How was your overall experience with polarized training. Are you still using a version of polarized training now? What were the challenges? How quick was your progress?
It’s an interesting idea, training by feel.
Last Christmas I rode 4hrs a day, every day for two weeks. Then rode and won a mtb race. Average power was about 120watts for those 4hr rides whereas 185-200w would be the range I ‘should’ be targeting for aerobic gains
Way to shift the goal posts. None of that has anything to do with the maximum power you can maintain for longer durations, which is what was being discussed.
It also doesn’t have anything to do with lactate metabolism. If you want to perform better day after day, eat more carbohydrate. Better still, just mainline it the way pros used to do - this ain’t rocket science.
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What goalposts? You and I were not engaged in a debate. I was reading a forum thread, in which I have zero stake. I had a thought - perhaps it was a dumb thought - and replied to you to see if you had any input.
I won’t make that mistake again. Not that of having a dumb thought - I’m sure there’s plenty more where that came from - but of trying to engage you, and your wealth of knowledge, in a constructive manner.
Bugger! I thought this was the sensible thread on Polarized.
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@old_but_not_dead_yet
None of those quotes are from @chidlow. They are from me. If nothing else, please direct your vitriol to the correct user, in this case me. I’ll generally ignore it (and you can take that personally), but occasionally if I think I’ll get some value out of it I will respond. It’s tough because feeding a troll is a tough way to live.
I have an agenda. I’m trying to learn and enjoy myself. I often like what you say @old_but_not_dead_yet. I never like the way you say it.
Now you’re conflating me with another user. I didn’t know that expression until I googled it. I’m old too. Good movie, though.
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I’ve had good results from Polarized in 2020. Lifted FTP from 169W to 252W in 7 months. Admittedly coming off a fairly chilled Nov / Dec 19. Not only that but on long rides, say a 12 hour event I needed to eat a lot less and didn’t fade so much as before.
I did one or two interval sessions a week. Usually a Monday and Thu but it wasn’t fixed in stone. If I started an interval session but it wasn’t happening. I’d abandon it, do a low intensity session for an hour. Then I’d either try the high intensity session later in the day or I’d wait till the following day.
Since July I’ve been in maintenance mode. Which means one high intensity session a week. The rest easy. In Dec 20 I did try one of my high intensity workouts from July 20 at the July intensities. I completed it, but my HR peak was 97% of my max by end of third set of intervals. So higher than I’d like. I prefer if the high intensity sessions finish around 91-92% of max HR. But it does mean my VO2 max and FTP are likely in touching distance of last July.
All this means I have much higher base to build from this year. I’m planning a ramp retest this afternoon. Once I’ve had lunch and let it go down. Then restart a build next week.
I’ve tried more intensity days which was my approaches in 2018/19. I found that although I got similar gains in FTP. That anything over 4 hours riding and I faded like a stone dropping through water. Plus my motivation evaporated after around 3-4 months,
So as with anything it will depend on what type of rides / events you do, what kind of response you see to your training, and whether it enables you to keep that long term consistently and motivation that underpins it.
I’m at the ultra endurance end of cycling and find polarized works great for me.
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I’m no expert, but this stuck out to me from study cited…
"Scientific evidence supports that a higher percentage of training time (from 70% to 90%) in zone 1 has a high impact on performance (Esteve-Lanao et al., 2007; Muñoz et al., 2014a; Tnønessen et al., 2014). An excess of high intensity training can lead the athlete to overtraining or a higher incidence of injuries (Maffetone and Laursen, 2016).
Based on this previous research, it seems clear that high part of the training time should be in zone 1, but several questions arise such as, “how should the remaining of the training be distributed?” or “what is the best training intensity distribution model for recreational athletes?” There is no definite answer to these questions to date."
My issue with TR plans above LV, and the question I’m far more interested in hearing TR address on Thursday, is the lack of zone 1 (Zone 1/2 in a 5-zone model) when athletes move beyond 3-4 1/2 hours of weekly training. I’m also less interested in the debate between POL and PYR or the value of SS.
Even in TR’s blog post about the necessity of low effort endurance training Zone 2 Training for Cyclists: Where Endurance Training Fits in Your Training Plan - TrainerRoad Blog, they make the argument that SS trains the same systems faster. To me, that’s where TR goes from science to selling Kool-Aid. (And I’m a loyal fan of TR and their customer support, other than this high-intensity over endurance bias, their missing Master’s plans and hopefully soon-to-come group workout on iOS.)
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Apologies to you both, then. Keeping track of who wrote what is a bit challenging on this forum, at least on my phone.
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Ah, no worries then, glad it was just a case of mistaken identity.
I should add that in terms of time I ride between 7-10 hours per week.
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But that’s what the science is pointing at. Sweetspot aka high tempo and low threshold is still very aerobic in nature. It’s not like that’s targeting a completely different zone.
I’m not sure I follow. Let’s say we agree that most athletes can pretty quickly work up to 2-3 hard workouts a week (some combination of SS or HIIT or over-unders, etc.). Are you saying that beyond that you’d recommend adding in more SS sessions as volume increases? Because I’d argue that’s a sure recipe for burnout, and that most athletes would benefit more from adding in some additional easy Z1-Z2 endurance rides instead. That’s my, and it seems many others’, issue with the MV/HV TR plans currently offered. That’s also the issue I hope TR will address during next podcast.
