I have two sets of 30/30s to get through today. I know erg mode is not recommended, and my trainer bike throws its chain every time I go from small ring to big ring, so it’s terrible for short high power efforts with easy rest in between. I know that is probably fixable, but assuming i can’t fix that before I need to do my workout today, I was thinking I’d just go outside. I’ve never tried these outside. Tips? I have a plenty long ~6% climb I can use, and some long flat stretches nearby too.
When I do them outside I have a flat deadend road I go to where I can get 3 30 sec efforts in then I turn around and do it again. I prefer going with high cadence, which I can’t do as easily on a climb.
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Just need a place where you can do the efforts without worrying about traffic for the effort itself and enough distance to recover before either turning around and doing it again, or continuing down the same road. I found that using a hill can make this more difficult because you have to check for traffic, turn, hammer the breaks, turn back uphill and repeat. A flat-ish out and back seems easier to me.
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Climb is two hours, so no turning needed. But high cadence seems important. Long straight section also doesn’t require turning until each set is done, but has more traffic. Hmm. Maybe I’ll stay inside and play the “flip erg mode on and off” game.
Given that you have these three options, I’d do whatever is most interesting or convenient depending on your priorities.
I know that when I was doing these sessions outside, my goal was to repeat the efforts so that I could complete each set at about 9/10 rpe. I shifted as needed but I think I hovered around upper 90 to low 100’s for cadence.
Whichever you decide to do, go get ‘em!
If it is 30/30 Billat-style I can recommend doing them on the trainer. It makes it a lot easier to not over cook them. It can take a bit of practice to get a hang of it though. The idea is to use the flywheel to your advantage by letting the cadence decrease somewhat during the rest intervals and just before the work interval you start to gradually increase the cadence to your preferred rpm. This will give you a close enough average power.
You could also do these in a small gear were the trainer respond quicker
Personally I didn’t buy an expensive smart trainer and not use it’s smart abilities. I prefer to use it to it’s advantage.
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Sounds like the chain throw issue might have to do with the limit screws on your front derailleur – if it’s just that, it should be a quick and easy fix!
If not, 30/30s are totally doable outside. As mentioned by other athletes here, just make sure you find a relatively quiet stretch of uninterrupted road you can do your efforts on. That 6% long climb would probably work well if you can rest adequately during the 30s “off.” If it’s too steep to recover effectively during the “off” periods, it may be worth using the long flat bits of road instead.
Try to keep your cadence and power application to the pedals nice and smooth. It can take a little practice if you haven’t done workouts like this outside much before, but I bet you’ll get the hang of it pretty quickly!
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30-30s are among the easier workouts to find good terrain for.
- Above all, prioritize your safety! Especially when you push VO2max power, your focus tends to narrow and you have less of a “focus budget” to spend on traffic. So pick a route and/or time that allows you to do your workout safely.
- Traditional 30-30s are done at high cadence. A long, false or true flat would be perfect for that. By pushing hard, you increase your speed and at speed, your wheels’ larger inertia makes most people prefer higher cadences.
- I second @ZackeryWeimer, independently of where you do your 30-30s, fix your front derailleur. Another option is to stay in one of the rings and adjust your trainer’s resistance accordingly. Mine is set up so that about 90–93 rpm give me 40 % FTP. I’m typically in 5th gear for FTP work and 6th or 7th gear for VO2max power. I still have plenty of gears to spare if I want to do them at lower cadence.
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I’ll second what TomasIvarsson said and I only have a cheap JetBlack Volt smart trainer and it has no problems doing 30/30s in Erg mode. I follow the strategy of low cadence in the recoveries and ramp up to a high cadence a couple of seconds before the interval starts.
Looking at my last 30/30 workout I used a 39:21 gear and varied between 80 and 110 rpm, with 110w recoveries and 400w intervals
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