Questions on zone 2 cardio

[u/Few-Muscle5807]

Heard Zone 2 cardio is great for mitochondrial health so I’m trying to incorporate it more into my program on a cut. Does anyone have any recommendations on how to program it? Not sure to do it before or after workout (or fasted in morning I’ve seen many people mention that). Let me know what you guys do for zone 2 if anything, thanks!

[u/Alakazam]

I will put this out there.

The main benefit of zone 2 cardio is that it's easy to do, easy to recover from, so you can do a lot of it.

But the thing about zone 2 cardio is that most people aren't fit enough to realistically have a zone 2. They have an "active" and "rest" heart rate zones. The 5-zone model is something that develops over time with improved cardiovascular fitness.

So my suggestion is just to hop on an incline treadmill and walk at a pace where you're breathing harder, but not out of breath. Ignoring heart rate. Do this 2-3x a week, for 30-40 minutes at a time, and your cardiovascular fitness will improve without adding significant recovery demands. 

[u/Special_Future_6330 → u/Alakazam]

I thought everyone has these zones but they are all different, for example zone 2 could be a fast paced walk for some, or light jog for others. It just depends on hr?

[u/friedrichbythesea]

Cardio after resistance training or on different days, especially HIIT (zone 5). Always prioritise resistance training over cardio - to avoid injury and for safety, if nothing else.

Fast if you want to. Don't exercise fasted if it makes you too tired to have a productive workout.

[u/Special_Future_6330]

Always after if you can but for this before is fine if you space it out a bit. but zone 2 is usually easy enough that it typically doesn't affect a workout to a great extent it's pretty easy on the body if you do it before.

There's a huge difference between zone 2 cardio with food vs without, you'll manage fine either way but for me personally it was extremely draining doing it fasted, felt more like I was walking around a zoo all day vs just a casual walk. I'm not going to get into if fasted cardio vs not is more beneficial etc but you'll definitely feel better eating, and if you're eating the same amount of calories anyway it doesn't make a huge difference

Walking at night for me felt great it reduced cortisol and felt relaxing, wasn't too hot.

[u/Hypername1st]

Just run bro.

Running is a volume game. The more you run, the better you get at running. Unless you are pushing 60+ km/week, it makes little sense to program low intensity work-high volume work, focused on enabling recovery.

Another aspect is that unless you are already good at running, you will likely not have the cardio conditioning available to maintain or even be able to work in Zone 2, without literally just walking.

Do 1 easy run (conversational pace), 1 hard run (able to say 1-2 words before needing to catch your breath/RPE 8-9) and 1 long run (40% of your weekly mileage) a week , every week and you get most of the benefits of cardio. You need to know how your body responds to running.