Training schedule…recovery week volume?

Triathlon Forum
1

My training schedule is currently a 3 week build followed by a 1 week recovery. My question is what percentage of your prior week training volume do you cut back to? I am currently cutting back to about 70-75% of my last week, which was the highest in total time/miles/intensity.

2

There’s a ton of stuff on this forum already about recovery. High level summary (without meaning to be fatuous) is “it depends”. If you’re training a couple of times a day, week 3 of your build cycle involves some serious volume and overtraining is a big risk then you may want your recovery week to be 50% volume. If you’re training 3 or 4 days a week for a total volume of 4-5 hours then some on this forum would probably tell you to not bother having a recovery week at all.

3

I currently train 6 days per week…5 runs (3 easy, 1 speed or interval, 1 long), 4-5 rides (1 long), 3 swims. So almost everyday is a double up of some type. Last week my total training time was just over 21 hours. I felt fine towards the end of the week…not overly tired, not sick or burned out, just good muscle sore after a long weekend of training. Should i consider going to a 4 week build and 1 week recovery? OR would it be better to add more intensity?

4

How about the idea of not using recovery weeks and do constant training without overloading?

That way you have a continuous training stress on your body.

I’m actually torn between that and a 3 week schedule.

If you go to 4 week build and 1 week recovery you will be gaining only 1 week of training over a 3 build 1 week recovery in 20 weeks or about 3 extra training weeks per year. Is that really worth it?

jaretj

5

First little bit of info from the training survey I just did:

I was surprised to see how low people’s recovery weeks were in relation to their ‘normal’ week.

I haven’t calculated the means yet but the recovery weeks (for those that had them) ranged from 20-70% of average week. The mode looks to be somewhere from 50-60%

Incidentally, only 37% of survey respondents to this point utilize recovery weeks.

Cheers,

Alan

6

For the fourth week of a training cycle I use anything between 100 and 120% of the previous week volume.

7

I currently train 6 days per week…5 runs (3 easy, 1 speed or interval, 1 long),

Where’s the tempo run?

8

Very interesting…If I’m thinking of what you are thinking of based on your approach to training stress.

jaretj