So, listening to all the podcasts and banter on polarized training it seems pretty much that 2 High Intensity Training (HIT) sessions per week is max. I get this for a pure runner a pure cyclist, but I cannot see how a triathlete can get anywhere with just 2 HIT sessions per week. I can train 2 times a day every day, doing only 2 HIT sessions would leave me dawdling around a hell of a lot.
When I listen to what pros are doing, it seems that HIT sessions are on the table nearly every day (I put tempo, sweetspot into the HIT category), for sure I cannot do this.
In the past I have done too much high intensity, and have benefitted from a more polarized approach, but I can’t see how my running and biking can be at their peak potential if I am restricted to 1 HIT session for each per week. BTW I think swimming can be smashed every day without too many probs.
What do you guys do? How do you plan out your training week?
fatigue, overtraining, risk of injury, weaked immune system, poor recovery - I’d suggest you have a go at smashing one of them every day and let us know how you get on.
doing repeat HIT sessions works until it doesn’t. There is decades of evidence of about LSD training and why its effective but I reckon you should try to disprove it and come back and tell us how its going.
Are you a pro - why would what pro’s be doing be relevant for you?
My limited understanding of what pro’s in all three sports do is mostly volume, more volume and more volume over years and years and years at paces that allow them to come back and do the same thing again the following day.
fatigue, overtraining, risk of injury, weaked immune system, poor recovery - I’d suggest you have a go at smashing one of them every day and let us know how you get on.
doing repeat HIT sessions works until it doesn’t. There is decades of evidence of about LSD training and why its effective but I reckon you should try to disprove it and come back and tell us how its going.
Are you a pro - why would what pro’s be doing be relevant for you?
My limited understanding of what pro’s in all three sports do is mostly volume, more volume and more volume over years and years and years at paces that allow them to come back and do the same thing again the following day.
I do think what pros do is relevant, most training concepts in every sport are derived from what the pros are doing, indeed the whole polarized thing is drawn down from a study of what pros are doing. I don’t want to smash out a HIT session every day, thus I ask for advice. I get the idea of consistent volume over years. But I also find myself knowing that more speed is available if I can implement more HIT training wisely. Should I be doubling up on HIT sessions in a day? Should I be doing bricks with HIT in both exercise modes?. Should I implement shorter HIT training sessions with more frequency?
I have been doing 2 HIT runs and 2 HIT rides per week, and I can handle it, and see improvement. I can do it for 3-4 weeks then I need to back off for a week.
Are we purely in try it and see territory, or is there any concrete understanding on how to apply High Intensity Training across multiple sports?
I am pretty certain there is a large evidence base for how to balance high / low intensity given the rates at which times have dropped in endurance events over the last 40 years (doping aside)
I started doing a 10 day on 1 day off for 2 weeks followed by 5 days of comp.
This is coming back from almost a year of nothing after having some medical issues with my wife that have since been resolved. I am retired, 48y/o so don’t have to stick to a traditional 7day week.
I usually do 1 high intensity of run and bike, 3 strength/weight sessions and 3 out of the 7 swims are intense. This is now, my next scheduled race is a marathon in March with a couple 70.3 races penciled in for May and June. I’m not wanting to burn out early.
I run 7 out of the 10 block days and usually do strides after 3 of them but don’t include that as my intensity time.
Right not the key for me is consistency, building durability, work on fatigue resistance during the longer stuff and adequate recovery for the key sessions which sometimes are combined to make up a fatigue resistance session. So far it’s been going well for the past 5 weeks. It can get boring just staying easy.
I run with power now and after really dialing in and setting my zones the easy is easy which always seemed to not be the case for me.
I am not trying to cut weight or anything so I eat when I am hungry, and sleep when tired.
I don’t think it’s easy to do just 2 high intensity sessions across 3 sports total, rather tri is more about maintaining some sort of balance between hiit and z2, the 80 20 thing is only really applicable with bigger volume if it’s 10 hrs or less can be much higher than 20.if it’s 20 hrs a week then yeah total 4 hrs hiit bearing in mind even hiit sessions have warm up comedown so very rare to have all hiit for a session.
