VO2 focus before threshold focus

[acoggan]

Okay, What about coming to my rescue too Andrew? What do you think about the "other" part of my original comment.
VO2 training is very intense so if you focus on it before you do a good deal of threshold training you will probably peak at the wrong time

As a general rule, I don't comment when people write things with which I tend to agree. IOW, you can take my lack of any commentary as tacit agreement.

 

[SolarEnergy]

Okay, What about coming to my rescue too Andrew? What do you think about the "other" part of my original comment.
VO2 training is very intense so if you focus on it before you do a good deal of threshold training you will probably peak at the wrong time

I don't think that VO2max really needs to be 'developed' (read improved compared to last season) in order for FTP development to benefit from some sort of VO2Max commitment anyway.

And also, if one needs to be sharp in his racing season, VO2Max wise, I don't see the point in developping it early off season.

On the other hand, my Ironman triathletes don't need to be *that* sharp in this department (though it helps). Therefore, it's wise for them to address its development early in the season as opposed to late the season. That just respects the specificity principle of periodization a bit more.

 

[SolarEnergy]

As a general rule, I don't comment when people write things with which I tend to agree.

Something tells me that you don't jump on every thing with which you disagree. Or else you'd become a full time moderator (not that we would complain)

 

[RipVanCommittee]

I don't think that VO2max really needs to be 'developed' (read improved compared to last season) in order for FTP development to benefit from some sort of VO2Max commitment anyway.

And also, if one needs to be sharp in his racing season, VO2Max wise, I don't see the point in developping it early off season.

Exactly. As one who advocates this approach, I'd say the focus isn't neccessarily "developing Vo2max" as much as improving "base metabolic fitness", or "raising the entire left side of the power/duration curve".

I also wouldn't suggest that this is the only approach, but one that seems to work quite well within the constructs of my athletes' obligations--i.e. having to race at a pretty high level from Feb-Sept.

If I were working with say, Masters guys who just wanted to peak for Natz, I very well may do it differently (I'm not, so I haven't given it a lot of thought...).

I do believe that one advantage to this way of training is less time on the bike, which, IME, leads to less chance of mid-season burnout (or would probably work well for those without much time to train).

 

[SolarEnergy]

I do believe that one advantage to this way of training is less time on the bike, which, IME, leads to less chance of mid-season burnout (or would probably work well for those without much time to train).

To tell you the truth, I haven't gave this approach that much of a thought yet. But it seems to be a fair way to optimize L4 training. Say you do two L4 workouts. And that as a third workout later in the week you try few of those 5min. You may want to simply try overloading the aerobic metabolism with what's left in the tank. If it's 108 it's 108.

Given that the rider is comfortable with that, I'd trust this approach to give L4 improvement a boost for a certain period of time.

Me I have always used this approach after all, because I coach running (triathletes) as well. Winter time is appropriate for track running, 2k intervals that sort of things.

 

[gimpy_calfee]

Why cannot one effectively train both L4 and L5 year round week after week if one manages their CTL effectively. Why, physiologically speaking, can a peak of fitness not be maintained over a long period of time. If the limiting factor is fatigue, cannot this be, theoretically speaking, managed to the point that it does not interfere with the peak. I struggle with understanding from a "cellular level" why we cannot maintain optimal fitness and progress endurance wise consistently day after day in theory. I know life intervenes, and I know decreasing ATL in the face of high chronic training load produces the optimal situation for a personal best to occur, but.....I'm melting, melting.....

 

[acoggan]

Why cannot one effectively train both L4 and L5 year round week after week if one manages their CTL effectively. Why, physiologically speaking, can a peak of fitness not be maintained over a long period of time. If the limiting factor is fatigue, cannot this be, theoretically speaking, managed to the point that it does not interfere with the peak. I struggle with understanding from a "cellular level" why we cannot maintain optimal fitness and progress endurance wise consistently day after day in theory. I know life intervenes, and I know decreasing ATL in the face of high chronic training load produces the optimal situation for a personal best to occur, but.....I'm melting, melting.....

I think that if you manage it properly, you can do level 4 and level 5 training week-in and week-out all year round without either reaching a peak or physically burning out (mentally/motivationally might be another story). I think the issues are 1) if you don't manage it properly - which can be hard to do - you end up going fast when it doesn't matter, and slow when it does, and 2) reaching a true peak entails maximizing all aspects of your fitness simultaneoulsy, not just the aerobic end of things. So, my approach is to limit how much really high intensity training I do in the off-season, and save that "adaptive energy" (to use Selye's term) for when it counts.

