Base Training - Advanced - 4 Weeks
Author: Alex Quirk
Length: 4 Weeks
Tags: cycling, road cycling, advanced, masters, power based, base period
Typical Week: 6 Bike, 3 Strength
Longest Workout:
3:00 hrs
Author: Alex Quirk
Length: 4 Weeks
Tags: cycling, road cycling, advanced, masters, power based, base period
Typical Week: 6 Bike, 3 Strength
Longest Workout:
3:00 hrs
Base Training - Advanced - 4 Weeks
Base training for experienced athletes wanting to start their season right. Ride slow to go faster!
This program is tailor made for athletes looking to do a proper base period. This program will put you through a proper base period with approx 11 - 13 hours a week of riding. The program places a heavy emphasis on sweet spot, tempo and endurance rides, to increase your fitness in the most efficient and sustainable way early in the season. This is ideally suited to experienced athletes who have trained with structured training previously and who are willing to be patient with not going too hard too early in the season.
- Introductory 20 minute power test
- Helpful guide for establishing training zones, calculating FTP, tips for using bike computers effectively and
general tips regarding using power meters and rate of perceived effort (RPE) properly
- No weekday sessions are longer than 2 hours
- Power Based: detailed guide of of wattage, heart rate and RPE zones for each session
- Clear sense of progression to keep you engaged
- Suitable for Cat 1 or A grade riders
First up on the program is a 20 minute power test. Before starting the test, you will need to do a brief warm up:
- Ride at your general riding pace for at least 10 minutes.
- Do a progressive effort where you start at a pace a bit harder than general riding pace and over 4 minutes to build up to your TT pace.
- 4 min easy
- 3 x 20 second sprints / 4 min easy
- 10 min easy
- 20 min TT effort (want to finish exhausted)
Head out to a relatively flat road that will allow you to do a 20 minute effort uninterrupted. Use the lap function to record the average power for the 20 minute test.
So what is all this for? We are going to try and APPROXIMATE your Functional Threshold Power (FTP). Functional Threshold Power is supposed to be the power at which you could hold for 1 hour. A colleague of mine commonly calls FTP the Failure To Perform and in a sense he is right. A lot of athletes think that successful riders have high FTP's. But successful athletes win races. Training with FTP is a tool and a guide, not the be all and end all.
You may not always be able to achieve the wattage that your FTP suggests. Mental stress creates physical stress. FTP's are not the be all and end all, sometimes it will feel like a struggle to hit your power targets while others it will feel a lot easier. Be prepared to listen to your body and adjust the intensity of future sessions based on how you feel.
Download the attached document, have a read, do the test and then go to the settings section on TrainingPeaks and set training zones for yourself.
If you feel like you paced this poorly, you could attempt it again on Sunday.
Anywhere between 45 min to an hour is fine. Keep it social, have a coffee, ect. Avoid longer and faster group rides. The aim is to recover!
Anywhere between 45 min to an hour is fine. Keep it social, have a coffee, ect. Avoid longer and faster group rides. The aim is to recover!
Anywhere between 45 min to an hour is fine. Keep it social, have a coffee, ect. Avoid longer and faster group rides. The aim is to recover!
Anywhere between 45 min to an hour is fine. Keep it social, have a coffee, ect. Avoid longer and faster group rides. The aim is to recover!
2 Sets of 4 Sprints: Each Sprint is 5 min apart and there is 10 minutes between each set. Start all sprints between 27 - 30 km/hr.
15 minutes general riding pace to warm up
Set 1:
3 x 8 seconds (53/52 x 14T Gearing)
1 x 10 - 12 seconds (53/52 x 14T Gearing)
10 min
Set 2:
3 x 8 seconds (53/52 x 13T Gearing)
1 x 10 - 12 seconds (53/52 x 13T Gearing)
10 - 15 min general riding to finish
Note: Having a target wattage and HR is not useful for this session. Sprinting is a 10/10 effort, do not change gears during the sprint!
Anywhere between 45 min to an hour is fine. Keep it social, have a coffee, ect. Avoid longer and faster group rides. The aim is to recover!