I have Tucson Bicycle Classic coming up Feb 21-23. But I’m looking over the training upcoming and it’s not what TR usually recommends. I used plan builder for my whole season, with my first A race in April and another in July. It is completely possible that I modified the TR plan but I don’t remember doing so.
Here’s what the next 4 (3 + race week) weeks of training look like.
The only issue is that this week (Jan 27) is the 4th straight week of intensity. In other words, it will be 5 weeks of intensity before the rest week. Which is different from what TR normally gives you. My last 3 weeks have been 549, 546, and 498 TSS. All Threshold or VO2 workouts. So here’s my question. Do I continue on as planned with this schedule? 5 weeks of intensity before a week recovery, then a couple opener workouts leading in. My other thought is take a mini recovery week this week and then hit a single week Feb 3.
So in short, if I’ve done 3 weeks of Threshold/VO2 (549, 546,498 TSS), how would you schedule the next 3 weeks before TBC?
Looks like you’ve got almost 2 full weeks of taper with the week of Feb 3 showing a ~140 point TSS drop, and then significantly more the week after while maintaining a little bit of intensity leading into the event.
Hard to tell without knowing your training history and prior calendar but personally, if you’re not feeling beat up, run down, and crushed from the current block, I’d stick with it because you’ve got time running into the event. But, if you’re having yellow / red days or a hard time hitting any of those workouts, don’t feel bad about taking an extra rest day or a recovery spin over the next two weeks.
Depending on when you start your plan, sometimes the dates and blocks don’t align perfectly so you have to make some adjustments. In this case, it seems TR just stretched your intensity block a bit to allow a more standard taper.
If you aren’t feeling unduly fatigued right now, I’d say just get on with it. If st some point this week or next, your legs are feeling bit dead, shelve a workout or two and then get to your taper.
Your fitness is largely baked at this point anyway…you are just slapping some frosting on it now. I’d follow the plan, but listen to your body and adjust if needed.
Finish week 4 of the training block. Rest week. Then instead of a bunch of vo2 work the week before the race, maybe go back to an easier week of endurance, with a race simulation on Saturday & Sunday. Monday & Tuesday off, Wednesday endurance miles, THursday do some short threshold-ish openers.
I think showing up with your best legs is pretty personal, and only you can figure that out with trial and error. You might go back and find periods where you were setting PR’s over a week or two, and see what you did leading up to that.
Good luck at the races! i was going to fly out for the weekend to race, but I have a priority race the following weekend and don’t want to risk fatigue from the travel. Sucks being old haha.
I went back to last year and looked at the races that I had my best results when I had my last big days about 10-14 days before the race. A couple times it was a really big weekend 2 weeks before the race. Another one was a big 3-day block that finished 10 days prior to the race. So I think the weekend before might be too close. I think I’m going to try to finish out the 2 week block (for 5 total) and really make that last weekend a big one before hitting a 2 week taper of sorts.
So basically keep it as planned in the picture except hit 2 big days on Feb 8-9.
I am, but I changed out the individual workouts a lot because as much as I like your plans, I don’t think you classify VO2 workouts correctly. So if TR suggested a VO2 workout, I would do my own VO2 workout. Rattlesnake +2 was given a VO2 8.0, and the only reason I marked it as Hard was because I increased the intensity. That workout should be like a 6.0 at most. So for this block especially I swapped a lot of VO2 workouts around. And I do the workouts in Zwift but recorded on my Garmin so they don’t show up as TR workouts (sorry I think the Zwift workout player is better). So if TR prescribed a Threshold workout I would find a similar one in Zwift or just another Threshold workout.
I also swapped most of the prescribed Anaerobic workouts for another VO2 because I don’t think the Anaerobic ones do much, at least at this time of the year. Hence why my Anaerobic training level is pretty low. So I take the structure of the block and sub in different workouts. So instead of 1 VO2, 1 Anaerobic, 1 Threshold per week I was trying to do 2 VO2 and 1 Threshold.
Also, looking back, I was sick at the end of December so I think me marking some time off for illness messed with the scheduling.
Either way, I think I’m going to finish out the 5-week block. I still feel pretty good now and that will give me a nice 2 week taper into the race.
Yea you could probably argue that. But I still stand by my opinion that TR gets VO2 max very wrong. Hence why I changed it. Rattlesnake +2 as I stated above is a perfect example. Classified as a VO2 8.0, so it should be pretty difficult. Even with increasing the intensity, I had 0 seconds >90% HRM, and 2:46 >85% HRM. And I wasn’t fatigued. I remember finishing an interval thinking, “that was way too easy.” I would have given it a VO2 6.0 at the very most. I actually finished that workout thinking to myself there’s no way that’s a VO2 Max workout. And I know every workout doesn’t have to kill you. But VO2 max should be hard. I’m not going to do a tempo ride and tell myself that it’s a Threshold workout. Actually have Sweetspot workouts that felt harder. I had a VO2 workout Sunday that started with 4x2min with 1min rest, so 2/1/2/1/2/1/2 with the work portions at 120%. In that single interval I had more time >90% HRM and a higher max HR than the entirety of Rattlesnake.
So what I use TR for is the yearly structure. Meaning I put in my events and get a yearly plan. And for the most part I stick to the prescribed workouts. Except for VO2 which I think TR messes up. And Anaerobic which I don’t feel are very productive at this point in the year based on previous training. So I use TR to get the block schedules (Base, Build, etc) but a lot of times TR workouts are too easy. I don’t need to do a 3x10 Sweetspot workout when I’ve just done a block doing 4x20. But I do like the structure part. Like, if a week has 2 Sweetspot and 1 Threshold, I’ll do that but might swap out certain workouts. It’s basically using the alternates function.
Check out my recent post about VO2 Max workouts here. I think it could be worth a read.
Not all VO2 Max workouts are designed to simply increase stroke volume through sustained time spent near VO2 Max. This is a power zone just like Endurance, Sweet Spot, and Threshold, but the name tends to confuse people. For example, with Threshold, the power or training zone is a range (95-105% of FTP) that covers the rough area around your estimated LT2. Similarly, VO2 Max as a power or training zone also covers a wide range (106-120% of FTP) and there are multiple types of stimulus that you can target while riding in that range, hence the many types of VO2 workouts.
If the VO2 workouts you’re being prescribed are too easy, simply finish them and fill out the post-workout survey properly and we’ll make the necessary adjustments down the road. There are plenty of hard VO2 Max workouts in our library.
The issue I see with your approach is that you’re not actually doing 90% of the workouts we’re prescribing to you, so while you think that what we’re giving you is too easy, you’re not really giving us a chance to suggest adaptations based on your performance. If you’re not following the plan, the specific workouts that we’re prescribing are pretty much meaningless other than that you can see one is a VO2, one is a Threshold, and one is Endurance so that you can find your own replacements.
Rather than using custom workouts or finding random placeholders, I’d recommend using Workout Alternates to find harder workouts when you feel the need. The workouts we suggest there will still respect the plan settings which are based on the discipline of your plan. This ensures that you’re specifically working towards your goal with relevant workouts.
