Zone 2 training....do short periods work as well?

crispybug2

I've been advised on zone 2 training for building a base throughout the winter in preperation for next year.

Now doing a three/four hour session on the weekend is not a problem, but during the week as a result of work constraints I can only do an hour in the mornings. So is it still a good idea to do the zone 2 session for an hour or would it be better to do a HIIT session instead?

As an aside one of the reasons to trying the zone 2 sessions is as a attempt to lose more weight, I've already lost four stone but I've stalled at fifteen and a half stone.

t.m.h.n.e.t

Zone 2 to lose weight? Eh???

Herbsman

Preparation for what next year?

Try 2x20min session during the week.

amaferanga

If these are just regular one hour rides (as opposed to rides where you can find a nice place to go do some intervals) then you'd be better just riding them hard - a sweet spot training (SST) ride. By riding easy all your doing is reducing the number of calories you burn.

tandrews8664

As far as I aware, Zone 2 is long slow rides to build an aerobic base. An hour may just be long enough, but 90 mins plus is better. But for weight loss as well - intervals are probably best, but won't help as much as a long zone 2 ride for endurance

danowat

I don't do Z2 for anything less than 2hrs, if you've only got an hour free, there are much better sessions you can do than an hour at Z2

bigpikle

The old story of Z2 only for building a 'base' has been largely dispelled as a total myth unless you train >15-20 hrs a week and couldnt ride any harder without burying yourself. If you're riding less hours then ride harder. Z3 & Z4 in appropriate amounts build aerobic performance brilliantly and do much more to build your FTP, which is the key determinant of cycling performance.

danowat

Bigpikle wrote:

The old story of Z2 only for building a 'base' has been largely dispelled as a total myth unless you train >15-20 hrs a week and couldnt ride any harder with burying yourself. If you're riding less hours then ride harder. Z3 & Z4 in appropriate amounts build aerobic performance brilliantly and do much more to build your FTP, which is the key determinant of cycling performance.

Indeed, its supposed that sessions of 2 x 20 at sweetspot is one of the better (best?) ways to raise your FTP

Alex_Simmons/RST

Level 2 may or may not be the best thing for a midweek ride.

Much depends on the entire structure of training week, and in context with everything else you are doing. Normally when time constrained, you tend to lift the intensity to compensate, however depending on what training you've been doing, that may or may not be something you'd do several times/week.

HIIT may not be necessary (or optimal) either.

Suggest including some Level 3 and 4 work into your routine. It doesn't need to be a lot to start with. Level 2 can still be quality work at the upper end.

bahzob

danowat wrote:

Bigpikle wrote:

The old story of Z2 only for building a 'base' has been largely dispelled as a total myth unless you train >15-20 hrs a week and couldnt ride any harder with burying yourself. If you're riding less hours then ride harder. Z3 & Z4 in appropriate amounts build aerobic performance brilliantly and do much more to build your FTP, which is the key determinant of cycling performance.

Indeed, its supposed that sessions of 2 x 20 at sweetspot is one of the better (best?) ways to raise your FTP

Sorry but this is wrong and illustrates a misunderstanding of what the sweet spot is and how training and intervals work, that's also relevant to the OP.
- Sweetspot power is less than your FTP.
- Your FTP is the power you can sustain for a full 60 minutes.
- Training works by putting stress on your system, recovery from this stress makes you fitter as you body adapts to meet the new needs being put on it.
- If you do 20 minutes at sweetspot you are riding under your FTP, putting relatively little stress on your system and wasting training time/effort.
- You should be doing 20 minute intervals at FTP or above.
- This is a general rule. If you are capable of doing X watts/intensity for Y minutes
>>> then for any interval of duration A: If A<Y then watts/intensity should be > X.

- This is not to say there is no benefit in doing sweetspot training. It certainly has its uses.
> If training indoors/ or got limited time it can be done for solid non-stop 60-90 minute sessions when it provides a good aerobic workout that can be done day after day with little ongoing cumulative fatigue. If your objective is to burn max calories/hour and only have an hour or so a day to train its probably the best you can do (so OP aim to do this).

> For longer sessions 2-3 hours with 80-90% of time done at sweetspot will be just as good/better than spending 4-5 hours at lower "zone 2" training.

