Hey Alex,
I looked into the VO2 and Threshold progressions, and here’s what I found interesting. VO2 max #8 MS is 3:00 at 115% and 2 min recovery. Threshold #8 is 4:00 at 100% and 4 min of recovery. I find this a bit inconsistent, since I would rather make it vice versa, VO2 interval clearly requires more time to recover.
I edit workouts in TP but just in case this may be smth to look into.
Thanks much!
It’s not inconsistent.
The purpose of a threshold session is to spend as much time as possible around the threshold power. Take some good recovery and then hit the FTP again for a longer effort.
For a VO2max workout, the purpose is to spend as much time as possible at a heartrate >95% of HR max. If you recover all the way, it takes way to much time to get back to that high HR. So you just get some brief recovery to let the muscles regain enough power to get back to the core of your session = high HR. If you recover too long, the time at the high HR will be much shorter. That’s why VO2max sessions are often done with short ON/OFF intervals. The muscles can handle the high power for longer that way and your HR is almost consistently very high.
Well, I got your point. At the same time, I took the MS and made a separate workout of it, it shows 48 TSS in 28 min with IF of 1.01. It may be barely doable (I personally doubt it is) but what’s going on down the road?? It’s just 8th level.
So, because VO2max has a heavy anaerobic contribution it means that W’ comes into play here especially when talking about 28 minutes. IF is more related to aerobic capacity. So for some with a strong W’ it might be hard and for others it might be impossible. I assume you are talking about VO2max crunched from the custom option and you may have turned up the intensity slider on your plan? In this case it is possible to create workouts that will be impossible for some people (me).
You can see from a W’ perspective it should be doable for someone with 200/13
This is #18, this is seriously ugly but still theoretically possible.
I really think when doing workouts > threshold it’s important to implement some RPE in that in the sense, just scale back a little if it is too much. My beliefs are in this video
I will double check with Andrea and see what he thinks once you confirm exactly what workouts you are doing. Send me a link to your plan or calendar.
If it is too hard, and it probably will be if your FTP is correct, allow the power to drop somewhat. The important thing for VO2max workouts is that your HR stays high.
And that’s also why they are so damned hard…
I personally don’t do that kind of work anymore, I find it to demanding at 59 y old.
My hardest workouts are Over-Unders.
But during spirited group rides, I every now and then find myself at those high breathing frequencies and almost maxed out HR. It’s a bit easier to find the motivation in those conditions 
Excellent and entertaining video!
I am 57 and 100% with you there, these super hard workouts are best left for the kids like @Bad_Santa 
My sprints are all when following my twin 8-year olds up MTB hills.
exactly this… I find myself no longer too interested (translation - indoor suffering allergic) in these VO2 styled workouts anymore. Leaving all the huffing and puffing during outdoor rides at specific KOM or climb sessions w/ the gang. It’s very easy to go down deep during these rides.
WPrime going down nearly 25mins of pushing @ average 105% FTP
note: after getting covid, I can’t get / hit my prev max HR before I give up.
I’m pretty much close to you Alex, I’m 57 this year 
excellent video, I have to agree I have become a slave of metrics over the years, it’s always like “oh man, you are 3W below the target, push it, crank those pedals man!!!”. Yep, it’s a psychological condition. Once you get high in FTP it becomes so valueable bc of the time you spent on it that you cannot agree it goes down and you are not that fast anymore…
I’m on this plan at the moment, week 6 currently. I usually modify/simplify it in TP adding Z2 interval to match the route so it looks usually like MS + ~30 min of Z2.
Yesterday I made VO2 max crunched #7 and despite of the fact I have modifieid it extending recoveries up to 3 min and adding longer recovery after 3rd interval, I blew up on the last interval. Here’s the workout data
I will look into CP and W’, this is very interesting idea indeed to understand if you are capable of doing it till the end. Could you pls share some explanation of how to understand this red line?
UPD: link is given will look deeper into it and revert.
Ok so you are just a bad ass So if you have more of time trial physiology vs sprinter then it would be much harder for you then someone with a sprinter profile. Search our blog, I have about 3 articles explaining how W’ works. CP is generally your best 20 minutes, or 1.05 X FTP.
