Endurance training basics

[tshortt]

@jlnzhrl

On last question though, could you not argue that peaking power during a otherwise z2 ride would activate the anaerobic energy system so that after that peak you no longer are using that aerobic system for the next 20 min even if you slow down

No. Doesn’t work that way. You are almost always (for practical purposes always) using the aerobic system. Simple pneumonic: less than a minute, more than you think, but still not predominant. Any duration more that, overwhelmingly aerobic driven. Doesn’t mean don’t do little surges and recovery from them…the recoverability from those numerous surges is…that’s right: aerobic in nature.

Since you asked, here goes:

How hard can you go and still use fat?

If you’re a muscle of a rat, really darn hard…so hard that initially almost a quarter of all energy is derived from non-oxidative metabolism, and force falls by ~30% in 5 min and ~50% by 20 min: If you’re a trained human, at least up to 85% of VO2max, and possibly even harder (methods for quantifying fat oxidation aren’t really valid during even higher intensity, shorter duration exercise so it’s hard to say for certain. Based on the rodent study cited above, however, it seems likely that the…

Welcome to the rabbit hole. That thread was started by a well-respected physiologist. Dig a little and you’ll figure out who it is.

[AJS914]

@jlnzhrl

Btw what is the training benefit of a group ride

These group rides are not for training per se. They are pseudo races. What you describe is the way they go - cruise along collegiality while chatting and then race up every hill.

@jlnzhrl

Is that the right approach or does it not matter if I occasionally push up the hill to keep a constant speed?

It does not matter.

@jlnzhrl

When it was my time to ride in the wind though I had to come to see that to keep the groups speed I had to put out 300 wats.

You are not required to maintain a certain speed. You shouldn’t be killing yourself to take a pull in a group ride. I’d recommend taking the pull at your threshold power. If that is too slow for the group then take a short pull and move to the back. There is no shame in that. The stronger riders can feel free to sit on the front all day if they like.

@jlnzhrl

While doing those long endurance rides like I have been doing I would always make sure not to exceed my Z2 wats

Why?

The primary reason for intensity control in training is so that you don’t burn yourself out. Maybe you did a hard interval session a day or two ago that you are still recovering from so you take it easy on your endurance ride. If you charge up every hill or turn endurance into tempo or sweet spot, you’ll be tired and delay recovery from the previous hard session.

You still need to train all systems to be a good cyclist:

endurance

threshold

glycolytic / anaerobic short power

Just keep showing up to the group ride. You’ll get better and better at it. They are fun!

[ZackeryWeimer]

Welcome to the TR community!

To answer your first question, you don’t need to perform workouts exactly like how your race will be. Long and intense sessions are taxing both physically and mentally, which is why those sorts of workouts are limited in a typical training plan. As you said, most workouts are either longer and slower or shorter and faster (though there certainly can be crossover).

Those longer but slower rides are good for building up your base fitness, while the shorter, more intense workouts will target the energy systems you need to build up when training for your goal event. Long and intense workouts could be beneficial if implemented correctly within a plan. If overdone, however, they can contribute significantly to excess fatigue and burnout.

In other words, the risks of these types of sessions may outweigh the potential rewards.

Here’s a good article we have on this subject that could be useful for you:

• I’ve Never Done My Full Race Distance — Will I Be Ready for My Event?

As for your second question, you will lose some base fitness as you lower volume and increase intensity as you approach your goal event, but you don’t lose as much as you might think. Further, athletes typically feel “sharper” or more primed for their goal event as they approach it and decrease volume in favor of intensity.

You will indeed do Zone 2/base workouts to maintain the fitness you built up during the base period to help maintain the fitness you’ve gained, but the main focus will shift towards more race-specific workouts as you get closer to your A race of the season.

The inverse happens in the off-season and the base phase. You’ll lose some of those high-intensity gains you made during your build and peak periods, but high-intensity cannot be maintained for the entire year. While you’ll lose that fitness in the short-term, if you allow yourself to rest, recover, and rebuild once more by going through a complete training cycle of base > build > peak, you’ll likely gain more fitness than you did through the previous cycle, and thus reach a higher peak fitness for your A race the next season.

Hope this helps! Feel free to let me know if you have any other questions.

[jlnzhrl]

Thank you very much. Since you offered, I do have one further question. I would like to get your opinion on my training ideas for the off-/next season. Ofc you other folks are welcome to give me yours as well.
Since I can neither run nor swim at the current time, at least not consistent, I was planning on improving my bike leg over the wintertime. I have 3 weeks of traveling to do where I will most likely not be able to do much cycling, so I will use this as a recovery block. Afterwards (mid-September) I was planning on doing maybe 12 weeks of off-season training:

• leg gym training 2/week
• Z2 rides short (max 90 min indoors) 2/week
• Z2 long (100-140 KM outdoors) 1/week
  Should I include 1 interval workout during off-season/base training or is that time only gonna be Z2 ?
  Afterwards, so end of December or starting January, I would do a base block (length to be determined). I would still go to the gym once a week but the other strength workout would be a home stability/glute focused workout as that is my weakness. As for the Z2 rides I would add a third during the week, increase the volume on the long ride and maybe include a second longish ride on sunday. Again: should I be doing one interval workout during this time or none at all and only focus on endurance?
  Then the build phase: gym stays the same, two interval sessions during the week (monday and thursday), one short Z2 or group ride on wednesday, Friday recovery ride 1h and a long ride Z2 on Saturday, sunday off.
  During build phase does it make sense to do f.e. two blocks, one focusing on threshold and one more on VO2max/sprint power or does it make more sense to do one big build block with one threshold and one VO2max/sprint power per week?
  Peak phase would depend on which races I would like to do, I haven’t planned that yet. Please let me know what you think!

[Michael_D]

I’m following a CTS plan now that advises endurance miles to be zone 2 and 3. Quite refreshing actually. Strange after being told for so long to keep zone 2 easy, now it’s a pretty wide range and makes both long weekend rides great. Paired with two midweek interval rides seems to be working wonders.

Really, just be consistent.