I’m trying to step things up a little - aiming at more tougher (but shorter) cycling sessions to peak for my upcoming races (olympic distance). But I am not certain what exactly to do.
During my build period, I was doing one zone 2 (Karvonen) LSD session, and 2 turbos sessions: one at zone 3 (eg 3x(20’+2’) @ 85+% FTP) and one zone 4 (eg 3x(10’+3’) @ FTP).
This leaves out zone 5 & 6 type sessions, which I know are not as useful for triathletes in general, but coming up to peaking are they useful? And what sort of sessions would be ideal? I have played around with ideas for zone 5 (7x(4’+1’) @ 105% FTP) and zone 6 (20x(1’+1’) @ 125% FTP).
As you can see, I am new to the power approach. And yes, a coach would be a good idea! But I am a decent cyclist (for a triathlete - sub 23 10m TT) and I don’t feel that the zone 2 or 3 sessions are adding to my speed much. There are certainly helping my endurance, but I have buckets of that already. I am a good base, but I am not certain how to get the most out of the work I have done.
Obviously, with tapering etc I would need to alter sessions as suits, but what would be a typical peaking session? I am aware I need to keep the other types of sessions going, but some guidance and suggestions would help me.
I think your instinct to do a little higher intensity during your peak phase is a good one. The zn5 session in particular would be great. I don’t know about 7 of those intervals though - maybe 4? 7 would be an excellent and challenging workout during some other phase of training, but during your taper it seems like it would be too much.
So I guess to answer your question, I think 4x4min@105% FTP with 2mins rest in between might be a good taper workout. I’d do that one maybe five days out, and 4 or 5 x 1min @125% FTP with 3mins rest maybe two days out. That would help you get that nice sharpening effect without spending too long on your taper (since you mention multiple races, I assume you want to leave **some **time in there for training )
Thanks for your feedback, MuffinTop. I might throw in 1 zone 5 a week and see if it helps.
I’m not sure about the zone 6 session 2 days before the race, however. Although it is pretty short, might it tire you (or me!) out for the race? Why do you suggest it out of interest?
Diesel - if I had the time I would read it! There’s no enough hours in the day!
That workout shouldn’t be enough to tire you - the work intervals are short, the rest is long, and you’ll already be at around half your normal training volume.
There is some scientific justification for this, which has something to do with blood plasma volume IIRC, but the way I always think about it is that it keeps you “sharp”. That is, you don’t want to just rest in the leadup to your race because then you’ll be somewhat “flat” on race day. By keeping these relatively shorter, higher-intensity efforts in there, you will still feel like racing on race day.
Hmmm. Okay … I’ll give it a try. I’m still a bit skeptical so I’ll only do 3 reps of 1 min and see how it goes on Sat. Will this help with glycogen loading? For example, will eating good carbs after fast workouts in the 2-3 days before racing be more beneficial than just generally eating more carbs? (I ask as I have had glycogen problems at oly distance previously, it’s something I’m wary of!)
I have a set pre-race week routine but I am trying to modify and optimise it. Just to see how the short fast bike session would fit in.
So far it looks like:
Sat/Sun - swim bike run!
Mon - rest, easy swim
Tues - easy swim; short Z3/4 bike outside; 7k steady run with pick-ups
Wed - fast swim @ 50% normal volume
Thurs - easy swim with sprints; 5k easy run with sprints; easy bike now with 3x1min @ 125% FTP!
Fri - easy swim; very easy bike
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