The giant disparity in the scale of the two main benefits of increased aerobic capacity gives us reason to suspect that improved fatigue resistance in runners is not entirely accounted for by gains in VO2max. This suspicion is supported by studies in which runners lose fitness instead of getting fitter. For example, in a study conducted by Danish researchers in 1985, well-trained endurance athletes were asked to reduce their training volume from between six and ten hours per week down to just thirty-five minutes per week for four weeks. At the end of that four-week period, their VO2max was
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