As a side note, consider how the lack of faith in the program might cause you to lose the self-confidence needed to get the most of the last weeks of training and perform at your best on race day.

This lack of faith is something worth addressing IMO, one way or another.

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"FTP is a bit 2015, don't you think?" - Gustav Iden

Well yes it’s a concern. I’m trying to be open to what I’m used to. And have emailed asking his thoughts on tempo work and the lack of it heading into a half. I like to understand the why’s. Confidence is a big thing I agree

I'm in a similar boat training for Daytona rn. Self-coached through ~2.5 years of triathlon with a running background. Had always done a lot of 70.3 specific pace work on the bike & have never had issues with endurance or running off the bike. Started with a new coach & now it's all VO2 + FTP work on the bike. Still have a month to go until the race so we'll see if we transition from that to race specific work. I was honest when we started up that I want to get better. I know I've gotten really efficient at my current power but, honestly, the way I had been training wouldn't really have me making any big gains on the bike. I wasn't really training to push more power. We're doing workouts/sessions I've neglected for years. I like the longer reps at 70.3/140.6. I also don't need them to get better. The FTP workouts with reps in the 10:00-20:00 range end up averaging 70.3 pace for ~2 hours with the recoveries in a 2.5-3 hours ride. I don't think I'll have issues holding that pace straight during the race. It'll honestly be welcome, with all the intensity we've been doing.

It sounds like you've talked to your coach but maybe just re-ask if you're going to do specific pace work as you get closer to the race/what their philosophy is on that.

So a lot of your long rides are mostly Z2, fairly cruisey, a few efforts, but you're not finishing feeling cooked?

There are 100s, no actually 1000s, wait, actually 10s of 1000s of ways to slice the cake.

Some coaches do a lot of vo2, some assign a little. Some assign a lot of tempo/sub threshold work others only a little.

What I would do if it were me and I was 4 weeks out from Busso (great race btw, love it there except for the flies, love Perth and WA as well) would be look at my data from a comparison year(s) back and see if I was making roughly the same gains in the duration needed for the bike leg AND think I could run well off of that.

If you're starting from a really high level and have been doing a lot of threshold/SS/tempo type stuff prior to working with this coach than a vo2 block may be good stimulus.

My advice is talk to your coach, literally schedule a time to chat, in person or on the phone, and have them walk you through the plan.

Hope that helps

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Brian Stover USAT LII
Accelerate3 Coaching
Insta

This question doesn't mean much without a definition of what you mean by tempo. High sweet spot/threshold are two definitions people sometimes use to mean tempo. 3h zone 2 is defined as below tempo by many.

How is your coach defining the zones, whatever thru may be, and what testing is he doing to set it confirm the zones? And how does that relate to your definition of tempo?

The long rides atleast yep. The other rides are indeed killers at times.

Well true zone 3 - around 80% ftp.

I’m making gains in short course and my run as well. However this is the first hit out with longer stuff so will see I guess.

I have a response

Hey mate it’s a really good question and well worth asking!
Anyway I asked if we don’t do much tempo because it is sometimes seen as a grey zone’

His response :

‘….. tempo is pretty much grey zone where we don’t necessarily want to spend too much time. It’s useful for specific training and for dialling in intensities and “getting used” to race pace, but it’s not essential to train a lot of tempo to be able to race at tempo on race day. It’s also pretty fatiguing to accumulate too much time there, even though it may not really seem like it at the time. Hopefully doing less tempo helps you go into race day fresher compared to previously.

Physiologically we get better training benefits from working sun-threshold/threshold/vo2 which is why you’ll see more of that in there’

Well, I am not an expert but feel it can depend on the hours per week you can expend.

Part of me feels like you’re not necessarily going to be able to do X if you’re never doing X. Like, if you need to crank out 800kj/hr for a few hours I would hope at some point in training you do it. Not always, but sometimes.

To me vo2 raises the vo2 max when threshold as a % of vo2max gets too close. Then threshold when threshold is a bit lower as a %. Back and forth to get where you want to be.

I did 3 hrs tempo today. It’s hard. Just with gravel and gearing sometimes pure z2 can’t be done as easily. Good for getting used to consuming calories and carbs.

His response is pretty much in line with most modern training theories. Always a good idea to ask the coach, even if for nothing more than a confidence boost.

