I am finishing up SSBLV2 this week. I am doing the SSBLV workouts on Monday, Wednesday, and Friday. I have added in outdoor workouts to Tuesday and Thursday(Cloud Peak, Holt Hill -2) and a outdoor zone 2 ride on Saturday or Sunday(Try to be zone2, riding with friends makes that difficult). I began to notice in week 5/last week just an over all “tiredness”. I have been sleeping well, but just feeling low energy/tired. I was able to complete all of my week 5 workouts, but definitely am not 100%. This week is recovery and am continuing to feel just super tired both mentally and physically. This is my first foray into structured training, so I am unsure if this to some degree is normal or if I am experiencing symptoms of over-training.
So Dave, reading the above you are riding 6 days a week and resting one. What where you doing before you started structured Training? How many Hrs a week? Indoor training is more taxing than outdoor rides due to the specificity and the structure, no free wheeling or traffic lights on the trainer. To me it sounds like your doing to much, if it was me I would follow the LV plan for a couple of weeks without adding anything else in - maybe difficult as we all want to ride outside when we can - you do have the option of doing those workouts outside. Once your body can handle the structure of these 3 sessions than look at adding in.
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Over training takes weeks and months of driving yourself into the ground, so I imagine it is not that. You might be over reaching a bit. I couldn’t find Cloud Peak, but SSB2 LV is pretty intense and Hold Hill -2 isn’t exactly what I would call a recovery or endurance ride. If you think you are over doing it, than you probably are. That said, fatigue is supposed to accumulate over each training block and then be shed during the recovery week, so I would consider that normalish. There are also plenty of threads with people talking about how they feel like doody during recovery weeks, I sure do.
I do LV++ like you. Monday is recovery (lazy mountain), Tues → Thurs are the TR LV rides, Friday is recoveryish (Pettit -1), Sat / Sun are usually free form, long Z2 rides. I’m not super strict about being z2, but generally have TSS goals for the weekend rides. For build I have to switch up the schedule due to extra recovery being needed between TR workouts.
Maybe reconsider the intensity of some of your rides / workouts to make sure you are getting sufficient recovery to prioritize the important ones? Also, if you are getting started with structured training, it might take a little time to figure out what works and doesn’t work for you. And when you can push through the fatigue or add additional recovery.
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What’s Cloud Peak? Do you mean Clouds Rest? That’s VO2.
Hold Hill is Z3 tempo.
I think the problem is you’re riding 6 days a week at Z3 or higher. Your volume is okay but there’s too much intensity. Try to limit two of those days to Z2 or even Z1.
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Sounds normal too me - SSB V2 is hard! You are in need of some rest, and (IMHO) the those first few days of rest, you don’t feel too good. This is the body repairing itself. Give it a few more day and you should be ready to rip into your next block.
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Personally, I think TR by default has too many “on” weeks but that may work if you only do the scheduled low volume workouts. There are plenty of rest days in there but you added extra workouts so are not getting the rest. Riding 5-6 days per week, you’ll probably do better with 3 weeks “on” and 1 week “off” or actually easy.
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Sounds like too much, esp if you z2 rides become a mix of everything like every group ride does. Then you end up with too much time in z4 and above.
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Well today is Tuesday so you’re only on day two of the recovery week. There are times when recovery starts that you might be feeling worn down because you’re not masking things by continuing to smash. See how you are feeling come Friday/Saturday.
You might be doing a bit too much. I find that I perform better when I have 2-3 harder rides in the week, and the rest being Z2 or less to just get time in the saddle. If its your first go into structured training you’re not exactly sure how you’re going to feel, but don’t feel like you have to do that “hard” workout if you’re not feeling good.
I just had to change my schedule for the week since I am feeling a bit cooked. Things happen.
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Last hard week of a training block I always feel knackered. I personally then take a VERY easy recovery week and raring to go again (with an ftp boost last few times after 9 month plateau). I find the VERY easy recovery week - often just 2 x 1 hour leg spinners outside - is vital for me to fully recover, get the fitness boost and ready myself physically and mentally for next training block.
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No matter where I am at in the training block. My easy day is an EASY day. Its an enjoyable ride where my feet will hurt from lack of pressure on the pedals, I make it an effort to make the route easy and to stay under ftp. My goal is to get blood flowing through the body my recovery ride today was .6 IF for 90 min with a 50tss and it felt perfect.
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Cloud Peak is an outdoor version of Pettit. I did it last fall and had an IF of .68
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Yup, it’s not that it has too many “on” weeks, it’s that lots of people are training outside TR. The LV plans are designed to compensate for the low volume by using more intensity. So if you then do a bunch of other riding or training then it can be too much, especially if that extra riding is anything above Z2.
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Or people are doing low volume and group rides, which end up being hammer fests.
Thanks everyone for all the suggestions/feedback it’s greatly appreciated. @JT_34 I am feeling significantly better this morning versus yesterday morning. I knew I’d be tired coming into the rest week, but wasn’t expecting that level of tiredness. @GrahamH I had initially been following the LV plan as prescribed, but nicer weather enticed me outdoors. I start sustained power build next week and am going back to the 3 LV workouts with a weekend outdoor ride.
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