I’ve never done power meters or training plans before, but I’m about 3 weeks into your Corona plan (doing it outdoors) and in the best shape of my life at 42 y/o. I know your latest email suggested doing the Sweet Spot plans 1-3 since there won’t be any races anytime soon. Since this Corona training plan includes intervals and since I’m peaking right now, should I just keep going with race-type training for another month or so to get some Strava PRs? Or should I put the brakes on intervals and scale it back to more sweet spot training?
My A rides this year were going to be Blood Sweat & Gears on June 27th and Belgian Waffle Ride on Aug 30th. Who knows if those will happen? But in the meantime, I love going after local Strava segments to keep motivation up, esp during CO-19 time. So Strava segments are now my A race until the ban lifts.
Thanks so much for your help and looking forward to my first official training plan.
Hi there @simskey - yea, the beauty is you can do whatever you want!
Sounds like you are on the right track tho - get some PR’s and have some fun with that hard earned work.
I’d limit that style riding to 3-4 weeks or whenever you stop feeling like going hard and then shift from ‘race back to base’ with the sweet spot style training. Build up for the late late Summer and Fall
Welcome to the wonderful world of power training! You can expect to take your training to the next level, though sounds like you have reached that already!
The Corona plan is great for intensity. You had 3 weeks of Vo2 max intervals. You don’t want to keep doing high intensity training for too long. The best scenario would be to do our 6 week sweet spot 3 plan! This is a good mix of aerobic and anaerobic work! Then after this 6 weeks you will have a better understanding of what riding and racing will be like this summer. Plus you are coming off low volume from the Corona plan so good to give that CTL (fitness) a boost back up before proceeding with any other plan.
After this 6 week plan we do have a Strava KOM plan that might be right up your alley as well!
Though if doing the Belgian waffle ride you will want to leave yourself 6 week to complete our Fondo plan. This way you are building up your CTL (fitness) through lots of sweet spot work which would be the most beneficial. So if you put that in the plan now you can work backwards from there to see how much time you have.
But for now I would recommend going to sweet spot 3. Build your CTL back up after doing the Corona plan and the high intensity of the vo2 max efforts.
Thank you guys so much. I’ve been riding about 8-10 hours/week, so much more than the Corona plan was suggesting. Sweet Spot 3 is what I was leaning towards too. Should I take an off week before starting it?
Now, to find an affordable power meter option…sigh.
Take Monday and Tuesday off. Wednesday and Saturday could be similar to the AmEx rides where you go for 100 TSS and can include going for a segment or two since you are feeling fast! Good way to stay sharp during a rest week while not doing too much work. Then Thursday only 1 hour easy and Sunday can be off or an easy endurance day. You’ll be rested and ready to hit Sweet Spot 3.
Just ordered and downloaded the Sweet Spot 3. Quick question: since I do group rides on Sat and take Sunday off…Could I do the typical Zone 2 - Sweet Spot workout (that normally follows the group ride) on Friday instead?
So you’ll just have put start date of the plan on the Sunday before you want to start the plan. So if starting this week put the start date as yesterday. This way Sundays are your recovery days and Thursdays will be your other.
Thanks Jake. Yeah, I did that. But I was also wondering if I could swap the 4th and 5th workouts of the week. Is that ok from a fatigue standpoint. (Bc I want to keep group ride on Saturday.) Does that make sense.
Looking the PMC for my Sweet Spot 3 plan, I can’t figure out why my form is projected to be so low. It seems to be skewed low for some reason based on everything I’ve read.
Yes the form is low on that. But you will have low numbers after some big base training.
However it looks like your CTL is set to start at 0 from that screen shot. I’m assuming since you were training before and did the Corona plan your CTL is actually no at 0 at the moment. So that is going to skew that number.
Quick question here: I’m in my recovery week on the Sweet Spot 3 plan. What are your thoughts on going after some Strava segments in lieu of 1 or 2 of workouts. As long as my TSS is about the same on the workout, it’s just a matter of working different muscles, right? Or would you recommend stick with SS3 plan as close as possible and save my segment chasing for later in the summer? Thanks…I’m just itching for some segments.
Just finished SS3. Loved the plan. Feel really strong. For the next plan…
I am scheduled to do the Belgian Waffle Ride in 10 weeks which would be my A race. (I would guess it’s 50/50 that it even happens, so I don’t necessarily want to throw all my eggs in that basket.) I’m guessing a Fondo plan would probably be good training for that. BUT I’m super fit right now and itching to go after some Strava segments. I just bought the under 15 mins Phil’s Strava KOM plan with your awesome Father’s Day discount. If I do that KOM plan now, do you think it’ll be a decent setup for the Belgian Waffle Ride, if it happens. Or is it too much power work and not enough Sweet Spot work? If so, I could do a Fondo plan now and save the KOM plan for the Fall. I also don’t want to burn the motivation I have right now with endless Sweet Spot training.
You can do 4 weeks of the Strava Plan now and then transition into our 6 week gravel plan. That is what I would suggest you do. By the time we are 6 weeks out from BWR we may know more if it will or will not happen. If not you can continue the last two weeks of the Strava plan. The issue with the Strava plan is that it would not give you the long simulation rides on the weekend which you would need to build your aerobic base!
But as Phil says a race result is just a result and a Strava KOM is a legacy. So that is something to think about.
I just finished the KOM plan and trying to figure out what to do next. Since the weather is going to get cooler soon (thank goodness) it seems like a good time to keep going after KOMs. Do I just do that for a few weeks or should I re-do the KOM plan? What that be too much stress on my muscles to re-do that plan again? I’m not ready to switch to off-season yet.
Thanks in advance for your help!
