Progressive overload, can we do better?

[nicoguilbert]

Hi there,
My wife has just completed Ironman Cozumel following Athletica plan (less than 3 months block of training). This her first long distance, having done multiple 70.3.
She is very happy with the training, especially the swim and run, coming from a cycling platform, and also the result, took a week off to recover and started to plan for next goal, a 70.3 in April.

We had the first week of testing, but replacing FTP and 5k test by similar load and intensity workout, just not all out, as her lung do not support all out effort.

Then goes the first week of training scheduled by Athletica, with a 1500 of load combined, slightly more than her higher week during ironman preparation ! I am surprised of such a high load to start a plan for a lower distance.
I would find a more progressive overload after a race has been completed would be more appropriate.

Obviously she started to feel fatigue on Wednesday and has failed workouts on Wednesday. Some other platforms have predicted it, a cycling platform gave a red flag, which only usually occurs after major races (happened after the Ironman), a watch told to rest for 80+ hours… but next day was another load day. I would expect athletica to do better as managing the load but maybe I am missing something ?

I also find a bit overkill to have 4 blocks of build and would have started back with some base to allow some time for the body to be ready for another build.
Is there a way for the athlete or the coach to change a block from build to base ?

[Prof]

Hi @nicoguilbert ,
As her coach I would definitely try to do better for her.
I would not set the race yet for Texas, or if you do, then just use recovery weeks.
I would put her on Train to Maintain until January. She probably needs at least 3 weeks to a month to recover from Cozumel full.
When you reset the program Athletica doesn’t yet remember the big race she did, only the high fitness she’s accumulated. So she needs to detrain for a bit to recover.
The build blocks you see are due to the proximity of the race. Typically if you are doing a race so soon, you want to build up to it now. You have a particular context that you need to adjust for.
Let me know if you need help doing so.
Best,
Paul

[mgiven]

@Prof

When you reset the program Athletica doesn’t yet remember the big race she did, only the high fitness she’s accumulated. So she needs to detrain for a bit to recover.

Could this be a good feature to add? It might be beneficial for the system to note any unusually high activity loads (like a full Ironman!) and ask the athlete for context, like “was this activity a recent race result that you completed?” If the athlete answers that it was then it could be recorded by the system as such and future training plans could reflect the needed recovery before starting to ramp up again. It could even go further by asking the athlete something like “Awesome! Would you like me to add a X week recovery plan to your training schedule?” Even if it isn’t that interactive with an athlete, maybe the system could go backward every time a training plan is started and take note of any recent HUGE training loads in their immediate past (say 30 days?) and adjust accordingly? Anway…just thinking out loud

[AdventureShoes]

Hey Prof, I see what you are saying here. However, if I may chime in, I think as a self-coached athlete myself it is sometimes tough to know when I need to push and stick to the plan in order to progress and when I need to know that even though Athletica says one thing, I need to do another. I would think that it should take into account the load and fatigue and lack of form from the race done and back off on prescribed training. Since I see it adjusting my workouts up and down, I tend to want to trust it and just hit ‘Go’ on my watch. If I am feeling sick or injured, I know to change things since Athletica doesn’t have that information. Are there any guidelines that make it a bit more concrete as to when we should listen to our bodies more than the Athletica plan?

[nicoguilbert]

Hi Paul,
Thank you for reviewing this and providing your insights and options I can use ! This is highly appreciated.

I have few follow-up questions :

1. How do I use recovery weeks only while the race is kept, is there a way in Athletica to move/copy an entire week from one to another ?
   Even if this may not be the approach I follow, I have been wondering how to do so, and the only way I have found is to copy each workout to library and replicate a week from there. If there is an option to move/copy a week that will save me some time.
2. As a coach and user of Athletica, I would expect AI to handle such case, considering past races, and not only fitness level, is this something that will be handled by AI at some point ? Again having first week of training to start with a load of 297 on TUE and 263 on Wednesday with a fitness of 127 is overkill, having done a . As I have mentioned other platforms are able to highlight such very unusual load for the athlete. My wife had a hard time to load yesterday’s workout as the other platform would not recommend anything but a rest day, such as her watch would recommend. Definitely something to think about here for Athletica AI

and btw happy anniversary !

[Prof]

Thanks for voicing these ideas @mgiven @AdventureShoes .
I cc @Andrea to consider and in fact we already have a feature that’s looking retrospectively across the week, just not yet back multiple weeks. But, that’s definitely something we can consider. Of course those reading will be aware that its one thing to wave your wand and just expect the system to do something you wish, and its another thing to engineer it. We are trying our best for you all…

@nicoguilbert

1. you can always hover over any microcycle date and swap the microcycle or change to a recovery microcycle. Just another thought I had for your athlete finishing Cozumel, I would ensure that her training hours are low (like less than 10) with intensities low, and you have her on the low volume train to maintain (or recovery weeks) until she’s feeling fresh again.

@nicoguilbert

As I have mentioned other platforms are able to highlight such very unusual load for the athlete. My wife had a hard time to load yesterday’s workout as the other platform would not recommend anything but a rest day

Please let me know which other platforms are highlighting the unusual load and advising rest days when the user resets the training plan. This way we can see how they are doing this from a technical standpoint.

