I’ve been doing the TOS advanced training plan with Strength and Yoga. Curious to discover my CTL on February 14th, I entered all the cycling workouts into TP as planned duration/TSS entries.
I was shocked to see that by the start of the Tour my CTL would actually be lower than it is currently, which is abysmal. It is 31 now and would drop to 29 without any changes.
It seems to me that the current plan is not aggressive enough, with multiple inspiration videos, two off days and shorter workouts on the weekends. The result is that I don’t feel like the plan is helping me accomplish my goal, and is actually hindering me from preparing for the upcoming year. It feels built to prevent me from losing fitness, while I had hoped it would help me make gains instead.
I’ve modified my planned workouts to increase the intensity a bit, using SUF vids after rest days and endurance rides on the weekend.
Here is my adjusted PMC. I’m hoping for some feedback on this since IANAC and can’t justify paying for a custom plan at the moment. After buying a Climb for Christmas and ordering a KOS Kit, I need to curtail my spending.
Am I on the right track to add more suffering into my plan?
Amen. I haven’t looked into it with same level of detail as you, but I definitely feel the advanced plan is a little laid back. This recovery week has been driving me nuts!
…and the first thing coming after recovery week? Rest day!!!
Sir Brian, when you look at your CTL today on the chart above does it match with the CTL on your TrainingPeaks home screen? The reason I ask is because if you mess with your chart (like I did on mine) they won’t match up and the Home Screen is accurate I’m told. Another thing, is your FTP set correctly in TP? I’m just doing a novice plan and seeing a solid ramp so I’m guessing something is off.
I have not previously used the training plans, mostly because I use SUF as a training supplement for when I can’t ride outside. I added the Tour Prep plan to try it out before beginning the ToS next month, and I was really surprised to see how much lighter the training is when compared to my regular week’s worth of riding outdoors. Three Inspiration videos in one week feels a lot like I am taking a week off. I am going to try to stick to the plan and see how it goes, but it is really hard to believe that this will help. So far all it seems like it is doing is boring me and keeping me from going out and enjoying a ride.
That can’t be right, can it? Having under a daily average of 30tss for the prep plan? You’re definitely picking advanced, right? I thought most of the plans were double that, give or take. Either way, of you want more it’s not hard to add more. My CTL is a lot lower than it used to be but currently 75.
Agree, In fact, I just emailed the minions to see what level of ToS prep plan I used last year - it generated reasonable training stress. This year I am on ‘intermediate’ (lots of work-related time/stress right now), but that plan is pretty puny. I’ve been adding activities to it and may reset and go for ‘advanced’. Even with the additions, I’m struggling to keep the CTL I entered with near the start of the year, and that was low since Nov/Dec are ‘easy’ months for me.
Either trust the process or don’t Sir Brian (by the way I’m not saying that you should or shouldn’t, and neither should anybody else). From this point the plan is in a kinda holding pattern and then it tapers off. Your CTL will get quite a bounce back from the Tour itself. Oh and Totally Silly Score. (p.s. my CTL is 26 today)
So week 2 is a recovery week, week 1 and 3 have more hours and will be over 30tss/day, what about the following 2 weeks?
It’s worth bearing in mind that they are bound to be taper weeks in there because of what’s coming.
Edit - just had a look and yes, the overall load is low. The plan is to try to get you fresh whilst still being fit. Not get you fitter but more fatigued.
Alternatively just do what you fancy. Nobody is forcing you to do it
Before the adjustments, it seemed like there were three taper weeks in a row. I was losing CTL each week with my final TSB at the start of the tour set to +28!! My understanding is that on event day, I should be aiming for a TSB of zero. With my adjustments, on the 13th, I’ll be at a slightly positive TSB.
What I don’t know is the effect of HIIT and an inaccurate TSB on my actual fitness vs what is modelled for me on TP.
Agreed, I like to start big events with a TSB around +10. Part of what I’m seeing in your TP schedule is you are only scheduled for 4ish hours a week, you’ll never hit a very high CTL with that volume.
My FTP was higher on TP, but I corrected that in November. It has been correct now for 2 1/2 months, long enough that it should not really factor into my current fitness modelling with the possible exception of a slightly lower CTL than I actually possess.
As far as I can tell TP is correct, barring obvious issues with TSS and HIIT training.
This was exactly what I was feeling, that the final three weeks of the plan were basically a holding pattern. But I don’t want to hold, I want to improve, with a single taper week. My main reasoning is that I’d lost my motivation last year after all my events were cancelled. So now I need to rebuild, and I can’t abide holding patterns that would leave me time crunched to regain that lost fitness before early spring events.
I totally get the issues with TSS, but it’s the only metric I’ve got to work with at this point. I’d love to see a GSS-like scoring that is aligned a bit better with HITT and 4DP than normalized power is.
