I saw Paulo tweet about the following article, basically suggesting that HIT intervals are better than longer intervals at the top end, and low end of the power curve.
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/24382021
These results suggest that the present SI protocol induces superior training adaptations on both the high-power region and lower power region of cyclists’ power profile compared with the present LI protocol.
I don’t have access to read the full paper, but comments:
It’s really hard to debunk something based on one study, you cannot make such a broad generalization. Also this is a short-term study so this can be misleading. You can also look at this on the other end and say the short interval group spent more time actually pedaling, so maybe the conclusion is to cycle more? Nothing specific can be deducted from this one single study, more specifically 2x20 intervals are not debunked in this study.
let see it another way. There is nothing to ''debunk about 2X20. it s one session that someone can do but i hope no one claim it to be the best way to improve your fitness.
shorter interval will simply be more effective to rise your FTP. it s also a lot more manageable for most athlete.
.
From this thread: http://forum.slowtwitch.com/cgi-bin/gforum.cgi?post=4709138#4709138, a couple of good posts from desert dude:
I’ve done 14 - 2x20 workouts since April
You guys need to get some creativity and variance in your life. There is nothing special about 2x20 at threshold.
N O T H I N G
I invented a game many years ago I like to call:
Fun with Intervals.
You will need 2 sets of dice. I like red although I’m also partial to black & orange swirl with yellow numbers dice but you can use any color(s) you want. You’ll also need the numbers 1,2,3,4 on equal size sheets of paper in a hat. You can get family members to play along with this game. It’s fun for you and them & it gets them involved with your training.
Roll 1 die this is the number of repeats you’ll do.
Roll 4 dice this is the length of the interval
Now have someone draw a number out of a hat, this is your rest interval.
Ok I’m about to roll/draw for your interval set here it goes (i’d get my go pro out for this & make a big YouTube production but I’m too lazy to walk to the bedroom, you’ll have to trust me)
Roll 1 = 5
Roll 2 = 11
I drew 2 out of the hat.
Do 5 repeats of 11 minutes at threshold with 2 minutes easy between them.
There are other variations to this game.
You can put the numbers 0 and .5 into a hat. After roll 2 you draw one of those numbers. If it’s .5 you add :30 to your interval, if it’s zero consider yourself lucky that you don’t have to work an extra :30, or does your competition consider themselves lucky your not doing more work…hmmmm. You can also do this for the rest interval but if it’s 0 consider yourself unlucky. If you draw both the .5 and the 0 it’s not your day, don’t play the lottery, or maybe you should. That’s out of my realm of advice.
jackmott paid to read the article. it’s pretty misleading.
from facebook, his comments:
The short interval group in the study was doing 30 seconds intervals, the low intensity group was doing 300 second intervals. The intensity they define as high intensity is 88% to 100% of maximum heart rate. Zone 4, where you do 2x20 intervals is defined to start at 91% of maximum heart rate. They used “Time working” to equalize the amount of work each group did, not energy or TSS or anything like TSS. The short interval group actually spent more time pedaling too. The rest periods were 50% power of the work periods, which means the LI group was doing less power when resting. From this I can conclude nothing about the efficacy of 2x20 minute intervals. Anyone who benefit from this info please paypal me $5 because I just paid $35 to see the full article. thanks/quote]
I don’t have access to read the full paper, but comments:
SI: 3 sets of 13 x 30 x 15 (n x duration x rest) @ 363W with 180S rest between sets. Total time 2070 Secs
LI: 4 x 300 x 150 @ 324W. Total time 1650 Secs
Power levels during exercise were the maximum the athlete could sustain. Rest power was 50% of work power. If you calculate NP based on the above figures the LI protocol has a slightly higher IF (1.067 vs 1.05 for SI)
Was there in fact ever any scientific evidence in favor of 2 x 20s?
I don’t doubt it’s a good workout but I’m not clear why it’s achieved a near-mystical status.
jackmott paid to read the article. it’s pretty misleading.
from facebook, his comments:
The short interval group in the study was doing 30 seconds intervals, the low intensity group was doing 300 second intervals. The intensity they define as high intensity is 88% to 100% of maximum heart rate. Zone 4, where you do 2x20 intervals is defined to start at 91% of maximum heart rate. They used “Time working” to equalize the amount of work each group did, not energy or TSS or anything like TSS. The short interval group actually spent more time pedaling too. The rest periods were 50% power of the work periods, which means the LI group was doing less power when resting. From this I can conclude nothing about the efficacy of 2x20 minute intervals. Anyone who benefit from this info please paypal me $5 because I just paid $35 to see the full article. thanks/quote]
Uh oh, Facebook is becoming slowtwitch…
Was there in fact ever any scientific evidence in favor of 2 x 20s?
