How it works Load, status and recovery

Load, training status and recovery

What your workouts ask of your body, whether that dose is making you improve, and how long you need before your next hard workout.

Recovery is freeLoad and status with Pro

7 daysof load compared with your last 4 weeks

8 statusesfrom Productive to Strained

0 to 96 hyour recovery time

What Stamio uses

Your heart rate during each workout, relative to your resting HR and your max HR.
Your VO2 max, run after run.
Your overnight HRV.

How it's calculated

The load of a workout

Each workout gets a load based on the intensity and duration of the effort, estimated from your heart rate: it's the oxygen debt the effort leaves your body with. An easy hour can weigh less than twenty very hard minutes.

Your 7-day load

It sums up your workouts from the last few days, with the most recent ones counting more. It's compared with your usual over the last 4 weeks: from 0.8 to 1.5 times that usual, you're in your optimal zone. Above that, fatigue builds up; below it, you're recovering, or losing fitness if it lasts.

The 4-week breakdown

Your load is sorted into three types: low aerobic (easy runs, long runs), high aerobic (tempo, threshold, VO2 max) and anaerobic (fast intervals, sprints). Stamio tells you when a type is missing or overflowing.

Your training status

It combines your VO2 max (your last 2 weeks compared with the 2 before), your 7-day load compared with your usual, and your overnight HRV. Each situation gets a word: Productive, Maintaining, Recovery, Peaking, Overreaching, Unproductive, Detraining or Strained, with a sentence that tells you what to do about it.

Your recovery time

Each workout sets a recovery need based on its effort. The time left goes down by one hour every hour. If you haven't finished recovering, a new workout partly adds to what was left. When you wake up, a very good night shortens the time left and a bad one stretches it; a nap speeds it up.

When it changes

Load and recovery, right after each recorded workout.
Status, every day: it takes into account your workouts, your VO2 max and your last night.
Your first status comes after about two weeks of runs.
Peaking lasts a few days at most: it's the moment for a race, not a lasting state.

What can throw it off

A workout without heart rate: its load is estimated from your pace, more roughly.
Workouts done with another watch: they only count if you turn on "Count workouts from other apps".
A wrong max HR or resting HR: every load is affected. Check them in Settings.
Strong heat or an illness: your heart rate goes up, so does the load, and your VO2 max can drop a little. The status often shows this as "Unproductive".

What you can set

Whether or not to count workouts from other apps.
Exclude a run whose heart rate was wrong: it keeps a load estimated from your pace.
Your resting HR and max HR, and your heart rate zones.

Verified

The 7-day load was calibrated, then checked against a high-end GPS watch worn at the same time: about a 3% difference.

Just one runner so far: me. The beta will tell the rest.

Questions

I run a lot and I'm "Unproductive". Why?

Your load is normal but your VO2 max is dropping: fatigue, sleep, heat or stress are often the cause. A few lighter days are usually enough to get back to Maintaining or Productive.

Does my strength training count?

Yes. Any activity recorded by your watch gets a load from your heart rate, and counts in your load and your recovery.

Why "Strained" when my load is low?

When your overnight HRV is well below your usual, your body is struggling to recover, whatever your load. Focus on rest, sleep and easy workouts.