Specificity is the key…if you have already have a well-developed aerobic engine. The OP has not yet achieved that so he really needs to include longer rides where possible.
Obviously given his time constraints, doing shorter, higher intensity workouts are going to be the majority of his training, but he cannot neglect the bigger aerobic conditioning that is required if he wants to develop more as a cyclist.
You have pretty much summed me up.
Totally agree that I (everyone?) could be more aerobically efficient, and that’s where the crux comes in - time constraints.Originally I had only contemplated doing a TR workout, then headed straight out the door on one of the bikes to make a “longer” session. Usually a Garrowby for sweetspot, Baird/Gendarme/Vandever for Vo2 then out the door for whatever is left in the tank. Or there’s a choice of Three hills locally, one is 26mins, one 22 and one 13mins, try for a PB then finish off indoors with a 30min Baird.
Knowing that its viable to train further apart and still get the benefits is a bit of a game changer in my mind. Im a morning person, if i have to get intensity done- its morning or nothing.
I have been off plan since March (sporadic work commitments) rotating heavy sweetspot and a more polarised approach in my attempt to convert/teach my dominant fast twitch to become more slow twitch!
Thanks all, this is making some great reading
So in principle, I agree with you -there is a need for long term aerobic development and you may experience quick gains and a plateau from higher intensity lower duration training.
However, in practice I do not think an athlete with 3-4 w/kg ftp is anywhere near this plateau, regardless of training plan choice.
Remember that the ‘w/kg ftp’ measure that we are all so interested in it is because it is a proxy for aerobic development. All training types contribute to its development, just some relatively more than others (see Andy Coggan’s ‘Training and racing with a power meter’ charts on adaptations from training in particular zones).
If you adequately recover from HIIT sessions, you are contributing to long term aerobic development. I may be wrong in this following assumption, but I believe the whole TR business model is based on HIIT / ‘time crunched cyclist’ ideas (ie getting the most out of time constrained training).
Doing longer duration riding (say 2.5-3hrs +) can generate fatigue that the athlete does not fully recover from that leads to less-quality high intensity sessions. This might be worthwhile if you are targeting a longer road race (most cat1 one day road races in US are 4hrs, cat3 usually top out at 2-3hrs). A crit specialist probably doesn’t need to ride more than 2 hours to be competitive up and into cat 3. Everything comes at a cost.
From those of you from a running background, Sebastian Coe said “Long, slow distance running creates long, slow runners. If speed is the name of the game, then never get too far away from it”. Contrast his training plan to Arthur Lydiard (who I used to think had the right idea… until I got a family and a 9-5 like OP).