TSS in OS Question - How Many TSS Per Week?
Between WKO and using an rTSS spreadsheet that Joel and Hayes have crafted here, my weekly TSS is ~ 500 (479/505) for the first two weeks of the OS.
Just out of curiosity, how many TSS do most of you rock stars typically rack up every week doing the OS as written?
Ya, I know short distances aren't perfect for TSS, but in general?
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John, funny you should ask. I was just going to put a thread in the JOS Group to point folks over to Mike G's excellent thread a few months ago on this topic:
Why TSS, ATL, CTL, and TSB don't matter in the OS
It's a must read, for noobes and vets alike.
Theoretically if everyone is doing the workouts per instructions and as written, we should all be getting about the same TSS. But there is a trap in focusing on those metrics during the OS that folks need to watch out for.
PERFECT! Have never seen this. Just wanted to know if I was in range of others. Got up way too early this morning and had some time to look at numbers, schedule, etc.
Thanks Nemo! And I agree you should let the JOS folks know about this.
Mike notes 400 to 450 TSS per week in OS. I am adding the half marry hack into my Sunday runs (even a little longer run today and a bit longer bike yesterday) so that would account for my higher TSS number each of the last two weeks.
And Mike, if you see this thread - a belated thanks for doing it.
@John, as Nemo pointed, I read that article. It is great and it is so correct. I can show you some TSS samples prior to EN and during EN HIM prep, than OS now. TSS can be so deceptive unless you get that article's perspective. Main thing from the article to take away is that TSS is duration biased, exponentially, as you can guess. Guess what our OS work is, pretty short in duration per session........Read it. Great one.
I perhaps need to reread my power stuff as I'm not familiar with ATL, CTL or TSB... what are they?
I had never looked at weekly (or monthly) TSS totals before you asked this question, so I went into WKO to check it out. Last year, in March (my only full OS month), I had 1989; so far this year first two weeks are 365 and 425. For comparison, August 2010 was 3150 (all without swimming - I'm not manually entering anytning for that in WKO).
As I said, I never paid attention to periodic totals. But I do look carefully at the PMC (not at this point in the season, but 5 weeks before an IM, I am looking at that every day), and want to see a steady rise in TSS over the season, with a dip in planned transition weeks, a peak about 2-3 weeks before an IM, and a dip of 3-6 weeks afterwards. I also pay attention to ATL and CTL, to make sure they don't get too negative, and that the ATL rises before my big race.
And, as Mike points out, my one and only goal in the OS workouts is to hit the main set as prescribed: number of inervals, time/distance, and power/pace level. If I do that each workout, I feel successful that day.
I'm lucky, even though I'm a physician, I'm not a scientist at heart, rather a poet. So I'm not really fascinated by numbers - except the ones I get in a race!
@ Becky - Here's the 411 on TSS, TSB, CTL, ATL, and the PMC. There will be an acronymn quiz next week.