Sweet Spot Progression

It was completed by different participants, not highly trained athletes. The protocol is extremely hardcore and probably will derail your training for a month but the gainnzzz :wink:

And the weightloss as a bonus:
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And vo2 max improvements:
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Edit:
And I have forgotten - it is 10 wk training program. Can you imagine?

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Another vote for WKO thread!

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Thanks so much. Pretty good increase afyer 2-3 weeks too

Unfortunatelly not 3 but 10 weeks of 6 days of vo2 max :slight_smile:

Yes, but was looking at the by week results

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Are you advocating for splitting this content?

Reason I ask there is already a WKO thread; WKO5 is here and it looks... different

While the title might not reflect the content any longer, I would hate to see the content split over multiple threads as there is a pretty solid base of users within this thread all following a similiar approach to training which if summarized largely follows the WKO webinar methodology, starts with extensive (SST Progressive) and moves into intensive (threshold) before VO2.

Thanks for pointing that out. I’m familiar with that thread. I was wondering if it’d be more appropriate to have all of the WKO webinar methodology in a WKO-focused thread for ease of searching, but really either way is fine. I certainly understand your point on not wanting to split the content.

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Ask the OP to edit the title a bit? Maybe?

Back to the topic…after 3x30 I was aiming for 1x105:

The first part was a Zwift Meetup Race with some mates and the finish was a little hectic…took some seconds to setup a workout for the rest and settled back in just a little under and then into SS again.
(HR was higher than supposed pretty early (due to the race excitement and little surges here and there))

I take it as a success …any opinion on not counting this as a valid 1x105’?

Not keen on progressing to 120 :sweat_drops: and not keen on jumping to intensive aerobic yet :man_shrugging:…maybe inserting a little block with focus on running :thinking:

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@Rizzi that’s an interesting way to do long SS intervals. The mental effort required to grind out 90, 100, 120 minutes on a trainer is huge. So good idea, well done, and yes: I’d count it.

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Totally fine. Most of us are way too worried about perfection and making sure all of our numbers are properly tracked and recorded and optimal.

The work is what matters.

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Coming back to this and to put it as a better question…when following the WKO training design…have you been at the end of extensive aerobic not wanting to extend further and also not wanting to go right into intensive aerobic (or more intensity at all)…what did you insert and how was the outcome for you?

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@Rizzi: I got to the end of my extensive phase early this week [it’s 21 Feb as I write]. Since then I’ve done several 2-3 hour Z2 rides, mostly outdoors; and I’ve tried out a couple of the shorter interval sessions, to see what they are like. These were just for familiarisation, and were not done to push me too hard. So, really, this was four or five days of taking it easy. On one of the Z2 rides [with a group] I also did a few 20 - 40 sec all-outs just to raise my actual max powers nearer to the model PD Curve.

Monday, I start on the intensive phase, using @kurt.braeckel’s suggested framework to me a hundred of so posts ago:

Good luck with the next phase of your life [sorry, I mean training].

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You can shift to repeatability. 15/15s, over/unders, etc.

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Here’s an idea if you can do longer endurance rides (which fill the bulk of your time). Depending on what you feel like, you could do one threshold session per week (making sure to progress TiZ week over week) as a “maintenance” workout until you’re ready to kick off another phase.

Shifting to a polarized approach w/two working sessions each week sounds like what you might want to do if you’re not ready for something super intensive.

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Depends on your goal. If you’re cooked, take a week or two of easy riding only. If you want to continue progressing, you could dive into a dedicated VO2max or repeatability build block. Depends on goal events and how far out they are, etc.

I followed the cookie cutter: Extensive - Intensive - VO2max. I’m going to take at least one recovery week after my last VO2 week, maybe recovery week then HVLI/test week and back to extending at my 10W (right now) higher FTP. But I’m doing that because I have no idea when I’m going to be racing…

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100%. The difference between AP and NP is tiny; this definitely counts. I thought 75 minutes @ 92% was hard. Great work.

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At some point along the way I hope you are testing a maximal effort. You should see an increase, which would mean restarting a block even at shorter duration would net a higher power output.
If you’re testing and you are not seeing an increase, you almost by definition then need to move into an intensive block to get the required stimulus to see growth.

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@michaelfrommelbourne @ErickVH @anthonylane @kurt.braeckel @RONDAL Thanks all for your suggestions and experiences…appreciated and food for thought!
(Just have to balance this with some running and hopefully swimming again sometime)

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I have a question.
I completely realize that doing longer intervals is more beneficial than doing shorter ones. I am aware of Kolie Moore’s view about not doing any intervals shorter than 10 minutes and I know the ultimate goal is to build longer intervals.
However: how big of a difference does it make if you do let’s say 12 x 6 minutes (Carson, actually 5-7minute intervals) vs, 6 x 12 minutes (Geiger) vs. 2 x 36 minutes?
I know you can’t say: “oh, that’s 2.24-times more effective”, but if I feel mentally weak on a certain day and find it much easier to do shorter intervals with short recoveries between, I’d like to know just what I’m letting go.

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