Key facts
- The tipping point into hard, unsustainable effort.
- A key determinant of endurance performance.
- Trainable with tempo and threshold work.
- Higher threshold means faster sustainable pace.
As you exercise harder, your body produces lactate, and up to a point it clears it just as fast. The lactate threshold is where production outpaces clearance and lactate starts accumulating — the intensity where effort shifts from comfortably hard to unsustainable, and where you can hold a pace for only so long.
It's one of the best predictors of endurance performance, often more telling than VO2 max for how fast you can race. Training near this intensity (tempo or threshold work) raises it, letting you sustain faster paces before fatigue sets in.
Frequently asked questions
How do I raise my lactate threshold?
Tempo and threshold training — sustained efforts right around that 'comfortably hard' intensity — push the threshold higher, letting you hold faster paces for longer.
Is lactate threshold the same as VO2 max?
No. VO2 max is your aerobic ceiling, while lactate threshold is the sustainable fraction of it. Threshold is often the better predictor of real endurance performance.
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