 

[gimpy_calfee]

I think that if you manage it properly, you can do level 4 and level 5 training week-in and week-out all year round without either reaching a peak or physically burning out (mentally/motivationally might be another story). I think the issues are 1) if you don't manage it properly - which can be hard to do - you end up going fast when it doesn't matter, and slow when it does, and 2) reaching a true peak entails maximizing all aspects of your fitness simultaneoulsy, not just the aerobic end of things. So, my approach is to limit how much really high intensity training I do in the off-season, and save that "adaptive energy" (to use Selye's term) for when it counts.

Thanks Andy. I wanted to make sure I wasn't crazy.

 

[SolarEnergy]

Why cannot one effectively train both L4 and L5 year round week after week if one manages their CTL effectively.

Why, physiologically speaking, can a peak of fitness not be maintained over a long period of time.

I see two very distinct questions here. I'll address the second as the first already got answered.

I see two reasons as for why a peak of fitness can't be maintain over a long period of time.

1) The unload phase (the taper) through which most need to go in order to trigger a peak has a negative impact on one's chronical training load. In order to get this CTL going up again after it went down, one needs to stand a higher ATL. Therefore the peak in fitness (CTL-ATL) is difficult to maintain during this rebuild phase.

2) I've never read this before in theory books. But I've often experienced this with athletes. The peak bring them to perform so high during the A competition, that they inflict themselve more muscle damage than usual. This may trigger more training related cramps for a certain period of time after this (these) important competition(s).

 

[gimpy_calfee]

I see two very distinct questions here. I'll address the second as the first already got answered.

I see two reasons as for why a peak of fitness can't be maintain over a long period of time.

1) The unload phase (the taper) through which most need to go in order to trigger a peak has a negative impact on one's chronical training load. In order to get this CTL going up again after it went down, one needs to stand a higher ATL. Therefore the peak in fitness (CTL-ATL) is difficult to maintain during this rebuild phase.

2) I've never read this before in theory books. But I've often experienced this with athletes. The peak bring them to perform so high during the A competition, that they inflict themselve more muscle damage than usual. This may trigger more training related cramps for a certain period of time after this (these) important competition(s).

I agree with your points. I think to get "the last drops" out of a peak, it should set you back. But I think in theory, if done well, only briefly. I know I've read repeatedly about scheduled rest weeks and "off season" layoffs. I think these often serve in just delaying progress. And so my thinking is keep doing L4,L5 regularly, weekly all the time and manage CTL.

 

[acoggan]

2) I've never read this before in theory books. But I've often experienced this with athletes. The peak bring them to perform so high during the A competition, that they inflict themselve more muscle damage than usual.

Interesting comment, given that the rule-of-thumb at the AIS (at least when training sprinters in the gym) is that if/when you set a personal best in training, that's it, you're done for the day. The thinking seems to be that it's better to be a bit conservative and quit early than it is to let someone overextend themselves and then go backwards in training for some time thereafter.

 

[gvanwagner]

Interesting comment, given that the rule-of-thumb at the AIS (at least when training sprinters in the gym) is that if/when you set a personal best in training, that's it, you're done for the day. The thinking seems to be that it's better to be a bit conservative and quit early than it is to let someone overextend themselves and then go backwards in training for some time thereafter.

My personal theory of why a peak can't last is because a flat P/D curve below Vo2max is really the essence of all aerobic sports. When combined with a steep P/D curve above vo2max and a rested individual then the fitness level is scary for a short time. Granted when you change the slope of one side of vo2max then it effects the other.

It takes a lot of work to get that flat slope (below vo2max) and its lost very quickly. Making matters worse is that there's not really any way to offload enough fatigue to trigger a full blow peak without ruining it. The reason it's difficult to do L5 work year round is because it takes away training time from training "long duration" (ie. 45min-3.5hr)fitness to the point that you haven't properly developed it.

Not many people are concerned with the shape of their P/D curve (esp below FTP) but Im beginning to think that's its almost as important as the aboslute values themselves- without reason of course.

More on topic, since you keep high end fitness much better then long duration then you could spend a handful of months working on flatening the curve then a month or two with level stuff before a month of two of flatening/specific work before your peak. That way you have to metabolic fitness to do the vo2 work and can still pull it all together for your peak.

Greg

 

[SolarEnergy]

My personal theory of why a peak can't last is because a flat P/D curve below Vo2max is really the essence of all aerobic sports. When combined with a steep P/D curve above vo2max and a rested individual then the fitness level is scary for a short time. Granted when you change the slope of one side of vo2max then it effects the other.

