problem: why training at your fat max wattage might actually make you worse if that number is too low
• The freediving connection: what elite breath-hold athletes know about thoracic mobility that cyclists are completely missing

The headline result from today's test: fat max improved from 280 to 320 watts compared to the previous test — while the athlete is two years older. That's the kind of data that changes how you train.

Whether you're preparing for a 1,000 km bikepacking race or just trying to understand why long rides feel harder than they should, this episode gives you a framework for thinking about endurance performance that goes well beyond watts and heart rate.

Guest: Steve Neal, performance physiologist and metabolic testing specialist based in British Columbia. [email protected]

Svein Tuft

tuftcamps.com

[email protected]

@svein.tuft on instagram