Hi guys, just looking for other people’s experience on masters v traditional 3 hard days approach. I’m a 43 year old looking to optimise training for racing. Im torn between masters volume and doing as much Z2 as I can or just going with Trainerroad suggested 3 days hard. Have a good level of fitness but not enough top end and repeatability. I know both approaches will get me somewhere in the ballpark but would love to hear what has worked for other people.
I’m also on the cusp and I haven’t been able to find a good answer to this, either. I’m thinking of staying with the traditional 3 day approach until I feel it’s getting to a point where it’s absolutely uncoverable, and then switching to the Master’s plan. I get far better FTP jumps with 3 days, but I definitely feel better on 2.
Maybe try the traditional 3 day plan initially, and do what you can to maximize recovery, even if it means reducing zone 2 work or taking a full rest day between the two hard workouts. I do this now, and I am faster than ever.
If you find you’re able to complete the workouts comfortably and recover well, start adding the zone 2 back in and maybe see where your limit is.
I’m 45. TR recommend the 3 days of intensity for me but I’ve manually switched to masters for the time being. Reason is I want to increase my volume over the next year without over straining. I figured I’d increase volume through more zone 2 then maybe once I’m at my goal of 10+hrs per week I’ll add a 3rd day of intensity, or maybe I’ll stick with two. My progress is going well so I don’t see a need to add a third day of intensity. You could play around with the new AIftp prediction and see how it changes with the extra day of intensity.
Here’s my unscientific experiment with a base of just 1 (me). I used the traditional approach for a stage race series (4-5 races over 6 days) and TR got me into a top 5 and even won a stage. My focused changed to a single day race (200 mile event) and I switched to a Masters volume plan (using “check my volume”). The Master’s plan has gotten me into the top 10 for solo males the last 2 years and cut almost 2 hours off my finishing time in the 3 years I’ve done the 200 mile race. This year I’ll be 56 and competing against the young guns again in the 200 mile. I still do the stage race series but I’m not able to keep pace with the group I was competitive with under the traditional plan; however my training plan isn’t focused on a stage race series and it shows.
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It’s really hard to provide a good recommendation based on experience of others, as the right answer depends a lot on your own circumstances: If work isn’t a huge stress factor, you don’t have small children, an understanding or no partner and the free time beyond social responsibilities: give it a try with the regular plan.
Personally I’d start with the masters first and see how that affects mood and energy levels. Especially when starting out with structured training, you can be exhausted either way, so it’s best not to overdo it. And you can always add more hard work to a masters plan, the other way is a bit more complicated
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Welcome to the community Niall
My advice would be to look at your recovery, more than the work.
Are you;
- Sleeping well
- Fresh and keen when you look at the trainer for your next hard session?
I moved into M50-54 AG last year so Masters became default, but I see better gains on 3 hard days.
A few caviats. This time of year, winter into spring, is when I build strength on the bike. I’m relatively muscular for an old cyclist which makes me feel like I can still handle the workload.
I check through the year whether the load is appropriate, so I could well switch to masters plans later in the season.
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I’ve tried both approaches. Masters-style high volume builds a solid aerobic base and helps with endurance, but the 3 hard days method really pushes your repeatability and top-end efforts. For racing, a mix usually works best — base volume early, then target the 3 hard days closer to race season.
N=1 I follow masters with the two hard workouts during the week, leaving me free to do something unstructured at the weekend, and also do some (also unstructured) running around my plan.
However, if that doesn’t happen for life reasons (or for example it never stopping raining on the east coast of Ireland since Christmas!), I switch in a third harder workout (I normally default to sweet spot). During the race season, that’ll be two hard workouts during the week and a (usually 2 hour) race at the weekend.
I see higher predicted FTP with 3 hard workouts, but then the unstructured stuff is social/ different outlet.
I had success using a hybrid approach during my recent build phase. With the typical 3 weeks of work to 1 week of de-load/recovery, I followed the master’s plan of 2 interval days per week during weeks 1 & 2, but manually added a 3rd interval day during week 3. The lower demand of week 4 allowed me to recover nicely.
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48yo here. Mainly doing 3 workouts per week. 2 high intensity and 1 long endurance. I’m not sure that is the best approach and not what custom training plan suggest, but if I didn’t choose masters plan I would not have time for endurance becides when I have a 4th day to add in once in a while.
I also try to strength train a few times per week so it all adds up. For me I think 1 long endurance day is more worth than 1 extra day of intensity.
52 year old here with 25+ years of structured training. I do a hybrid approach myself. I am in the US midwest and as hours are mostly on trainer and lower this time of year, I do 3 intensity workouts per week. When I get outside more often and hours go up closer to 15 per week, I will scale back to 2.
I have also done the hybrid approach discussed above. Using a 3 week on, 1 week deload schedule, done 3 workouts on week 1 when I am fresh and week 3 when I am about to head into a rest week. Keep week 2 at 2 workouts.
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My personal experience, I feel like 3x hard intervals per week keeps me in better race shape during XCO season, but if I try to add lower body gym work I have to dial it back to 2x hard intervals per week because I just wasn’t feeling recovered enough to hit the mid-week interval session. My off-season is over the summer so I plan to introduce heavy lifting again and probably reduce hard intervals to 2x per week until I get to our fall XCO and gravel seasons.
This is gold. 
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I do something similar, but under the structure of a regular plan. I pick a regular plan (3 hard days), but I flag one of those days (saturday) as group ride. So, my plan gives me 2 interval workouts per week and then Saturday is a bit of a free-for-all. It might be a solo day with some structure, but often is just a big TSS day with a portion of it being a team group ride. Lots of junk miles and fatigue, maybe not the most physically productive (but a lot of fun and good mental break from proper training). The 2 interval days are where I keep my discipline, Saturday is a reward for being good.
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Well I am in my late 50’s and I was doing the Masters Plan for the last few years. But I tried the Garmin coaching and that was more like 2.5 days of hard riding. I say 2.5 days because one of the interval days was not really a very hard interval day. When I decided to switch back to TR I went with the regular 3 interval days on the Medium plan with the Balance approach. I really like it and I am seeing really good gains. On Sundays it does sometimes get to me but Monday is my day off. Also by the end of the third build week I start feeling fatigue but I can handle it as the 4th week is the recovery week. I also only lift one day a week instead of two. But I have come to realize that before I was just doing too much zone 2 and not enough intervals. I think I wasn’t pushing my workouts hard enough. I really think with this new AI it is pushing me to work hard on the interval days and go easy on the easy day. I am also planning to do the High Volume plan in April. If I can’t handle high volume with 3 inteval days I will go back to masters. But right now I am really liking the training plan and seeing power increases that I haven’t seen I was in my 40’s.
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Just turned 45 and having been back doing regular training plan for a year after being on the masters plan. Changed employment last year and my new employment means my sleep is much better and have been recovering better. That said my legs have been feeling like they are not fully recovering and are feeling heavy. Training has been going well (4 days per week including 2 double days with gym work) but was thinking about switching back to masters. What I didn’t like about masters and the 2 hard sessions was the lack of sweetspot and the build and speciality sessions felt very similar. Like the sound of a hybrid type approach.