This is what I normally do, a recovery ‘block of 4 - 5 days’ as looking at my Performance Management chart (PMC) I’m well in the fresh range after 4 days.
As my recovery block was over Christmas I took the full week as in TR plan which was too much (even though I inserted a few sprint in one session), hopefully won’t be making that mistake again, PMC went beyond fresh and into transition / detraining.
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Depends, it is extremely individual.
I think you need to ask yourself how much fatigue have you got to shed.
Often I dont feel like I need a recovery week at all, so I have a token block of 3 - 5 days just so the fatigue doesn’t creep up on me in the next block. If you are hanging on looking towards the recovery week for relief then close to a full week might be needed.
I like something along the lines of the following
Mon - rest day, day off
Tue - 30 - 45 minutes Z1 50% recovery only
Wed - 60 minutes easy endurance 60% ish
Thu - 45 - 60 minutes easy intensity i.e Z2 with an easy set of 8x 1on/1off VO2max power
Fri - 45 Z1 50% or rest day
Sat - Sun back to normal training
Note this compares two a normal ‘on week’ where
Tue to Thu would be 2 hour sessions,
Wed might be 2.25hrs some weeks,
Mon would be 45 min Z1 recovery (or just a swim)
Fri - 1 hour mid Z2 and maybe a run
So you can see its a significant drop for 5 days over a normal training week. I keep and eye on the PMC chart and check in with myself honestly daily about how I feel and resting HR (to a lesser extent hrv as well)
Anyway, experiment see what works and adjust as needed.
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As others have commented on another thread, I don’t wholly trust TR’s approach to recovery weeks. It seems like there is just too much recovery/detraining in them. I also question there not being any intensity in their recovery weeks. I’m used to having one intensity workout, albeit not at max effort.
I use Training Peaks to monitor what they call “fatigue” and “form.” I wish TR had something similar, but that’s another discussion. At the end of a 3 week block before a recovery week, my form is usually around -23 or so. I try to calibrate my recovery week (by TSS) so that at the beginning of the next 3 week block, my form is around +23 or so. This will put me back at around -23 or so at the end of the next 3 week block.
Another thing I shoot for is having my recovery week be approximately 50% - 60% or so of the last week’s TSS before the recovery week.
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Like any good plan, my recovery week is not fixed.
I will generally take a day off the bike and then jump back on with some easy endurance for a day or too and see how I feel. If I need another day I take it off. If my legs are feeling good I will do a bit of intensity to open the legs back up before heading into a more formal endurance ride and then kicking the next block off.
A recovery ‘week’ might be 2-3 days or might be longer.
I don’t really pay that much attention to where my form etc ours me during these weeks. I rely on how I feel, the numbers are just a description of where I ended up after the fact.
I tend to end up about 70% TSS of my last block FWIW.
I am not using TRs plans though…
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Sound like recovery rides offer a great opportunity for you to work on you pedal fluidity and balance.
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Really?
They would be better of just sleeping.
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In answer to the question you want to be getting off the bike feeling significantly better than when you started, whatever level that is.
The recovery week should really just be prioritizing sleep, diet, and other recovery modalities over the actual training itself. Sleep surplus, caloric surplus (more carbs, more protein), naps, generally the lazier the better is the right way to do it.
I think on the on bike training is secondary to a large degree. Getting in 6-8 hours of easy riding (if for example you’re typically training 12-16 hours) is plenty to keep the body from losing most of the temporary adaptations. I wouldn’t overthink specific intensities or duration here, the recovery rides really only serve to minimize de-training, not enhance recovery. The work you put in during the last 3-6 week training block is what the body is using for signaling to enhance itself.
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Yeah you have to ride on a flat route and, for me, it makes me wonder on every pedal stroke if it’s actually doing anything to move the bike forward. On outdoor recovery rides I’m probably doing an average of 12mph or less on a flat trail.
There are literally dozens of studies that dispute this claim. Just Google Scholar it.
Yeah that’s what he’s said on his podcast.
I recently started with one of their other coaches and I haven’t been given any hard power numbers. Maybe I would if I started doing them too hard. But so far she’s not been strict with the recovery days. Sometimes I’ll ride easy around town (NP 100-130W FTP305W), sometimes I do a 20-30 super easy jog/walk, sometimes I just do a longish walk with my wife, and sometimes I just say “didn’t get a ride in, spent the time doing some light chores and errands”. Emphasis on “Recovery” and not “Ride”.
