So I was in the half-Iron plan but the Half Iron isn’t going to happen this year. I still have several longer gravel rides on tap for the fall. Do I switch plans out? And if so, to what?
I am not looking to race these, nor am I looking to just survive. Think finishing in the top 20% of my AG (50+). I also due the Tuesday WTRL races on Zwift and I get crushed on climbs and sprints. I have no top end which is weird for being a big guy.
Any tips here?
Use plan builder and put your gravel events in.
You won’t need to hone your sprints for gravel races, but w/kg is another matter, as a lot of these races have a lot of climbing. Have you already decided on your events? What are the elevation profiles?
Yeah… Worlds in August and then a couple in Wisconsin in October. The WI ones have short steep stabby kind of climbs.
I dumped everything in and it’s starting me at sweet spot base. Again.
That element is crucial and covered in the TR support article:
Keep with a tri plan, you’ll be twice as good next year 
Two factors would make me decide to drop the tri plan and go for a bike plan through the last gravel event and then switch back to a tri plan. Time from last gravel event to the the triathlon and how much you are following the swim and runs on the tri plan anyway.
If you are 6+ months between events I’d just switch to a plan and roll your own swim and run similar to what you have been doing. This will be more flexible towards the gravel events and give you appropriate bike focused TSS.
If you are a little tighter on time between the events but are rolling your own swim and run I’d still consider modifying it but play with volume. like stick with a bike plan through the tri, but go mid now and down to low after the gravel event something like that. Then throw in what you need for swim and run.
Ideally there would be a way to have 2 types of plans going at one time, taking into consideration event type to better tie them together. Best you can do right now is a bike plan up to the event and then start a new plan but tell it you started training now or whenever you started like Chad mentioned above. This should get you into the right phase after the Gravel event to build on for the tri plan even if it gives you a new base phase.
I never knew this was an option. Thanks for the heads up. Maybe I’ll go back and rebuild with a different date.
