recovery ride at the end of training week?

[USCswimming]

I am trying to find out if a 90 minute recovery ride is more beneficial the day after my hardest ride of the week or should I take the day off and then do a recovery ride to start the week?

I do intervals on Tuesday so I currently take mondays off with a recovery ride on sundays.

I was thinking of moving my day off to sunday, do a 90 min recovery ride on monday and then do intervals on Tuesday. It seems kind of tough to do intervals coming from a day off.

Any thoughts on which plan would be more beneficial to overall recovery? as well as being beneficial to my tuesday intervals?

 

[iliveonnitro]

I am trying to find out if a 90 minute recovery ride is more beneficial the day after my hardest ride of the week or should I take the day off and then do a recovery ride to start the week?

I do intervals on Tuesday so I currently take mondays off with a recovery ride on sundays.

I was thinking of moving my day off to sunday, do a 90 min recovery ride on monday and then do intervals on Tuesday. It seems kind of tough to do intervals coming from a day off.

Any thoughts on which plan would be more beneficial to overall recovery? as well as being beneficial to my tuesday intervals?

Maybe someone more experienced can comment, but I would need to see one of your typical weeks. Do you race? Group rides? What other sort of riding do you do during the week?

 

[USCswimming]

Maybe someone more experienced can comment, but I would need to see one of your typical weeks. Do you race? Group rides? What other sort of riding do you do during the week?

Old schedule:

Mon - off
Tue - Anaerbic threshold intervals (for ex: 4 x 6 min with 90 secs rest) 90 min
Wed- Tempo Ride - 30 min aerobic threshold (90 min ride)
Thur- Group ride - 150 min ride
Fri - 1 hour recovery ride
Sat- Race or group ride (3 hour)
Sun-Race or group ride (90 min)

New schedule that I am pondering:
Mon - 90 min easy ride
Tue - AT intervals
Wed - Tempo Ride
Thur - 120 minute easy with some mild tempo
Fri - Easy 90 min recovery ride
Sat - Race/Group Ride - 3-4 hours
Sun - Off

My new schedule will have me hardly racing at all. I have scaled back my race schedule to almost nothing. Coming from a huge swimming backgroud we used to have sundays off, then an easy workout monday, then tuesday was back to intensity. So I think my body is more comfortable with an easy ride the day before I do intervals. Plus it feels like I get better recovery from sunday off.

Again this is just how my body seems to "feel". I am just looking for a physiological answer to which would be more beneficial to a: recovery or b: my tuesday intervals as it seems weird to do intervals coming from a day off.

 

[NomadVW]

I find intervals after a complete rest day harder than after a day with just L2 riding.

I enjoy getting on the bike for a recovery spin at the end of the hard workouts of the week. It also gives me a chance to do a handful of max 10 sec sprints with full recovery in between without really stressing the body much.

Thanks to the coach for both of these revelations.

 

[daveryanwyoming]

...
New schedule that I am pondering:
Mon - 90 min easy ride
Tue - AT intervals
Wed - Tempo Ride
Thur - 120 minute easy with some mild tempo
Fri - Easy 90 min recovery ride
Sat - Race/Group Ride - 3-4 hours
Sun - Off
...

I sure wouldn't sacrifice a weekly L4/SST session for 3 hours of easy riding on Mondays and Fridays. I agree it's a bit easier to put out good efforts after a warmup day, but what purpose does 90 minutes of easy riding serve over say 60 minutes? Just seems like a few more calories burned without any particular aerobic fitness benefit. Loosening up is one thing, but how about scaling the time back on those two easy days and using some of the energy you've saved to bump one of your tempo sessions up to SST/L4?

-Dave
Edit.... ahh, I see, I read that as VO2 Max intervals, but I assume you mean L4 by "AT" intervals. In that case I'd bump the AT work to VO2 Max (L5) and change one of the tempo days to SST/L4.....

 

[USCswimming]

I find intervals after a complete rest day harder than after a day with just L2 riding.

I enjoy getting on the bike for a recovery spin at the end of the hard workouts of the week. It also gives me a chance to do a handful of max 10 sec sprints with full recovery in between without really stressing the body much.

Thanks to the coach for both of these revelations.

I have worked with a very reputable local coach for the last 6 months or so but since I trimmed my racing I don't need to be as serious. So I am using a lot of his training but am trying to switch a few things up to fit my personal need a bit more.

 

[USCswimming]

-Dave
Edit.... ahh, I see, I read that as VO2 Max intervals, but I assume you mean L4 by "AT" intervals. In that case I'd bump the AT work to VO2 Max (L5) and change one of the tempo days to SST/L4.....

Yeah I am trying to decipher how you guys word things here. My coach simplified his system pretty well. So I only go by 4 training zones. Here are my zones based on my last VO2 max test.

Zone 1 - 0-163 HR or 0-286 watts
Zone 2 - 167-176 HR or 314-362 watts
Zone 3 - 176-184 HR or 362-378 watts
Zone 4 - 184-200 HR or 378 and up

My aerobic ventilary threshold is 165 HR or 315 watts being my VT1. My anaerobic ventilary threshold is 180 HR or 385 watts being my VT2. So if I incorporate these zones into my training plan it would look like this.

Mon - 90 min middle to upper zone 1
Tue - 4 x 6 min zone 3 intervals (VT2) (just an example - as I increase this through out a 1-2 month build)
Wed - 90 min zone 1 (30 min TT at steady VT1)
Thur - 120 min Zone 1 & 2
Fri - 60 min zone 1
Sat - Race/Group Ride - 3-4 hours - Zone 1-4
Sun - Off