Sometimes if that recovery ride is preceding a harder workout then it can be nice to get the legs moving vs just passive recovery. Even if the difference is purely mental.
Also, there’s definitely some confusion in this thread about whether people are talking about a recovery ride within a week of real training or an entire week of recovery. Because my recovery weeks from Empirical Cycling are certainly not just 7 days of couch and <100W riding.
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Not sure what you are disagreeing with…
Again, the recovery period is less about the actual training (so long as you don’t screw it up by doing a ton of training that causes you to over reach even more) and more about the sleep, diet, etc. I’m not advocating the best or only way to recover is to sit on the couch all day and just do a few 100 watt rides, or not ride at all, or saying there is a specific % of TSS or volume that is optimal or can applied to every single person. I’m also not saying it has nothing to do with training either, but I don’t think there is a magical combination of rides or lack of rides or specific intensities that enhance recovery to a large degree on a macro scale throughout a season. I think the bigger risk is screwing up your recovery up by not eating and resting hard, and/or riding too hard and too often, than erring on the side of more sleep, more food, and less intensity and volume for a handful of days. A single 3-6 block of recovery every say 6 weeks, even if you don’t ride much at all, is not going to ruin your fitness, and in some cases can pay dividends by allowing you to take on more load the next block. Likewise doing some sort of sprints or adding in a tempo ride, as long as the load is sufficiently small, won’t screw it up either.
I think some personal experimentation is required there. I was doing sub 20hr weeks and found TRs recovery weeks to be too much. I switched to 5 days of z1 then 2-3hrs/day of z2 on the weekend, then back into it. With the TR recovery week I felt crappy the first 1-1.5 weeks of the next block, with the extra recovery I was feeling great right at the start of week 1. I also played with adding some short intervals in the middle and didn’t like how it left me feeling and I was worse in week 1 of the next block. YMMV!
@rkoswald, recovery rides are normally between 30-90 mins and should be around 40%-65% of FTP. These rides are not meant to be taxing and should feel easy with as little stress on your body as possible.
I personally like riding outside, so when I do a recovery ride, I try to find a “flat” one hour loop with good views that has a coffee stop at the end, hehe. These are times to smell the flowers and relax. I am with you on #4 @cartsman!
@Bbt67, as you mentioned, it is extremely individual. We all have very different schedules and recovery rates.
While a week may seem like a long time to focus on recovery, it can be one of the most productive weeks in your training plan when you give it the care and attention it needs.
In most plans, you’ll have a recovery week integrated into your schedule every three to six weeks. The week itself is designed to reduce overall training stress through low-intensity rides. These types of rides put comparatively smaller amounts of stress on your body so that you can recover completely from prior weeks of training.
We’ve changed the work-to-recovery ratio from 5:1 to 3:1 on our General Base Phase (previously known as SS Base). This means you’ll get a Recovery Reek every fourth week in your general base plan, just like most of our other training phases.
When you don’t recover sufficiently, you risk shortchanging positive physical adaptations and compromising the productivity of upcoming workouts. Over time, you can even put yourself at risk of overtraining if you don’t recover properly. Of course, you are always welcome to adjust your recovery weeks as you see fit. At the end of the day you know yourself best.
This is probably why you listen to your body on a daily basis 
. But for those athletes who aren’t as in tune with their bodies/training yet and are unsure, it can be hard to know when recovery is needed. For this reason, we recommend taking the Recovery Weeks as scheduled if you are following our plans.
We have a blog post that goes more in-depth about Recovery Weeks here:
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There it is! 
the truth comes out
I think any volume, even at super low intensity, is better than nothing. Compound those low-level gains every day over time and it starts to add up.
For me a recovery block is about going from: ‘Phew I’m tired. All I seem to do is train, eat, work and sleep’, to ‘I can’t wait to start training again, I’ve caught up on those nagging jobs and done loads of food prep’.
That takes however long it takes.
If I add in extra rides: recovery (stupid term in my opinion, they’d be called Exercise Addiction rides if we were more honest), or endurance, then the restart can gets kicked down the road by a day or two.
After that I lauch into another 2,3,4 week training block, make wonderful progress until that ‘Jeez I’m tired’ feeling returns
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#humblebrag 
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Yeah, he was getting EXCITED on the podcast about riders ONLY having a tss of like 3-5 on a recovery ride 