I’m curious to crowdsource the forum’s opinion on my performance in two recent Vo2 workouts.
Quick background … Tuesday’s are my Vo2 days and I’ve been struggling a bit with Gendarme — it’s a pretty straightforward 30/30 workout. I’ve been focusing on it a building towards being able to complete it at the prescribed power … which I have yet to be able to do this season.
For a change of pace, I decided to do Snowshoe Fire yesterday — which is 4x5 at 106% — and I was able to complete it at the prescribed power pretty handily. In fact, if it was a 5x5 workout at 106% I’m pretty confident I could have held the power for another interval … however unpleasant it might have been.
Gendarme is rated a 3.0 level Vo2 workout, and Snowshow Fire is rate a 4.8 Vo2 workout … which doesn’t seem to me to be an insignificant gap.
I’ve posted both workout files below … and given that I was identically rested and well fueled for both workouts only 1 week apart, this is my question:
What, if anything, does this say about my physiology or current fitness?
Does this illustrate a gap in base training? Strength work? Ability to recover after hard starts?
Or am I giving too much credence to the TR workout levels?
This isn’t really bothersome to me, but I thought it might be an opportunity to glean an insight from my training that I could apply going forward. Thanks in advance.
While thee are both VO2 max workouts, they are really pretty different and, IMO, speak more to your attributes as a rider vs. any training issue.
I could knock out Gendarme without too much difficulty, but would probably struggle on Snowshoe Fire, as extended VO2 efforts are my weakness. But after decades of group rides and races, I can make an effort, quickly recover and go again without too much issue.
I’m probably a 4 or a 5? My pmax is ~1300 watts on an FTP that has been dangling around +/- 300W for the last 2-3 years. I haven’t hit 1000W yet this year … nor have I really tried. (I’m also 49 y.o.)
This makes sense … I’ve always had (relatively speaking) long, diesel power as a strength. I gravitate towards long SS and Tempo intervals when training and my favorite races are attritional and are decided by repeated 2-5 min punches … i.e. not crits
Has TR been doing anything to work on my glycolitic power? Or I have I been doing anything? I’m not following a TR plan right now … but I suppose either way, the answer is “no”
I do Vo2 work on Tuesday, Z2 Wednesday, Tempo or SS on Thursday, SS on Saturday as part of long-ish ride and Z2 on Sunday.
If I’m not mistaken, the original studies on 30/30s and 30/15s had the participants self-selecting the highest max repeatable power. In other words your insistence on completing the workout at some arbitrary target power is an interesting yet forum-familiar approach. If you are in Erg mode turn that off and drop your power a bit.
@batwood14 this is really common, and I’d guess there are other threads in here on the difference of tabata 30/30 40/20 etc Vs. more classic vo2max training.
30/30 much more anaerobic, and those 4x5 are very low vo2max at 106%…totally different beasts.
Just echo’ing what Power said: more a difference in your current capabilities vs something being wrong. While both those can train vo2, they don’t take you to the same place…30/30 more anaerobic and surgy…the 5x5 is that rouleur power over the bergs!
Not that it matters but that’s not really what I’m doing … I’m riding my 30’s at what I think I can sustain for 30 seconds. You can see from the photo that I’m surging well above 120%, and in fact I put something over my power during the workout so I’m not riding to power in that case … but when I get the interval summary at the end of the 30s, if I’m not staying above 120% on average I think of it as a “fail” … and if I don’t feel I can put my average back above 120% … I pull the plug.
And I mostly pull the plug at that point because I’ve learned that at my age I don’t recover quickly from repeated maximal(ish) efforts, so I will do go deep in the well, but if I have to go very deep and still am not hitting some minimum I realize I’m probably going to set myself back later in the week or in the following week.
I can do 700-800 TSS for multiple weeks and be totally fine if it’s all SS or below. But if I do 400-500 TSS and it includes, for instance, multiple 30/30 workouts I will feel shattered the next week.
Not sure if that’s unique to me, people my age, or everyone … but that’s kind of the way I attach a governor to these things for (what I think is) my own benefit.
Interestingly (or not) if I wasn’t able to sustain the 5 min intervals at 106%, I would have kept riding through the full 5 mins as hard as I could, because at that level I don’t have as steep of a recovery penalty.
30 s on/off intervals will be predominantly aerobically fueled. Even repeated Wingate tests, with much more recovery in between (i.e., 4 min) become so by the 3rd one.
Here’s an example of someone doing 30 s on/off intervals, alternating between ~125% and ~85% of FTP.
As performed and as described, this workout would have done little, if anything, to increase the athlete’s ability to generate energy non-aerobically. To do that, they would have had to go a lot harder during the “on” periods, but that would have required significantly reducing the intensity of the “off” periods (and they would have likely blown up quite quickly).
I think of short on/off intervals as “level 4 or 5 with a level 7 twist”. IOW, they are really training aerobic metabolism, but with higher neuromuscular demand. However, they aren’t really very good at increasing anaerobic capacity/MAOD/W’/FRC.
I noticed in both cases your rest interval power levels are quite a bit above what is prescribed by the workout. (I see this in a lot of people’s workouts - is that a thing?) I wonder if that might have something to do with your inability to recover enough to get the main blocks done in the Gendarme workout?
And, yeah, I would expect Gendarme to be more difficult since Snowshoe is only at 106% (bare minimum for VO2). So, yes it looks weird to me that Gendarme is rated easier. Perhaps for most people who use Trainerroad, 30-30’s are easier to do than a solid block, even at lower watts?
I’m usually more of a diesel, so the solid blocks are somewhat easier for me, as well. I think we’re in the minority around here!
it’s an aerobic sport for sure, but 30s might be 70% anaerobic…sliding more towards 50/50 at the 1m mark based on the models I’ve seen for an athlete with solid anaerobic capacity.
someone with weak AC is modeled around 60% anaerobic at 30s at 65% aerobic at 1m.
If 5x4 @ 106% is a VO2 max workout for you, your FTP is most likely inflated, hence the struggle with Gendarme. Those really aren’t hard workouts and with a properly set FTP you shouldn’t struggle with any of them.
But it is TR that classifies it as a VO2 Max workout…that rating is independent of your FTP, it would be listed as a VO2 max workout for everyone, regardless of whether your FTP is calculated correctly.
yea I know. But I doubt that 5 minutes at 106% of a properly set FTP will have any significant training stimulus regarding VO2 max. If 5 min 106% makes you gasp for air like a fish out of the water, your ftp is set wrong.
