Naturally anaerobically gifted athletes, how did you turn your anaerobic power into aerobic power? Anaerobically I’m quite strong even without any structured training, my > 60 min power is mediocre at best andmy 3-30min power is sub par. I’ve followed sustained power LV but although my > 60 power did increase my anaerobic power increased way more. Which build/specialty would be best to get my sustained power as high as my 30s-60s power?
Start with a strong base, which is best achieved by long/slow Z2 work. 3-30 minutes starts with VO2 Max work and shifts into threshold/supra threshold. Out of all of this, Z2 work is the most important. The problem most of us face is the weekly volume needed to see improvements by following a “traditional base” plan is higher than what’s available. That said, if you’re starting a structured plan, new to structure, I’m of the opinion that trying a TB plan over the SS base plans is the best course of action.
After that, you can get in the weeds about the best 3-5 VO2 intervals, and the best anaerobic work outs but honestly most of those details don’t mean much if you haven’t taken the time to develop your base.
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Sweetspot sweetspot sweetspot sweetspot sweetspot and tempo
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I’ve done the classic SS build but it did not work for me. What does work is lots of zone 2 with one day of intensity (local chain gang for me). I ride at the top end of zone 2 maybe even into tempo. It’s been the best thing ever for me. I’m a classic, always win a sprint, never win a time trial type rider. Now my aerobic engine is SO much better. By lots of zone 2 I mean only about 7 hours. The one day of intensity makes my entire volume about 8 hours. I never need to touch my 2 minute and under power and V02 max as it looks after itself and never seems to drop off. (actually it’s been increasing recently on the back of all the zone 2 work, go figure!)
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Sensible, and I would suspect that this is what more people should follow. My buddy, who is a very experienced bike racer, hit some FTP PRs over his winter training. His “secret” was tons of Z2 rides with one day of threshold work.
Sweet Spot training shouldn’t be used as a substitute for Z2 IMHO.
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I’ve seen really good results averaging 8-9 hours/week with 60-80% at upper zone2. Minimum of about 5 hours/week, with 2 per week that are steady long-ish rides of 2+ hours. I really don’t do a lot of intervals below 5-minutes, and yet my entire short power curve has increased and able to do things like put down 1000+W repeated sprint efforts at the end of rides. And I’m back to animating parts of the Wed night group rides - so much better now that I’m not blowing up after a couple anaerobic efforts.
Exactly, for me SS is a complement to z2 and not a replacement. TR style SSB goes heavy on intervals, and seemed to cap me at 250-260W ftp (before TR I hit 280). Now after doing z2 all year I’m back around 265-280W ftp throughout the last year, without having done a proper build.
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75% zone 2 easy rides.
25% sweet spot /tempo.
1 ftp/threshold workout every 10 days
Sharpen by doing anaerobic workouts 2-3 weeks before your race.Stay away
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SSBMV cooked me. Like others have said the plans are deceptively tough and the fatigue comes on slowly, but it’s real. I was sick a lot that winter and didn’t have much snap on the bike FTP was decent but not PR status.
I think more people are probably realizing even low volume base training has a ton of benefits.
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60% Z2, 20% Z3/tempo, 20% Sweet spot and no sprints or anything shorter than 2’ effort with long(ish) rest.
Actually power at all durations from 2’ upwards increased, but over the time span of about 4 months I increased my FTP with 12W (20’ test) while I was already at 4.4W/kg and I could hold my 5’ best power for 7’ as well (5.45W/kg).
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Yes, I think it’s a big mistake to not have Z2 as the basis of training. High intensity should be sprinkled in lightly. It’s amazing the fitness you can get from just 7 hours of Z2 a week. Replace one day with intensity when you have your base done but never lose sight that Z2 should be the other 80%. If you have 20 hours a week obviously then you want more low intensity, 20 hours of 2 would kill you.
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more endurance riding. Definitely disagree with those recommending sweet spot as that riding is very glycolytic. You want the exact opposite in order to hopefully have a chance of shifting your physiology towards becoming more aerobic. Even if you are low volume, 60-90 minutes of endurance will help. Have you tried a more polarized approach? might be a really good route for you to explore.
Brendan
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I think we can all agree that the ideal is around 20 hours a week, 80 or 90% highly aerobic lower intensity and somewhere around 10 or 20% high intensity of some sort depending on rider and time of season etc. The problem is, most can’t do that because of time so what’s the answer, I’m not sure what the lower volume equivalent is but I am pretty sure that it’s not 3 * 10 minutes just under threshold 3 or 4 times a week.
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As am I and I’m at an all time high FTP this year doing SSBHV. Better yet, with AT I’m did less hours and TSS this past year and saw better results. That’s even with increasing my 1 hour recovery (Wed, Fri) rides to 1:30. SS training for the win!
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When I was doing <10 hours I found sweetspot worked well for me. Long (at the time) intervals like 20 mins or even better, long SST workouts like Baird Peak where there’s no recovery intervals. I like to do longer Z2 rides when I’m doing higher volumes though. Again constant pressure on the pedals.
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I’m zerocarb and usually do my sweetspot fasted
High volume Zone 2 and lots of it. Trying to substitute sweet spot for z2 cooks me every time, CNS fatigue I suspect.
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Or glycogen
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I am very time-limited so I do 2x1hr VO2max float sets and 1x1.5hrs threshold under/overs or these La Dama Blanca type sets per week plus whatever unstructured rides I can fit outdoors. This takes aerobic training out of my list of racing bottlenecks…which also include things like cornering.
None of this is aerobic training.
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^ Worth highlighing and bringing this to attention ^
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