Fatigue, Recovery, TP Help

[Jake]

Hi Patrick!

Welcome to the coaching subscription! I’m coach Jake and I handle most of these. So I am happy to help you out and get you squared away!

So there is quite a few things to unpack here and we can go through it step by step.

1. Great job training this year and building up your fitness. Your CTL has increased nicely, built up a nice base and have transition from race to base. That is perfect and how we would design a personal plan. So you are good there!

2. So we are in summer now and it is hot and humid! It sort of is like training indoors without a fan. Your power will decrease while the heart rate and perceived exertion will increase. If you look at your peak heart rate averages across all durations you have hit most in the past few weeks. This is most likely do to the heat. Also with the heat once you go into the red it is hard to recover. So you might not want to shoot for the highest range in the first few efforts of your rides. Let heart rate and perceived exertion be your guide as well as power.

3. The ride you did at the end of June was pretty massive! It was a big ride and it appears you never really recovered from that effort. You basically went right into the following week as is and continued to push through efforts. Something that big may have required more rest. Usually when we have riders do something so big to following it up with regeneration week. Since you kept going you just kept digging that hole a little bit bigger. So even with just this one week now it maybe not enough to fully recover.

4. We do highly recommend that all athletes take a midsummer break. It is hard to train throughout the whole year without a break. Your body needs that rest at some point. With Gateway up in the air and actually still pretty far off you might benefit from maybe a quick midseason break now. You could just take the rest of the week off and then repeat this regeneration week next week to help open back up and continue on. I would also not recommend doing a field test. Could just do some sweet spot. No reason to keep testing. I also notice you do quite a few ramp test. I would recommend not doing those so often.

How and when to take a midseason break

Taking a midseason break can make an enormous difference in the season for those of us with multiple A races. Particularly, big efforts (such as this past weekend’s Dirty Kanza extravaganza) can deplete us more than we think, and coming back without proper rest and recovery, even from a mental perspective, can decimate later goals. We had a great question about it on last week’s podcast, so I broke it down in video form here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GGKavKqkmA0 What are your thoughts o…

5. Its good to hear that nutrition has been on point. With it being hotter you will need to make sure you are getting more to drink. With your Whoop being low you have to look at outside factors as well. Make sure you are getting quality sleep and increase it if you can. Try to get more rest! Really think about how your rest has been going. It sounds like you have not been recovery with how you feel along with the whoop. So some solid rest maybe what you need.

How to Train with WHOOP — the Power Meter for Recovery

6. You still have been putting out good power! Even on your 10 minute efforts on yesterday you put out your 3rd best 5 minute effort. So you do have fitness you are just not fresh. A little freshness will help get you through these harder more intense intervals. As the saying goes, go easier so you can go harder.

So long story short I would recommend a little break. There is no reason not to do that at the moment. Gateway is a huge question mark and even if it does happen you would have a solid 5 - 6 weeks of training before it even starts and that is on top of the big base you already build.

If this sounds good to you I can go into your TrainingPeaks and shift things around for you and get you squared away. Let me know if you have any questions.