Hi,
I am 47 years old, and I’ve been trying a polarized base to prepare 2024 with a low volume plan. I ride some 10-12 hours per week but this includes commuting to work some unstructured rides so I opted for a low-volume structured plan for indoor training. When I have more time or the weather is bad I use train now to add additional workouts.
My question is about the polarized base: adaptive training has been giving me endurance and threshold only. But everything I read about polarized training puts threshold in the dead zone and says the 20% should be VO2max or higher. So why is AT giving me so much threshold?
When you move to build threshold is replaced with Vo2 intervals.
Personally I would reconsider an either or approach and include both threshold and Vo2 into your weekly regime, if of course that is appealing to you.
The benefits are your training two key areas along with building your base and if you ride outside with mates or a club you will quickly find out your areas for improvement if you omit one of these energy systems
it depends on what you are trying to train. when you do ftp work, why are you doing it? why do SS? what even is SS? why does Vo2 training matter? what does Anaerobic mean?
when folk “do polarized” or any other approach, why are you doing it?
you are riding a bike 10 to 12 hours a week. so what are you not getting from this?
I’d like to increase FTP and hence speed. I’ve had a massive increase from 161 to 213 since I did my first FTP test ever when I resumed cycling last April after a many year break. But I seem to have stalled for the last few months.
so the noob gainz are mostly gone! the next improvement will be slower, and possibly take more work. IF ftp is your goal!
ask yourself a few questions. can you hold your ftp for >30 mins without a problem? is it a struggle with your breathing very laboured? can you ride at 90% ftp for >60 mins? the honest answer to these might direct you to what you need to train next. perhaps your next efforts should be towards extending your ability to hold your ftp, or, maybe target your VO2 max, if these long efforts are already good. also, are you wanting to ride long events? how do things get to feel after 3 hours?
ask yourself a few questions. can you hold your ftp for >30 mins without a problem? is it a struggle with your breathing very laboured? can you ride at 90% ftp for >60 mins? the honest answer to these might direct you to what you need to train next. perhaps your next efforts should be towards extending your ability to hold your ftp, or, maybe target your VO2 max, if these long efforts are already good. also, are you wanting to ride long events? how do things get to feel after 3 hours?
So if I understand you’re suggesting I do my own testing and choose my own workouts as opposed to letting AT do the work of choosing the “best workouts”?
Polarized training is not one thing, different people have different ideas what it means. We have several very long threads in this forum on the topic.
TR decided to implement one specific form of polarized training, based on a 3-zone power model. According to that, threshold, VO2max and above are one single zone.
Then probably you will be disappointed with the training outcomes after polarized blocks. I have incorporated polarized blocks into my training for several years. In my experience, FTP gains are small, much smaller than with sweet spot training. Instead, I saw gains in time-to-exhaustion (endurance at or near threshold). Both are good goals, and I combine sweet spot and polarized blocks depending on my needs.
No, I think @cagiva_wmx125’s point is that fitness expresses itself in different ways, it isn’t just a one-dimensional thing. His questions aimed at identifying limitations and weaknesses in your current fitness, none of which cannot be expressed in terms of FTP.
Question: how much of this is because of the training distribution itself, and how much is just because the hard workouts you were doing were the sort of riding that would extend your TTE anyway (eg FTP workouts progressively increasing TiZ)?
My point being that maybe the results aren’t really driven by the polarization.
You get better at the things you train for. TR’s polarized plans have changed a lot over the years. The first time around had me progress from 4 x 8 minutes at 100 % FTP to 3 x 16 minutes at 100 % FTP. Guess what, I got better at riding at FTP. The next block was a sweet spot block and I progressed to PL 9.2. I could have pushed further, but I didn’t want to do 1 minute at 150 % FTP to induce fatigue for the sweet spot intervals.
Right now I am doing my 6th or 7th polarized block, and while the blocks have changed (TR serves me 4 x 9-minute intervals with intensities ranging from 95 % to 105 %), the main benefits were time-in-zone for me. For the current training season, my first block was sweet spot (somewhat unusual). I went from 312 W to 327 W within 4 weeks. Then I did a polarized block, which ended this Sunday. I went from 327 W to 332 W.
So I think it is primarily the (polarized) training distribution. The fact that I have been doing polarized blocks should tell you that I’m not telling you polarized doesn’t work or is worse than sweet spot. Instead, that you should look out for fitness gains apart from FTP. The latter are harder to quantify, though.
Also, some people seem to advise people to do polarized blocks as they are easier. That hasn’t been my experience at all.
I’m just writing this so that people can adjust their expectations.
Up until mid December I was averaging around 40 hires per month. Most is this was z2 with one threshold and one Vo2 max. Work and then covid have meant a temporary pause in training.
The gains haven’t been fantastic but they have been consistent and my top end power and my power output relative to heart rate have all seen improvements.
I’m 56 and simply don’t have the genes to do three hard workouts per week on a sustainable and consistent basis. And being consistent is as important to gains as diet and recovery.
Seiler does Sweetspot rides in his personal training, so I wouldn’t be purist for the sake of it. Train Sweetspot it it works, or fits with you goals. You just need to make sure it’s a “hard” ride IMO. 40 mins is Sweetspot = meh. 1x90 = hard
if you’re trying to build aerobic base and are time limited. E.g. If you only have 5-6 hours/week to train then Z2 isn’t going to move the needle much after initial new cyclist gains
If it’s specific to your event. E.g. If you’re training for a gran fondo with long climbs, or a 50 mile TT, or a 70.3 then being able to hold a high % of FTP for long durations is highly relevant
If you enjoy it. Some people seem to love SS and find it a comfortable and beneficial place to be. I don’t particularly - only way I have really found to enjoy doing extended SS efforts is in the mountains where it comes much easier to me. The focus required to hold the power for long intervals either on the flat/rolling roads where I live or indoors takes so much out of me mentally and physically that the workouts become counterproductive. Since I don’t live near any mountains, don’t really do races requiring long SS efforts, and can usually fit in enough hours to build a decent base without much SS, I tend to not do much!
For those who have Zwift, instead of just using RoboPacers for Z2, I’ve begun using them for intervals too. Teleport to (in my case) Jacques for 20 minutes’ work, teleport to Bernie to recover for a few minutes (or stay with Jacques and use a coffee stop) and then do another 20 minutes with Jacques.
Turns out that the intervals work out at about 95% of FTP. There’s some terrain/draft induced variability which gives the intervals a nice IRL over/undery feel. Obvs it’s child’s play to progress these rides by TiZ and/or turn them into Tempo/SST by choosing a different RoboPacer.
Worth a try for those who find boredom/lack of focus an issue.
maybe the point of the plan you are looking at is to extend your TTE, rather than increase the FTP number? your ftp might go up, it might not. it depends on many factors. not just the workouts. you could become fitter without a higher ftp. just pick your plan, based on what you need, rather on what you want.
you may want a higher ftp, but first you may need more Vo2 work and recovery, or even a period of more endurance work, before the higher ftp can develop. personally, i need to work on vo2 max and rest more, because my ftp is too close to aerobic limit, and i already do lots of volume.
