Zone 3 Syndrome

john979

The same thing happened to me. This year, I don't intend many 2X20s until peaking for an event.

SST is basically the Lydiard approach, and as Dr. Coggan likes to say: "Lydiard got it right."

grahamspringett

I'm no guru, but I think 2x20s serve as a base which won't bring you to a peak. They're bread and butter endurance efforts designed to increase FTP. It's the level 6 anaerobic efforts which will bring you to a peak and wear you out if you're not careful.

I'm targeting a criterium race on March 1 so last week I began one L6 session to bring on a peak. 2x20s continue regardless.

ctgt

I like Zone 3. It's fun. As long as it's not compromising my more intense workouts, I'd prefer to do more of my riding here than in Zone 2. (especially on the trainer)

I like that its considered by some to be the sweet spot (do I have that right?) instead of no-man's land.

I have been lurking here for quite some time and I think I remeber seeing a graph (with "arbitrary units" on the y-axis I believe) that showed the "sweet-spot". Anyone remember this graph, or have other insights for sweet-spot training (ex: xx% of FTP for yy minutes)?

Mike (former lurker/spam-hater/self-appointed thread bumper)

ctgt

Never mind. I found it.

http://www.fascatcoaching.com/train...t_partdeux.html

john979

I have an "A" race in late June for which I am planning to peak. Until then, the bulk of my training will be SST of 87.5%-92.5% FTP. I just find 1-2 hours in this Zone more effective than 2X20s at 95-100% FTP. So far, I have seen a nice, steady progression in my FTP with very little L4 or greater training, save what might come from group rides on the weekends. Come late April, I will start to include more 2X20s and 2X20s and in May add L5 stuff. I actually perform L6 workouts year-round, although more during the taper period.

kopride

Isn't 90-92.5 L4? Sounds like you are doing most of your training either in L4, or within a few clicks of L4? Did you mean to say L5?

rmur17

Standard definition:

• L3: 0.75-0.90 FTP
• L4: 0.90-1.05 FTP

For my purposes, I like to think of and categorize around:

• Tempo = L3: 0.75-0.85 FTP (steady-state 3-5 hrs work)
• Sub-threshold = UL3-LL4: 0.85-0.95 FTP (steady-state 1.5-3hrs work)
• Threshold = L4: 0.95-1.05 FTP (interval work)

Now I recognize it's really a continuum with analog shades of grey rather than discrete levels but personally I find things different once I exceed 0.95 FTP where I'm much more likely to do intervals vs. the steady-state below.

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rmur

kopride

That's what I thought. If John in fact is riding at SST of 87.5%-92.5% FTP, then he is doing a lot of L4, albeit along the lower ranges. I thought he meant to say that he doesn't do L5 or L6 much.

You're guidelines are great. But for those of us that are really limited to 60-90 minutes per workout, it seems to me that we need to have time in sub-threshold and threshold. being in threshold the whole time, you have recovery issues. Staying in sub threshold for might not maximize the potential for improvement. But I think if your are doing SST, you are going to spend some time at the lower ranges of L4. And there is no question that .95 seems to be a real cutoff between being able to stay in that zone for longer periods.

frenchyge

I tend to think in terms of IF, and go by the typical values of .85 - .95 for L3. That helps eliminate the need for a separate sub-threshold range in that unique feeling area. Of course, when I finish a trainer ride with an AP near .75 FTP, it hardly seems like a tempo (L3) effort.

john979

I agree although at 95% FTP I find more than an hour grueling...

BullGod

What I think we see sometimes on the forum is that some riders are looking to train year round, outside of work / family and want to get the best value out of their limited training time, and, in particular, raise their FTP.

Some guys also want to train for a long time with one goal in mind, their first race, an A race etc.

Some of us (myself included) are looking to prepare for an entire season, and have plenty of time to train "old school" with a long base, followed up by a period of intensity to fine tune FTP etc.