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Forgive me but my comment was referring to the sentence you wrote and which I quoted in my previous comment. I tried to make the point that both endurance and sweetspot workouts train the same, aerobic, system.
Regarding your comment I have quoted above, I wouldn’t classify sweetspot as intensity. However, to answer your question, I would say it depends. Mostly on how much additional volume we are looking at. If it’s a few hours, I would always go for sweetspot rather than endurance hours. If it’s more than that I would go for a blend. As the hours increase predominantly endurance hours.
The issues some folks seem to have with the TrainerRoad plans are controversial. I think many folks here simply train with an inflated FTP. As intervals are fairly short, they get away with it for some time. Though not for long.
It would be interesting to see if all those folks can hold their FTP for 30 minutes straight. I would bet that even that would be too much for the majority of them. Not to mention 50+ minutes.
However, for masters athletes, people with high stress jobs and lives, I think the plans are just too intense. Also the loading cycles are too long.
Thanks for sharing. 
Are you planning to continue POL training?
Regarding longer rides, I rarely do longer rides anymore as that conflicts too much with my dad duties. Before we had our daughter and my wife was often working one day a weekend, I’d just go out riding for the entire day. That isn’t an option, unfortunately. So I wouldn’t be surprised if my stamina isn’t as great as it used to be, although I am not sure whether this is because of my lack of long-distance rides or the training methodology.
Yes that’s the plan.
I’m also very much someone who enjoys the aspects of riding in the countryside. As I found out when I was climbing on the turbo nearly every day. It can be done short term but it doesn’t motivate me.
But one or two hard turbo sessions a week. Then enjoying leisurely rides outdoors is great. Then drop to one hard session a week when I want to keep the gains but have a little break from the turbo. Something I can see myself keep at longer term.
I do have the occasional harder ride outdoors. Just to see how it’s translating. Going hard up the hills at a pace that see me get close to or reach max HR for instance. Those 4-5 minute hills.
There’s no events at moment. It’s still lockdown in UK. So aim to restart build next week with a target event end of June if it happens.
The current C19 vaccination goal for the UK is all adults vaccinated by July. Currently a third of the adult population has been done. I’m expecting an invite in April.
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Thanks for the explanation, Keoni. I’m riding all indoors at the moment living in NYC area. But even on the trainer, I enjoy an easy ride or two to keep things from feeling like a total grind.
I did find in lockdown 1 in UK I did do some low intensity sessions on the turbo. Just an hour to 90 mins. But no let up, I’d sit in between 65-75% all the way. I’d then look at aerobic decoupling I.e between HR and power. Once it was below 5% I’d increase the HR I’d do these session at. Then when decoupling at the higher HR dropped below 5% do it a bit harder. So by the end your working at the top end of the Seiler z1 around 78% max and still have decoupling below 5% over 60-90 minutes.
@GoLongThenGoHome, you and I have sort of the same journey! 
Although I switched to a POL approach much later, I can relate to “feeling” the same benefits as you do!
During end of 2020 I was on paternity leave hence couldn´t do much volume on weekdays, it was either above FTP work or SST. Wanting to improve my TTE, and knowing I wouldn´t be racing for several months, I did 3xSST per week from Sep to Dec. Adding endurance rides on weekends and “in-between-days”. So sort of a “poor mans POL”, i.e. 80%/20%/0%… This worked really well for me since the lack of really intense stuff meant that I was well recovered for the long SST workouts (progressing from 60min up to 100min TiZ). After final SST block I performed an lactate test, LT1/AeT up by 40W to a new all time high.
December I did a 4w build block: 3xZ3 sessions per week + Z1. I was surprised by how well I managed these workouts considering having done 0min Z3 for over 3 months. However, one mistake I did was to do 4w instead of 3w (aligned well with the holidays…). Was really tired during the fourth week and had to dial down the power on the last Z3 sessions. Took one week completely of the bike. Had to recover.
(Luckily this was in early Jan and not end of May…)
Plan was to continue 2021 with a PYR approach but as I started working again, meaning commuting by bike everyday, I noticed I didn´t recover enough for my “hard days”. Even the once a week SST felt hard. Had to change something.
So I completely skipped the SST. Left was only 2xZ3 and Z1 (plus some strength training). And I do the Z1-commute-rides really easy. Even if it´s only been 4-5 weeks of this modified training plan I feel so much better on the bike. Not only during the Z3 sessions, but also on the long Z1 weekend rides. Will definitely continue a POL approach throughout my base period. As for my build period I had already planned it to resemble a POL approach (gonna do block periodization).
So, what do I want to say with this? Is POL better than SST? I don´t know! What I do know is that there is definitely a time and place for both. This of course depends on several things, e.g.:
- What are you training for? Is it a TT, 100mile gravel race, crit race etc.
- What type of athlete are you? What are your strengths & weaknesses? What do you want to improve?
- How much time do you have to ride the bike?
- How much time do you have to recover?
For me a POL approach seems to work best at the moment with the goals and targets (and current limitations in life… “family”… “work”…) I have for this season. Still, the SST approach worked really well just a couple of months ago. 
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Sounds like you got your priorities all right! Ultimately, the way to go about it. 