Interesting thoughts

I have a question for you. I've asked it once on this forum but it remained unanswered

Given that one's preparing for a 60min time trial or long hill climb event.
Given a 3-4 week long pre-taper with some emphasis on both L4 and L5.
Given a 2 week long taper following the pre-taper.
How would you manage L5 workload during the taper? (Cut? Keep? Increase?)

the rule-of-thumb at the AIS (at least when training sprinters in the gym) is that if/when you set a personal best in training, that's it, you're done for the day. The thinking seems to be that it's better to be a bit conservative and quit early than it is to let someone overextend themselves and then go backwards in training for some time thereafter.

That makes sense, especially with sprinters.
Thanks for the feedback, it can be very useful.

 

[gvanwagner]

Interesting thoughts

I have a question for you. I've asked it once on this forum but it remained unanswered

Given that one's preparing for a 60min time trial or long hill climb event.
Given a 3-4 week long pre-taper with some emphasis on both L4 and L5.
Given a 2 week long taper following the pre-taper.
How would you manage L5 workload during the taper? (Cut? Keep? Increase?)

.

Sorry for the late reply-

Well, personally- I wouldn't do a 2 week taper- way too much risk for that extra bit over a 5 day or shorter taper. But of course that's dodging the question. For a 2 week taper- If your really tapering then you can't be gaining fitness, so the goal is to maintain while getting some freshness. - Assuming your well trained then your not going to lose or gain much in the L5 level.

So that's a tough question but Id say do the most specific work without undue fatigue. Trying of course to mimic the specifics of the event and making sure neuromuscularly your "primed".

Of course it depends on the individual riders makeup/PD curve and the path they took to get to their peak event.

If the event was, say, a pursuit then yeah- a full 2 week taper and specific work (L5+6). I know that a lot of people when they taper use the standard "high intensity/volume <50%." So they do a bunch of l6 work in the taper when that not most specific to their event.

Why a 2 week taper?- even if the athlete plans to give up a huge chunk of their season after the peak, much can it gain over a 1 week taper. Plus, frshness is a exponential function that's flattens as time goes on. While resting 3 days will help more than one by the time you get past 7 days that curves pretty darn flat.

As far as detraining- we lose long duration power (30min + in this context) fastest and high intensity power much slower. As far as tapering- it helps high end power (<30min) much more. So that a double whammy against long tapers for long durations. And also why there's probably not a need to do too much l5+ work during the taper. OTOH doing long duration stuff wouldn't let you get the freshness side of things. So that's a rock and a hard place.

OTOH that question's made a lot easier if you do a short taper.

Greg

 

[Pureshot78]

As far as detraining- we lose long duration power (30min + in this context) fastest and high intensity power much slower.
Greg

This is the opposite of what i remember Friel wrote in the Cycling Bible. Was he wrong or am i mistaken on what he said?

 

[Alex Simmons]

This is the opposite of what i remember Friel wrote in the Cycling Bible. Was he wrong or am i mistaken on what he said?

I had a brief look back through Friel's Bible and couldn't see any reference to what you describe. Maybe I just didn't look hard enough or my book is an early version (1999). Perhaps if you can cite a reference that would help.

I'm not sure about rate of "loss" of power at various durations but it is typical that you need greater freshness (i.e. a higher TSB) to attain peak performance in events requiring NMP (track sprints & TTs), than you do for longer aerobic events where high CTL (i.e. fitness) is as, if not more, important than a high TSB. As a rule of thumb, the longer the event, the greater the weighting on CTL over TSB (and vice versa). In other words, you probably need a longer taper for short duration events, less so for longer races (in order to induce the optimal CTL/TSB mix for you).

I know Andy Coggan collected data on this recently (including mine) but I haven't asked him for the full details to see the precise pattern that emerges.

 

[gvanwagner]

This is the opposite of what i remember Friel wrote in the Cycling Bible. Was he wrong or am i mistaken on what he said?

To be honest- I can't find the study that backs my opinion up but I can say that the powermeter says its true. I posted a link to that study in a post a while back I remember.

 

[SolarEnergy]

Thanks for your input guys

---------
Alex. Thanks.

So basically what you're saying is that
Fitness <> CTL - ATL
In preparation for longer events. We should aim at higher CTL even if it means lower TBS?

-----------
Greg. "Why a 2week long taper?"

Well by habit I'd say
I'm used to triathlon coaching. That's 3 disciplines to taper for.
But be reassured. My main fear was not to loose too much CTL during the taper, and also making sure that some threshold power would not be lost.

I should point out the fact that I started coaching this guy very late in the season. I didn't want to take entire responsability of the results therefore I didn't change his existing plan all that much.

