What workout did you do today? (2020, part 2)

Kennedy Peak plus some extra Z2 as I was still reading through the ISM training thread.

Not too bad at all - I still need to improve my stability on the saddle, as I’m shifting left and right trying to get into a comfier position, as well as adjusting the pad around.

Anyway, it’s time to mask up and get some Five Guys!

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Vegetarian Cajon Chicken was in my calendar today as a warm up before my last TT tomorrow. The suito/ERG seemed to mysteriously drop out at the end of the warm up intervals, it seemed more stable in the 8mins sub threshold interval. It did drop out once or twice but it seemed to stabilise faster. Oh and I added to my pain corridor a remote control fan.

Edit I’ve pulled out of the TT. I didn’t fancying a 4 hour round trip to ride in gusty wet weather. Today’s TT on that course was cancelled and I don’t want to drive 2hours to find Sunday’s is too :neutral_face:

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Not a TR workout today…but I’m currently in hotel quarantine in Sydney, Australia so I hired a trainer. It’s my first experience with a direct drive, so after finishing week of MV Build (about 6 weeks in now) - I thought I should make the most of it and head over to Zwift for a vEverest attempt. At 5:30am I wasn’t sure I would even make it half way - but 243km, 10393m of elevation and 13 hours I completed 10 reps of Alpe du Zwift (and got the lightweight meilinsteins after rep 9!).

Might need to swap out next Monday’s VO2max session for recovery - I think my legs will be a bit tired.

Two more days and we are free to leave quarantine - and hopefully start doing some TR workouts outside :smile:

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Madness!

Great effort!

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My first two hour Trainerroad workout. Normally at weekends I would go outside or do a FulGaz ride to make a change. I made it through and hit the targets, but now my legs are feeling it. :slight_smile:. My longest Trainerroad ride before today was an hour and fifteen minutes. That extra 45 minutes made a big difference!

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4x15 O/U so quite gentle workout after some Z2 riding. TR power frozen after first surge on the last interval, after restart I did not noticed that was not even registered in the app. Felt surprinsigly fresh during the workout.

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This was tough but made it through. I’m trying to boost my 3 minute efforts to lock down breakaway efforts. Luckily, this was on the schedule and it was raining so I was stuck inside.

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I haven’t seen that golden trophy for quite some time :fire:

Completed my goal of 90 minutes of sweet spot about a week and a half earlier than I had anticipated. The first 15-20 minutes I was doubting I would make it. Then it got better, but around 45ish minutes it got dark for a few minutes. Once I had a half hour left somehow my legs felt lighter! Ramped it up the last 15 minutes to go for the KOM on Box Hill in Zwift, that hurt me.

Threshold block next :muscle:

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Started with SSB1 MV today after a FTP bump from 235 to 264.

The sweet spot intervals this week were okay, but the over /under intervals of Tunemah today almost broke me, it was sooo hard. My HR was at 95% (180 in the last interval).

Hope I can manage another 90 minutes of Leavitt +2 tomorrow…not looking forward to it.

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I’ve sat down to write this post a few times, but had upload issues, and parenthood issues…
It was going to be a “last two weeks” post but since I’m doing this to hold myself accountable, and maybe jog my memory in 6 months, its now going to be a “training plan flame out” review.

I’ve been riding for 10 or 11 years now, with winter-only indoor training for the most part. I’m 6-3-and-a-fraction, currently around 188lbs [85+kg]. Previously, I’d take advantage of the free strava plans and structure weeks and a month at a time on their plans, but life (parenthood, work etc) would often prevent me from stringing multiple 4 week plans (consistency) together. My peak 20 minute test based FTP was somewhere in the low 320s, as tested, but I probably had slightly better fitness at least one or two years while spending the majority of the summer riding hard( ish) outside.

I joined TR this March, 18 months after leaving great out-the-front door riding to city riding. Also COVID. :man_shrugging:

First 20 minute test on TR put me at 297. Corresponding ramp put me at least 10 watts lower. I chose LV plan builder, back in March, with an A-race of CX Nats, with the local fall cross series estimated in as B/C races. Since the “lockdown” I’ve been commuting to the office one week on, one week off teleworking, and with all the free time, I’ve routinely added a Collins or similar ride on “off”-days for volume, so the LV is really at lot closer to MV. My commute is between 25 and 30 minutes, lots of stops and starts, not exactly high TSS, but not exactly a Taku, either. But the gym at the office is closed, so I lost that training stress.

5 weeks in, I allegedly jumped to 325 FTP, but there might have been a calibration issue as 4 weeks later, I dropped to 309 on both the 20 minute and ramp protocols (also, there might have been an issue with lock-down related hangovers, just saying).

