Help Wanted: EN Cycling Case Studies
Hi Folks,
Last week I wrote this article, the latest in our ROI series, this time talking about the bike.
Patrick and I are working on a cool little project, going live in March, that you'll be able to share with your friends, as an opportunity to experience a good bit of what we do here. To set that up and get as much interest as possible, I want to add some case studies and athlete interview to this cycling ROI jazz. So...
- Please answer the questions below.
- Email me at rich@endurancenation.us if you'd like to be interviewed by me. We'll talk about the stuff below in more detail and it should only take about 10-15' of your time. You'll be famous!
Question 1: the article above first talks about the time efficiency and large absolute speed gains to be made by inserting a total of about 40-60' of FTP/Lactate Threshold interval cycling into a cycling week. That is, something as simple as 3 x 15' @ Z4, done 1x per week, will make nearly any triathlete much faster on the bike. Please tell us about your experiences with this -- small time invested ^this^ way made you much faster. % gain in FTP and or faster race day bike splits would be awesome :-)
Question 2: the article then talks about our recommendation to view your training as Training Stress, not volume. What changes have you been able to make with your training and how has your mental game changed after you adopted this to perspective?
Thanks in advance!
Comments
Question 1:
Prior to joining EN, I was a student with a limited amount of time to train, and even more limited knowledge of how I should be training. My perception of workload on the bike was based on the number of miles and hours I logged, and not on intensity. While this lead to a reasonably solid endurance base, my power on the bike was severely limited due to the limited amount of time I spent riding at threshold. My triathlon bike splits in my first season were weak, and I struggled with that fact given all the hours of training I tried to throw in. It then occurred to me that I lacked the physical and mental preparation of riding for extended period at threshold. After spending a month training with EN's Outseason plan with regular threshold work, I was able to see a 6% increase in threshold power from 230 watts to 245 watts. While this was an appreciable boost in power given the relatively short length of time I had spent with EN, my true gains were likely higher due to my threshold testing indoors vs. outdoors.
Question 2:
By using Training Stress instead of hours as a metric of my workload, I was able to gain a much better quantitative understanding of how hard I was actually training. I was also able to gain insight that despite the number of hours I was putting into the bike, I wasn't going hard enough to merit any significant addition to my training load. While it's satisfying to talk about the long hours we spend on the bike each week, volume is a relatively poor indicator of the amount of real work actually being done. When I first started training under the EN protocol using high intensity FTP intervals, I was highly skeptical that I was doing enough work given the fact that I was measuring my workload in terms of minutes instead of hours. However, after seeing my results in terms of Training Stress, I was able to understand how hard I was actually working at a significantly smaller time investment. This gave me the mental confidence that despite my limited training hours, I had the benefit of quality.
1. Initial FTP test in November OS was 197. Second test 219. Week 14 test 229. A 15% increase so far. Almost always I do the full warm-up and ONLY the work sets and a quick warm down. Most sessions I can keep to between 40-50 minutes.
2. Looking at my log book from last year at this time I had weeks of 10 to 14 hours on the bike, mostly noodling around at zone 1. I still look with dread to some of the workouts due to the difficulty of the short work sessions. It is nothing like the dread I felt with a looming 4 hour boring trainer session or 5 or 6 hours in the cold on the road. Few will understand all the extra time I have on my hands. As an airline pilot I am home 3-4 days per week and have to fit all my bike sessions into these days. 12 hours vs 3 hours on the bike fit into 3 days, one can only guess which lends to a more balanced home life.
I am easily the most fit and lean as I have ever been in my life. I look forward to adding swimming again but am strictly following the protocol and cannot wait to race again.
Dave
Truthfully I do not monitor my TSS or PMC very rigorously.
Truthfully I do not monitor my TSS or PMC very rigorously.
I was training for IMLP 2010, and due to life circumstances, was not able to complete huge chunks of the training. In fact, I held sacred only 3 workouts. Long Run on Thursday, Long Bike on Saturday, and Hard Bike on Tuesday. Anything else was gravy (and often skipped). My long bikes on Saturday exceeded 4.5 hours only twice, for two Race Rehearsal rides. Otherwise, they were all between 3.5 and 4.5 hours. All of my local training partners were concerned, to say the least, that I was going to arrive woefully underprepared.
On race day, I had the confidence of having executed many rides of similar TSS, and had great execution guidance. I was able to stay in my box, and go ride a solid bike split en route to an 11:5x finish on the day. I'm living proof that week after week of 5+hour rides are unnecessary to successfully complete an ironman.