Are there any alternatives to doing endurance rides like Petit and Baxter? They’re just unbelievably boring. Or, can I get the same benefit by increasing the intensity and decreasing the time? At this point if I have one of those rides scheduled I’d just as soon skip it and get more sleep.
I see these short endurance workouts as “ride in your local forest with your mates for 1.3 x [insert workout duration here]”
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Do them outside if you can I think, if you can’t just have trainerroad on in the background and completely ignore my power (doesn’t matter if you have erg and if not just ride at what feels like a easy endurance pace) and watch something else.
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Second the comments above, if I can get outside for these recovery workouts then I do just that. I find these easy workouts mentally more taxing than the hard stuff indoors!
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I save my favorite shows and YouTube videos for my weekly Pettit rides. I just zone out and watch TV and it’s over before I know it. I actually get excited to catch up on my shows during that time.
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Same here mentally pretty difficult. And here in north Europe in the winter time outside riding is not an option. 1:30h is pretty long time for easy ride…
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Agreed, it’s difficult. I tend to do Baxter rather than petit or something similar. I know it’s not exactly the same IF, but at least the effort level changes more frequently which reduces the tedium slightly!
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I split these workouts into, say, 4 or 5 chunks, in between those chunks I pop off the bike and do planks, and other low impact stuff, and jump back in. Time goes quicker somehow.
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I must be the only one who doesnt find these rides easy.
I find one hour zone 2 rides kind of difficult.
I’m usually breathing and sweating too much to concentrate on anything haha.
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I usually replace anything like Petit with a Baxter/Colosseum version or Black. They bore me out of my mind unless I’m watching something super engaging. I like the shorter variations of those rides compared to Petit/Andrews/etc.
When schedule allows, I do these outside on the road. Ride at an aerobic pace for about the same amount of time/TSS, done.
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I find them difficult too - pedaling nonstop for 60-90 minutes is more than a mindless effort for me, regardless of the intensity. That said, they’re also suuuuper boring, and the dull ache of endurance pace compounds the boredom.
For this reason, I find these rides really valuable. Mental training is every bit as important as physical training, and it’s a place I feel like I have big gains to make. Don’t look at your boredom as a bad thing to be avoided, look at it as threshold efforts for your brain 
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I actually look forward to these rides. Intense threshold or VO2 intervals bury me and I can hardly look up from my stem. Pettit is a breath of fresh air, I watch 2 episodes of a show on Netflix and the whole workout is over before I know it.
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I usually just sub West Vidette or West Vidette +1 depending on what part of the season I’m in. 45 minutes is about the longest I can go with that level of effort, even with some good TV.
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when I’m on a plan and I see Petit, I smile and enjoy the easy workout… because very likely the next ones will be punishing.
Black workout is another good one.
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I’m also a fan of “saving up” entertainment for these. Generally I just go down the YouTube rabbit hole and finally watching all those random videos the algorithm recommends me.
Another thing I did on today’s Pettit was set an interval timer on my phone and every 4 minutes I kept rotating cadences from 95, 85, 75. I kept repeating that cycle and that split up the boring low intervals as well.
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I’ve found that doing these workouts, or the endurance addition to some of the VO2 workouts, is much easier to chug through in a lower cadence. Usually I struggle to get comfortable in a gearing with normal-high rpm on the trainer for these power ranges, but if I aim for 75-80 rpm instead of 90+ they are much easier to get through, and the time seems to go by faster.
I do them on a dumb trainer – you have to stay somewhat alert as I have to shift periodically to stay with things.
Do a 2-3 hr endurance paced outside ride at the weekend instead.
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I contend your entertainment is boring. Game of Thrones + Pettit = Fun!
Of course, bike + fresh air = More fun.