So please describe how to undertake a 30/30 VO2max interval. I’m not referring to 3-8min long intervals. In 30 seconds this is all about me and the bike, not about what my bike computer is telling me, that is a pointless distraction when the whole interval is just 30secs; interesting subsequent data but during, useless.
What is the objective for me, my feeling, breathing, cadence, by the end of 30secs How do I get there? Is supposedly reaching some RPE, through an even level of intensity, that I’m supposed to innately know in advance, or is a growing or dying intensity over the period, etc?
Please explain it, as if you were standing next to your athlete from your initial ‘GO’!, while you monitor the data, the athlete, etc.
Dang, now we have to replace all the posts with VO2max with VO2Peak.
Ask your coach.
I’m asking you as it is your input that requires the explanation. If I ask another coach, they may be operating on a completely different premise to that of you.
Please explain.
Phil’s initial question regarded - How do you do 30/30 intervals? My request to you was to explain how you would Coach such training, ie, 1-2-1 as your trainee was doing an interval. Your response “Ask your coach”.
Does that make you credible?
I’m a scientist, not a coach, so my credibility as the latter is irrelevant. If I were a coach, though, 30 s on/off intervals are not something I would be likely to prescribe. Their popularity seems to largely stem from Billat’s hypothesis that time at/near VO2max is key to improvement, which has never really been tested (note the emphasis on time). But, if someone were insistent on trying them, I would point them towards this, and then adjust accordingly:
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I did a search of this thread and couldn’t find a list - but what would be a good set of TR workouts that achieve this 30/30 protocol?
But for at least some here, VO2max is the right term, so what’s a person to do? 
(Note that I have no objection to folks routinely referring to VO2max in practice; I was just addressing the question of mode specificity.)
In some arenas, e.g., cardiology, the norm is just to punt on the issue, and always call it VO2peak, even if it might actually be a patient’s true VO2max. In this case, though, it is more in recognition of their disease (e.g., heart failure) than any nod in the direction of test modality. Plus, you can’t trust those folks to be knowledgeable about exercise physiology - heck, the American Heart Association still embraces Wasserman’s “anaerobic threshold” hypothesis, even though it was clearly debunked 50 y ago. TV
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Just use the search and filter tools on the TR Workout page.
Filters: VO2 Max, On/Offs, then set your Duration preference(s).
Search: “30/30” or any other pattern of interest.
9 total for the above at an hour and you can add or swap Duration or the pattern as desired to get more results.
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30/30s could be done in an infinite amount of ways which is probably why you got ‘ask your coach’. If you come across a 30/30 TR workout, they will tell you how to do it.
I believe that the Billat way is to run the 30 seconds at MAP and then 30 seconds easy.
Another way might be something like 30 seconds above threshold (105-115%) but then keep the watts high on the rest interval (at like 90%). That would be more like an FTP over/under. In any case, there are infinite possibilities.
That moxy chart someone posted recently (sorry I can’t remember the name or the original post) shows that the rest interval on 30/30s is a bit too long for vo2 intervals. 40/20s, 15/15s, or 30/15s will provided a sustained low level of muscle oxygenation.
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Coincidentally I was served Sleeping Beauty +4 today. For you non-Trainerroad users it consists of 5 sets of 5 x 30/30s intervals @130% FTP.
I find these types of workouts quite manageable, mainly because of the 1:1 work/rest- relationship. Some have claimed that 40/20 or 30/15 (2:1) is better but I doubt it is more of an academic standpoint than actual fact. With a 2:1 relationship you are working at a lower power and I believe that could/should be a factor to consider.
If you compare to Brasted it is 13x30/15 @120% FTP, a considerably lower power. Rundle is a 40/20 @115% FTP, also considerably lower power but both has a PL of 5.1 indicating similar demands. To be fair, one maybe should compare those to Gendarme +6 with 20 x 30/30 @130% FTP and not the Sleeping Beauty series of workouts as they have fewer intervals in each set?
Anyway, my point is that in the 30/30s type of workouts work could be performed at a higher intensity, loading the muscles with more lactate intermittently than possible with a 2:1 ratio, hence being equally effective.
