I’ve been working with a coach for 1.5 years prioritizing olympic and half distance triathlon. I am now going to coach myself for a period of time. Looking at the TR Half Distance Triathlon plans, I see even the low volume has 3x rides per week. Typically with my coach I’ve done 1 speed focused (~1 hr) ride during the week and then 1 endurance focused (2-3 hr) ride on the weekends and this is best for my schedule. How bad would it be to complete 2 of the 3 TR workouts on 1 day to stay consistent with this type of schedule? Would it be better to just select various 2-3 hr rides in the workouts section versus doing 2 1hr rides? Note I was looking at the base phase workouts. I am a 30 yr old female with 3.6w/kg FTP at 130 pds and I’ve had good success with my races this past season getting on the podium for my 3/4 of my A races .
I’m not a triathlete but I’ll offer my experience with TR at least.
It’s not uncommon for people to do multiple workouts in a single day. You could even argue that this could be a benefit, if it means that you’re therefore getting more rest days. On the flip side of this, doubling up workouts and then not taking the extra rest could be detrimental to your fitness, depending on your personal abilities.
TR have just introduced the plan builder feature. It may be worth taking a look at this as it allows you to tailor your program to your own needs even more than ever.
I would argue that TR’s biggest value is the plans, not the individual workouts. So, with that in mind, I’d personally recommend you try and follow the low volume tri plan if your schedule allows for it. However I can understand you not wanting to shake your routine up too much since it’s obviously working for you!
I don’t know about what your previous experience was like on the bike specifically but with TR I will admit that the biking workouts are pretty intense. Typically volume can be subbed for intensity, and TR seems to focus on that for the low volume plans; to get you race ready on less rides per week (low volume) the shorter rides are more intense, so doubling up on one day may be too much intensity for you.
I see no issue per se dropping one workout a week and seeing how it goes. Alternatively you could try subbing workouts so you still hit 2 rides per week but they become longer workouts or tacking things onto the tail end, but it will become extremely difficult doing say VO2 max/threshold for an hour and something of any value after. I would also consider asking yourself how you see your strengths vs weaknesses; if you are a fast runner and a slower rider, it might be worthwhile dropping a bit of running volume to trade for the extra ride in it’s place. Sounds like you have a ripper time so TBH I think theres no “right way” to do this, but what I will say is that the low volume rides are challenging, and skipping 1/3 rides per week will definitely impact your results vs trying to space it out hitting all 3. IMO doing 3/3 but hitting 2x on one day sounds kinda painful and you might burn out doing it, although thats something you could try and perhaps with your background, you could nail.
What I can tell you is that for me, within one year of following the TR plan in the early season and then sort of loosely following the plans as race season got near, I was able to amass a ton of bike fitness and my times were in the top bike times, and thats from no prior structured training.
TR seems to work for me with respect to cycling fitness. I hope you find the same success. I think subbing something in the week so you can at least nail 3/3 of the workouts a week or worst case doing say a 2/3 3/3 2/3 3/3 etc. bi weekly alternation of workouts would get you the most gain, and I would advise against straight doing 2x TR low volume workouts on a single day.
Edit: I will add that the hard workout are HARD. I am specifically looking at things like over-unders on the weekends. I find I struggle the most on these, but I also feel the strongest after a solid block of these types of workouts. I am talking about Sweet Spot Base type workouts on the weekends where its a 1.5 hour workout and TBH after the workout I am gassed… I would be unable to hold anything other than recovery rides after and the next day is easy or endurance at best. Anything sweetspot and above would bury me, so again I think doing 2x would kill me.
Hello, I’m wondering how you decided to modify this? I’m currently following the low Half distance plan and want to drop to two rides per week and am looking for some feedback as to which ride to “skip” each week. Hope your training is going well.