> If you are training for an etape or similar event that involves climbs that will take more than an hour it is especially worth spending some focused time on this intensity since it is the one you should be using during the event itself.

>>OP also may be worth getting this book. http://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/193403083X

Its author sucks but the advice and training plans in the book are very good, especially if, like most people, time is the main limiting factor in training.

SBezza

bahzob wrote:

> For longer sessions 2-3 hours with 80-90% of time done at sweetspot will be just as good/better than spending 4-5 hours at lower "zone 2" training.

And this might not be worth doing either if it takes a rider too long to recover from that sort of effort, 2-3 hours with 90% at sweetspot might take a rider 48 hours or more to recover from to do any meaniful training alongside it, whereas 4 hours at a zone 2 they would likely be training the following day without much impact.

It isn't just one session that makes gains, it is the cumulative effect of training that gives you the gains, going hard all the time will give you gains in FTP no doubt, but it maintaining that fitness and FTP that might be a struggle. Ideally you should try and aim for 5/6 days training a week, and be consistant in developing, if you have to take too many days off to recover from a session, then that session ulimately was substandard in the overall scheme of things.

You can see good gains by doing Z3 rides, and you can see rises in FTP, but with the added benefit of training on a daily basis, though even these cause deep down fatigue. The aim of doing the threshold session slightly lower in effort, is to be able to do more of them, or more frequently, the training effect of each session is slightly less admittedly, but if you can do more of them, you will likely get a bigger benefit in the long term. It is a balance between increasing FTP, and repeating the training at a level which causes adaption.

Training should be very individual, and tailored to the sort of events they are likely to do. Less fit riders are unlikley to manage 2 hours at Z3 comfortably, let alone having 90% of that time at an even higher level.

Zoomer37

crispybug2 wrote:

As an aside one of the reasons to trying the zone 2 sessions is as a attempt to lose more weight, I've already lost four stone but I've stalled at fifteen and a half stone.

Unless your built like a brick sh*t house above the waist, you want to be focused on losing fat not weight and riding 10 hrs a day in any zone aint going to help drop the flab if at the end of each day your consuming too many calories. What is your daily cal deficit?

t.m.h.n.e.t

Zoomer37 wrote:

crispybug2 wrote:

As an aside one of the reasons to trying the zone 2 sessions is as a attempt to lose more weight, I've already lost four stone but I've stalled at fifteen and a half stone.

Unless your built like a brick sh*t house above the waist, you want to be focused on losing fat not weight and riding 10 hrs a day in any zone aint going to help drop the flab if at the end of each day your consuming too many calories. What is your daily cal deficit?

Or indeed,too much of a deficit

amaferanga

bahzob wrote:

- You should be doing 20 minute intervals at FTP or above.

Plenty of other parts of your post that I'd take issue with, but this is simply wrong.

trickydisco

From my experience i'd say yes. This was the result of a fitness test i had 2 years ago



The coach said my fat burning profile was absolutely terrible. I was only utilising 43% of energy from fat in zone 2. He said this wasn't that great and would mean i'd bonk a lot on long rides (i did)

He then drew up a 5 month plan and the only 'base' zone 2 training i did was indoors on rollers for 1 hour max. The rest was intervals and other bits of training.

5 months later this 43% figure went up to 84%. my zone 2 effectivly changed as well from 125 - 144 to 140 - 155. I was still utlising the majority of calories from fat at a HR of 155

Herbsman

Sweet

jgsi

trickydisco wrote:

From my experience i'd say yes. This was the result of a fitness test i had 2 years ago



The coach said my fat burning profile was absolutely terrible. I was only utilising 43% of energy from fat in zone 2. He said this wasn't that great and would mean i'd bonk a lot on long rides (i did)

He then drew up a 5 month plan and the only 'base' zone 2 training i did was indoors on rollers for 1 hour max. The rest was intervals and other bits of training.

5 months later this 43% figure went up to 84%. my zone 2 effectivly changed as well from 125 - 144 to 140 - 155. I was still utlising the majority of calories from fat at a HR of 155

I assume then that was a 'lab test'.. using expelled air to get the %'s of fats usage.?
Interesting result.

Alex_Simmons/RST

amaferanga wrote:

bahzob wrote:

- You should be doing 20 minute intervals at FTP or above.