Most research seems to suggest
2 vo2 max type bike sessions a week 3rd one. Benefits marginal and negative for older athletes, can do marginally more if sweet spot, time in zone for vo2 15-18min per workout enough; rest of week sweet spot tempo or z2, so for me 1 vo2 2 sweet spot sessions 1 long ride a week
swim a lot of time can be spent swimming fast almost every session if AOS as we suck our technique is the limiter so key is swim technically correct then try to swim fast to learn to swim fast longer, for me 5 or 6 sessions a week 2 hiit rest mod or mod hard with bursts of hiit inside but on balance not that much
run torn acl bad knees 5 runs a week 2 hiit sessions 1 long run 1 mod tempo runs off bike 1 very short recovery off bike
Firstly, everyone is different. Some people can handle much higher intensity loads than others. Anecdotally, I believe the following to be true:
Athletes with a naturally higher vo2max can much easier destroy themselves with vo2max type training, and should thus perform these types of workouts much more sparingly and at an easier perceived effort than athletes who are more on the "efficient end of the spectrum.
Athletes who have more lean muscle mass require a lot more easy, zone 1 volume to support their hard workouts.
Females can generally perform more higher intensity workouts per week than men (see 1 and 2).
Older athletes should reduce the overall intensity (TSS) of both their hard and easy sessions, but otherwise keep the frequency of intensity the same and the overall volume of training hours as high as possible without injury.
I train about 15-20 hours a week across the 3 disciplines. I am a big believer in a basic week that you can repeat indefinitely without accumulating excessive fatigue. I am 40, so right on the border of being an “older athlete”
Mon: Long aerobic swim with sprints.
Tuesday: Threshold swim a.m. longer easy run p.m.
Wed: easy swim and easy bike.
Thursday: Brick with longer bike containing tempo or threshold efforts, plus moderate effort/length run with steady zone 2 or tempo off of bike.
Friday: Threshold or v02 swim a.m. Easy bike p.m.
Saturday: Long easy bike with light vo2 efforts if no hard run the next day. short run off bike
Sunday: Long steady run or threshold intervals in racing season. Easy open water swim in p.m.
That is 2 hard swims, 1-2 hard bikes, and 1-2 hard runs per week. I would point out however that most of the individual sessions are not nearly as hard as what you would see a single sport athlete doing.
For example, the Saturday ride may contain 4-6 90 seconds hills at vo2 effort. If I was a cyclist only I would probably do 10-12. The Sunday long run might be 1:30-1:40 with 4x12 minutes zone 2. “real” runners (like me back when I was younger) usually do a 2 hour long run with 90 minutes zone 2 to zone 3.
I don’t think it’s easy to do just 2 high intensity sessions across 3 sports total, rather tri is more about maintaining some sort of balance between hiit and z2, the 80 20 thing is only really applicable with bigger volume if it’s 10 hrs or less can be much higher than 20.if it’s 20 hrs a week then yeah total 4 hrs hiit bearing in mind even hiit sessions have warm up comedown so very rare to have all hiit for a session.
Most research seems to suggest
2 vo2 max type bike sessions a week 3rd one. Benefits marginal and negative for older athletes, can do marginally more if sweet spot, time in zone for vo2 15-18min per workout enough; rest of week sweet spot tempo or z2, so for me 1 vo2 2 sweet spot sessions 1 long ride a week
swim a lot of time can be spent swimming fast almost every session if AOS as we suck our technique is the limiter so key is swim technically correct then try to swim fast to learn to swim fast longer, for me 5 or 6 sessions a week 2 hiit rest mod or mod hard with bursts of hiit inside but on balance not that much
run torn acl bad knees 5 runs a week 2 hiit sessions 1 long run 1 mod tempo runs off bike 1 very short recovery off bike
at age 51 different to age 31. Ymmv
Thanks for the constructive reply, I’m 50 so nice to hear your perspective. 15-18min vo2 per workout is interesting - for sure I probably tend to go longer than that…
Firstly, everyone is different. Some people can handle much higher intensity loads than others. Anecdotally, I believe the following to be true:
Athletes with a naturally higher vo2max can much easier destroy themselves with vo2max type training, and should thus perform these types of workouts much more sparingly and at an easier perceived effort than athletes who are more on the "efficient end of the spectrum.