What I think the author is saying is that there can be risks in "riding as hard as you can" each time you train because you will quickly become "permanently fatigued" and your performance will stagnate. That isn't the same thing as saying "if you train L3 a lot you will not get any better". I don't think he is also advocating old school base training especially vociferously. He is just warning against riding "too fast too often" especially in the off season.

FWIW the last 2 seasons I rode Cat 1 and only rode crits. Thus in the winter I did (mainly indoor) more intense workouts of shorter durations, pretty much only L3, 4, 5 and 6. I was terrified of losing my speed, and thought that unless I was suffering I was stagnating.

At the start of the season yes I was fast and fit, and good enough to finish races. However, as the season went on I noticed I was not really improving at all, and my legs were constantly fatigued. When I was riding with elite riders I noticed I could match them for a short duration, but would find myself gasping to maintain what they lay down for longer periods seemingly effortlessly. To try and correct this I went out and trained even harder, more intervals, more L5, and then ended up doing 3 day blocks of 90 minute "hard as I can" rides, then 2 days resy before a crit. Sure, I got good at being in the hurt box for 90 mins, but generally I got slower, tired and demotivated. The reasoning process was "I got slower, I need to train faster" etc etc It got unpleasant.

This season I have moved up to elite, and since November I have been laying down 4-5 hr endurance rides on the weekends, and 3 x 2-3hr "sweet spot" based indoor sessions in the week. (240-280w / 62 - 75% of Max HR, Highest possible cadence 95+) With commuting as well I have been 20hrs a week for a month or so now, but with hardly anything over low to mid L4.

Right now I feel really strong, as if I am charging a battery - I have this feeling of freshness in my legs, and I really feel that by having clocked up so much duration in the lower intensity aerobic / sweet spot zones when it comes to turning on the speed I will quickly see some impressive results. I'll also not be fatigued from months of agony through the winter.

When season starts I'll be able to use the (weekly) classics in the spring to get massive durations in L3/4/5 which will then give me a great base to build the top end of the engine in the crits.

rmur17

so do I but in winter training at 8-12hrs/wk (typical for many?), it's not extended gruelling is it?

I have to say (since no one asked ) that if I could do nothing else, I'd just ride hard to very hard for 1.5-2hrs (plus a little w/u and c/d) five days per week with one recovery day and one moderate day. I figure I could get within 3-5% of my best FTP w/o doing *any* true L4 work (> 0.95FTP) whilst building up a very good CTL base for the season.

IMHO, such a routine would provide a very good balance of FTP and CTL. Working harder/shorter is better for FTP, working easier/longer is better for CTL.

I'll shut up now

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rmur

rmur17

just wondering re the highlighted section and assuming you use a PM and PMC, what your CTL chart was like for the season? On the face of it, this sounds like the common "running out of base" issue that seems to come fairly frequently ...

Your current training sounds like it's going great. If it ain't broken ....

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rmur

frenchyge

BullGod, that someone can work up to the elite level using advice from an internet forum and without formal coaching is really impressive. Congrats!

We hit on this a little earlier in the thread, but are you making an effort to track your rising fitness during this period and adjust your "sweet spot" accordingly? I think you're using the KK power computer for indoor riding, so maybe you're tweaking up the power target on a weekly basis or something. Without using power and at least revising one's fitness estimate periodically, I think it's pretty touchy between maintaining a slowly building training load, holding steady, or actually declining in relative load as the body responds -- especially when the rides are primarily low-PE efforts. Months of riding at the same overall training load is not especially productive if one is trying to make the most use of their winter training time.

This part is what really struck me.

No doubt you will be ready to go harder when the time comes, but having such a fresh, happy feeling in the legs with 20 hrs/wk of training would make me wonder if my body hadn't already adapted to the current training load and started to recover (in power terms, your FTP has now risen to the point that these rides are no longer in the "sweet spot" and are no longer providing the desired training stress -- CTL dropping and TSB rising due to an underestimated FTP and increasingly lower ride TSSs). The motivation is certainly there, but I'd like to have a tinge of weariness in the legs to help me feel that the body is still keeping up with the load.