Plenty of other parts of your post that I'd take issue with, but this is simply wrong.

+1

One might do intervals at that level at times, but it is neither compulsory nor necessary to make tremendous gains in fitness and it can in fact be counter productive to attempt to ride that hard every time you do such training.

Alex_Simmons/RST

trickydisco wrote:

From my experience i'd say yes. This was the result of a fitness test i had 2 years ago



The coach said my fat burning profile was absolutely terrible. I was only utilising 43% of energy from fat in zone 2. He said this wasn't that great and would mean i'd bonk a lot on long rides (i did)

He then drew up a 5 month plan and the only 'base' zone 2 training i did was indoors on rollers for 1 hour max. The rest was intervals and other bits of training.

5 months later this 43% figure went up to 84%. my zone 2 effectivly changed as well from 125 - 144 to 140 - 155. I was still utlising the majority of calories from fat at a HR of 155

Nice work on improving your fitness.

Just one point to help you with understanding things-

The fuel substrate mix we use when exercising (i.e. proportion of fats/free fatty acids vs carbohydrate/glycogen) has very little do do with losing excess body fat. What matters is the overall calorie balance - the amount consumed via eating/drinking less that expended through normal daily metabolism and exercise, irrespective of what fuel substrate we used to fuel our effort.

However, it might be for some people that they are capable of metabolising more calories overall by doing longer rides at lower (but now low) intensities, than shorter rides at higher intensities which end up being so short due to excessive fatigue.

But once you have an exercise time constraint, then the only way to metabolise more overall, is to lift the absolute intensity (and to a much smaller extent, the relative intensity as well).

bigpikle

Alex_Simmons/RST wrote:

amaferanga wrote:

bahzob wrote:

- You should be doing 20 minute intervals at FTP or above.

Plenty of other parts of your post that I'd take issue with, but this is simply wrong.

+1

One might do intervals at that level at times, but it is neither compulsory nor necessary to make tremendous gains in fitness and it can in fact be counter productive to attempt to ride that hard every time you do such training.

This is my experience as well. Doing these at or above FTP means more fatigue for little if any benefit, so you cant do them as often. Do them at sweetspot, 85-88% of FTP, means you can do these sessions day after day if you want, accumulating good quantities of time at L3/4 without creating so much fatigue that you have to take a rest day or do an easy day. I do like to occasionally do a 100-105% FTP session if I know I have some forced rest days afterwards though, like a work trip or something that keeps me off the bike to recover.

Have spent the last 3 weeks racking up lots of sweetspot 2x20 sessions day after day, with a only a few days off, and this simply wouldnt have been possible if I did them at FTP or above!

trickydisco

Alex_Simmons/RST wrote:

trickydisco wrote:

From my experience i'd say yes. This was the result of a fitness test i had 2 years ago



The coach said my fat burning profile was absolutely terrible. I was only utilising 43% of energy from fat in zone 2. He said this wasn't that great and would mean i'd bonk a lot on long rides (i did)

He then drew up a 5 month plan and the only 'base' zone 2 training i did was indoors on rollers for 1 hour max. The rest was intervals and other bits of training.

5 months later this 43% figure went up to 84%. my zone 2 effectivly changed as well from 125 - 144 to 140 - 155. I was still utlising the majority of calories from fat at a HR of 155

Nice work on improving your fitness.

Just one point to help you with understanding things-

The fuel substrate mix we use when exercising (i.e. proportion of fats/free fatty acids vs carbohydrate/glycogen) has very little do do with losing excess body fat. What matters is the overall calorie balance - the amount consumed via eating/drinking less that expended through normal daily metabolism and exercise, irrespective of what fuel substrate we used to fuel our effort.
).

He told me this in the report he gave me. What also helped over the 5 months was changing my diet completely. It was a diet recommended by Dave smith (coached lots of big name people) who used to work for RST. This involved taking out a lot of carbs in my diet (bread, pasta). The combination of diet and training made my engine more efficient

mclarent

Bigpikle wrote:

Alex_Simmons/RST wrote:

<snip>
One might do intervals at that level at times, but it is neither compulsory nor necessary to make tremendous gains in fitness and it can in fact be counter productive to attempt to ride that hard every time you do such training.

