I’m not sure how to setup my plan for my current needs. I currently do a 3-4 hour group ride on Saturday and an easy 1.5 hour recovery ride on Sunday, and I’m not sure how to setup my training calendar.
Should I pick a 3 day training week (Base Phase) and just ride normally on weekends? Will it mess up my TSS for the week?
Should I pick a 5 day training week and not follow it on weekends?
Is there a way to setup the plan for the weekends that better suit my current needs and I’m just missing it?
Use plan builder. Take a 3 days/week plan and susbtitute the 3rd ride by your Saturday ride.
Add your Sunday ride on top
(so, on Low Vollume, you’d ride Tuesday/Thursday/Saturday/Sunday)
Stay on top of your fatigue and if things are too much, dial down some of the workouts to a minus version, or drop the Sunday ride
It’s always easier to add more stress than trying to remove some. If after the first phase of the build phase, you feel like you can definitely take on some more, feel free to move to the mid-volume.
I agree with @holybinch. You don’t give much info on your training history, time availability, goals, etc. but I think that is a great place to start. Then if you find yourself wanting to ride another day during the week then you can add a shorter (1-1.5hr) endurance ride on Wednesday.
I’m a 47yr old male. I bought a Wahoo Kickr and bike Nov 2019 on the recommendation of my doctor because at the time I weight 290lbs (currently 225lbs). I’ve been doing a “sweet spot” plan for awhile but wanted to give TR a try. I usually try to ride about 6-10 hiurs a week and the only real goal I have is maybe do a grand fondo sometime next year.
Hi
When you use Plan Builder it You can pick and choose the days you want your rides. If You pick the 3 day plan , You can ride Mon/Wed and Thursday. Then just ride the weekends as the weather allows. You will get the TSS for those rides added into weekly Totals, so you can track the stress score. If the weekend weather is not good, Just add an indoor Z2 ride for your long outdoor ride.
I do low volume plans, M-W-F and make sure to keep those fixed. Then, I do outside rides as usual.
T and Th are just a meandering ride with a friend. We ride side by side and talk the whole time.
Saturday is usually long (up to a century)
Sunday is usually easy, just to get breakfast.
Keeping M-W-F fixed as the things I MUST do, I’m then able to leave out something else during the week to give me a rest day. If I’m feeling extra drained, Saturday might only be 40 or 50 miles. What’s important for me is to ensure I can do the M-W-F commitment. If I need more time off to do it, so be it. If I can ride 7 days and still nail the workouts, that’s good, too.
More or less, I do a high volume plan, by using the low volume structure. I keep an eye on the TSS to make sure I’m not going crazy too many weeks in a row (not all TSS is created equal though, so you have to be careful there) and this works for me.
I should not, I’m not a racer. I’m not event driven. I do some things here and there, but they aren’t “I gotta win or PR” type events. I use TR inside to make riding outside easier and more fun. If you have specific goals and those goals are date or event specific, absolutely DO NOT do what I do!!!
A good thing to look at (if you have something like training peaks or intervals.icu) is how much time you have previously been spending in which training zone.
If you’ve been riding 8 hours per week solidly for quite sometimes outdoors etc you may find that 30% of that was in zone 1 (ie not doing a great deal), so if you then jump into structured training you find there is very little “filler” and the stress level is greater. As an example here, training this year 100% indoors during lock down, and then since then when doing a combination.
