I’m building back up my cycling fitness after a year of mostly laziness and am training for a couple races. I am hoping to get some feedback on my training plan. Let me know what you think…
My first race is Dirty Kanza 100 on 6/1 and my plan for that is:
Sweet Spot Base 1 (mid volume) - On week 3 now and it doesn’t seem very hard
Sweet Spot Base 2 (mid volume) - might do high volume for SSB2
Sustained Power Build (mid volume) - will only get in 6wks then 1wk taper before DK 100
Thoughts? Should I go high volume all the way? I’m pretty sure I can fit the hours in my schedule. My biggest concerns are rebuilding my endurance and building power for the 50,000ft of climbing in the TNGA.
Do the workouts seem easy, or does the training load throughout the week seem easy? If you can manage it, moving up to the high volume plan will definitely result in increases of the training adaptations you’re looking for, but you’ll have to be careful not to overtrain. Rebuilding for your second A race, TNGA, looks like a great idea. You may even consider a shorter taper, depending on the training load you’re carrying once you get there.
So far the workouts seem a little on the easy side. Of course I’m only on week 3 of Sweet Spot 1 but I’ve yet to get off the bike wiped out (except the FTP test). Within the workouts the higher wattage intervals aren’t easy but for the most part I’m pushing 5-10 watts over the target and haven’t had to back off on the intervals towards the end of the workout.
Hmm, you might want to try retesting your FTP to see if you may have undershot the original test. We have an 8 minute and a 20 minute format for testing as well, and it’s possible one of these could help you find an FTP that scales the workouts a little closer to your best abilities.
Gosh, I don’t know. I did the 20-min test - which I’ve done two or three times before. It felt like I went harder than I did on the other tests. I was barely hanging on by the end of the 20min. I tried the ramp test back in Nov and totally bombed it - partly because I didn’t understand the test format.
Sweet Spot Base should hurt but be manageable, you definitely shouldn’t be wiped out at the end of a workout but each interval should be stressful enough for you not to want to consider working harder. Because the “sweet spot” is such a narrow range, and you’ve said that you end up pushing 5-10 watts over the target, I have a feeling that your FTP calculation might just be a little off. It’s possible that you just respond really well to efforts in that range, and that you’re capable of taking on more training load/stress, so you might consider moving to a high volume plan or adding more workouts to the existing mid volume plan you’re currently following.
Thanks Larry! Appreciate all your tips and advice. Thinking more about it most of the intervals do challenge me in the sense that I’m constantly trying to weigh how much effort to put out while having enough in the tank for the whole workout. The last interval on my workouts this week was tough. I think I will finish out the last three weeks of the SSB1 and then step it up to High Volume for SSB2. I will do my best to put in all the hours on the high volume but skip a workout or dial back the intensity on one if I feel like I’m not recovering.
Sounds like a great plan! Getting a real feel for how hard those workouts are takes a bit of introspection and thinking, so I appreciate your effort there. Of course, definitely dial it back if you find the high volume plan a little too demanding.
Because the “sweet spot” is such a narrow range, and you’ve said that you end up pushing 5-10 watts over the target, I have a feeling that your FTP calculation might just be a little off. It’s possible that you just respond really well to efforts in that range, and that you’re capable of taking on more training load/stress, so you might consider moving to a high volume plan or adding more workouts to the existing mid volume plan you’re currently following.