If I meet the daily cardio load target, why does cardio status say I’m not meeting cardio goal?

[LindaMtl]

I am having trouble understanding my cardio load status. My goal is set to improving cardio fitness, and has been since December. I wear my charge 5 day and night. 

I generally follow daily cardio load guidance (at times I do go over, never under). Yet I only obtain a « you are improving » status one day a week.  The rest of the time I’m maintaining cardio fitness.  Why?

I’m 68, active and have « excellent for your age » cardio score. I get that improving needs a fair bit of work and it may be tougher at my age. However, if my cardio load target is supposed to be personalized to my metrics, why does meeting the cardio load target not lead to the stated cardio fitness goals?

Insights appreciated. 

[RiekoC]

Hello @LindaMtl 

The help page on cardio load & target cardio load (<-- click link) was recently revised. I'm not sure that the revised page has the right info to answer your questions, but it might be worth a check.

I've been using the Cardio Load feature since it was introduced for the Pixel Watch 3 and still don't fully understand it.

[LindaMtl]

Thanks but as you suspected it does not answer the question. Cardio load sounds like a great feature, but for now it’s confusing and I only keep an eye on it out of curiosity.  Too bad

[RiekoC]

Hello @LindaMtl 

I think keeping an eye on your Cardio Load out of curiosity is a good plan for now. It's pretty much the same as what I'm doing.

I'm still hoping that the Fitbit team will eventually update the Cardio Load info page so that it makes sense for everyone.

[HopeSkavinsky]

I'm having problems with cardio load as well.  I consistently go over the recommended highest number, but they are still telling me to get certain numbers in order to get "back on track." I used to have overtraining risks with much lower numbers. Ir makes no sense.

[RiekoC]

Hello @HopeSkavinsky 

What did you set as your fitness goal on the Cardio Load page? 

If you have it set to Improve, maybe try setting it to Maintain. Users that have their goal as Improve report that their daily range is often very high, almost unattainable. When they change to Maintain, the range is much more reasonable & attainable. Eventually, they see their dot on the bar graph move into the Improve area where they wanted to be in the first place. And, it's much easier for them to achieve their actual fitness goal.

[YachatsMike]

I have come to the conclusion that Cardio Load is a measure of relative fitness.  It tries to coach you into either maintaining or improving your cardio fitness compared to your current average fitness results.  If you are exercising more vigorously than the recommended level, those performances will raise your baseline and make exercises that used to improve your performance start scoring as maintaining and the ones that used to rate as maintaining look like under-training. 

There are no real objective standard that you are trying meet.  You have to kind of choose you own level of fitness and, once you reach it, set your goal to maintain and follow the coaching to keep yourself there. 

I'm still trying to understand the best way to use the feature.