Tuesday night I was pretty cooked after a heavy ride over the weekend and my plan had an 1hr30min Vo2 max ride, I looked at it and thought that is gonna be a real struggle. So had an idea to do 30min easy warm up and see if that eases the legs a bit and then try 1hr workout with same progression level. Seamed to work and got through the workout. That go me wondering is there any detriment to doing this with regards to training benefit? Sometimes I feel like a longer warmer up or maybe when mentally tired I can battle through an hour but an 1hr30min when hanging feels like a challenge too much.
I know the tss maybe a bit lower and probably the training effect would be totally subjective anyhow, but is there any major drawback to this?
More stimulus = more adaption is only valid if you haven’t accumulated more fatigue than you can recover from. In this case “less is more”. Piling on more work in a fatigued state is not a way to success but rather the opposite.
@Matt_W1 Being consistent with your plan is far more important than following each workout to it’s letter. I think you made the right choice and went for a workout that you could manage rather than one you possibly would have failed.
There shouldn’t be much of a detriment to your training by doing a shorter workout in this instance. It might be a bit less stimulus, as @wintermute mentioned above, but, as @TomasIvarsson said, it’s better to be consistent and complete a workout you’re capable of doing on a given day rather than overdoing it and burning yourself out.
Kudos on listening to how your body was feeling and adjusting your plan!
When comparing two similar workouts with the same PL but different durations, you’ll often notice that the shorter workout has a higher IF. This is because in order to be ranked at the same workout level as the longer workout, it needs to be a bit more intense.
This can create a similar overall stimulus as the longer workout but doesn’t necessarily mean it will have the same amount of TSS.