The Base Phase is an often neglected phase of training, however, it is one of the most crucial for your success as an athlete. We highly recommend starting with the Base Phase and then working your way into the Build and Specialty Phases. The complete Half-Distance Plan takes 24 weeks, and you have about 19-22 weeks, so depending on when your race takes place in September, you will shave 2-5 weeks from the Specialty Phase.

Leading up to your race, you will want to complete Weeks 7 and 8 of Specialty as your Taper. The Taper will serve to freshen your legs and prepare you for the race to come.

I hope this helps, let me know if you have any further questions :)

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Get Faster with TrainerRoad

Hi Bryce,

I am currently in week 11 of the low volume IM base plan and things have been going well. I've been completing all my higher wattage work outs without much issue. Not that they are easy, but I'm not struggling too much. Didn't have time for a long ride this past weekend so substituted a quick Ramp Test to see how I've progressed and I increased my FTP by 21w! Good to see the improvement but...when I did my first workout today with the new FTP it was really hard. I was doing Midway and I was able to complete intervals 1-6 and most of them were to near failure. For 7&8 I lowered intensity to 95% and for 9 I lowered to 90%.

Moving forward, is it better to do as much of the workout at 100% and adjust when I start struggling, or start at like 90-95% until I feel ready for the full 100% effort?

Thanks!

Awesome thanks Bryce I will follow your advice. Thanks again to you and the team, the results i got from TR was so much better than I had previously wandering around Watopia wasting my time 😥

So firstly, if you test outside of the recommended times, it may be difficult to complete the workouts at first. The reason for this is that the weeks already incorporate a progressively more difficult training load, and if you add a FTP bump, it may be too much all at once. That is why we recommend testing at the beginning of the phase since you just came off of a recovery week, and you should be rested and ready to tackle the next phase of work.

But to directly answer your question, it would be better to do all of the intervals at 95% than to start at 100%, then 95%, then 90%. Not only is it a better workout, but it will leave you in a better mental state than the if you are gradually beaten down by a workout that is a little too tough.

I hope that clears thigns up, let me know if you have any further questions.

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Get Faster with TrainerRoad

Great! Thanks for the advice. I completely understand about the timing of a test. This was definitely not intended but I wanted to get something in and figured a ramp test was short and hard so why the heck not!

Hey just wanted to provide a followup. Ended up getting the Wahoo sensor and got TR going yesterday. Couple pieces of feedback...

1) The sensor works, but it's pretty unresponsive. I know to tempter my expectations as it's only an est and it can only respond so quickly, but it was pretty rough trying to go through the ramp test. Which leads into...

2) My phone (Google Pixel 2) and TR app actually did see the Inride 1. I was able to do a spindown test and it provided a MUCH better experience than the Wahoo. It is far, far more responsive to changes in power (I suspect that's because the Wahoo roller rotates so many more times and therefore gives many more data points vs the slower rotational velocity of the hub-based sensor.) I'll just keep using that, it seems to work great. :)

That said, loving TR so far. Did the Reinstein over unders, and that definitely woke me up!

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JustinDoesTriathlon

Owner, FuelRodz Endurance.

Wow, thanks so much for sharing your feedback!

I'm sorry to hear that the sensor did not work as seamlessly as we expected, but I'm glad the InRide 1 seems to be working just fine! I am not sure why it's working since in our records we have dropped support for that trainer, but it's good news nonetheless!

If you ordered the Wahoo sensor on Amazon or a similar website, you may be able to return it due to unacceptable performance.

All in all, I'm glad to hear you have things up and running, and if you have any further questions, feel free to ask.

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Get Faster with TrainerRoad

Yeah I'll just return the sensor, it's no big deal. And no problem, I'm all about sharing feedback. I can say your records are definitely partly correct and I thought I wrote this, but I guess I didn't: Zwift can detect the Inride 1 on my Macbook, but TR cannot. So if you're looking to use the computer app, no go. I'll just stick with my phone for now to get the benefits of the faster data. Must have just gotten lucky with the Pixel 2 or something. :)

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JustinDoesTriathlon

Owner, FuelRodz Endurance.

