That’s quite a cool site. I suppose geometry proves that you can ride over 120km without ever being more than 20k from home. Ok, in the real world you’re never going to make a perfect circle, but that’s given me some Strava ideas - thanks.
When I rejoined TR a year ago this week it was for several long distance mountain bike ITTs (see this site for more details - https://www.selfsupporteduk.net/ ) but of course most during the summer were cancelled. I did one of my events in September and one a couple of weeks ago (in Wales just a few days before everything went pear shaped).
For next year the two foreign events that I would have been interested in (one in Norway, one in Finland) have already been cancelled. Not sure what’s going to happen with the UK ones, I suspect the group starts won’t happen but if travel is allowed then I’ll do them as a pure ITT. The first of the UK events has been cancelled but it’s going to be held virtually in your own area - it would have been in Mid-Wales - someone will come up with a set of Grid Refs for us to visit.
So I’ll stick the events in the calendar as if they are going ahead but won’t assume that they are. After that it’s mainly trying not to become a tub of lard!
I took a similar view of doing whatever I wanted to but I couldn’t abandon structure because without it I am the kind of guy who’s workouts look surprisingly similar to sitting on the sofa.
As I am a triathlete, I decided to take the first lockdown as a chance to run through a whole Cycling only Base/Build/Specialty cycle. Granted I did 40k TT, which really was outside but pushed right up next to the box, but dropping the running and swimming meant I saw progress that I would never have dreamt possible.
However, I did miss running so I am now doing the TR Sprint Triathlon plan (obviously no swimming) as I have never followed the running workouts and I kinda wanted to see how they were first hand. If they are no good and I don’t make any progress then I really havent lost anything.
For me if I was to put an actual event that I wanted to do on the calendar and start to train seriously for it for it to get cancelled I would feel much more deflated than if I just train for fun now and take this as the strange time that it is.
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Was this a question by someone or did he just mention it? If so, do you remember the podcast?
I’m personally also thinking about doing reverse period early winter
This is a really good point. In the gym I don’t used a fan but I’m in a big open space so I haven’t felt like I needed any cooling.
I don’t do any competitive riding I do this just to keeping myself in good shape and because I enjoy it. So it is all pointing to getting the trainers on and getting out running more.
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Cheers HLaB. Sounds like a tight squeeze there. I was looking at the Elite range yesterday, just can’t get over the line with buying one. There is one part of the house I’m thinking I could do it but would need a bit of reorganising. Part of the enjoyment is getting out of the house as I work from here now as well. No announcements of gym closures in Scotland yet so will keep at for now and keep reviewing.
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TTs, with a healthy side dose of general fitness and mental wellbeing. Seems with covid there are an awful lot of things I can’t control (Christmas, any kind of social life, whether schools stay open, work, etc!), so having some structure that I can control in cycling seems like a good thing right now 
Spent the first ~6 months of lockdown very similar to you with quite a bit of Zwift racing, quite a few epic rides, lots of unstructured riding with friends, not a lot of structure. Missed proper racing so entered some TTs when they started up again in the UK. Got my arse kicked, realised I’d lost quite a bit of race fitness, that coincided with a couple of fast group rides where I got dropped in situations I was unaccustomed to being dropped in, so decided it was time to knuckle down and set some goals and structure again. Figure there’ll at least be some TTs next season (if not then I guess I’ll go find some suitable longer segments to go KOM hunting on). And if or when other racing starts up then TT power is a pretty solid foundation to build other types of fitness on. Right now I’m getting enough enjoyment and motivation just from having a plan and following it again, along with the usual improvements in RPE at a given power, FTP bumps, etc, that I don’t particularly feel the need to have an actual race in the diary. Hopefully by the time the novelty wears off there’ll be some more clarity around racing next season. Or else I’ll have to try cyclocross…
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Can’t remember off-hand, I think it was in relation to HIIT and similar. Pretty sure it’s been in the main body of the podcast rather than the quick-fire questions at the end.
I’ve absolutely no interest in racing or competing. I don’t get out in my bike much these days as I have young kids. So I do this completely for fitness reasons. My mates think I’m crazy but I love jumping on a Wattbike Pro/Stages SC3 for an hour or 2, listen to music and completely zone out of life 
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There is a general rule of thumb that says you want your training to become more race-specific the closer you get to your event… For that reason, “reverse periodization” is often a great choice for triathletes, especially long-course triathletes. Raise your FTP during the inter period with high-intensity workouts and then add in more distance as you approach your events. If you accept that theory, then reverse priodization isn’t often a great choice for cyclists (unless they are doing ultra-endurance events like Unbound, SBTGRVL, etc.
That said, if you are using the winter period to focus on weaknesses, and one of your weaknesses is FTP efforts, VO2 Max efforts, etc. then reverse periodization is a great option so you can improve a weakness.
So the TL:DR is what it often is with training - It depends. 
I’d like to politely point out that the UK isn’t going into a 4 week lockdown - England is.
Wales started it’s 2 week lockdown last weekend so those of us who live here will be able to get out and about again from next Monday. I’m planning on heading to Bike Park Wales when they reopen that week!
For clarity, I’m English but live in Wales and I’ve not gone native or become a secret Welsh Nationalist; it’s just irritating to be lumped in with the ridiculous state of English mismanagement when the Welsh Assembly Government are doing a far better job for us here 
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To be fair, my 10 year old could have done a better job than our lot in England.
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Oh yes, sorry - as a former resident (if not native) of Wales, I should have known better!
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Watch it - another slip like that and they might not let you back in! 
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Back to the OP, lockdown for me means more time for training and more time for recovery. I lost my job in the last lockdown anyway, so time is less of an issue for me now already, but this will no doubt mean even more time indoors… I’ll venture out for some miles on better days but like some said, drivers here got totally out of control last time and we also had a backlash against cyclists outdoors.
Therefore my logic is the opposite - I’ll do high volume SST & tempo work and just continue to work ‘base’, and work up some longer intervals and sessions. I really dont think you can have too much ‘base’ and doing intensity now seems a little pointless given your fear of next year’s goal events evaporating. I’m not convinced ‘reversing’ the periodisation creates as long term benefits as intensity later on top of a bigger ‘base’.
Good luck whatever you go for!
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using a fatter rear tyre if you have one? a big commuter tyre to add resistance. and run low pressure
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Though low PSI is the easiest way to add resistance.
I was going to say use mtb tyres, and was only half joking!
I’m thinking on moving from SSB MV to SSB HV as the workouts are lower in intensity and therefore I gamble on having a wider base by doing so.
As noted above, just lower your psi substantially and your resistance will go up a fair amount.