Longevity testing – based on assessing how efficiently the heart, lungs and muscles utilise oxygen – offers vital insights into a person’s long-term health
Chrissie Russell: ‘I’m fretting that maybe everything would have been different if I’d managed that final two minutes on the treadmill.’ Photo: © Presseye/Stephen Hamilton
We’re only seven minutes in, and I already want to rip the mask from my face and stagger away from the treadmill. With hindsight, this should have been my first alarm bell that perhaps my biological age, currently being calculated by the treadmill and mask combo, might not be as good as I had hoped.
At 13 minutes, and with two minutes to go, jogging at a pace many would no doubt find sedate, and at an incline more befitting of the trolley ramp at Tesco than any summit hike, I hit my wall and have to stop, hoping that whatever data has been collected thus far will suffice when calculating my VO2 max score and its all-important predictions for my longevity.