How to build a training plan around long unstructured rides on weekends?

Hi,

I started cycling last year and just recently got a road bike and a smart trainer. I did the ramp test and my ftp is 260 (4w/kg, 32yo, m).
I want to start structured training but I’m not sure how to manage having structured workouts througout the week and unstructured, long rides (3-5h) on weekends since I don’t think due to traffic and other reasons I will be able to do structured training outside, but I don’t just want to ride in Zone 2 either. Mostly I do Zone 2 and 3 outdoors. I also have a power meter.

If it were completely up to me, I’d do the following:

Monday - Rest
Tuesday - structured hard effort inside for 1-2h
Wednesday - structured medium effort inside for 1-2h
Thursday - structured hard effort inside 1-2h
Friday - rest or very low intensity outside
Saturday - very long ride outside, 4-5h
Sunday - long ride outside, 3-4h

I pretty much have all the time in the world and could swap things on weekdays around, but those long rides on the weekend have to stay.

Any recommendations for a plan around that schedule? If I use the plan builder and go low intensity, it’s not enough riding and if I go for medium, I can’t do unstructured on weekends.

I’m not looking to do racing any time soon, for now I just want to go faster and longer. In the long run 5w/kg would be great. I’d have to gain 50w and lose 5kg, which I’m already working at with a 300-500kcal deficit daily.

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Hi,

very good question, I am in for a similar scenario: workouts during the week, longer outside rides on weekends.

Right now I am at the end of a Sweetspot Plan. I am considering the new polarized plans since they offer something which fits my schedule quite well.

Have you had a look at those?

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I asked kind of a similar question a while back here.

I ended up choosing LV plans and adding my long, outside rides. It should be even easier for you to keep track of your TSS since you have a power meter.

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This might take forever, but maybe add the unstructured as events using plan builder? You put in duration/relative effort and get out a TSS estimate - which the rest of the plan builder would take into account.

Make them all C races so it doesn’t try to make you peak for them.

Making them a C race would just have plan builder replace that days workout with your ‘race’…as far as I know it doesn’t do anything else.

I like the OPs thought process, I don’t think there’s much wrong with doing it that way or much room for improvement on it.

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+1 for the polarized training plans.

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My main concern with LV [I guess that stands for low volume? I’m still fairly new to this thing :slight_smile: ] is that I don’t spent as much time on the bike at each individual workout as I’d like. I love riding my bike, even indoors, and ideally I’d do 90 minutes workouts, but the LV workouts are all sub one hour as far as I can see.

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I am planning to go for the polarized plans and actually reduce the intensity of the indoor workouts a bit so I do not hit absolute peak all the time. Yes, i am to be crucified as this is not polarized anymore, but it would suit my needs well.

I don’t get out Saturday and Sunday (generally Saturday is my window, with Sunday family time), but I do mid volume on Monday - Saturday schedule. So I sub out the “moderate” end of week workout for an unstructured spin.

If I could get out Saturday and Sunday, I would probably look at the polarized plans. 2 hard/ moderate workouts would be enough for me on top of two 4 hour weekend rides.

I experimented over lockdown with more condensed weeks - 2 days back to back was all I could really manage after a few weeks.

I did almost exactly what you’re describing. My schedule ended up being:

Monday - 60min active recovery (lazy mountain)
Tuesday - TR LV 90min ride (normally Saturday)
Wednesday - TR LV 60min ride (normally Thursday)
Thursday - TR LV 60min ride (normally Tuesday) sometimes extended to 90min if feeling good
Friday - 60min active recovery or low endurance (lazy mountain or pettit -1)
Sat / Sun - Open, typically 3-4hrs endurance ride on Sat, 3hr on Sun.

This schedule worked fine for SSBI/II and first half of Sustained Power Build. I had to adjust the schedule for second half of SusPB as it was too intense to do on consecutive days and I was starting to crumble. I chose to prioritize 2 of the workouts and do them Tues/Thurs and make the 3rd optional / best effort on Friday.