336 on June 15th (see, it was mostly the hangover).
331 on July 13th after a big week of the 4th and a recovery week following.
335 on August 10th and 11th (ramp and 20 minute matched well enough, I guess).
341 on September 8 (ramp)
351 on September 9 (20 minute, that’s my number, and I’m sticking with it.)

Leads into a new training level, and the kids are back into their (outdoor) activities so way more chauffeur duties that I’ve had since February. And since my better half wants to get all the activities in before our region gets put on lock-ish-down again, my three kids are overscheduled, as are we.

I moved into SSbase portion of plan builder and had no issues with Ericson or Carson on Tue/Thursday, but Saturday, Tunemah blew me up. Lungs, legs, heart, motivation - it all fell off on my bike in the basement two Saturdays ago. It was easily the worst trainer ride I’ve ever had, I bailed like 5 minutes into the first set of O/U…

I took off that Sunday, woke up with a sore throat on Monday, got tested for Covid on Tuesday, intentionally didn’t ride until I had results, so that meant I was off until Thursday… Felt medically fine by Wednesday, but stressed waiting, and spending the nights on the couch to hopefully prevent passing anything to the wife… No Covid, yay! I have no idea if it was overreach, immune system failing, unrelated to riding, or just “time to shut it down.”

Forget it. I decided not to overthink it, call it a season, hit reset, and take a few extra days off. So 7 consecutive days off the bike, followed by a Sunday spin of 75 minutes on the trainer, with hardly more than zone 2.

Which leads me to the current week in review. The local CX series is cancelled, CX nationals are cancelled, I’m not traveling to race a series. Maybe I’ll take a crack at the spring practice crits. Plan Builder for Crits peaking roughly April 2021. Took a Ramp test, rather than the 20 minute, it says I’m 5 watts better than I was three weeks ago (by ramp vs ramp) or 5 watts down from my 20 minute… I’ll keep those higher vanity watts, for now. SSBase, bumped to MV this time, even if I end up dropping a trainer workout every now and again for commutes or extended commutes.

Mount Field seemed too easy, and too low of a volume, so light it the heck up. (Also, a rainstorm hit, cancelling my son’s baseball practice, so took advantage of the time slot).

Today was Reinstein which didn’t feel quite as easy, but I wasn’t ready for the easy spin down into active recovery, so I rode Z2 and added 5 minutes of stupid easy time.

Tomorrow calls for Glassy, but I might try to get outside for something a little longer, if less predictably smooth.

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Some days just weren’t meant for cycling :wink: Hope you have a great day.

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Rubbish British weather so I opted for a nice endurance spin.

Dear, oh dear. I have work to do! Two weeks off has not agreed with me. I was puffing from the 30 minute mark and my HR was all over the place.

Sweet Spot Base is going to kill me :rofl:

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Weather is dreadful today. My family are allowing me a 2 hour window at 2pm. I am torn between going to gym to use wattbike (Home turbo still broke :cry:) or going out in the rain for 2 hours! Decisions decisions.

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Spent far too long in the dry recently, so as the weather was rubbish I went out in search of mud :grin:

Back in the garage tomorrow for start of SSBII :unamused:

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Ramp Test + extended Taku today to start the first build phase. New all-time FTP record by 1W (133W → 134W). I’m a bit disappointed for not reaching 135, but a watt is a watt also on a handbike. And as it was made by finishing the SSBMV1, this gives me some confidence about possibly some more gains during the build phase.


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Week 1 of TBHV2 done. This was a hard week mentally - 12 hours sitting in the garage just spinning the trainer (it hasn’t stopped raining in the UK). I’m not sure it’s going to get any easier, so your Netflix cycling/history/documentary recommendations are most welcome!

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The weather is cr@p today and I didn’t fancy a two hour trip to find out it was cancelled (yesterday’s 10 on the same course was cancelled) so I replaced the outdoor TT with a virtual TT. As usual on a long climb though I kept too much in reserve.

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Woke up to apocalyptic weather, so any notion to taking the bike out was dismissed pretty quickly. I’d Longfellow on the calendar but upped the duration a little to make up for cutting the run short yesterday.

Longest turbo session in a long time - took a lot of willpower to stay on the bike for the last 45mins :sweat_smile:.

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Two weeks ago I looked at my power curve and the rate my avg. power dropped after the 20 min mark made me realize that I will never be able to race with that attitude (not wanting to suffer for long period of time). I wanted to change that, and I did.

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Easy 4x20@92% to conclude the week. 160 TiZ of SST, 1xO/U and rest of the week Z2. If weeks do not contain threshold or 3xVO2, 11h of training seems very easy :slight_smile:

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