Hey all! Going skiing in Jackson,WY next Saturday and am not sure which workout to cut. I am doing General Base II Mid Volume so I have 5 Rides:
- 1hr Sweet Spot
- 1hr Recovery
- 1hr Sweet Spot
- 1.5hr Over Unders
- 2hr Endurance
Anything except 2. 
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Its a long time since I’ve done any skiing. How does it leave you feeling? If you feel like you need to recover from it I’d drop the HIIT workout you like least and keep the recovery. However, if you take in your stride and can go again a moment later, I’d drop the recovery instead.
Definitely cut intensity for the duration you’re there, and maybe even for a couple days after depending on conditions and how you ski. I’d get rid of Sweet Spot and Over Unders and just do endurance / recovery.
Skiing, especially if you haven’t been doing it and training specifically for it, can CRUSH your legs.
P.S. - Mangy Moose is up there on the list of all time best ski bars… I’ve had some fun times there that I mostly remember…
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I’d take out 1,3 or 4. Honestly which one isn’t going to make a difference. One workout doesn’t make a break a training plan.
Is skiing xc skiing or alpine skiing, to be precise? If xc, then it could substitute quite broadly, especially if it’s freestyle xc. If it’s alpine skiing then there is no substitute, except maybe tiny general conditioning/active recovery.
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Hey @JackWiser, I would just skip Saturday’s workout and follow everything else as normal 
You’ll have Sunday off to recover, and on Monday you can choose a Workout Alternate if you are still feeling fatigued from skiing.
The nice thing is that you’re in a Recovery Week this week, so that’s a plus going into next week!
If alpine and you’re halfway experienced I wouldn’t cut anything. If you’re a beginner I’d just make sure my legs were devoid of residual soreness the day before the 1st day of skiing. If nordic maybe just make sure you’re fresh a couple days before but, even then unless competing I’d probably keep the entire schedule.
I’ll clarify what I said earlier. I’ve skied (Alpine) my entire life, used to ski and race 50-100 days a season, coached for a couple years, and have plenty of days at Jackson. To this day, I still do an old-guy beer league running gates for about 6 weeks every winter.
If it’s just an easy groomer day or a lighter day, or you already have a bunch of days in and you’re in ski shape for it, no sweat, you’ll be back without any impact to workouts pretty fast. I wouldn’t do an intensity workout the same day. If it’s multiple days or harder days, it could be a completely different story.
My hardest days at Jackson (and others like it) were as hard or harder and tougher on my legs than any heavy squat / deadlift workout or any interval workout I’ve ever done. We’re talking sore and fatigued for days. Skiing, especially if off-piste and in powder or chunk, has a lot of both eccentric and concentric movements that can be very, very fatiguing if you’re not used to them and in “Ski Shape”.
You’ll very much need to account for how hard you’re going and may want to eliminate ALL intensity around the trip, and potentially scale some workouts back to endurance only. It depends.
A hard week of skiing is definitely NOT a recovery week.
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Totally this.
I’d add soreness can last even longer. Like let’s say you’re coming from Florida and have a long history of skiing until moving south 3 years ago. And you are going to visit your brother in Idaho who skis a lot and has exceptional finesse and fitness. And say your 50’s. And say you try for a skiing century because why not? ( it’s open 8am-10pm) in that scenario you can expect to turkey out after 70 miles and not feel right for weeks.
Totally worth it though!!!
Joe
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Thanks for the thoughts everyone. To clarify, it will be my only day so far this year and I haven’t done any training geared towards downhill skiing. It seems like the best option is to drop one intensity day on Saturday. If I feel fine that night I may workout Saturday night, but it’s my first week of the block so I don’t want to compromise my training.
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