[nicoguilbert]

Thank you Paul, I am glad this feature to swap weeks exists and I will make good use of it

Cycling platform is Trainerroad you can find information on their website : https://support.trainerroad.com/hc/en-us/articles/20753792083995-Red-Light-Green-Light
This is how it looked like on her TR calendar

Also her Garmin watch provides a recovery widget, which was suggesting 80 hours of recovery. You can find information on their website What Is the Recovery Time Feature on My Garmin Device? | Garmin Customer Support

[Prof]

@AdventureShoes

I think as a self-coached athlete myself it is sometimes tough to know when I need to push and stick to the plan in order to progress and when I need to know that even though Athletica says one thing, I need to do another. I would think that it should take into account the load and fatigue and lack of form from the race done and back off on prescribed training. Since I see it adjusting my workouts up and down, I tend to want to trust it and just hit ‘Go’ on my watch. If I am feeling sick or injured, I know to change things since Athletica doesn’t have that information. Are there any guidelines that make it a bit more concrete as to when we should listen to our bodies more than the Athletica plan?

Hey @AdventureShoes ,
I appreciate where you are coming from. There’s lots to learn when it comes to trusting the plan vs your feel. Many of us here are Type A personalities, and we tend to be of the opinion that more is better, or the old ‘no pain no gain’ philosophy, or toughen up buttercup, etc. , messages are gospel. But here, and with the athletes I coach, we are on a journey to developing our ‘feel’ for what is right for us in any context. We might not get it right off the bat, and that’s okay. We have to recognize that everything is a process. And every time we perhaps err, we can use it as a learning opportunity.

To your question, here’s a couple recommendations that might help you develop this feel for good training - when to push, and when to pull back.

1. Knowledge is power. Make listening to our Athlete’s Compass Podcast a regular part of your week. Here we routinely discuss the tools and scientific system within Athletica you can use to optimize your training.
2. Put your questions out to our amazing community here. There is no shortage of wisdom I read from our user-base every day
3. Use tools such as the load warnings and Recovery Profile alongside the AI coach to help guide you. Remember that none of those systems are perfect, but if you get all three lining up (load warning, HRV warning, feel), then you’d be wise to listen and change things up.

Finally, I’ll just say the we will continue to iterate on the product. It isn’t perfect but it will continue to improve for athletes and coaches over time. We will also continue to educate users on how they can develop their feel, as this is just as important, if not more so, to developing your best self. Enjoy the process.

[AdventureShoes]

Hey, thanks for replying! I will continue to listen to the podcasts to better understand the numbers I am seeing in the app. And I will try asking questions when I have specific ones. Good advice.

[Marjaana]

Congrats to your wife !

A lot of wisdom already here but I would add one more thing:

• motivation: it is tempting to jump on a new training plan after a race because we are often so freaking pumped and excited after a big event. It’s a double edge sword I think. One, body & mind needs some time to recover event though we feel like we are ready to go. The power of mind , you know what I mean. that’s when we usually sign up for another big event, because we want more of that high that comes from months of dedication and hard work and kicking ass on a race day.
  Second, what can sometimes happen is that we “forget” that we are not machines (although after an Ironman it is easy to think we are), and we just go back to training. This is where we may take the wrong path (talking from experience). Both our bodies and minds need a little break. Whether it is two weeks, one month or even two, depends on the individual athlete. Let your body and mind recover and don’t worry about fitness. Whatever you do, do not look at the fitness number taking a deep dive of the 10m spring board.
  Now, as a coach, and husband, you are in a pivotal role- do you hold your wife back a little (if she is eager to get going again) and make sure she is recovered before getting to the kicking ass wagon again, (and perhaps risk making her a little mad at you ) and let fitness numbers plummet for a little bit, or get her back on training. I’d say you’re doing great questioning why Athletica is trying to get her on big training already. Kudos to you.

I guess my point is: a late season Ironman and early season Ironman is a big ask, and an interesting challenge. I would definitely cut some volume and intensity for a few more weeks (holidays are stressful) and over the new year put her in the build for IMTX.

The good news is that IM brought her such a deep level fitness (+motivation and belief) - it just doesn’t disappear as fast as the “fitness” numbers in any platform.

Hope this makes some sort of sense?

MJ
Let me know who to cheer for at IMTX I will be there to cheer people on!!

[nicoguilbert]

Thank you @Marjaana for your great insights, this makes total sense to me.

The point I am trying to make is that in my own experience, also highlighted by @AdventureShoes feedback, athletes subscribing to an AI platform could expect it to not only provide a plan based on individual threshold and volume, but also adapt to individual fatigue (races, life events…) or individual capacity to accumulate a certain rate of load.