I would give this schedule a shot as-is before increasing the lengths of the workouts during the week. SSB LV is mostly threshold / over-unders / VO2max workouts and intensity is higher than MV or HV. Its not like 60min of sweet spot each day. If you can handle that schedule / volume I’d just add on z2 / endurance riding on those weekday rides to get you up to 90min if desired.

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Yes, this is what I ended up with :slight_smile:
On this weekend rides did you make an effort to stay in z2? Structured is nice, but sometimes I just want to ride how I feel at the moment. I expect to dip into tempo a lot and do some harder efforts on climbs (I live in a very hilly area).

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Understood…

The two options would be to keep the low volume, but add 30-45 min of strict z2 at the end of each 1hr workout. That’ll add time/volume/fitness without adding a ton of stress.

Other option is to choose the high volume plan, but only keep 2-3 of the 5-6 workouts each week. Delete the other ones that are least functional for you and/or would lead to overtraining if you did them all. That might mean keeping the vo2 max, sweetspot and endurance and dropping the supra threshold and over/unders. If you try to keep the vo2 max, over/unders, and supra threshold…and also do 8-10hrs of spirited riding on the weekends, you’re probably gonna be cooked in 2-3 weeks.

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I would say that in general I tried to stay in z2 for the weekend rides and tended to choose routes, if riding solo, or zwift group events that made it easier to ride steady z2. But I would also do spirited solo rides or hit the hills or zwift events that would cause me to spend a lot of time in z3/z4. I mostly tried to minimize time in z1 and avoid going so hard that I needed to drop to z1 to recover. And tried to restrain myself a little bit so I could recover on Monday for the Tuesday workout, but still enjoy myself and have fun. I was probably getting 190-220TSS for Sat and 150TSS for Sun.

For me it was a matter of balancing fun and structure. Structure without fun = burnout and falling off the plan. Fun and no structure = stagnation and/or regression. Seriously, I applaud your effort to incorporate the ‘fun’ rides into your plan. Its totally doable with a little thought.

My brain melts every tie I see a thread where someone basically says I love X / Y / Z about cycling and want to get better so I hopped on a plan where I won’t do X/Y/Z for 12-20 weeks. If they love X/Y/Z, they should make sure their plan has at least one of those activities each week. For most of us its a hobby and we do it for our enjoyment, just because we have structure and a plan doesn’t mean we cannot have those.

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This actually is very similar to the manner in which I structure my training:
Monday - Rest
Tuesday - structured hard effort inside for ~1 hr + Z2 to make 2 hrs
Wednesday - structured Z2 effort inside for 1-2h
Thursday - structured hard effort inside for ~1 hr + Z2 to make 2 hrs
Friday - rest
Saturday - very long ride outside, 5+h
Sunday - structured hard effort inside for ~1 hr + Z2 to make 2 hrs
I sometimes switch Saturday/Sunday, depending on group rides. If Saturday is very. very long [6.5 hours yesterday], I drop the Sunday ride. And sometimes, depending on the group, the very long ride might be mid-week; then I try to adjust to match my fatigue levels.

At the moment I have found no TR plans that readily accomodate that kind of planning, so I’ll be interested to see how you go. I am going to investigate the polarized plans once I’m finished with the current plan.

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I’m in a similar position; quite a lot of free time*, but want to keep some ‘fun’ rides in while making progress. With some help from a local coach, I ended up with a loosely POL plan:

Mon: 1.5-2hrs Z2
Tuesday: structured intervals
Weds: as Mon
Thurs: off
Fri: 2.5-3 Z2, hilly route or including 2x20 min sweet spot pushes
Sat: 3 hours + long ride
Sun: off

I’ve really enjoyed that style of setup.

*I’m temporarily unusually busy at work for the next month-6 weeks, so dropping down to 2 x long-ish rides on Friday and Saturday, with intervals Monday and Wednesday.

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