We had a cross race at the weekend in the NW (rearranged) – really dry conditions relative to the usual, put 30psi in the back which is unheard of. Suffered with the lack of mud, not my cup of tea, but was fun to race cross in April.

Definitely noticing the absence of a bike commute for me this past year re injuries. My commute was kinda junk miles and didn’t do a great deal for condition, but I think it really helped get some movement into the back and hips first thing. Suffering with man-at-desk ailments atm, groin and hip not very happy (although it’s off the bike, not on it so much). Let the physio slide over winter and guess there’s a price to be paid for that.

I struggle to appreciate the concept of ‘junk miles’ – is it not simply polarised training once you add a bit of high intensity.

I can see how increasing training load can tire you out though and commuting could present a high load.

How many hours/ miles to you all aim for each week?

I have recently upped my volume to 10-12 hours a week and I have more tiredness qand muscular soreness. Been doing it for a couple of months hoping to adapt.

I equate ‘junk miles’ with ‘ineffecient miles’ e.g. too easy to get any real fitness gains from, but too hard to do a quality ‘hard’ session the next day. Neither fish nor fowl basically.

Sadly this is exactly what most of my weekend riding becomes, brilliant rides usually exploring new roads or tracks, but impossible to keep intensity low enough that I can do a hard session the next day (or even the following day). So from a training perspective they are junk because I could have done two easy sessions and a high intensity session, but from a fun perspective they’re not junk.

I’m pretty sure the old saying goes ‘they’re not junk miles if you enjoyed them’ 😎

I equate ‘junk miles’ with ‘ineffecient miles’ e.g. too easy to get any real fitness gains from, but too hard to do a quality ‘hard’ session the next day. Neither fish nor fowl basically.

So pretty much what others might describe as “sweetpost” or threshold?

Ummmm… good point!

The distinction is clear enough in my head because I know exactly how I feel after a long gravel ride each weekend, I’m rinsed and can’t do any proper sessions for a day or three afterwards. Whereas I can do a 3×15 sweetspot turbo session (and I usually overshoot sweetspot anyway) and usually recover more quickly, certainly ready for another turbo session within 48 hours.

Perhaps you’re right, and I’m feeling so rinsed from my weekend rides because they’re effectively 5hrs of sweetspot riding! So therefore the question is do you get more fitness gains out of 5hrs sweetspot vs. 5hrs zone 1/2 followed by a 1hr interval session on the turbo the next day?

Edit: I guess basically ‘junk’ is low Z3 whereas sweetspot is high Z3?

I’d say junk miles are those that don’t fit into a training plan, i.e. there’s no purpose to them. If you aren’t on a training plan then you can’t be doing junk miles!

I thought the idea of Sweetspot/tempo/threshold training was that it was for when you were time limited, i.e. maybe an hour or 90 mins tops. Once you go longer than that then you should be dropping the intensity.

Just been out for a couple of hours, average power of 58% FTP, normalised power 73% – the big difference being due to the 23mins of coasting, just no way to avoid it around here. Most of the time I spent in Z3 and above was also due to the hills – quite how you get up a 10% slope into a headwind and keep below 70%FTP is beyond me!

I should mention that I’ve switched to one of TR’s experimental polarised training plans to see how they stack up. The above session is one of the Z1 (in the three zone model) rides. I’m intending to do them all outside. It is a bit disconcerting to be passed by someone in jeans when you are trying to keep the power within particular limits. On the other hand I’m completely fresh, my HR was only out of Z1 for 9 minutes. It’ll be interesting to see how I feel at the end of it, the endurance stuff will be fine but some of the intervals look brutal. You do have to be pretty focused on the endurance rides and not chase other riders.

For the last two weeks I’ve been training outdoors on the MTB using RPE and HR together. Is it me or is it suddenly harder outdoors when your doing threshold and above?

and I’m feeling so rinsed from my weekend rides because they’re effectively 5hrs of sweetspot riding!

I would suggest thats well below sweetspot if you can sustain for 5 hours.

I would suggest thats well below sweetspot if you can sustain for 5 hours.

Yes, that was sort of the point I was coming too, that ‘junk miles’ aren’t sweetspot, ‘junk miles’ are slightly harder than recovery but not proper sweetspot (which is why they are sustainable for longer). Hence less beneficial adaptation for the amount of recovery required.

I feel it needs to be said that I’m not writing off ‘junk miles’ as they tend also to be ‘fun miles’ or the rides I look forward to the most! 😎

“Sweetspot” is surpringly high as FTP%, last year while doing the Zwift TT Tune-Up workplan, the sweetspot sessions like https://whatsonzwift.com/workouts/tt-tuneup/week-5-cruise-intervals-3 were a killer for me towards the end, but that might well be heavily influenced by the fact I rarely do 40min+ efforts near my limit.

