Hi!
This is my first full winter using the Wahoo Kickr and TrainerRoad programme.
I have been following mid volume - Sweet sport base, Sustained Power base and today I have started Century.
My question is…when do I head out to get actual miles on the bike. I need to build in a taper - but not sure I have enough time?
The 312 is end of April. Any suggestions are very welcome.
Helen
Hi, I did the 312 last year and followed mostly an indoor TR plan until and beyond the 312.
It wasn’t my A event so I was in the middle sustained build when the ride took place but mostly I just subbed as many workouts for miles as I could outdoors while still getting in 2-3 of the quality midweek sweetspot/Vo2 workouts in. Mainly the weekend TR rides would become my longer and hillier outdoor rides and the easier ‘recovery’ Zone 2 ride midweek often became outdoor miles.
My advice is to just ride…depending on your experience level you just need to get your body used to spending that amount of time in the saddle. Its a long long day. Best wishes for the 312, I hope it goes well.
Thanks, I have been cycling for years and have done multi days in the Dolomites, Alps and Pyrenees. I was old school - getting winter miles in!
Love the simplicity of smart turbo etc. I have seen a good upturn in FTP and feel strong.
Haven’t made my mind up re: distance of 312 yet! 
Build in a taper by grabbing weeks 7&8 from the plan and putting them on the last two weeks before the Mallorca 312. You may end up having to cut out some of the plan, but this will help you taper correctly for the event.
For outdoor rides, you can do them whenever! I recommend replacing the long weekend rides in your plan with outdoor rides and getting used to being on the bike for a long time.
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I did the 312 last year, had planned to finish my specialty plan right before the event but had a week or two of sickness post Christmas and just ran out of time. I was only following the Low Volume plans - that meant I had time to fit in outdoor rides around the plan whenever time allowed.
Good luck, it’s a great event. Best advice I can give is get to the start early - our group was literally the last across the start line and although it spreads out nicely I found myself fighting early on to stay ahead of the time cut-off riders. They’re pretty strict with the time cutoffs as well and pulling down signs. I know a few that were left to find their own route back to the finish that were doing the 225 route. That final split point is also really close to the end of the 225 so can be quite a mental challenge to turn away from the finish and put in another 80km, especially as the first few km’s post the split are rough roads/tracks through fields.
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I have to say I found the route awful when we started heading back up and inland. All small, gravelly and pot holed roads with lots of right-angled left/right turns. The last bit was very mentally hard like you say!
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Hi,
I’ve just found this thread as I’m doing to Mallorca 312 too.
I’ve been following the sweet spot base, sustained power build and am now into the high volume century specialty phase.
I’ve been doing the TR workouts in the week on the Wattbike and then heading out at the weekend for long miles. I’ve been building up the long rides and did a hundred miles last weekend. I’m planning to do another couple of century rides and possibly something around 200km+ as my last long ride about three weeks out (April 6/7th), before tapering. Keeping the intensity but dropping the long rides down at the weekend.
My goal is simply to finish before the cut off. Any suggestions welcome and good luck with your training.
Hi Lee, I did the 312 last year and am doing it again this year. A couple of suggestions would be to not waste any time at the feed stations as it quickly mounts up. I know that’s obvious but the number of people at the earlier stations was enormous and difficult to get through. I’d also recommend doing some heat adaptation training as suggested in the earlier TR podcasts. Salt capsules saved the day for me but it was very hot midday. Lastly I’d say don’t think that once you’re through the mountains that the hard work is over. I found the second half very taxing as did my mates. Good luck.
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I did the Mallorca 312 last year and absolutely loved it.
I followed SSB Mid Voume then did abit of a general build, I then went to Mallorca 4/5 days before and did my longest ride ever (90 hard Miles) on the Thursday, Recovery day Friday, had some sort of nervous induced diarrhoea Friday night…
Woke up Saturday morning 4am for the start and rode super strong all day somehow.
Had only been riding about a year and was my first huge event so I was so nervous about it, went super well though.
Wasn’t able to do it this year due to a friends stag do, plan to do the 167 or 225 next year but absolutely smash it as I’m a much much stronger rider now.
Enjoy it!
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I am in also, first time doing this event, the short route though (167k). This is not an A event for me, so I am in the middle of SSB II Mid Volume and my plan is just to continue training all the way through the event, meaning no taper and taking race day as a hard long workout.
Less than 7 weeks to go!
