Originally Posted by
rubiksoval
Fast cat 3s? Seriously? Upper 60s vo2 max...I wouldn't expect a cat 3 to be a cat 3 for very long. I mean, in competitive cycling, many cat 3s are people who stuck with the sport long enough to get an upgrade. Hardly physiological outliers.
VO2max is HIGHLY trainable. Everyone here posted in this thread right now would test in the upper percentiles vs. the average popular of untrained humans.
Edit: obviously not conclusive, but I'm not crazy in saying that there are cat3s are in the 60s, and fast ones could be mid to upper 60s:
https://www.cyclist.co.uk/in-depth/5...e-pro-cyclists. I do not mean that ALL fast cat3s would be mid to upper 60s, but there will be fast cat3s in the mid to upper 60s.
Edit: here's some more data, cat3s at 65 +/- 2:
http://sites.edb.utexas.edu/uploads/...le-Results.pdf.