Here is one example article but others explain it a bit better. I need to do a video on this. AWC and W’ are the same thing.
https://blog.trainerday.com/how-to-determine-your-w-missing-calculator-17967294a1e4
Generally as the red line gets closer to the bottom it gets very hard. The red line is W’Bal meaning the balance of what is left (theoretically) in your gas AWC or W’ tank.
Something like below with repeats of digging deep is even harder than hitting absolute 0 (the bottom) one time.
Interesting, we got sick often this winter and my guess is one of them was COVID but we never got tested since we were staying home anyway. But my tolerance for higher HR is low these days as well. I was thinking I was just getting more lazy. Maybe I have a better excuse
I’m a VERY into ultra endurance, I can ride for like 12h non stop but I would be the last finishing on any crit probably
Reading you posts on W’, thanks much, Alex.
Yep so that likely contributes to your flatter curve and less ability (compared to a sprinter with the same FTP) to do intensities greater than FTP. I agree with @MedTechCD I would lower the intensity rather than make longer rests, but really longer rests are ok too. This is easy in our app but I not sure how you do that in Zwift or others. You can use our app to control the trainer and Zwift (or others) to ride in assuming you can connect Zwift to Ant+. In our app just press the - button to get to 110%. Also our VO2max intervals might be a bit easier at 110% in the crunched version.
Thanks everyone for the help, you are so great!
Based loosely on Andy Coggan’s contributions on the timetriallingforum’s VO2 Max Session Advice thread, I have done a couple of 5x5 VO2 workouts in the last couple of weeks.
The impact of the rest period on the outcome of the workout is what I am highlighting here. It is, of course, only n=1 and in no way is it a robust methodology to base much on. Even so:
A) 5x5 @ 108% with 5’ rest between intervals
Highest HR seen 167, time @>90% HR max = 9’49"
B) 5x5 @ 108% with 3’ rest between intervals
Highest HR seen 176, time @>90% HR max = 17’54"
Even allowing for all sorts of things, it is clear that the shorter rest period between intervals had a very significant effect for me.
These are Hickson protocol right? Tough intervals!
Dave
B, the one with the shorter rest periods was pretty tough (I couldn’t have completed another interval in style). A, the one with the longer rest periods was hard, but significantly easier (probably too easy to make it an efficient / effective Vo2 workout really). I am hoping to be able to up the power in the intervals in the coming weeks, but I am not in a rush to crank it up by much!
The Hickson protocol is a bit more involved than just one VO2 workout per week. The abstract of the original paper Linear increase in aerobic power induced by a strenuous program of endurance exercise - PubMed describes it:
“Eight subjects exercised for 40 min/day, 6 days/wk for 10 wk. For 3 days/wk they performed six 5-min intervals of bicycling on an ergometer against a resistance that elicited VO2 max, separated by 2-min intervals of exercise requiring 50-60% of Vo2 max. On the alternate 3 days, they ran as far as they could in 40 min.”
It sounds pretty savage, but the results were significant:
“Endurance, Vo2 max, and time to attainment of peak heart rate all increased linearly during the 10 wk. The average weekly increase in Vo2 max was 0.12 l/min. The total increase in Vo2 max averaged 16.8 ml/kg per min (44%). Four of the eight subjects attained Vo2 max levels approaching or exceeding 60 ml/kg per min.”
You can decide for yourself on the wrap up!
“It appears from these results that aerobic work capacity can increase more rapidly and to a greater extent in response to training than has generally been thought.”
Are you a racing cyclist? If so, what kind of events do you like?
I’m a recreational cyclist, more enjoy the scenery type rides. There’s a lot of barns, country roads, etc… in my area.
Dave
I am also a recreational cyclist these days. But the group I ride with has been getting noticeably faster in the last few years, hence I’ve been upping my training quite a bit.
In doing so, I am starting wonder about doing a few time trials again. 10 mile and 25 mile were the distances I used to race, but that was over 20 years ago!
Here in the UK, the time trial scene is quite active and there is a renewed interest in the standard road bike category again. That’s what I would do. I don’t want to get a TT bike and all the aero gear.
I would only be racing myself really, with no expectation of getting anywhere close to the prizes. But there is something about pinning a number on and giving it a go that is hard to replicate otherwise.
Maybe next year.
I helped work on the Trek mens team TT strategy and the female team won a TTT following my strategy. But ultimately if you get serious about that just get intimate with best bike split. I was writing code for my work but best bike split is great.