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Also heading for M312 (short route) this spring, being there already on Tuesday before and probably struggling to keep mileage down before the event - I just love the mountain climbs.
Any advice on % of FTP that is advisable on the first part climbs, i.e. basically from Pollenca to the top of Puig Major, in order to not risk too many matches burnt too early but not taking it too easy either?
On earlier visits I usually took the big climbs with 90-100% FTP, but then there are those coffee and lunch stops and usually not exceeding 120km on the same day.
Also taking part in my first 312. SSB 1&2 LV and will just about manage 3/4 of sustained power adding in a 2 week taper from century speciality as advised earlier. Club spins since October every weekend regularly knocking out 6 to 7 hours with climbing, tempo pace. This weekend did a 257km with 3000m 100km of it solo with a 26km average on Irish(heavy) roads. Just don’t want to go to hard earlier on as the section from Ariany to Arta looks to be tough. Best of luck to everyone with the remaining training miles…not long now. Some great advice from previous posts.
Hi all,
I thought I would just update this thread after the 312 at the weekend. My goal was just to finish the event, and I managed it! My total time was 12 hours and 41 minutes, of which I spent just over 12 hours riding and around 40 minutes at the various feed stations - including a nice beer at the final feed station in Arta.
I was really worried that I wouldn’t make the 9pm cutoff as I didn’t actually start until 7:40am, but I managed to catch up despite starting so late, and finished at around 8:20pm - so well before the 9pm cutoff.
Thanks for all the advice, hope you all had good rides.
Lee
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Hi
For those riders who have completed the full 312km could you share some of your power data for the ride? Please include ftp and w/kg at the time.
I am heading out this April and aiming for the full distance. If you could also shed some light on average IF and target IF (for the climbs) with total time at food stops it would be a big help.
Please reply or pm me, many thanks in advance 
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Hi, Veloaccro,
I have done the Mallorca 312 six times and will be attempting my seventh in April.
I can send you links to my Strava files for the ride, two of the rides were on the old course which went around the perimeter of the island. The last four rides were on the new course which keeps
the ride in the north of the island on closed roads, however, the new course has added another two five kilometre climbs at around the 90 - 100 mile mark.
My FTP was around 315watts, 4.2w/kg last year, but must be honest, I have never ridden to IF, just purely on RPE.
Looking back at last year, it looks like my average IF was @0.68 for the whole ride, the last major climb, es Grau at @0.84 IF.
There are six food stops on the route, I stopped a total of @35 minutes for the six last year. I would point out that the first stop at Gorg Blau is water / soft drinks only, so you will have to carry sufficient nutrition from the start for at least 4 hours of riding, this will get you to the second stop which has food and water. All other stops from there on will have food and water. I advise you stay away from the peanuts 
Anyway, anything you need to know about the ride, I will try and help.
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Hi @veloaccro - I rode this in 2018, my strava and TR file is here:
https://www.strava.com/activities/1537331090
https://www.trainerroad.com/career/philrcook/rides/33551770-mallorca-312
I used Best Bike Split to follow on the day and it worked out pretty well, my aim was just to finish but secretly I also wanted my ride time to be under 12 hours, which I just achieved. I was surprised how accurate BBS ended up being and by no means did I follow power profile to the letter it did help me keep the early climbs steady.
I had an FTP of 270w then - no idea how as never been close to that again and think I saw a big increase when moving to ramp test whilst it was in beta so possibly not totally accurate. Regardless I’d have been around or just over 4w/kg as I’ve hovered around 65kg for years.
I’ve not the same amount of experience as @Behind_Bars but feel free to drop me a message if you want anymore info or advice from my experience.
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Thanks @Behind_Bars and @philrcook for the invaluable nuggets of wisdom. I’m ~3.5w/kg at the moment and dream of getting to 4. I’ll make sure to give you a wave @Behind_Bars as you whizz by! 
Thanks again
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I’m also training for the 312. Really useful advice @Behind_Bars and @philrcook 
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Just seen the 312 has been unsurprisingly postponed until October 10th. Their post mentioned that for people who can’t make the new date should be able to transfer or sell the place. If anyone on here is in that position give me a shout I’d be keen to take the place (I live 2km from the start line!)
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go outside whenever you can! if you have a power meter on your bike you could recreate any indoor workout outside, and there’s definitely a great argument for why you’d want to.
enjoy the outdoors while you can and hope your event goes off with all of the other races getting cancelled here in the US