Increase your Cycling Power over the winter = Faster times on 2009 (Page 2)

Me.  Me.  Me.  HRM and trainer.

This is awesome of you.

Cheryl 

Jorge, thanks for doing this!  I am in though I travel and may miss a few or have to adjust my shedule, this will be great to keep me on the bike this winter.  I have a marathon in May and my longer tris start after that, so it should work good while allowing me to get my runs in for marathon training.

I hope you get some business out of this!

I have no idea as to what half of those words meant in your opening thread or how to do any of that testing stuff.

so clearly I need to join. pming you now.

I'm in!

Thanks for doing this Jorge.

Q&A:
1.      Is this for anyone or just those with a power meter? Anyone who is willing to do the work and easy into the programs can join. I’ll provide sessions based on watts, HR or RPE (respiratory perceived exertion). If you use a trainer or have a road/loop in which you can test often under the same circumstances it will make it easier for you to wuantify your improvement.

2.      Is this only for indoors or outdoors training? Any! The sessions are around 1 hr long each max considering many of us training live in the north and are forced to ride the trainer more often than not. Also this type of sessions are easier to do on the trainer as you can managed your efforts easier and void the hassles of outdoors (spot lights, traffic, terrain, weather, etc.) for that reason the sessions are relatively short but intense enough that most of the time spent is well used. But if you live in warm climates you can easily do these sessions outside.

3.      Can I use rollers? You could, just keep in mind you are going to be pushing your effort to threshold or VO2 max constantly hence you have to be careful!

4.      What kind of base do I need to have before joining this group? As long as you’ve been active and done some riding over the past 6 months you should be able handle the load. The first 5 weeks of the plan are precisely focused to allow your body adapt so you can handle greater load and push yourself more coming January 09.

5.      I have a computrainer (or any other trainer with power feature) but sometimes I might ride outside, how can I do both? Once of the key goals of the plan is to teach you get in tune with your body so you can assess what sort of work you are doing given RPE. Hence some of the intervals done indoors I will suggest you to cover your HR or power meter and go by feel and see how well you do. Learning this you will have a built in power meter

6.      The plan starts kind of early in the year, I don’t want to end up burn out by the summer. Indeed the plan starts early but the 1^st 3 weeks are relatively simple in workload. Really we’ll start pushing the load as of week 4 and the progression will be gradual so really we’ll have 11 weeks of structured training. Also we’ll have a holiday ‘break’ that should help you recover mentally while doing a bit of something AND after the program is over, I recommend taking an easy week or two to recover before jumping into your specific season training.

7.      I’ve been training consistently over the past month and the plan seems a bit conservative for my goals, how can I adjust it? You will have two options: 1) either slow down a bit, start the program with everyone just adding a more intensity than advised and wait until Jan to really pick up the pace. That can be wise if you have planned a long racing season and don’t want to be burn out by mid summer. 2)  Or start the program doing your testing on week no.1 and then pick up the plan on week no. 6. By the time you complete it you can test, adjust your training zones with you higher power threshold and do it again! You WILL have a killer cycling training under your legs coming March.

8.      I need to address other limiters, how can I do that while following the program? The plan is design in general to allow athletes to fit in swimming and running as well so you can address other limiters and become a more complete athlete. The current plan allows for a balanced focus as: 3 swims, 3 bikes and 4+ runs. If you want to address another limiter then you could:
a.      If limiter is swimming: You should be able to fit easily 4-6 swims x week and handle the cycling program, plus 3-4 runs a week. If it is too much you can drop one of the cycling sessions
b.      If limiter is cycling: you can fit in easily 3 swim as maintenance, do 3-4 runs as maintenance and follow the program or even add an extra bike x week , for those training for 70.3/IM you can just do a 2-4 hr ride on the weekend between z2 and z3.
c.       If limiter is running: you have a few options i) do 3x swim maintenance, follow the program as it is and do 4-6x run. You will need to focus on ‘just’ run at the pace that your body feels good on the given day, IOW just run but keep intensity in check (low) and build base through frequency. ii) do 3x swim maintenance, drop one bike session of program as it is and run 4-5 a week adding more intensity (strides, threshold) etc.
The above are just suggestions of course, there are many other ways to address this and make it fit your needs.

Remember the main point for this program is to help you accomplish your 2008 racing goals, and by following it should make sense for your plans. There are many ways to tackle training and this is just one way (may way ), the point is for you to grab bits and pieces of information to help you learn and apply it to your specific needs. Or for those seasoned athletes to play and help others and keep each other motivated.

I would absolutely LOVE to do this!

Thank you So much for doing this for the whole BT community!  It's great for people like me who have very little knowledge regarding bike training!

You're a true community helper-outer!!

I'm in.  Should coincide nicely with my plan for IM NO 70.3.

Thanks for doing this.