Training (with power) for an Ultra Event

LT Intolerant

This is a follow up question to a thread I sort of hijacked on building CTL. I'm preparing for an ultra event (ultra in my mind) that is 112 miles w 12k feet of climbing.

Using the calculator on kreuzotter I've estimated that the event will take me roughly 7:30 hours plus and I'll burn 5,600 calories at an NP at of 220 watts (an L2 ride for me given my FTP).

Twice a week I do long rides (1/2 w a group and 1/2 by myself) where I put in roughly 75 miles and burn roughly 2,700 calories. I plan to crank these up to 100 +miles 2x per week to get ready for the demands of this event.

My question is, if you were me, how would you approach preparing for this event. Heavy diet of 2 x 20s and/or 1 x 60s (i.e., shorter, more intense rides)? Or would you go with long L2/L3 and forgo the intensity? Dave Ryan has already weighed in (thanks Dave), but I'm curious as to what you might do if you were me.

Thanks in advance for any thoughts you have or for what might have worked for you in a similar situation.

gene r

fleshbroiler

By any chance would that be the Assault on Mount Mitchell?

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LT Intolerant

It's called the Mullholland Challenge, put on by Planet Ultra, and its held in the Santa Monica Mountains in S Cal. The record is held by Tinker Juarez who rode it in 6:25 in 2005, and he stopped for pictures w fans on numerous occasions along the way!

I've heard about the Mt Mitchell ride. It too sounds like a beast!

fleshbroiler

Sounds cool, good luck with it. I'll be interested to read what advice you get from the gurus.

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LT Intolerant

Thx. Not much action on this thread at this point. I'm going to post this to the other power forum as well and see if I can get any bites over there.

I'm considering hiring a coach to help me prepare for this event, a similar event in May, and then a killer event in September, the Everest Challenge. That one is a 2-day slugfest...

Day one is 120 miles w 15,500 ft of climbing
Day two is 86 miles w 13,570 ft of climbing

- Be afraid, be VERY afraid!

fleshbroiler

Nice!
This is my goal for the year. Just 1 lap though.

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LT Intolerant

Yeah, just one little beyatchin' 136 mile lap! No sweat! Good luck to you amigo!

Those doing 4 laps? Insane!!!

Spunout

If the caloric requirements are accurate, then you had better be ready to put out that much work in the event. How long you want to take to do it, is a matter of training.

Long rides at 3,000 Cal are great, but think of the dietary and endurance training required to burn over 5,000 Cal. If you want to finish the ride in good shape, then try to do 1-2 training rides at around 4500 or 5000 Cal before.

Because your training hours are low, I wouldn't worry about the intensity. Just get out there for the hours, and keep your pace up. If you focus on intensity, you'll be fast...for the first half. Hitting the hills, group rides, will give you required intensity.

LT Intolerant

Thanks Spunout. I agree that I've got to prepare my system to handle the caloric burn the MC requires. Over the next 8 weeks my plan is to do 2 rides/wk where I steadily increase caloric burn per ride from 2,800 (current high) to 5,000, forgoing structured intensity, because I am getting that through group rides.

What's interesting about these events is how you pace yourself. It's so different from USCF racing. I'm always tempted to go with the rabbits, but I've found that when I do, I pay for it later. So managing the burn rate per hour is as much of an art as managing overall burn. I'm still learning how to do that.

daveryanwyoming

That sure sounds like a new spin on the "gotta train long miles to race long miles" philosophy. Exactly what in your body needs to be trained to be able to burn a lot of calories?

Sure you need some long rides to get used to being on the bike and to dial in your pacing, feeding and hydration strategies, but the body doesn't need to be trained to burn calories. You need sufficient CTL to handle the one day(or two day in the case of the Everest Challenge) load, you need an FTP sufficiently high that you can handle the high intensity climbing and high enough that most of the time you're not pressed right up against your limits and come race day you need to keep the calories and fluids topped up to the best of your ability.

Long endurance rides have been shown to promote better glycogen storage, and that's certainly useful but it might be the difference between 1500 and 1800 calories stored in your muscles. It won't be enough to carry you through an all day event so you'll still have to develop and stick to a good feeding strategy. A high FTP is crucial here so that you're working at a relatively low percentage of your sustainable power most of the day and hence burning more fat and less of those precious glycogen stores.

There a lot of things to train with long rides, but training your body to burn more calories isn't one of them. Your body will burn calories just fine as long as you do the ride and keep the calories coming.

Good luck,
-Dave

LT Intolerant

I am DEFINITELY a pseudoscientist Dave, but I did stay at a Holiday Inn Express last night!

Seriously, I admit I'm guessing that I have to train my body to ride Tempo for a bazillion hours and burn a gaggle of calories, by doing just that, riding a bazillion hours and consuming a gaggle.

I'm not saying I'm right, it just feels right. I appreciate the contrarian viewpoint, and to hedge my bets; and train more efficiently; and to still do well in other USCF events that require intensity I am keeping a day or two of L4/5/6 in my schedule. It's kind of a schitzo schedule. Two loooong days and two days of intense workouts and lots of rest, all the while trying to build CTL and raise FTP.

I'm a guinea pig in my own twisted experiment and my handlers might find me dead in my cage some day! But the upside is my wife then gets that 25 year old Italian boyfriend she's always wanted!

daveryanwyoming

Me too, what could be more pseudoscientific than being an engineer, at least that's how the physicists I work with look at it

Yeah, I doubt I'll convince you, but I tried the long mileage experiment for many years with lousy results. Quality over quantity has taken me a lot further in a lot less time and my long events last year were no problem with more power but a lot less mileage under my belt. YMMV.

Good luck however you go about it,
-Dave

sidewind

Generally, I assume the power drops by ~10 % when the duration is doubled. So. for an 8 hour event, one could hold like 70...75 % of the one hour power. I'd use my training focus on the FTP development with 2*20 and SST, with occasional (like one per week) 3-5 hour rides, just to get used to eat, drink and sit on the saddle.

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Spunout

I am speaking in the OP's terms. Put it into CTL, TSS, hours, miles, whatever. We should not be so narrow to quantify efforts in one system or another.

So I can put it this way: If you always train at X, you will have difficulty completing with performance success, an event of 2X.