First, I’m interested in the Moxy. I’ve spent some hours reading blog posts, threads here, and have listened a few podcasts.
After all of that research I’m still not sure if spending $1200+ on a device, software, and a course is worth it. Also, do you need more than one device? Measuring both legs? Or a leg plus a deltoid or paraspinal simulantiously? Three devices = $2500+, gulp!
Is going deep with muscle oxygenation unlocking the last 2% of gains or could it be a total game changer for training?
I also find it interesting that some coaches are talking about muscle oxygenation and respiratory training (lots of Canadians, Swiss mountain bikers, etc.) but most US coaches never mention it. Curious.
I do really enjoy geeking out with exercise physiology. Is there a market for testing friends for a fee to defray equipment costs? (I realize it’s not a get rich quick scheme.)
(I’m just a slightly above average 56 year old athlete doing fondos, small local races, and group rides. I’m no where near making the podium at big races. An extra 2% in watts is not that meaningful to me. Now, if it was 10-20% then I’d be on board.)
Is there anything I can read that is A to Z for beginners?
I have been using a moxy since it has been around, my mentor ( Juerg Feldmann - father of Andri Feldmann who you may have found on youtube).
Juerg helped me greatly in the first 15-18 years of my 33 year coaching career, I honestly think about what I learned from him on many levels, every single day.
As an athlete you only need one. You can learn an awful lot by putting this on a working muscle, and sometimes even more by putting it on a non-working muscle relative to the sport.
There are many ways to use the device for testing (LT1 and LT2 or non-invasive way of finding those two points), very easy. So compare the cost of a moxy to say lactate testing?
You don’t need the software as an endurance athlete, just a device like a garmin or wahoo to be able to see the data live.
You can use this for testing as mentioned above, and if you get more of an understanding you can also define some of your limitations from the moxy that could help your training.
You can also use this during every training session, which then really starts to show the cost benefit relative to say lactate with ongoing costs.
I think you are already doing the right thing by finding as much as you can online regarding the device.
Does it work? yes all of my private clients use one everyday. I teach them how to use the device to make live decisions during workouts or when to go ahead with a planned workout. The device really tends to agree with a persons perceived exertion and gives you confidence in making daily decisions.
If you are interested I do have a discount code that you can use for your purchase, has been listed somewhere before but don’t mind posting here again if you decide to go ahead.
On the forum you will see that they are starting to discuss a fine test (versus coarse test) this is something I have been doing for years, now that they are doing the same idea we will get a lot more science from what I believe works.)
The other place is Andri Feldmann youtube.
There are other great resources as well.
Many of the scientific details will be explained in great detail in these places, and you can ask questions as well.
This deserves a longer response, but my initial answer to this question is usually caution: IMHO the game-changer insight that muscle oxygenation reveals is that if we pay attention to our bodies and respect the sensations of effort, we’ll find that our brain does a pretty good job knowing how hard we can go, and how to pace an effort of a known duration. Muscle oxygenation is a very nice way to confirm or learn about those sensations in real time.
I think there’s an under-utilised model for coaches / clinicians / performance specialists to loan NIRS sensors to athletes for some period of time, eg. a two-week period or 4-week training block. Where the athlete can use that time to collect data and work with the expert to interpret the data and gain maybe 80% of the insight from that shorter period. Rather than every athlete buying a sensor to use permanently. Maybe it’s being done and I’m not aware. Maybe it’s a bad model for a reason I haven’t thought about.
Of course, there are performance specialists (incl. myself) who perform an assessment using NIRS and provide the insights from that single session test to an athlete. But I do think there is a lot of value in understanding the numbers in real-time during a variety of ‘real-world’ training or competitive sessions.