You'll also see that there's no L5 at all last week of the taper. A very important threshold/sweet spot workout was scheduled in the middle of the week. Everything before or after was of secondary importance.

-------
Usual training protocol before I get involve
9hr/week plus non-significant commuting

Tuesday : Sweet spot training 120min
Wednsday : Threshold training done as 3-4x15min of micro-intervals
Thursday : Pure L5 work done as 6-9 x 5-6min hard up hill
Friday : Off
Saturday : Off
Sunday : 180-240 min long ride with plenty of threshold work up long hills
-------
Pre-taper protocol
3 week training camp. Between 10-15hr of training per week
Based on the usual training protocol
No micro intervals (replaced by longer threshold up hill)
A lot of race pace (targeted power over race duration) uphill
-------
Taper protocol
Week 1
7hr (77% of usual volume)
Monday : off
Tuesday : 60min L2 followed by 30min Threshold
Wednsady : 30min ez
Thursday : 6x6 min L5 plus wup wdown
Friday : off
Saturday : Short and sweet
Sunday : 120-180 long ride with at least 45min of threshold pace up hill

week 2
4.75Hr (55% including the race. Sunday doesn't even count)
Monday : off
Tuesday : 60min L2
Wednsday : 2x20 L4 followed by 30-45min L2/3
Thursday : off
Friday : ez short and sweet
Saturday : Mnt Washington
Sunday : Century race for fun (did not participate finally because of the rain)

Results : Lifetime best (of course). Good enough to start with the Top Notch group (with elite and pro) next year.

Thanks again guys. Next taper occasion I will give it an extra-thought as to how long it should be.

 

[Alex Simmons]

Alex. Thanks.

So basically what you're saying is that
Fitness <> CTL - ATL
In preparation for longer events. We should aim at higher CTL even if it means lower TBS?

No, yes, er not sure as the equation is stated in the negative and not sure, when you say <> , you mean not equal to?

Fitness = CTL (and hence by definition Fitness <> CTL - ATL is true)

Form (like fitness at your peak) = Fitness + Freshness (and that's a direct Coggan quote) and this equates to TSB = CTL - ATL.

But the optimal combination of CTL and TSB will vary for each individual and for the specific event. This is where the retro analysis of past performances helps pick what works best.

 

[gvanwagner]

Thanks for your input guys

---------
Alex. Thanks.

So basically what you're saying is that
Fitness <> CTL - ATL
In preparation for longer events. We should aim at higher CTL even if it means lower TBS?

-----------
Greg. "Why a 2week long taper?"

Well by habit I'd say
I'm used to triathlon coaching. That's 3 disciplines to taper for.
But be reassured. My main fear was not to loose too much CTL during the taper, and also making sure that some threshold power would not be lost.

I should point out the fact that I started coaching this guy very late in the season. I didn't want to take entire responsability of the results therefore I didn't change his existing plan all that much.

You'll also see that there's no L5 at all last week of the taper. A very important threshold/sweet spot workout was scheduled in the middle of the week. Everything before or after was of secondary importance.

-------
Usual training protocol before I get involve
9hr/week plus non-significant commuting

Tuesday : Sweet spot training 120min
Wednsday : Threshold training done as 3-4x15min of micro-intervals
Thursday : Pure L5 work done as 6-9 x 5-6min hard up hill
Friday : Off
Saturday : Off
Sunday : 180-240 min long ride with plenty of threshold work up long hills
-------
Pre-taper protocol
3 week training camp. Between 10-15hr of training per week
Based on the usual training protocol
No micro intervals (replaced by longer threshold up hill)
A lot of race pace (targeted power over race duration) uphill
-------
Taper protocol
Week 1
7hr (77% of usual volume)
Monday : off
Tuesday : 60min L2 followed by 30min Threshold
Wednsady : 30min ez
Thursday : 6x6 min L5 plus wup wdown
Friday : off
Saturday : Short and sweet
Sunday : 120-180 long ride with at least 45min of threshold pace up hill

week 2
4.75Hr (55% including the race. Sunday doesn't even count)
Monday : off
Tuesday : 60min L2
Wednsday : 2x20 L4 followed by 30-45min L2/3
Thursday : off
Friday : ez short and sweet
Saturday : Mnt Washington
Sunday : Century race for fun (did not participate finally because of the rain)

Results : Lifetime best (of course). Good enough to start with the Top Notch group (with elite and pro) next year.

Thanks again guys. Next taper occasion I will give it an extra-thought as to how long it should be.

Looks good- esp in the first week- the second week is one hell of a taper- 10-15 per wk- assuming a 12 ave going to 2.5 in the week 2 before the event- I get lke 20%.