No, like a lot of crap AeT comes to mind, someone made it up and said it approximated a decent FTP test. Then people jumped on the bandwagon that 2x20 is/was the best(better) way to raise FTP.
Next thing you know you have a bunch of people mainly doing 2x20 to raise FTP.
They see a tree and think it’s the forest.
The bottom line is there are a number of ways to cut the cake to raise FTP. 2x20 is but one tiny slice of that cake. 4x7min vo2 could be another and 20x:30hard could be a third slice.
If you calculate NP based on the above figures the LI protocol has a slightly higher IF (1.067 vs 1.05 for SI)
and SI got about 20% more tss
.
The guy who goes on about them a lot, Andrew Coggan, favors them just because they are psychologically not to terrible to execute and because you can do them day after day.
He would argue that there are many ways to skin a cat and that there is nothing magic about 2x20. Feel free to do 3x20 or 3x15 or 1x40 to 4x10 or 1x60 or whatever you have time for and can tolerate and that fits within the scope of the rest of your training plan.
Take any random group of athletes and most of them are not going to be ‘peaked’ in fitness, and as such a period of high intensity intervals is always going to give them a bump in performance. That doesn’t mean you want to do nothing but high intensity intervals (probably).
The details of working out are really complicated and who knows what is ideal for each person, but the good news is if you work really hard for a shorter time or work medium hard for a longer time or anywhere in between you get really fast.
Was there in fact ever any scientific evidence in favor of 2 x 20s?
I don’t doubt it’s a good workout but I’m not clear why it’s achieved a near-mystical status.
Well to be fair a physiologist and state champ cyclist came up with them as a good aerobic workout first.
My preferred variation in the 2012 duathlon season was something like 25 minutes @ ftp then 5 minutes all out because I had to fit in a lunch break.
Was there in fact ever any scientific evidence in favor of 2 x 20s?
No, like a lot of crap AeT comes to mind, someone made it up and said it approximated a decent FTP test. Then people jumped on the bandwagon that 2x20 is/was the best(better) way to raise FTP.
Next thing you know you have a bunch of people mainly doing 2x20 to raise FTP.
They see a tree and think it’s the forest.
The bottom line is there are a number of ways to cut the cake to raise FTP. 2x20 is but one tiny slice of that cake. 4x7min vo2 could be another and 20x:30hard could be a third slice.
I hope everyone changes their training to never include 2x20s. Makes life easier for me.
If you find an article behind a paywall, check if the author is on ResearchGate. Sometimes, the articles are available to download on their page, sometimes you have to request it. In this case, it is request-only.
If you calculate NP based on the above figures the LI protocol has a slightly higher IF (1.067 vs 1.05 for SI)
and SI got about 20% more tssCorrect, although the total TSS for either workout was quite small (52 & 63 assuming FTP of 280W) and not likely to make much of an impact given they were only doing interval sessions twice a week.
I saw Paulo tweet about the following article, basically suggesting that HIT intervals are better than longer intervals at the top end, and low end of the power curve.
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/24382021
These results suggest that the present SI protocol induces superior training adaptations on both the high-power region and lower power region of cyclists’ power profile compared with the present LI protocol.
I didn’t read Paulo’s tweet but this study compares:
Tabata style intervals (13X30 sec hard/15 sec easy, 3 sets with 3 min easy between)
with 4X5 min with 2:30 recoveries.
So nothing about 2X20 min.
All three workouts are different,
Maurice
jackmott’s facebook page is basically ST lite.
ETA: although that quote did not originate on a post by him.
Can you link to the original tweet?
Who is Paulo? Is it the ‘coach’ of endurance planet?
I use coach in the loosest of terms as the advice provided on that podcast is fairly generic and generally ends in Maffetone.
Not that I am criticising phil, but there is far more to training than taking one protocol and doing it to death.
The reason AC has always championed sweetspot or similar work is as others have mentioned the ability to carry out high load and a relatively high intensity on a regular basis.
All this training lark is all pretty personal, its not to say what works for fred won’t work for you, but if fred is at a completely different stage of physiological development than you then it is likely you will respond differently to the training stimulus.
Personally variations of 2x20 and sweetspot work have taken me from an FTP of 310 to 360 in since September. My VO2max is low, as expected as I haven’t been pushing it. If I spend a couple of minutes at around 390-400 I start to struggle, but can spend endless time below 360.
I know that at some point soon my SS gains will result in a stagnation of FTP. But to be honest I am happy with 360@67kg for a triathlete. As I am a runner by trade.
If I decide that my schedule can include something like VO2max intervals that may bump it up a bit more, then I may add it in.
But, you’ve got to ask yourself, as a triathlete are you willing to fully develop your bike at a possible risk to swim and run? And will that extra development result in a faster overall race time?
Only 360 watts for 67kg. That’s terrible. Are you sure this is the FTP for both legs?