The caveat is in how you arrived at your FTP value and how that relates to your metabolism changes at different %'s. A criterium racer taking a ramp test is going to end up training far too hard. Opposite for someone who eschews speed work in favor of Z2 only. Ideally you'd want to base your training off the most specific numbers you can get for an event, in this case previous 70.3's.

Big picture though it should be fine. 70.3 efforts are balanced enough that you need as big of an article base as you can get but also a fairly high lactate tolerance which can be effectively built by VO2 work as well.

Hopefully doing less tempo helps you go into race day fresher compared to previously.


That to me is telling

Sounds like maybe you told him you went into previous races not fresh. Is that possible?

Oh I went in fresh I was ok had good bike legs. Run is hit and miss. My bike training in lead up was thur tempo rides up to 2hrs trainer and tempo sat as well broken 3 hrs. Perhaps I over tempo’d lol but I did race well as far as the bike went. I did have a good run off that build up as well but that isn’t always the case. I guess that’s why I find it very different to do next to zero tempo in the lead up. That 2 hours I did the other week as a one off killed me and it shouldn’t , hence the worry

I'm a fairly strong biker, often top 10. My best HIM finish time by 20mins was the one where I 'underbiked' and nded up with an overall position higher than my bike position. Taking 10mins off the bike requires a huge effort. Blowing 10mins on the run just needs you to lose it at the 19km mark.

So going in with a lot of training at 270w is leading you to race at that level as you are used to that feel, and you'll end up blowing on the latter half of the run as you're never doing a 15km+ run in training off the back of 2 hours at tempo.

I guess everyone responds differently and more than one way to skin a cat, but I've always done better on the bike when the program has incorporated tempo and Z2 rides were reserved for recovery weeks. So long rides at the moment might be 100km inc 8 x 15m efforts with 3 min recovery. So that's 2 hours of efforts. That's got to be more beneficial than 3 hours cruising? I've also found shop rides to be really beneficial. Don't do them when on a program, but they would typically be 50km balls to the wall.

i am similar. I mean i have 6x3 mins v02 mixed in, which is very new to me on a long ride. Well trust the process and see i guess ...

Knowing the Busso course pretty well, are you training to power at the moment? If so, how accurate is your FTP?
I know each coach has their own methodologies, but there is a skill to be able to ride to your targeted race power on the day that requires some practice at riding at that race power beforehand.
My coach would often sprinkle in race paced efforts on my long rides leading into race day. Eg 3X 20 mins at 85% FTP with 5 min recovery...(85% FTP being the generally agreed power target for 70.3 races, some will push a bit more, some a bit less).
There is something to be said for the specificity of learning to ride at the actual pace/power you will be wanting to hit on the day.
4 weeks out from Busso you realistically have two long rides left so these would be the key rides to do this on....depending on your recovery profile you could also do a longish ride one week out and have a shorter taper....but I would be nervous if I was not doing anything specific for race day in these sessions...

2 long rides over the last 4 weeks before a 70.3 is that the usual way of training?

What do you consider a long ride in time?

Intensity?

For reference, we have been doing a *little* tempo, just not as much as im used to. Youre right we have 2 long rides left. One is described below. EG:

-sat COMING is 3hr ride with 6x3mins v02 within. rest z2
- sat just gone, was z2 3 hours z2 however last 30mins tempo with 6km run off the bike. (i was naughty did 2hrs worth of tempo, not 30mins)
-sat previous i raced a race sunday so no hard sat ride.
- sat before was 3 hours, with 2x1hr tempo (rest z2)
-sat before was 3hours z2 with 3x30 tempo
-sat before was a race (short)
-sat before was 2hr ride, threshold intervals within

So there hasnt been a huge amount. I often did thur rides up to 2hours all tempo, sat long and all at tempo with small rests. Now, my thur is more sweetspot / v02/ threshold mix.

yup

So 18mins of work and the rest is Z2?

There are three weekends left before race weekend and for us that would normally be two long ride each weekend with a run off the bike and then generally starting the taper and so not much of a long ride that final weekend pre race.

Long for us would normally be 3.5-4 hours for a 70.3 build-that’s aiming for a race day bike split of around 2:20ish…..

this week....yep

yep - busso im usually just over 36kmhr average, under 2:30. Would love to be 2:20 and be able to run!