I’m terrible at sweetspot anyway, partly down to my old dumb trainer, doing sweetspot power requires an uncomfortably low cadence in one gear, or a silly high cadence in the next gear lower. So I end up just pushing a higher power than necessary to sit at a happy cadence! Weird…

@13thfloormonk I doubt your outdoor rides will be at sweetspot – but just because you can’t do intensity for 1-3 days after dosn’t mean its a bad way to train in IMO. Proper intense workouts are once or twice a week for me (in my 50’s) and I generally have a rest day before.

@Whitestone – report back on the polarised TR plan. As I said earlier I decided that the TR format did not suit me. I seem to be doing much better (in terms of training accomplished, not results) with XERT.

@Kryton57 – I have a similar issue. Find it hard to do threshold workouts outdoors, much easier for me to be focussed when on the trainer. Possibly on outdoor group rides I’m guilty of saving a bit. But all the same threshold feels less sustainable outdoors for some reason. Perhaps its the more variable conditions.

As for breathing, one of the best things that I learnt from a few years martial arts training is breathing properly, it really helped me with cycling too. But that was in through the nose and out through the mouth. Interesting article 👍

The rails have come off my training also. I was always planning on have a rest week but I ended up taking this a week earlier than planned due to a generally feeling of fatigue. I’m also skipping the rollers/turbo in favour of riding outdoors, this riding is ridden purely on feel. I’d like to think I’m mostly sitting on zone 2 with a few short sharp efforts thrown in for fun.

It’s all riding though, so better than sitting watching the telly 🤷

I think you can have miles that are quality for one person and junk for another too which makes for a woolly definition.

My current focus is building towards two days with 15hrs riding each day. My long rides are probably junk to most XC racers. But not to me as I condition myself to eat, ride and drink towards that sort of duration. The physical fitness and speed are already there, the mental game, physical comfort on the saddle, bike handling and nutritional tactics are the parts that most need work.

There’s still hard fast efforts, but they are not the focus.

I have a similar issue. Find it hard to do threshold workouts outdoors, much easier for me to be focussed when on the trainer. Possibly on outdoor group rides I’m guilty of saving a bit. But all the same threshold feels less sustainable outdoors for some reason. Perhaps its the more variable conditions.

I’ve just raced and spent 2h 20m in my threshold HR zone. I’m tired…

@whitestone for the TR outside workouts which Garmin are you using?

I have an edge 520 and as I don’t have a PM will be using RPE but I could do with a screen that tells me what power I should be aiming at for the interval but cant seem to do anything. How do you remember what the interval should be?

Having to put some notes on the stem seems to defeat the point as it basically just becomes a fancy stop watch then. Power at least gives me an indication of what I should be doing relative to RPE

After nine weeks of structured (less so the last couple of weeks as the weather has been too good to sit in the garage on the rollers/turbo) training, my legs have started to feel good 😁👌

Went for an hours spin last night and could feel my legs just wanting to go fast, it is a truly great feeling. I’m going to make a concerted effort this winter to try and keep my weight down and my fitness up as it’s getting harder for me to regain fitness after each glutinous Christmas now I’m in my forties.

Happy days! Just need to lose 5-6kg now 😭

@robbo1234biking – I’ve a 520 as well. There’s a TR article where they go through the fields to set up for outdoor workouts but obviously it’s aimed at a power meter setup. I set up a separate activity profile for this. One of the screens is a Garmin default one that has a “thermometer” style scale – green in the middle, then orange then red. I don’t remember setting that up so not sure where it came from. Main problem for me is that the text is so small I can’t read it without my glasses.

If you select RPE rather than power for the outside workout you get a message popping up saying “ride at RPE 7 for ten minutes” or whatever at the start of each interval. Obviously you have to have some idea of what those levels feel like. I’ve an endurance ride on Thursday, I’ll set it up for RPE not power and report back.

What’s surprising is just how hard it is to keep the power down to low levels when you are doing one of the endurance workouts – anything over say a 5% grade and you are just crawling along!

Does riding out of the saddle help to keep the heart rate down when climbing on endurance rides?

Thanks Whitestone – will give it a go and see what happens. Only one 5 minute hill on the route so if the HR goes up a bit for that it isn’t going to kill the purpose of the work.

@didnthurt for me personally my HR would increase if I were to stand as more of the body is being used not just the legs (more of the core and upper body becomes engaged).