Athletes who have more lean muscle mass require a lot more easy, zone 1 volume to support their hard workouts.
Females can generally perform more higher intensity workouts per week than men (see 1 and 2).
Older athletes should reduce the overall intensity (TSS) of both their hard and easy sessions, but otherwise keep the frequency of intensity the same and the overall volume of training hours as high as possible without injury.
I train about 15-20 hours a week across the 3 disciplines. I am a big believer in a basic week that you can repeat indefinitely without accumulating excessive fatigue. I am 40, so right on the border of being an “older athlete”
Mon: Long aerobic swim with sprints.
Tuesday: Threshold swim a.m. longer easy run p.m.
Wed: easy swim and easy bike.
Thursday: Brick with longer bike containing tempo or threshold efforts, plus moderate effort/length run with steady zone 2 or tempo off of bike.
Friday: Threshold or v02 swim a.m. Easy bike p.m.
Saturday: Long easy bike with light vo2 efforts if no hard run the next day. short run off bike
Sunday: Long steady run or threshold intervals in racing season. Easy open water swim in p.m.
That is 2 hard swims, 1-2 hard bikes, and 1-2 hard runs per week. I would point out however that most of the individual sessions are not nearly as hard as what you would see a single sport athlete doing.
For example, the Saturday ride may contain 4-6 90 seconds hills at vo2 effort. If I was a cyclist only I would probably do 10-12. The Sunday long run might be 1:30-1:40 with 4x12 minutes zone 2. “real” runners (like me back when I was younger) usually do a 2 hour long run with 90 minutes zone 2 to zone 3.
I think you are right in sessions not being as hard as it would be for a single sport athlete… i do think 2 HIT sessions per sport is OK -and either the intensity or total duration of effort should be less than single sport athletes.
I will try to control myself a bit more in the future
Yeah it depends what you consider HIT to be. With your expanded definition, then, yes, you can do those sessions much more frequently. When I hear HIT I think short/fast reps, something like VO2 or faster. It’s similar to when I hear amateur marathoners talk about speed work. Are they doing something non-specific like a weekly 8 x 400 @ 5k or are they doing 8 x mile @ T on short rest.
You can do almost daily tempo/sweet spot work on the bike, depending on volume (weekly & in specific workouts). The short/fast stuff should be limited no matter who you are.
So, listening to all the podcasts and banter on polarized training it seems pretty much that 2 High Intensity Training (HIT) sessions per week is max. I get this for a pure runner a pure cyclist, but I cannot see how a triathlete can get anywhere with just 2 HIT sessions per week. I can train 2 times a day every day, doing only 2 HIT sessions would leave me dawdling around a hell of a lot.
When I listen to what pros are doing, it seems that HIT sessions are on the table nearly every day (I put tempo, sweetspot into the HIT category), for sure I cannot do this.
In the past I have done too much high intensity, and have benefitted from a more polarized approach, but I can’t see how my running and biking can be at their peak potential if I am restricted to 1 HIT session for each per week. BTW I think swimming can be smashed every day without too many probs.
What do you guys do? How do you plan out your training week?
First off the higher your overall training load, both short and long term the more intensity you can get away with. The aburaage age group triathlete would probably go faster if they decreased the total % of time they spent going hard. The average age group athlete can probably do well off of ~ 10-15% total training time spent at high intensity. After that they just don’t have the training load to support much more. A lot of pros train more in 7-10d than the average triathlete trains in 30d. Scaling down what the pro’s do is probably still not going to give you the optimal training load/mix.
2nd: I’d bet that if you added more volume you’d get better results than if you added more intensity. Especially if you’re a low # of hours type of athlete (<10-12 per week)
3rd: Just because you can do more time doing intervals ie a 90 min Sweet spot session it might be better to make it a 45 min threshold session instead.
4th: Be very careful w/running as you age. Your recovery isn’t as good and it might be smarter to do 1 threshold type session per week then some short vo2 later in the week something like 5x(1.5min vo2 + adequate rest)
5th: Who said you need to restrict yourself to 1 HIT session per week. there is a way to get more HIT in with less overall stress although I’d suggest for a lot of athletes adding more volume while keeping the HIT the same would = better results.