This is my experience as well. Doing these at or above FTP means more fatigue for little if any benefit, so you cant do them as often. Do them at sweetspot, 85-88% of FTP, means you can do these sessions day after day if you want, accumulating good quantities of time at L3/4 without creating so much fatigue that you have to take a rest day or do an easy day. I do like to occasionally do a 100-105% FTP session if I know I have some forced rest days afterwards though, like a work trip or something that keeps me off the bike to recover.

Have spent the last 3 weeks racking up lots of sweetspot 2x20 sessions day after day, with a only a few days off, and this simply wouldnt have been possible if I did them at FTP or above!

Another alternative (my preference) is longer sessions at sweetspot (1.5-2 hrs riding with 60-90mins @ SS) vs 2x20s @88-93% FTP... Pretty sure it would hit the same objective. I do this stuff in the spring, at the moment I'm all about the Z2.

As to the comment above re min hours, IIRC TCC suggests "traditional" periodisation for those riding 12+ hours a week, that's the rule of thumb I work to.

Crimmey

I'm intrigued with tricky discos results as I work a trial and error system and am doing something similar myself except mine isn't subjected to scientific analysis. The way I see it, Im not sure how to phrase this but he has increased his fat burning efficiency so that he burns a greater ratio of fats to carbs at a higher heart rate than previously....yes? Is this what is meant by the term developing aerobic base? or is this some sort of aerobic efficiency. His results seems to have been dismissed as 'getting fitter'. Now I have been 'training' for a few years and have always thought of slow, easy miles being wasted miles so have tended to do intervals/threshold efforts. My TT times have improved year on year which I assume I am' getting fitter' yet I felt that my fat burning zones stayed constant at very low HR's.
Recently I have been training most of my hours at low HR's (130bpm ish) (90%) with maybe one interval session built in and have found that not only can I go similar speeds to before at lower heart rates than before I am actually getting faster too at those lower HR's, so I assume my power is increasing during my increased fat burning zone ( Not sure that is right but Ill leave it in). Unfortunatley I can't quantify it as Im still totally unconvinced how valuable a power meter is as a training tool :P yet I keep thinking about buying one every week. A couple of weeks ago I did a big 90mile mile, loads of climbing, on no breaksfast and one snickers bar, keeping my heart rate low....the surprising thing it wasn't all that slow and could have quite happily carried on.

A few questions :
Why do we not hear more of training our 'fat burning efficiency' yet it all seems to be about FTP?
Is there such thing as 'fat burning efficiency? ( where burning fat can be increased for greater intensities)
If so, does increasing FTP, increase 'fat burning efficiency?' it's just that from limited experience it does not.
Can short interval sessions as described above develop our systems where fat is used more for greater intensities?
Are 'zone2' 'base miles ( whatever it means) really that worthless?
If not, there must be a point where they do become worthless ( time wise) hence the interval advice.

Just trying to understand, if anyone wants to take the time to read and write back.

djfleming22

I have read a few books about people talking about training in zone 1 to zone 2 and yes it does matter if you are doing just an hour the most important part of this zone is to teach the body to burn fats much better that only happens when you are cycling more than 1 1/2 hours or more at the suggest zone so that when you are cycling in different zones and at a higher bpm or zone that you are using all the fats stored in body...the book was saying that sometimes if you body is not burning energy properly that you will bonk alot quicker .... i have been trying this out over the last couple of weeks and have noticed that on longer rides of about 100 miles that i am little fresher and not so sore if this is down to fitness as well then that's all good.

I think the difference with all sports now its more of a science than everything else and everyone has a opinion of how to do it right !

Alex_Simmons/RST

Crimmey wrote:

A few questions :
Why do we not hear more of training our 'fat burning efficiency' yet it all seems to be about FTP?
Is there such thing as 'fat burning efficiency? ( where burning fat can be increased for greater intensities)
If so, does increasing FTP, increase 'fat burning efficiency?' it's just that from limited experience it does not.
Can short interval sessions as described above develop our systems where fat is used more for greater intensities?
Are 'zone2' 'base miles ( whatever it means) really that worthless?
If not, there must be a point where they do become worthless ( time wise) hence the interval advice.

Just trying to understand, if anyone wants to take the time to read and write back.