Tried my first outdoor ride last night with TR. Worked well. I used RPE and kept the heart rate down for the most part. I did the flattest circular route I can locally and got 210m of climbing so didn’t attack the hills but didn’t worry about crawling up them. This had a couple of 20 seconds sprints in which I got done. I had to cycle the end of some of the intervals to do them on a sensible place on the road but just used the lap button for that. Overall it worked well for that type of workout.

Bagged my first Strava KOM (actually got 2 and a top 3) last night so my fitness must be on up. The trails being bone dry along with a lack of wind obviously wouldn’t have hindered my efforts.

Frustrating days racing on Sunday. For perspective this is a slow course. The winner was around 20 minutes, someone who would be looking at 18 on a fast course.

I knew I wasn’t in great form from the feelings I got through the week. I did 24 minutes on a standard road bike. Its left me feeling quite negative, it wasn’t where I thought I would be and nowhere near where I wanted to be, about a minute off my PB and languishing in mid table mediocrity when I normally expect to be on the road podium (I won something like 7 events in 2019)

Preparation wasn’t amazing. Hard ride on Thu, 10 mile hill walk the day before but that is fairly normal for me – I used to be able to double up CX races over a weekend and hold my own.

I followed the same pacing plan I have in the past. I know the course and the speed I need to do. So off the line I wound it up and settled down at the right pace. I’ve no power meter but my legs felt empty, it just felt like I couldn’t press on and keep the speed up. My heart rate was where it would be from experience, threshold, 170ish bpm (max of 180ish).

So what’s gone wrong. I’m fit, I’ve done mega miles since January but generally following the same patterns I always have. The only exception is racing days having not pinned a number on since the end of the 2019 CX season. My power on the turbo is better than in previous years and everything suggests I should be flying. I’m thinking one of two things. A fortnight ago I had a very heavy 10 days riding racking a strava RSS of close to 2000 when normally I would be 7-800. In the past on training camps, 2 weeks would normally see me peaking.

Would it really take that long to recover? There’s a possibility of underlying illness but that seems unlikely given I’m still hardly seeing people outside a small group outside.

Diet has been well off. Felt tired, craved sugar and caffeine although I put this down in part to spending all day on Teams at home.

I think the answer is rest in any case. Work and personal stuff is going to conspire against my riding for the next two weeks so I will take it as a blessing. See what I feel like after that.

Not at your level but I had exactly the same experience at my first Gorrick (MTB) a few weeks ago. For me we’ve pinned it on not enough Z4/5 work as I struggle at Z5 anyway and everyone rode the 3hr race like it was a 1hr XCO.

A few sharper workouts and I was better at the last one although coming 17th/21 I matched my September ’20 pace on the same course where I came 7th, so was just outgunned by the field.

I’m worried about falling into the trap of pushing on harder after a bad performance. Part of me thinks the answer is to double down and work on top end. But that’s also the route to long term overtraining fatigue.

If it helps, I’m tired and have a lot of “work TSS” at the moment. There’s another Garrick next weekend and I’m doing only the following after 2hrs MTB and 4hrs Road “free” this weekend:

Tonight – 35 mins including 8 x 40s Z5 at low cadence 50RPM
Wednesday – 30 mins including 1 x 5 mins
Thursday – a 35 min pre-race – 1 x 5 min at Z4, 2 x 1 min at Z5, the rest Z2 with an extended 15 min Z1 recovery
Friday – rest.
Saturday – Race.

I usually do the pre race the day before but am experimenting with an extended rest period to see if it helps.

At then of the day, I figure if I matched my prior performance early in this year and rode 3hrs at threshold, then thats likely all I’ve got – I can’t help who else turns up on the day. I have all the Build to go for a June, July and August races.

.

Racing has its ups & downs doesn’t it? Having completed the three 3h Gorrick races always finishing at the back of category:

Round 1 – was a mess for me. I hadn’t spent enough time on the MTB and was all over the shop, and was not “race fit”. I suffered and came away disappointed.

Round 2 – did all the prior training on my MTB and was much better technically. but the course was tough on me – training for Marathons and long climbs it was 3hrs of short and punchy, I missed the cut off for the last lap by 3 mins, but thought I’d raced to my ability otherwise.

Round 2 – I felt so much at one with he bike I didn’t even think about it. Got the final lap in, felt consistent throughout but still missing my top end and again thought I’d raced well otherwise.

Then this morning I compared my lap times for Saturdays race; If I’d have raced on Sunday, I would have been top 10 in every single category including 1.5hrs.

FFS! Turns out Saturday afternoon rounds are full of hitters.

Great experience though and good to be in the mix again. Back now to training for the Southern XC Marathon and Pivot 12hr.

Thought rd3’s course was really nice. Lots of fun sections, decent climbs and places where you could actually drink/eat!

Came in about 30 secs after the cut, frustrating but….

