Suitcase of Courage: Epic Week
43 hours between last Sat and this Sun. Yowza. 37 hours on the saddle, with some swim and run to round it out. Looks like this will be a nice little TSS bump!
took Monday off, and run easy today. HR very low, and still retaining a lot of water ...weigh in about 7 pounds more than when I started!
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Comments
• I’m thinking more and more about the long-term economies of scale or economies of duration as they apply to big week or epic training. Last week was a lot of volume and a lot of work. However, this is now the umpteenth Epic week I’ve done over the years, and what used to look like a daunting week on the outside, isn’t anymore. I kind of think of it as the same feeling that we experience in the second or third season of IM racing, where a 5-hr bike ride goes from being an Event in season one to a ’been there, done that’ workout after a bunch of them are in the bag. Rich has referred to this elsewhere as a perception realignment exercise … where ‘long’ isn’t, and it’s just another spot on the dial.
• The more interesting part this time around is the adaptation or absorption of Big Week/Epic. When doing these in the past, I was on the edge for a lot of the week, and shelled by the end of it. This time, with similar numbers and most other things kept constant, I was very surprised to see how quickly I was bouncing back day over day. I was even more surprised by the final weekend: after a complete rest day, I put a Best in Show 4h ride in, a 5h strong day the next day, and a 5h strong day the day after that. In fact, the last two days were within 1 TSS point of one another,
• The rest day is Gold. No monkeying around with easy riding or light jog: it was hitting rest hard.
• The post Epic week has been uneventful. (uneventful=good, by the way.) Monday off, Tuesday easy run and swim (but bailed 20 minutes because I wasn’t feeling it), and a 2h run Wednesday. I decided to play the run by feel and quit if there was any point it was feeling bad, but it was a strong 35 EP, 25 MP, 2 x 20 (3’)HMP outing with some minor erosion of pace in the HMP stuff. Remainder was a tough EP where I normally finish at MP, but I’ll take that.
• Run HR is whacky, and I think my body is chasing my bike HR when I run. I’ll explain: pre-epic, and normally at this time of the season, my EP HR is around 158. During Epic Week, I did a LOT of 80 – 85% riding, and this was putting my HR consistently in the 140s. After Epic Week, my EP HR is sitting in the 140s (MP and HMP are in their normal places, though). I’m thinking two things could be happening: (1) the training effect has translated to efficiency, or (2) my HR at lighter aerobic efforts is depressed, and is telling me I’m overtrained. (but I don’t feel overtrained, and don’t have another markers.)
• Back to riffing on the long-term economies of scale / economies of duration: if this is the case, should I be exploiting this? in other words, and time permitting, if a long-distance triathlete has a competitive advantage where they can absorb a lot of steady / 80%-80% work, with minimal recovery cost relative to other athletes, should I try to pop in a few large training events over a season?
• Riding a lot does make you a better rider. Every time I emerge from one of these things, I’m surprised at how much more efficient my pedal stroke feels, and how there are little cues, tricks, and skills that I finally ‘get.’ Last year, it was the smoothness of a pedal stroke that would come from consistent pressure on the big toe. This year, it was high cadence climbing. Even though I can read about those techniques or attempt deliberate practice in isolated sessions, the depth that comes from doing these over big miles is remarkable.
• I’m now pretty good at admin – I know the supplies I need, calories needs, etc. The one gift I give myself is a pristine drivetrain every day, and I use that eco-horrible Finish Line aerosol cleaner. Sadly, the stuff is incredible for cleaning a chain, perfectly, and fast.
• I can’t run during these weeks. It’s EP all the way, and I just try to alternate a run day and a swim day to supplement riding. I could / should probably just skip running altogether, but I ain’t mentally ready to do that with a race in the next few months.
• Riding with others is a tough one. I know in the big picture, it would make be a better rider, but during these weeks I am trying very hard to stay in a very tight box, and not push outside my limits until the end. On the third last day, a friend who is a F pro invited me to ride, and I had to bail because I knew I would be doing dumb things to try to stay on her (very fast) wheel.
• On that note, I think I spent maybe 5 cumulative minutes over 37 hours, tops, at FT or above. Intensity in these weeks kills.
• Heat Lab: two of the days over the Week were record setting temperatures (most of the week was hot). The first was tough, but manageable with judicious hydration. A few days later, on the second record setter, I knew it was hot, but there was already an adaptation that made the RPE much much lower. In fact, I had no idea it was as hot as it was until I got home and went online.
• Heat Lab II: I’m okay with riding in the heat. I’m okay with riding in the wind. But riding in the hot wind frikin sucks. Gotta get my head around that for Hawaii: what I imagined would be a hard, but doable race could be very very mentally challenging.
• Weight gain and loss is a crapshoot on hot Epic Weeks. I finished the week 7 pounds heavier than when I started, but weight has now normalized. I think the only benefit from in-week weigh-ins is as a gauge of hydration. With the number of calories in/out in the week, weighing in to track body composition is a wash.
• Sleep was very very strange. I use a Zeo to track sleep, and normally view a z-score of 80 as ‘good sleep.’ Over the week, and despite fatigue, my z-scores were in the 50s and 60s. I haven’t analyzed the graphs in any depth, but something that stood out immediately was how little deep sleep (the body-repair kinda stuff) I was getting nightly. Definitely far less than normal, for sure. Curious as to the suppressing role of big exercise. (alternative: my deep sleep baseline numbers have been tracked only during OS. Maybe these are artificially high due to the intensity, and after finally dropping that after 20 + weeks, I’m returning to something a bit more normal)
• Swims were in the 3000y/hr range, but chose ‘steady 100/200/300/400/500/500/400/300/200/100 negative split on descend latter’ as main workout instead of the traditional 3 x 500, 10 x 100h/50e. Just didn’t have any appetite for the intensity of hard, even though it was in the water.
Regards to the weight deal, cortisol will elevate with high intensity exercise, which really makes your body retain water, as well as inflammation. Sooo dont weigh yourself after competition or hard workou days, especially an epic week like that!
Dave ... Thanks for the specificity and depth of your observations. My general response is ... If you want to Improve from where you are, you may need to rethink your BBWs for the future. Doing the same stuff often results inthe same outcomes... To improve the outcome, think about changing up the program next time. Ex ... Decrease bike frequency, include some days for harder work, along with some long days, trying to hit the same TSS total for the "week" with fewer biking days and hours. Just something to switch the pattern, may produce the small increments of improvement which are all you have left to achieve.