There is no "Fat Burning Zone", so the premise is flawed to begin with.

And the use of the term "efficiency" in this context of "fat burning" is also imprecise and confusing.

There are many things that impact on the relative proportion of the fuel substrates we use. These include fatigue, diet, level of glycogen stores, fitness, and of course the relative intensity of exercise.

At rest, we metabolise in roughly a 50:50 ratio of FFA:CHO.

As exercise intensity increases (power output rises), then an increasingly greater proportion of our output is fuelled by metabolism of CHO, to the point that when going at TT pace or harder, we are reliant almost all if not entirely on aerobic CHO metabolism. As intensity increases further we begin to also rely on anaerobic metabolism of CHO (fats can only be metabolised aerobically).

So for instance you might be metabolising at a FFA:CHO ratio of 20:80 while pedalling at a given power output. With improved fitness, that might change to 30:70 at the same power. IOW, at the same absolute intensity (power output), you are using fewer carbs and more fat to fuel your effort.

This is an import element in fitness development, as for all intents and purposes, our glycogen supply is very limited, but we have almost limitless supply of fats (in healthy fit adult males the ratio of energy stored as fat and glycogen is about 80:1, and more for many people). So improving this element of our fitness means our endurance at sub threshold power levels is greatly improved, as it takes longer to run out of glycogen. Running out of glycogen is bad for performance for a few reasons I won't go into here.

Now this is where some people go a little off the rails - namely the false notion that one needs to ride at (lower) intensity levels that rely on a higher proportion of fats, in order to "train our bodies to burn fat".

What matters for improving our ability to reduce CHO reliance at any given absolute intensity (power output) is improving the body's aerobic metabolism support infrastructure (capillary density, mitochondrial density, VO2 max, cardiac output, glycogen storage capacity etc).

That's best achieved (especially when time is limited) by doing a good proportion of one's training at higher relative intensities, even though those efforts will rely mostly on CHO metabolism. This development does occur from training performed at all intensity levels above recovery, however the rate of this induced change per hour of effort is much greater at higher intensities than it is from lower intensities. Since we can't ride flat out all the time, then we design training to provide a mix of volume and intensity. Optimising this mix is part of the art, craft and science in developing good training plans.

It just so happens, that training that improves ones sustainable aerobic power output (as indicated by FTP) is exactly what drives these fundamental improvements in aerobic infrastructure and hence fuel substrate utilisation. It's axiomatic really since riding at threshold power is fundamentally an aerobic process.

Now, we can not only improve our absolute power output at a given FFA:CHO level, we can also increase the % of our FTP at which that same FFA:CHO level occurs. This means that we are able to ride closer to our FTP for longer - it's a deeper element of fitness development.


I've previously discussed earlier in this thread the other false notion, that one needs to ride at an intensity which is significantly reliant on FFA metabolism in order to lose excess body fat. All that matters for that is the overall calorie balance, not the nature of fuel substrate utilisation per se.


As for the use of the term efficiency - please keep in mind that efficiency is an indicator of output as a proportion of input, and as such we get no more or less energy output from each gram of fat utilised, so there is no change to our fat burning efficiency that can occur - it's a fixed chemical equation.

However the chemical efficiency of aerobic metabolism of fats and of glycogen are slightly different, so that overall efficiency (energy delivered to the cranks as proportion of total energy metabolised) is very slightly affected by our fitness since that changes the ratio of fats and glycogen utilised, although in practical terms, not so much simply because when training we tend to ride up to our fitness level and use a high proportion of glycogen anyway.

mattshrops

Been looking at some of my 2-4 hr rides. Attempting to do zone 2(power) and finding that say in a 3 hr ride i will have only done 1hr max in zone 2. one reason would be living in shropshire although not mountainous it is fairly lumpy, so i end up with a fair bit of z3 z4 even z5 and as a consequence spend about an hour in z1 as well.
My season goals are to be good at all distances . I wish. Specifically some 100TT plus a 12hrTT.With that in mind i'm wanting to have a good base. Putting the two parts of this post together i've decided that 1 hr on the turbo at z2 is a more specific "hit". So 1 long ride 5-9 hrs, various turbo sessions to includeall zones -with as much z2 as poss.
Thoughts please?

