No Man's Land

Training is in no man's land. I'm a tweener. One can ride long and slow. Or short and hard. But how to do a little of both?

Entering a unique part of the season. Until now training sessions are pretty non-intensive. My focus has been sub-threshold to threshold work to develop the aerobic system and endurance. Thus sessions are longer. Duration has been king. Now I'm starting to add intensity. Because the body hasn't adapted to this yet, I'm slowly adding in the intensity. This shortens my workouts significantly.

Right now, I am limited by my above-threshold endurance, I can't get enough volume into one session a day. Two straight hours of VO2 intervals isn't an option. But two one-hour long VO2 interval sessions are. Thus, I can get in two hours of intervals without running myself completely aground. I also have the option of doing intensity for one workout, and tempo for the other.

Splitting my efforts into two daily sessions helps tremendously. I ride a short VO2, neuromuscular, or skill-based session either before work, or during my lunch period. Leaving my evening free to do longer rides and build volume. Today was a perfect example. I did 15s VO2 intervals at lunch, followed by a 3-hour endurance-level ride in the evening.

Eventually the intensity will be rise to replace volume in the training program. That's a few weeks away...