As I understand it these kinds of workouts aim to raise one’s VO2max which is often centrally limited and the most important thing is to let the heart and lungs get as much Time In Zone (considered by Helgerud and Hoff among others being the 90-95% bracket) as possible without inducing more fatigue than necessary. In my experience a 30s rest period does not lower my heart rate more than a insignificant amount - usually only one single beat or so. In today’s workout I ended up with 17 min 45 sec above 90%, which I find OK given it felt quite manageable; I could possibly have managed an additional set or two.
I am anaerobically inclined and probably gifted with predominantly fast twitch fibers and that may be why I like 30/30 over 40/20 or 30/15. A person more endurance inclined might prefer 40/20 hypothetically because they don’t produce as much lactate? 15-20s could then be enough to go again?
Another opinion I like to comment on is the suggestion to use resistance mode to do these kinds of intervals. I didn’t get a 1000$/€ Kickr to use it in resistance mode. It’s just too much cognitive load. Instead I use the flywheel to my advantage. I do most of my workouts in the big ring to get a more road-like feel. During the rest intervals I ease off and let the cadence fall something like 10-15 rpm. Just before the work interval starts I begin to load the flywheel with inertia by resuming a 100+ cadence. If I miss out on the last watts I don’t care that much as it is time in the HR zone I focus on. I might also mention that I use a crank based power meter with power match and this might be beneficial in this user case, YMMV…
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Honestly, the forum tries to put too sharp of a point on whether one should do 15/15s, 30/30s, 30/15s, 40/20s, etc. If there was a study comparing all these intervals and they were work matched, we’d probably find insignificant differences in the outcomes.
Seiler studied the 4x4s, 4x8s, and 4x16s and found the 4x8s better by a not statistically significant margin. That means you can do most sorts of interval sets and improve. Maybe you can eek out that last few percentage points with certain types of intervals at certain points during the year. Big picture, most of us don’t need to worry about it.
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30/15s. Last time I did them was back in April 2023 for a couple of weeks. By the last workout I’d progressed to 3 sets of 13 with a nice 10 minutes between sets. Avg power for the ‘on’ intervals was 139% of FTP.
All in Resistance mode and with the aim of building Anaerobic Capacity rather than targetting VO2 Max.
ETA: The 10 minute recoveries btwn sets were at 50% of FTP. The 15s recoveries btwn 30s efforts varied btwn 30% and 50% of FTP.
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Given the kinetics of metabolic responses at the cellular level, shortening the rest period from 30 to 20 to 15 s will in fact have a significant impact.
Altering the duration of the work interval will also changes things, especially as you go shorter. The classic studies of this were performed by Bergita Essen, who demonstrated that even totally untrained individuals could maintain a metabolic steady state at a power that would normally elicit VO2max by inserting 15 s rest intervals every 15 s:
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We just use FTFY (Fixed That For You) but I guessed it was something similar from the scored out text 
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Interesting study, l’ll see if I can do a n=1 trial in the near future. I don’t doubt that there are adaptions on a cellular level that differs based on the length of the rest period but probably not any central.
Edit: It would have been interesting to know if that protocol induced greater adaptions in VO2max than other variants of workout.
Anyone who has done this will know empirically how different they from just looking at the heart rate trace and their RPE as the intervals and sets go on.
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Rønnestad’s group recently published a conference abstract showing some promising soon-to-come work on this. Would be interested to hear your thoughts. Waiting for the full publications from this.
https://jsc-journal.com/index.php/JSC/article/view/810
And thesis of the first author with more details.
https://brage.inn.no/inn-xmlui/handle/11250/3019331
They compared a few basic interval protocols
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at last! long-awaited “magic interval” is coming and all self respecting cyclist should adopt this right away besides, it is easy to be programmed and executed, both indoor and outdoor…yeah
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Kudos to them for at least attempting to rest Billat’s hypothesis, as opposed to simply ass u me ing it is correct, and proceeding to design intervals aimed at extending time.
As for the apparent results (based on the title), they are what I would have predicted.
(Note that I have been making the above points for close to 20 y.)
ETA: Checking your second link, my reaction is now mostly “meh”.
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