VO2 max is nothing but your bodies ability to use oxygen efficiently to produce energy for us to perform during various aerobic activities. Our mitochondria are the powerhouses in your cells. They need to be efficient enough to use the maximum oxygen efficiently and effectively give you the required energy to perform aerobic activities like running, cycling, swimming etc,.
A.V. Hill and Hartley Lupton first identified VO2max in 1923. In the 1950s and 1960s, Henry Taylor, Per-Olof Åstrand, and Bengt Saltin developed protocols and physiological indicators for measuring VO2max. However, it took a few decades for the process to become reliable enough to trust the data.
The equations developed to measure VO2 max gave a fair assessment of a person’s performance and aerobic caliber during non-competitive scenarios. However , these VO2 max formulae failed during the real competitive situations. This proves that there is no guarantee that the person having the highest VO2 max wins in the the competition because a lot of variables affect a person’s performance in a given moment like the strength of nerves, ability to remain calm in high stress moments, ability to focus when there are high stakes involved, emotional balance whether the crowd is cheering or geering.
This might work in a smaller settings and small groups but would not work in professional settings and in long run.
For example, an olympic diver or gymnast would win not because they are perfect but they are the best compared to others and they displayed the best that they could on that day.
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