Thanks for all the information everyone!
Pain doesn’t tend to phase me, so I’m not sure that is it but I will try the “embrace it” method anyway. In 2017 I actually trained and raced for almost a month with a torn quad because I kept telling myself it was “just a cramp”. 
I’ll give this a try next time too!
I think the reason you might be failing VO2max workouts is because you are doing the hardest ones in the catalog!
Sneak preview from AT beta for you - Elephants +4 is one of the hardest VO2max workouts, rated 8.4 progression level (out of 10). What makes you think it is “Low VO2?”
Baird +6 and Bashful+6 are both rated 6.9, so they are pretty hardcore as well.
Haha. Apparently Trainerroad is trying to kill me then. I used the automatic plan builder based on races I put in the calendar.
Gulp… I have this planned for Saturday and I was already not looking forward to it 
The levels raise an interesting point… I’m going to look through my training history to see if I can find the hardest I’ve ever done (from the beforetimes, when I was fit).
Elephants +2 (9.1) apparently. I like my workout text…
I really can’t say how incredibly good it feels to have got through that. I felt like I was about to start bleeding from the eyeballs on the last two intervals, but I’m sick of these damn sessions (the ones just a little over FTP) beating me.
It definitely looks like I’m better at longer intervals though. The highest short interval / high power I’ve managed was Bashful +2 (7.6). My training history is littered with failures and struggle passes!
Joining the long list of Vo2 max failures, it is interesting to see we seem to have in common being able to complete workouts like Bashful and baird, but in my case ,Spencer+2 defeated me after 2 of the 3 minute intervals ,and that was after lowering the intensity 6%.
I’m wondering if most of us are Masters athletes and age is making it harder to do (high, 120%) vo2. I seem ok if its 105-110%
It’s to do with sustaining that power. 1- 1,5 minute intervals are fine. 2 minutes start to hurt bad but do-able on a good day. 3 minutes just end up with jelly legs and bursting head.
The worst bit is, occasionally I have a really amazing day , great legs, and fly through a session like this, thinking I am now a world class athlete, but these days I probably get about 3 of these days/ year. 
I pulled up my only Spencer +2 attempt and at first thought it was a success
But then noticed the HR dips. So I pulled it up in TrainingPeaks:
WOW so many pauses. I hate the default auto-pause in the TR app. Makes it impossible to determine how long I stopped pedaling. But clearly I stopped pedaling in every interval. And after “completing” each interval.
I have been able to complete 3-min vo2max intervals above 120% but only AFTER switching base training to mostly aerobic endurance. In my late fifties and now in 6th season I found TR’s SSB never properly prepared me to do vo2max work.
Yeah, that’s another good example of why I’m against pausing right there. Also, never stop pedalling, your legs will clear faster even if you’re barely turning them over (Level mode rather than ERG has its advantages here).
Agree however by auto-pause I meant TR stops recording and doesn’t advance time. So I can only guess at how long I stopped mid interval and at the end of 1st and 4th interval. That app behavior is so wrong for anyone training by power. Lies, damn lies, and tr auto-pause recording.
Yeah, it’s less than ideal.
Yep I also find V02 wayyyy harder than threshold work! One big thing I do to even-up the difficulty is take-on specific cadence challenges for threshold, but do whatever I need to get through VO2.
In other words: I have an easy time with threshold, so look to push myself with a higher cadence.
But for VO2 I’ll switch-up the cadence/gear to whatever it takes to get through the target power. I’ll either alternate higher/lower cadence, so each stimulus gets a break, or do first 3/4 of workout with high cadence and then finish lower cadence once my legs are cooked from the speed. Another way to put this I’ll keep a lower RPM up my sleeve for if/when I need it.
I’ve been trying to up my cadence on other workouts which has helped me with VO2 workouts. The increased cadence makes the other workouts more aerobic and therefore helps with the VO2
Steven Seiler has a good youtube video where he covers research covering decline of VO2max / lactate threshold (LT2) with age. Short version, and going from memory, is that VO2max decreased significantly from mid-30s to 60s (by like 25%) but LT2 only decreases something like 10%. That is because older athletes compensate by sustaining a higher percentage of their VO2max (higher fractional utilization.) To me that means as people age VO2max power targets should be reduced if based off of a static percentage of FTP. It would be interesting to see the accuracy of WKO optimized intervals for older athletes when taking FTP as a percentage of MAP / power at VO2max into account.
I think this also applies to TT’er type people. My latest FTP assessment puts my FTP at about 84% of my MAP / power at VO2max / 5min peak power, which I believe is somewhat unusual for someone my age but might be in the normal range for a trained male athlete in their 60s.
Are you doing VO2max intervals using WKOs optimized interval recommendations currently?
If you are, I’m curious how ‘accurate’ you find the power targets and interval lengths for getting you into a state of VO2max or if you still had to do some adjusting or power targets / interval duration to dial them in.
WKO takes 95% of the length and adds/subtracts 10W.
Retrospectively (before WKO) here is my best-ever max effort 4x5-min on the Stages spin bike at the gym:
Seems pretty accurate.
Best 3-min vo2max June 2020 (outside), I tried pacing using WKO (95% of 3-min PDC +/- 10W):
Ah, very cool. Thank you.
I don’t use WKO, but looked at my actual and modeled PDC in Intervals.icu and the 95% +/- 10W for 3 and 5 min durations look to be reasonable. The 3min target is just about where I arrived at with experimentation during TR workouts. The 5min target looks ‘reasonable’ but I’m sure would be quite unpleasant. But that is kinda how they are supposed to feel.
I appreciate you taking the time to pull that information together and share your experience.
No worries I had already done the analysis so it was quick to pull up.
Could be something TR could bake into the Adaptive Training.
I guess even if they didn’t it would work itself out over time. Though with that said, I’m not entirely sure how accurate the difficulty ratings are on the VO2max stuff as I’ve done two with the same score that felt VERY different.
Ditto on resistance mode and going as hard as can be maintained for the interval. My goal is to get my HR into 93-95% of max. The last 30 seconds of each interval make me question my choice of riding a bike as a hobby.
I tend to aim to hit that 93-95% peak by the end of the last set of intervals. Generally the first set peaks around 89-90% as I find my way into the VO2 max work.
I’m 54 and 120-125% of FTP is okay but only after 2-3 weeks working into them. If it’s been a while since I did VO2 max work I usually allow myself up 4 weeks building the duration and intensity as I get the feel for them.
I did a proper VO2 max and LT2 assessment as part of a lung research study 3 years ago. That put my LT2 at 81.1% of VO2 max. That translates to my vo2 max being 123% of ftp. Assuming ftp correlates closely to my LT2 point. Thus it makes sense as to why 120-125% is okay for me when doing vo2 max workouts. It’s right on the money in my case.
