Hi everyone, I follow TR for my key indoor interval workouts using Zwift every week, and it works really well—I’m very satisfied. However, I’ll be away on a business trip next week. I’m bringing my bike along, but I’m unfamiliar with the area and most likely won’t be able to find a suitable place to do my workouts. What would you guys do? Just go for a ride, or try to follow the prescribed workouts—at least partially?
Ride and enjoy exploring a new area.
A thing I try to remember is that however much I want to improve and perform well is that I’m a computer engineer approaching 45 not a pro in my 20s, so if I have a session playing in the woods or a week just razzing about finding new places who cares?
Go for a ride. I may pick a particular energy system to stick with, capping yourself at sweet spot watts is probably quite easy. Anything more intense could get tricky. No need to find a workout.
I mean a trip somewhere new… that’s a bit of why we train! To go far and enjoy new places and adventure around the next turn! Just alter plan a bit to make it a recovery week of sorts if that helps. Get in a bit extra work before you leave, thats what I always do before a vacation.
Try to find some routes and map it up on Strava/Garmin/Ridewithgps etc to find some good routes and have fun! Likely you will come along some ruotes with a good climb that you could ride some sweetspot or just push some tempo when you can to keep systems going.
If on the first ride or two you see or find a good area for a workout, maybe return later in the week and knock out some shorter efforts or whatever. I have also found workouts like 30/30s on/offs to be very easy to do out in the wild. Can ride the breaks if needed, can cut a set short and then get back into them soon as you have a good section to hit another 30seconds! Can do by feel without a PM also!
Life… (and cycling) is about more than training. A week of resetting and enjoying what you can see is worth more than sticking to a workout. But that’s just my opinion.
I may be a bit over philosophical after my A race was cancelled yesterday evening due to a natural disaster, but… there’s more to life than sticking to numbers on a training ride. Go enjoy, reset, and you’ll likely be hitting your intervals better when you return anyways.