Intense weekend bunch riders - (un)productive?

Training
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I do 600-900TSS/wk. I try to rise my FTP and VO2max now (cuz I lost some after a surgery and bike break). So I do vo2max intervals on Tue, and then FTP on Thu - I try to do my hilly ride (50-60km, 2-3h, 900-1300m elev. 150-190TSS)

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(^^ this is shorter 2h version, ~150TSS, red line at 90%HRmax, yellow at FTP), >50min in Z4 and higher (there in is total ~20min in Z5-Z6, but it’s to keep avg around ~100%, or during some accelerations in a city, I don’t try to do intervals climbs above 100%FTP on purpose).

and then, I have Saturday bunch rides, 300-500TSS (depends how I feel :slight_smile: ), a lot of fun (albeit type2) drop rides.

yesterday’s first hour:

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It was pretty exhausting, riding in a group and all those power surges to stay in group (red line at 80%HRmax). later I decided to do detour, do more climbing (steady hour at Z2-Z3) and return at Z2. 320TSS, Z2: 1h16, Z3:1h05m, Z4:47m, Z5:18m, Z6+7 : 21min, almost no time at Zhr5 (1 minute) (maybe cuz I wasn’t so fresh?).

a few weeks before my Saturday ride for example had ~450TSS, but more steady climbs: Z2:45min, Z3:35min, Z4:1h08m, Z5:55min, Z6+7 : 40min. (Zhr5: 24min, Zhr4: 2h10min)

On top of that I do 1-2 eMTB rides, i try to go easy on climbs, but legs still work a lot on descents (enduro/dh style) or road 2h Z2 rides.

Are those Saturday rides “productive”. I mean, for sure they give a lot! maybe depends which ones? I feel that my last Saturday ride, with all those power surges, was way less “productive”, just exhausting for legs (or maybe it was good for lactate clearing?), than any other ride with more steady power output.

Or… maybe we can say, If I’m able to do my week intervals - then everything is ok ? or maybe “threshold Thu” could be better with just 2-3x20mins @Z4 ?

2

That’s a ton of intensity and training. What’s your FTP w/kg?

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4x hard sessions a week, 450~700TSS every weekend…

You can ‘work in’ group rides to training, but you’re doing intervals and ‘just’ riding on the weekends, not training.

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As mentioned above you can probably plan training a bit better, but to answer if the group rides are productive…. Yes they are. You are training to be a cyclist, these rides are essential in practicing group dynamics, safety, pace lines, strategy, etc.

it has been mentioned on the TR podcast but many pros do a group ride in Arizona called the shoot out. It will be important to recover and plan training appropriately around competibe group rides but in general they are beneficial when done right.

5

I asked for group rides intensity, I can ride also with other groups to have a bit different intensity level or a bit different style, also don’t mind doing 100-200km alone (then it’s definitely less intense, however I can do sustained climbs for 30-60 mins anywhere between Z2 and Z4 )

M45, 3.75W/kg. previous year was ~4W/kg

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isn’t it called training ? what would be a training for you? strictly following some rigid structure and phases? (base/build etc.) ?

it’s more like 3x hard session per week ( + 2-4h@Z2 or eMTB) in total

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I’ve misread your post, though it may have changed and grouped the Thursday session with the Saturday ride. All riding is good riding but at least a vague structure would be where I’d start drawing the lines between training and exercising. Overload, progression, periodization, and to a lesser extent goals etc

To directly answer your question on the productivity of the group ride: it depends.

I’d guess that it’ll have an impact on your freshness for the Tuesday session, making that less productive. Zone breakdown would suggest you spend as much time at and around your defined threshold than your FTP days, but given its likely more sporadic it’s unlikely to be long enough for progression and is effectively just adding fatigue. Somewhat unproductive but again it depends.

It would be productive if you were trying to replicate a fondo/race environment, learn bunch dynamics etc. It’s also very productive if doing the ride is your motivation to ride at all, it’s supposed to be fun.

Yes you could make it more productive by structuring the rides around it differently but also why is it not being productive an issue?