FFS! Turns out Saturday afternoon rounds are full of hitters.

I did the same series Kryton & pretty much agree with all you say! Felt brutally fast for a 3hr race..

Yeah its a brutal course but Rd was better. Im slowly learning to judge my results by personal performance not places, so im happy with this.

The Southern xc Marathon will be interesting for me as my base endurance/muscular endurance is clearly up, so with lots of z3/4 and weekend marathon simulations coming up before topping of the top end prior to the races i think im a good place.

Just waiting for a Stages crank to arrive as clearly training on the MTB helps, and it’ll be good for post race analysis.

But before all that, a kind of taper leading to an ftp test next week – eek!

Yep, Southern XC marathon for me too & then possibly exposure followed by definitely Torq in your sleep. Might do a Southern XC round to see what the setup is like. I’ve alyssa enjoyed the Gorrick but if it’s always going to the same venue that might get a bit boring after a while..

I did my FTP last w/e – bleuurrgghhh….HATE THEM.

A question for you folks with a bit more training experience. I had a good few months of winter training on the turbo and maintained my ftp which usually falls before I start ‘proper’ training ie; more work and longer outdoor rides but….work has gone mad as we come out of lockdown so I’m arriving home totally knackered, add a 5 month old Kelpie dog thatcneeds walking and lots of attention and my riding has been about 1.5 hours per week since Mid March. I have done few sweet spot sessions at my ftp and although I managed them I’m concerned I’m going to dig a fatigue hole for myself. I’m 54y.o and have noticed I have to be careful with training load to avoid this. Should I retest ( I really hate ramp tests) or just knock my ftp down a couple of %. I’m was hoping for TR adaptive training beta which sounds like it will adjust things for me. Any thoughts gratefully received…..writing it down I kind of realise I know what to do but still interested in your thoughts. Thanks

I much prefer to do a 16Km+ Tempus Fugit TT on Zwift and use the final 20mins, rather than ramp test, which always give me inflated figures in comparison.

@teamslug

Sounds like you need to test again for accuracy – if you’re so inclined!

You can do a number of different tests. 1×20, 2×8, 4DP & of course 1×60. The gold standard is the 1×60 but I know relatively few who’ve ever even done it TBH.

Personally I think the best is 1×20, but I get similar numbers on a 2×8 – sometimes..

I’ve not Sufferfests 4DP but the theory makes sense.

Whichever you do be prepared for quite a lot of discomfort..

https://support.trainerroad.com/hc/en-us/articles/360003912172-How-to-Test-with-the-20-Minute-8-Minute-FTP-Tests

https://trainright.com/cts-field-test-why-eight-minutes-not-20/

https://thesufferfest.com/pages/4dp

My test week has start well with a 1 min test today, moving from a 477w to 508w PB – a decent improvement.

A 5 min test tomorrow, which is where my power curve goes a bit South, threshold power for me is bottom of the bell curve.

Looks like I’m going to be able to have a go at climbing the B4501 from Debigh to Llyn Brenig in a few weekend’s time, which will easily be my biggest climb to date (~7 miles, ~1200 feet).

Only snag is that my first OxAZ jab on 12th April knocked me out for at least two weeks, not done an awful lot since and I’m now the heaviest I’ve been since Jan 2017 (~84Kg, +8 since Covid and +11 since Aug ’17), when I started cycling to try and regain some fitness.

If it’s not a headwind, I might stand half a chance of getting up it in ~35mins.

It just happens that it took me ~35mins to climb the Zwift Epic KOM plus the radio tower bonus climb this afternoon, pacing the main climb, to average ~270W (best for some months as I don’t often attempt to find my limit beyond 30mins).

I managed 299W for the last 20mins of a Zwift TT this past week, which surprised me a bit, after how rough I felt after my jab.

For what little prep I can do over the next two weeks, would it be better to keep practicing my 35-40min pace, or would there be more value in doing multiple 4/8min VO2 max intervals at ~120% FTP?

@Kryton57 @mrlebowski I did the Gorricks too
Pity you were not doing the Day 1 AM Kryton, then we could’ve both been at the back together 🙂

I only managed to get in top 10 for round 3, I think a bunch of the better people were on holiday that week 🙂

Didn’t have brutal bits as such but was relentless, more like doing a 3hr time trial than a traditional MTB endurance where there tend to be some long downhills.

I need to lose weight, and train..

Any other races coming up? around London? I only found out about Gorrick by chance.

Twisty there is the Beastway series (XCO). I’m not doing it but here:

http://beastwaymtb.com

Bit of a pig to get to if your aren’t nearby as the North Circ can be slow, but the M25 approach via J26/Loughton is OK.