Edit: obv. will be ramping up the power after christmas

Alex_Simmons/RST

mattshrops wrote:

Thoughts please?

I don't think one can sensibly give specific advice, without far more detailed knowledge of the individual in question.

But if I were to give general advice, it would be to progress from general aerobic conditioning (e.g. lifting FTP) to specific conditioning (which will depend on the event/target/goals and may be e.g. extending ride duration capacity).

phreak

Thanks for the long reply Alex. Am I right in taking from that post therefore that if you have an hour for training, you're better off doing a tempo session than you are a base session as you then improve both FTP and your energy from fat ratio?

Out of interest, if that is the case, what's the rationale behind so many books (Friel et al) suggesting doing base work over the winter? Is that more for people with plenty of time?

bahzob

Bigpikle wrote:

Alex_Simmons/RST wrote:

amaferanga wrote:

bahzob wrote:

- You should be doing 20 minute intervals at FTP or above.

Plenty of other parts of your post that I'd take issue with, but this is simply wrong.

+1

One might do intervals at that level at times, but it is neither compulsory nor necessary to make tremendous gains in fitness and it can in fact be counter productive to attempt to ride that hard every time you do such training.

This is my experience as well. Doing these at or above FTP means more fatigue for little if any benefit, so you cant do them as often. Do them at sweetspot, 85-88% of FTP, means you can do these sessions day after day if you want, accumulating good quantities of time at L3/4 without creating so much fatigue that you have to take a rest day or do an easy day. I do like to occasionally do a 100-105% FTP session if I know I have some forced rest days afterwards though, like a work trip or something that keeps me off the bike to recover.

Have spent the last 3 weeks racking up lots of sweetspot 2x20 sessions day after day, with a only a few days off, and this simply wouldnt have been possible if I did them at FTP or above!

This is just plain daft. Your FTP is the power you can sustain for a solid 60 minutes.

If you get exhausted doing 20 minutes at less than that number and/or need a "recovery" day after doing 40 FTP minutes with a 5 minute rest midway then either you are ill or your FTP is wrong.

The zone 85-88% of FTP is the zone you should be capable of doing massively more work. It's the zone that tour riders (and me for that matter) do the big mountain climbs at, so big intervals repeated multiple times per day, day after day. Yes they/I get tired as a result but they/I also will typically end up getting fitter as well.

I simply do not understand the benefit of doing 20 minutes at a pace you should be able to sustain for well over an hour and then having a break. What's the point?

t.m.h.n.e.t

Alex_Simmons/RST wrote:

However the chemical efficiency of aerobic metabolism of fats and of glycogen are slightly different, so that overall efficiency (energy delivered to the cranks as proportion of total energy metabolised) is very slightly affected by our fitness since that changes the ratio of fats and glycogen utilised, although in practical terms, not so much simply because when training we tend to ride up to our fitness level and use a high proportion of glycogen anyway.

Understatement :P According to my coursework,complete breakdown of 1 glucose molecule generates 36moles of ATP. 1 fat molecule (1glycerol and 3 fatty acids) will yield 460moles of ATP.

Clearly fat is the greater energy source, not only on a chemical but dietry level (9cals per g fat/ 4cals per g carb) but the efficiency and rate at which the fat is broke down, does leave preference for carbs.

Also suggests that intensity 60%-95% max effort uses primarily the lactate system which is limited in ATP production and duration. Predominant muscle fiber recruitment changes at that point too.

Alex_Simmons/RST

phreak wrote:

Thanks for the long reply Alex. Am I right in taking from that post therefore that if you have an hour for training, you're better off doing a tempo session than you are a base session as you then improve both FTP and your energy from fat ratio?

viewtopic.php?p=17958394#p17958394

phreak wrote:

Out of interest, if that is the case, what's the rationale behind so many books (Friel et al) suggesting doing base work over the winter? Is that more for people with plenty of time?

Depends on what you or anyone else means by "base".

Base to me is anything that improves FTP / sustainable aerobic power / general aerobic condition. You can achieve that in many ways but they all have one thing in common, i.e. appropriate changes in workload, with workload being a function of both duration and intensity. There is typically little need for a lot of, or any regular structured, supra-threshold work during such "base" phases, however there are still occasional circumstances where it can be useful.