Taking an example the day she had the huge load (Tuesday), Trainerroad has identified it as an usual load, and red flagged the next day advising a rest day. Now not considering unusual load, if you do not finish a workout on trainerroad and report you are sick or training fatigue, the plan will adjust accordingly with rest days or lower intensity the next day.
My wife did report feeling terrible on Athletica on her last session that day, the plan did not adjust, she did not complete the session the next day and reported feeling terrible, the plan did not adjust. I believe that is were AI could help the athlete.
Of course she has me and I could have taken better actions, I am not a certified coach, just a proud husband learning how she responds better to training to help her improving.

I initially set her on a medium volume until new year but she convinced me to move it to high volume.
I think even having a platform adjusting the plan or providing red flags, some athletes will still get over it and push it, but then will recognize the recommendations were right and gain more confidence into those, it is better this way than the other way around, following the plan and burning out.

I have no doubt Athletica will continue to grow and improve, the platform is great already and the team is super responsive. AI provides a lot of possibilities and already quite a lot of expectations , just giving my own side of the story hoping Athletica can help more athletes.

note, she is not doing the full IMTX but the half 3 weeks earlier, this time hoping for a PR and WC slot.

[Marjaana]

I think we are all 100% behind you on that one. We can do better and will do better.
Thank you for voicing your concern.

Sorry I missed the 70.3 race plan…

Keep in touch, MJ

[Phil]

@nicoguilbert

I initially set her on a medium volume until new year but she convinced me to move it to high volume.

Can I ask what her arguments were for high volume, rather than medium volume?

[nicoguilbert]

Of course ! She felt good on high volume preparing for her Ironman and ready to start training again on the same volume for her coming half Ironman.
What none of us would expect is to have her first week of training (after a week off and a week of testing) to be as hard as her biggest week training for full distance.

[Phil]

Did you set her to medium during the week off, and when did you change it to high?

[nicoguilbert]

She was still on high volume the week following the race with a load of 680.
She did not complete any workout the week after the race (excluding a 90min easy ride Sunday) to take a break and recover, that is the time I have changed the plan to medium and set the middle distance goal in April (previously set later in the year).
She started the test week the week after, felt good and this is when I changed it back to high volume

[Phil]

I ride brevets which are long distance non competitive bike events.

I’ll show you the loads of my A event last July

The event was 8 days during which I generated a load of 4,955. That’s an average load of 619 every single day, for 8 days in a row.

Here is where my fitness and fatigue numbers were at their peak.

Now I do the medium bike plan for my training. The event went great.

My numbers above show that the numbers alone cannot tell you firstly what loads you can sustain and recover from, staying injury free. That you don’t need to train high volume / loads to be able to handle what you might call high volume / load events.

What did I do after my A event? I had 4 days off, then got back to short easy aerobic for a while. I set my plan to unscheduled for a while to recharge both physically and mentally. Then set it to train to maintain as I transitioned back to structure. Finally switching back to training for events in autumn.

Now given how fast I recover and loads I can repeat plus no sprint. I’m an obvious candidate for being in the slow twitch muscle camp. But I’ve never had a biopsy and the AI certainly doesn’t know.

We have our own built in ability to know how we feel. Your wife said she felt good in test week. Personally if that was me I wouldn’t have blinked at a weekly load of 1500, two weeks after a daily event load of 600 if I felt good. You increased the training plan from medium to high volume, virtually telling the AI to put her straight back at higher loads. The AI can’t distinguish based on numbers.

All this goes back to trusting how you feel. Prioritising recovery you feel you need, regardless of what the AI says,

I’d also question why she was really so keen to start high volume this side of New Year. Is it truly the reason she gave, or is she concerned that fitness number will plummet? I have a single day event in March that will have a load of 500-600. My current fitness value is 80, I’m still quite happy on medium volume and the default ramp rate. Your wife might also be.

You really can do well in very large load events, off the back of medium plans. Plans that in my opinion reach a balance of enough volume, giving enough time for recovery, without risking burnout.

I hope some of my thoughts are above are of use. I think Athletica is great, and continues to improve, but feel and gut instinct plays an important role when self coaching. Certainly if you want to be in it for the long term.

Edit to add. There is also the fatigue tab in workout wizard if she wants to reduce the load of any planned workout.

[nicoguilbert]

That event load is impressive !

I agree key is to listen to your body, but this is not given to everyone, this can be difficult for some athlete to step back and having a plan comforting such decision would be very helpful.

Also selecting high volume plan does not mean we should feel ready to handle a weekly load of 1500 first week. It means we are ready to handle up to 20+ hours of training in the long term for the event, expecting AI to provide progressive overload.

AI could be in a good position where if a user set a plan that is not appropriate, given the last events, current fitness and last week loads, it should probably either recommend a lower volume (I believe Athletica does that already in some conditions) or provide a more progressive overload until reaching the set volume.

Thanks for recommending the fatigue feature I did not even know about, still learning about Athletica’s features
I have tried to use it last Saturday, it has provided another workout with lower intensity (l3b to l3a) but longer and slightly higher load. If someone is fatigued, shouldn’t we expect the plan to recommend the athlete to rest or a recovery activity at most ?

[Phil]

The guidelines for which plan to pick.

How many hours for the week was the 1500 load?

[nicoguilbert]

not sure what it was, plan was changed last week, probably in the low 20s