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In terms of increasing power? No, they are most likely harmful: you are incurring a whole lot of fatigue, especially since you are touching all of the intensity zones near and above threshold. 300–500 TSS in a single ride is massive.

However, if you find them fun and are ok with your fitness not growing as quickly and as much, then by all means, continue. Just accept the consequences.

Nope. The added fatigue means you won’t be able to push your interval workouts as hard for as long. Formulated in terms of PLs for simplicity, you might be able to do PL7 workouts instead of the PL4 workouts you are currently doing.

2 Likes
10

Yeah. IDK. I was never so fit as when I was doing 3 tough group rides a week. Between those rides and riding to/from their starts/finishes, I was putting in something like 150 miles a week. Was it too much? Could I have gotten even stronger with more structure? Probably, but I was pretty happy with where I was fitness-wise and haven’t since come close.

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11

You need to define “productive”. The meaning can vary a lot from one person to the next.

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12

My goal is to get back my FTP now :slight_smile: (so at least +10% (around 25W), to feel better and to have even more motivation at the end :slight_smile: (and then weekend rides with that group will be easier).

That ride (there were just some different people that preferred a bit more flat ride) doesn’t look like my “races” (gran fondos - where there are steady 3-4x 30-80mins climbs). and yes, this is what I felt, most power surges were very short.

I’m trying to do a “proper” training, but also to enjoy my rides. So 1 strict vo2max interval session is ok. second - thresholds - I could just do 2-3x20min, or ride my hills at Z4 (very first image in this thread, 10-15mins climbs), and also 2h (where 1h is really steady Z2 with just 2 lights in a middle) is doable, but weekend endurance ride (hours in Z2) would be too much (too boring). at the end, I want to enjoy my bike (and I can enjoy type2 fun, thus intervals are not a problem)

(last week I did 342km and 6000m elev - on a road bike. there’re also 2 emtb rides)

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Did anyone else misread this and think “of course brunch rides are unproductive?”

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Based on descriptions of your proposed workouts, it doesn’t like you do any sort of TR workouts? If your goal is purely raising your FTP, it could much much easier be done through actual structured TR workouts and increasing progression levels. Doesn’t even have to be necessarily part of a structured TR program. Also, the “cutback” week every 3-4 weeks is important.

The power in some zones have a pretty broad range, where you’re at in them is important, as well as the amount of rest (and at what power) between intervals.

The above has gotten me to 4 w/kg with wayyy less volume and about 20 months on the bike. I’ve only had 5 weeks over 500 TSS in the last year.

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15

I’m confused are you saying you did a 450tss ride on a weekend? Are you smashing for 6 hours? Of course you’re not going to manage vo2, threshold and 450tss rides in a week. Something will give.

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yes, 163km, 3050m elev. 6h17m moving time (+60mins for coffee/water stops), it was with steady climbs. this looked more like gran fondo, just a tiny bit less intense.

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You’re doing a lot of work. It won’t matter how optimal that work is if you aren’t doing the rest of it right. Make sure that you’re fueling well (on and off the bike), sleeping well, keeping stress down and giving yourself proper recovery weeks.

What does your recovery week look like? How often do you take it?

Post your CTL graph.

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this year:

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I’ve just started to ride more intense (I couldn’t find motivation in October-Nov).

I’ll do rest week now. (previous weeks were: 899, 700, 847, 749 TSS)

19

There’s a few red flags there. Loss of motivation for two months is a major indicator that you were burned out. Taking a week or two off is normal, needing that much time is not.

And you have several of those in one year it looks like (or maybe something else happened in that big break earlier in the year).

So it seems that you’re not a good judge of when you’re overdoing your training load.

You tell me that you’re doing 4 intense weeks then 1 recovery week. With how intense your weeks are plus your history of burnout, you really should either lower the load of your hard weeks or do a cycle of only 3 hard weeks before a recovery week.

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20

Every weekend? Unless you are a grand tour rider you might want to consider doing just one workout a week.

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other weekend rides were smaller, like: 333, 330, 340 TSS

grand tour riders do that every day :slight_smile: