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Is It Safe to Train When the Air Is Full of Wildfire Smoke?
Episode 416
Thursday, 24 September, 2026
Parts of the country now get a few weeks of wildfire smoke every year, and the obvious question is whether there is a point where the air is bad enough that the workout costs you more than it gives you. We went and looked. There is a real number, it comes from about 1.5 million people, and it is not the number that gets quoted.This is a free preview of Direct Line, our monthly ask-us-anything for Barbell Medicine Plus subscribers. Two of this month's twelve questions are here in full.First: training in wildfire smoke. What PM2.5 is, why the AQI on your phone and the number in the paper are not the same quantity, where the 90-minutes-at-100-micrograms figure comes from and why it is softer than it sounds, what happened when six cities modeled telling people to stay inside, and why your breathing rate during a set of squats matters more than you would think.Second: the effective reps model. A subscriber noticed that if a set only counts when you are within five reps of failure, the triceps in a heavy bench press should not count, and if you are going to count that as a fractional set for the triceps, then a warm-up set counts for the chest. Both cannot be true. We go through the meta-regression on proximity to failure, the 67-study analysis that tested whether an indirect set should count as one, as half, or as zero, and where we actually put our sets.Join Barbell Medicine Plus today: https://barbellmedicine.supercast.com/Buy the book, Signal: https://www.barbellmedicine.com/shop/learning/signal/New Barbell Medicine Hybrid 5K and 10K Run + Lift ProgramsBarbell Medicine coaching and templates: https://www.barbellmedicine.comTimestamps1:47 The question: is there a point where the air is too bad to train?2:37 What PM2.5 actually is3:05 AQI vs micrograms, and why your phone disagrees with the paper3:50 Where the "90 minutes" number comes from4:54 Austin: what breathing this air does to your lungs9:14 1.5 million adults: does dirty air cancel the benefit of exercise?10:44 Six cities modeled staying indoors. Mortality did not improve.11:22 Lifting vs cycling: breathing rate is the whole mechanism12:33 Indoor air during a wildfire, and what filtration does not fix13:24 Is wildfire smoke worse than city pollution?14:38 What we would actually tell a patient18:35 The question: hard sets, fractional sets, and the five-rep rule19:18 Reps in reserve, hard sets, and fractional sets defined20:19 The meta-regression: no threshold, just a line21:13 Do indirect sets count as half a set?23:08 Would you rather: every set at 5 RIR, or every set to failure?25:22 Why you get worse at judging RIR the further you are from failure28:42 The numbers we use: RPE 7 to 9 for hypertrophy, 4 to 6 for strength29:20 Austin: individual variation dwarfs all of this33:28 Why nobody can measure training load in the weight roomResourcesTainio M, de Nazelle AJ, Götschi T, et al. Can air pollution negate the health benefits of cycling and walking? Prev Med. 2016;87:233-236. doi:10.1016/j.ypmed.2016.02.002. PMID 27156248Ku PW, Steptoe A, Hamer M, et al. Does ambient PM2.5 reduce the protective association of leisure-time physical activity with mortality? A systematic review, meta-analysis, and individual-level pooled analysis of cohort studies involving 1.5 million adults. BMC Med. 2025;23(1):647. doi:10.1186/s12916-025-04496-y. PMID 41310726Giallouros G, Kouis P, Papatheodorou SI, Woodcock J, Tainio M. The long-term impact of restricting cycling and walking during high air pollution days on all-cause mortality: health impact assessment study. Environ Int. 2020;140:105679. doi:10.1016/j.envint.2020.105679. PMID 32353667Sun S, Cao W, Qiu H, et al. Benefits of physical activity not affected by air pollution: a prospective cohort study. Int J Epidemiol. 2020;49(1):142-152. doi:10.1093/ije/dyz184. PMID 31504557Robles P, Araujo T, Brooks D, et al. Cardiorespiratory responses to short bouts of resistance training exercises in individuals with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease: a comparison of exercise intensities. J Cardiopulm Rehabil Prev. 2017;37(5):356-362. doi:10.1097/HCR.0000000000000282. PMID 28858033Liang Y, Sengupta D, Campmier MJ, Lunderberg DM, Apte JS, Goldstein AH. Wildfire smoke impacts on indoor air quality assessed using crowdsourced data in California. Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A. 2021;118(36):e2106478118. doi:10.1073/pnas.2106478118. PMID 34465624Aguilera R, Corringham T, Gershunov A, Benmarhnia T. Wildfire smoke impacts respiratory health more than fine particles from other sources: observational evidence from Southern California. Nat Commun. 2021;12(1):1493. doi:10.1038/s41467-021-21708-0. PMID 33674571US Environmental Protection Agency. Air Quality Index (AQI) breakpoints. Air Quality System code tables. Accessed August 10, 2026. https://aqs.epa.gov/aqsweb/documents/codetables/aqi_breakpoints.htmlRobinson ZP, Pelland JC, Remmert JF, Refalo MC, Jukic I, Steele J, et al. Exploring the dose-response relationship between estimated resistance training proximity to failure, strength gain, and muscle hypertrophy: a series of meta-regressions. Sports Med. 2024;54(9):2209-2231. doi:10.1007/s40279-024-02069-2. PMID 38970765Pelland JC, Remmert JF, Robinson ZP, Hinson SR, Zourdos MC. The resistance training dose response: meta-regressions exploring the effects of weekly volume and frequency on muscle hypertrophy and strength gains. Sports Med. 2026;56(2):481-505. doi:10.1007/s40279-025-02344-wOur Sponsors:* Check out FIGS and use my code FIGSRX for a great deal: https://wearfigs.com* Check out FIGS and use my code FIGSRX for a great deal: https://wearfigs.com* Check out Factor and use my code factormeals.com/bbm50off for a great deal: https://www.factor75.com* Check out Quince and use my code quince.com/BBM for a great deal: https://www.quince.com* Check out Ten Thousand and use my code PODCAST15 for a great deal: https://www.tenthousand.ccAdvertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brands