Hi Bryce, thank you in advance for your participation here and council.

I just finished an A race, and now I am 17 weeks away from my A+ 70.3 race. I have been using the mid-volume Base, Build, & Specialty plans for Half Distance Triathlon with great success, and my power was way up for my race last weekend. I want to build power a little more for this A+ race, but I really focus most on run improvement.

I think this is a bit obvious, but I wanted to ask for confirmation. Given I have time for two plan cycles, and I already have a very strong bike power and endurance base, would it make most sense to do a Build then Specialty plan or a Base the Specialty plan.

Partially interrupting this is that I have a 2 week cruise coming up in which I will just do whatever bike & treadmill workouts I can muster while on the boat.

We recommend doing the Build/Specialty plans. We call this a Re-build.

Good luck with your upcoming training!

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Get Faster with TrainerRoad

Instead of ERG mode what's the optimal resistance to set trainerroad to in game?

If you're using Resistance Mode, 25-45 works well for most people. If you are using Slope, or Standard Mode, then 2-4 typically works best.

All trainers are different, as are all athletes, so its tough to nail down a single solid number that will work best for everyone. With a little trial and error on your end, you'll figure out the sweet spot pretty quickly :)

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Get Faster with TrainerRoad

I recently switched from a Kickr to a Tacx Neo 2 - using TR. I never had any issues with with sprints on the Kickr but with the Neo it feels like it is slipping or they are just near impossible to do (even at wattages I know I can do) and the timing is always 2 seconds off (ie, the sprint starts when TR notes I'm still 2 seconds away). Any suggestions? Thanks.

goodie wrote:

I recently switched from a Kickr to a Tacx Neo 2 - using TR. I never had any issues with with sprints on the Kickr but with the Neo it feels like it is slipping or they are just near impossible to do (even at wattages I know I can do) and the timing is always 2 seconds off (ie, the sprint starts when TR notes I'm still 2 seconds away). Any suggestions? Thanks.

Hey Goodie,

for your issue with the premature jumps during sprints, this is one of the issues of doing sprint-type workouts in ERG mode. ERG messages are always sent a little before the interval begins. This is to make sure you’re at the target power as early into the interval as possible.


When it comes to sprint intervals, the increase in resistance is greater than what you’d experience in, say, a sweet spot interval. So you really feel it in the sprint effort, where you might have barely noticed it during the sweet spot effort. At the end of the day, the best way to eliminate this in your high-intensity, short duration efforts is to use Resistance mode and rely on your gears to hit the target power.

As for the workouts feeling impossible and slipping, I am not sure what that indicates. It is certainly not an issue that we typically see with wheel-off trainers like the Neo. I'd recommend reaching out to Tacx support to see if this is a hardware issue that they have seen before.

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Get Faster with TrainerRoad

Anyone do trainer road is summer?

why? to beat traffic ? time management

I am wondering where more biking is coming from and TR is the answer -

Any issues? Staying cool & hydrated

Any modifications on your plan vs over the winter?

I can only speak for myself, but if you only have 60-90 minutes to fit a workout into a busy schedule, then doing it indoor on a trainer is so much more effective than trying to sneak one in outside. Some are lucky to live just minutes from an area condusive to training, but others have to pedal 30 minutes or more to get to a either a good hill, or a region without traffic lights. And top of that, there's the added safety, which is more relevant in some regions than others.

As for staying cool, we highly recommend Lasko Blowers. They create a concentrated, steady stream of air that you can point directly at your chest for maximum cooling. My personal setup includes one of those blowers, as well as an AC unit. I point the colder, lower velocity AC air at my face, and the higher velocity blower air at my chest. And as a heavy sweater, this works very well for me.

