I almost talked myself into a Z2 session instead today. Yesterday I missed the workout, but I’m ok with that. It was a very busy and stressful day. I didn’t want to add some physical stress on top of it. Good recovery past 2 days however, with more than 8 hours of sleep a night. I need that.
I could tell in today’s session that I was close, but not quite there. Last week I did 2 x 8 @350W. I forgot to look and remind myself and set up today’s session as 2x6@340W. It was mildly challenging, and would have been great for 10reps perhaps instead of 6 (mWR at 20% however, so maybe 8 would have done it … @Phil looking forward to the WR field for my Fenix 6 Pro ). I’ll remember to check next week before the session.
Once you have live mWR you’ll be able to pace your session to perfection I’m sure. To me, the live mWR is showing direct correlation as to how repeatable my intervals are before I need to back off. In other words once you’ve worked out your mWR repeatability marker for a particular interval type, don’t dip below it till you’re on that last one or two, then recover and finish.
An update on the impact of blood donation on my training. In the few days after blood donation I saw a 20% dip in my efficiency factor. For yesterday’s VO2 max session my efficiency factor was 6% behind baseline. Today my efficiency factor for Threshold is now only 4% below my typical baseline. This is 11 days after donation.
It’s interesting to watch my body as it tries to get back to where it was. A mWR of 5.9% by the end of today’s session. Body getting back in the groove.
Meanwhile I’ve got a text that my blood has gone to my local hospital. Let’s hope my athlete blood helps someone recover just when they need it.
Blockquote Let’s hope my athlete blood helps someone recover just when they need it.
Seriously, they’re going to have super powers thanks to your donation!
I managed to get this one done first thing in the morning. Later in the day and family commitments start to intervene and I'm much less likely to get it done. I was a little sluggish this morning getting down there, but I did it.
I know my CP/FTP has increased, so I used the first 3 intervals to find that comfortable leg burn that indicates threshold. Looks like it’s somewhere in the 5% to 7% range since the beginning of January. Not ready to update my thresholds yet… I hear there’s an update to Athletica in the works will do this for me.
Despite going to bed very late last night and a head ache lasting days. I was motivated to hop on the bike for a z2 session. Very interesting how a tired body reacts to training. This session needed 15 watts less than earlier this week to stay in z2. Good thing I’m training by HR and not power
For some reason I’ve been mis-reading my HR cycling zones. Not sure how I got z2 and 3a mixed up… maybe just because I’m tired. I may have been riding in 3a HR for a few sessions thinking I was in z2. I’ll be making sure to ride easier this week.
My long HIIT VO2 today. Weather outside wasn’t very inviting and I didn’t feel particularly powerful. You can see I was feeling my way into it during first interval, then hit my stride. I hit a mWR of 8% by final interval, and thus couldn’t have been doing too bad.
Okay that hurt. Too much alpine skiing and not enough cycling but @Phil 's WR app needs testing. Doesn’t seem to be anything there in the field yet but I figured that’s probably because I don’t have 6 weeks of data since the snow hit Revy hard? So into the pain cave I went to lay down some form of a power profile WR can leverage. Thought the power profile came out looking good with 3 honest efforts (2 x 10s sprints, 1 x 60s all out, 1 x 10min TT). First 2 sprints were in the 600 range so doesn’t seem to be picking those up on the Session Analysis tab, but did so in the power profile. GC or watch hasn’t prompted me for my Athletica credentials as per video so LMK if I’m missing something @Phil .
That IQ symbol means the data field choked on something. Since you didn’t get the login prompt, implies it choked on something during the initial Authorisation step.
My other thought is that I did your watch after I’d been working on the 260 x 260 watch parameters. I may have inadvertently introduced code designed for larger screens to your 240 x 240 watch screen.
Did you ever see the NO PROFILE displayed on the screen?
In theory there should be a crash report uploaded to Garmin IQ. I’ll take a look tomorrow to see what I can find.
The bro voice is strong in my head this week. It’s telling me that more is better, right?! Since discovering that I was riding closer to Z3a than Z2 due to some first week mix up on the weekend, it’s stronger than ever. Riding easier can’t possibly get me faster. >:(
I feel that I’m in a good position to resist the urge to push harder… it helps that I’m sharing my experience with yous here on the line so I can be held accountable!
Great threshold session today, tiring, but super doable. mWR of 2%! The temptation was there to increase the watts… but I did not! True z2 ride tomorrow
Great job Prof! I’m sure skiing down the mountain are finely strengthening your biking muscles
I’ve noticed analysis tab not picking up short duration high power peaks, but I think it is because of the smoothing. It’s defaulted to 30sec so if you adjust it a little bit lower you may see larger power peaks on the analysis tab.
A strength endurance session of 5 x 10 min intervals. Another storm is brewing and was windy out earlier, but makes you feel alive. Forgot my heart rate strap , whilst I don’t look at HR during these sessions, nice to see it with power after. mWR of 13% , a strong effort but leaving some in reserve. AI coach seemed happy with my session, as was I.
Waa post send me an waambulance…
Kids have all had a head cold and of course, I had to get it too. Last Friday I took a day off because I was feeling the bug itching my throat, and runny nose. Felt fine Saturday morning so I stuck to the plan and did a long epic ride 4.5 hours and half an hour run off the bike. Felt fantastic. I was feeling excited … then Sunday - I clearly overdid it on Saturday as I woke up with a runny nose and sore throat again. So now it’s Wednesday and I’ve missed all workouts this week. Just walking with the doggie and taking breaks from work, sitting in the sun soaking up the Vitamin D. Feeling a bit sorry for myself at the moment… but i’ve been on this illness boat enough times that I know what needs to be done. Sleep and rest the best I can and stay patient. Everyone here knows that’s the hardest thing to do!
I love this forum because I know someone here is going to give me a thumbs up, pat on the shoulder and save my day.
My wife had the Lurgi last week. I saw my resting HR up and HRV out of baseline. I took a couple of days easy just in case, then day 3 HRV / resting HRV back in baseline and off I went again.
In 2014 I pushed on through a low level respiratory illness. That didn’t turn out well, as it sank into my chest. That took 6-8 weeks to clear with the help of anti biotics in the end. Time off the bike and rest.
You know what you need to do. Catch up on some reading when you would be training. A good book in a quiet place.
Threshold today 10 x 4 min / 2 min recovery. It was going well till the chain started skipping. Last two intervals not as solid as a result. Found cause, a chain link has snapped on the outer plate. Replacing chain now in this afternoon’s maintenance tasks. I normally replace chain this month, but was hoping to reach my recovery day on Monday. Good job I have my own emporium of spare cycling consumables
New chain fitted, also did cassette as well as the old one had managed 4 chains. Test ride and feels nice and snappy again. You forget how as a chain wears it loses the snappiness. Ready for the long aerobic development tomorrow.
). I’ll remember to check next week before the session.
send me an waambulance…
I missed you on my 30/30’s this week.