I’m a lifelong runner who’s moved over to cycling “more seriously” due to the classic injury/weather/time trifecta. After a six-month injury layoff, I’ve been on TrainerRoad for two months now and I’m really enjoying the newbie gains.
My current goal is simply rebuilding my engine and increasing FTP. I’m currently on a 12-week custom General Fitness (Road) plan. My schedule is:
Volume: 3x hard interval sessions per week (60–90 mins each).
Frequency: Usually MWF.
I’m looking to add more load, but I’m debating where to add it (extra endurance days after hard intervals or before?) and when to pull the trigger (next block which starts April 27th or next next training block).
I’d love to hear your thoughts, especially any data-driven insights on how to ramp up to higher-volume cycling (from 3-4 hrs to 6-8 hrs).
Manually adding endurance rides should still be the way to go. With your current MWF schedule, I’d see if there’s any chance to add load on Saturday. Not much in the beginning, maybe 30min to 1h max, and slowly increase that over time. You probably want to have the endurance after a higher intensity workout and before a rest day initially, so you can power yourself out without risking recovery before the next intense one comes around.
If you don’t want to do it like that, consider modifying your current plan by adding another workout but keep the 3 intense one as they are. This should default to adding an endurance day. You can then move the days around to match your current schedule if they don’t already.
The best thing to do in most circumstances is to use the “Check Volume” tool, which you can find by clicking on your plan title in the top left corner of your calendar. You’ll see a button to check your volume in the window that pops up.
If we’re not recommending adding any volume yet, you can always make that call yourself and click “Edit Plan” in the same window instead to edit your plan and add a day of endurance riding if you’d like.
There’s a bit of a fallacy around needing more volume by default, if you’re getting fitter with what you have scheduled now then it could be counterproductive.
If you want to put in a harder period of training now, you can switch up from Balanced to Demanding or Aggressive, which will usually recommend more rides and when they should
Fit into your week. Plan to switch back to Balanced at some point though.
Then there’s those who just want to ride more because they love it, which is cool.
That’s interesting, thanks for the insight. How does the tool recommend adding volume? Does it send a notification when “it is time” or should I be checking it periodically? I don’t need to add any volume right now but I was wondering when I had to trigger that process myself, I didn’t know the tool would do / suggest it for me.
Sure,but the OP is doing 3 days of intervals and has four days of rest. I’m sure they could throw in a day of easy endurance. The easy part though is were many go wrong - doing their endurance too hard which leaves them fatigued.
I’d throw out there that maybe two days of intervals and two days of endurance might even be more productive.
Yep I agree with that assessment, with 3 hard days of intervals and relatively new to structured training OP may struggle with extra endurance on top of these. Could start by adding 15 mins after the 60 min rides.
Endurance has its place but trying to double volume whilst maintaining 3 hard workouts can be difficult. But I’m old school and prefer to keep the high volume low intensity training separate to higher intensity phases.
Just reverse the situation where a cyclist starts to get into running. Would you advise 4 workouts per week initially? After all, they have experience training and a well-developed aerobic engine.
The body still has to get used to the different types of stresses cycling places on the body. There is no reason to rush. Develop a routine, focus on consistency and that you can recover.
The OP has a background as a runner, his aerobic engine is well-developed. IMHO the focus should be to make the transition and allow his body to recover from the different types of stresses cycling places on his body.
As a fellow lifelong runner who moved to cycling 5 years ago (and coaching runners for 25 years now)… if someone started running after a 6 month injury I would start with no intensity and maybe running every other day to start. I’d build up to running 5-6 days of just easy running and endurance, eventually adding in strides and maybe one up-tempo (“endurance+”) session when ready. Then I’d add distance to the long run and lastly intensity. Not sure if this is what you are getting at but i wouldn’t jump into three high intensity days to start.
I know cycling is different and we can do a lot more than running due to the impact. I also understand when time crunched intensity is the best bang for your buck. But for long term progress, even with an aerobic running background, endurance is still the foundation IMO.
The gist of my post (its intended meaning anyway) is well-summarized by you here: slowly build up and don’t overdo it.
Nobody here (as far as I can tell) disputed this. Like others have posted, though: adding too much endurance will impact your hard sessions, which are equally crucial for making progress.
Of course it does. Most people can train more than 3 days per week. He can certainly add 30 minutes of endurance and then 45 and then 60 and 90. If it keeps the intensity low (and not tempo) he’ll be totally fine.
Someone above said “double his volume”. Why would he do that?
Junk miles are a thing. Doing more endurance days instead of just having days off can absolutely be counterproductive to cycling gains. The plan builder often shows this by giving newbies only 3 interval days and no endurance days.
To @vivisks , I might suggest editing your plan to have a dynamic endurance day on the weekend. Set the max duration to 2-5 hours (limited by whatever you feel comfortable doing or your schedule allows).
The dynamic endurance will adapt to whatever it thinks you can handle that week. For me, sometimes it’s a yellow day, so it will drop to 45 min and I’ll usually just skip it. Other days I’m fresh and it gives me 2 hour rides.
I don’t know if it’s designed that way, but it’s basically a filler spot that the AI gets to use on me if it determines I can handle more volume that week.
I get this for time crunched cyclists with job and family demands… but this take is the opposite of every observation and experience I’ve had as a coach and athlete. Low volume, high intensity can work but this is why American distance running was pathetic in the 90’s.
Again, works for some but in my experience you can get really fit off just base training. It’s the 98%.
If you are still executing your workouts to target more stimulus is not going to be making you slower. Just because the plan builder only assigns 3 rides a week does not mean that doing more won’t be better…
The check volume tool is something to use when you’re on a training plan and want to see if we’d recommend a change in your volume. We won’t prompt you, so you need to check yourself for the time being.
Each time you build a new plan, we’ll recommend what we think is ideal for you, so this tool is just for checking when you’re on a plan.