For staying hydrated, you can stack a ton of bottles next to your bike if needed, prepped with electrolytes, carbs, or whatever the workout demands.

And for those long endurance paced rides on the weekend, you can do them outside and just associate that outdoor workout with the planned workout.

Hopefully some others can chime in as well, but those are my experiences :)

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Get Faster with TrainerRoad

Hi Bryce,

I am currently doing specialty mid volume sprint tri training plan. I just did Mount Good and struggled to maintain power during the 95%+ intervals, did the first and second one fine but struggled to complete the last 15min interval. I do every ride in aero position. I found on that last interval if I broke aero I could maintain the required power. If I stayed in aero I would need to lower the power by 25-30%. What would be more beneficial to stay in aero at a much lower power or break aero and complete the workout without lowering power. Let me know what you think. Thanks!

It is best to stay in aero as long as you can, but if you can no longer maintain the target power, sit up and finish out the workout in the upright position.

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Get Faster with TrainerRoad

Hi Bryce,

I just completed the full Half Ironman low plan ending with a race yesterday. I am now looking at building back towards my second 70.3 taking place end of October (18-19 weeks from now with a 2-week holiday in there so effectively about 16 weeks). Between now and then, I'll race in a number of other events (mostly Olympic distance) mid July, early August and mid September.

While I enjoyed the triathlon plan and would likely look at finishing off with a 70.3 specialty plan, I was looking at diversifying a bit and tackling another plan. Questions are:
- Do I need to go back to a base plan or jump straight into build?
- Assuming doing a base is the right thing to do, should I be looking at SSB2 (skipping SSB1)?
- Moving into build, would I be truly worse off by tackling sustained power over the 70.3 plan?

Hope all clear. Thanks in advance!

Best,
Bertrand

We recommend jumping back into the Build Phase. Doing Base multiple times in a season is somewhat unnecessary if time is restricted, and you will see a greater improvement by doing a Re-Build.



With your 16 weeks, the best thing you can do is another Build and Specialty Phase



The 70.3 plan is our recommendation for a few reasons. For one, it is designed specifically for the Half Ironman Distance. It also accommodates the "bigger picture" when it comes to the stress of your other disciplines. the Sustained Build plan assumes that cycling is your only sport, and it allocated training stress accordingly. This may ultimately be too much stress when you add in your running and swimming.


You can certainly modify the Sustained Power Build Plan to fit your needs, but it just requires more knowledge and insight than simply following the Half-Distance Plan.


I hope that clears things up a bit, let me know if you have any further questions.

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Get Faster with TrainerRoad

Hi Bryce,

I was hoping to get your input on the following.

I've finished the base and build plans for a full IM and I was suppose to start the 8 week Specialty Full Ironman HV Training Plan this week. It was timed perfectly to lead into IM Canada. Due to a bike crash over the weekend, my bike will be in the shop for the week, so I'll have missed majority of the first week of the plan.

How should I approach the specialty plan now?

Thanks!

In your situation, go ahead and do Week 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 7, 8 of Specialty.

This will shorten your plan by a week, but still retain the two week taper leading up to your event.

You got this :)

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Get Faster with TrainerRoad

I am new to TR and just upgraded to and edge 520 (from 500) can we import workouts to the head unit and do them outside? I have to get outside at least once a week if possible for my sanity and this would be fantastic if possible.

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2019 T-Rex Tri Series

Transferring TR workouts onto head units is not here yet, but it's on the way.

It sounds like the Garmin side is very close, with the Wahoo side coming soon after.

Apologies for hijacking this one.

Bryce, I was interested to see your advice with respect to the Sustained Build - perhaps being unsuitable (in standard form) for triathletes.

Does this mean that, if I had 8 weeks budgeted for a build toward a sprint triathlon, I would be better using the Sprint Build programme twice (ie 2x4 weeks Sprint Build) rather than using the 8 weeks Suatained Build?