Use HR and power?

bobmcstuff

Alex_Simmons/RST wrote:

If you are quickly hitting and sustaining a HR that occurs when riding a hard 20-min or threshold type effort, then it's very likely that your power output started far too hard and then faded throughout the effort. Well paced efforts will see a gradual rise in HR all through the effort, and initially it may take 2-3 minutes for HR to reach "threshold" level, even though your power output has already been there for some time.

That is how I used to do it - but following a similar post by yourself previously I now set up my intervals so there is a gradual HR rise (rather than going straight from recovery to z4 or whatever).

I'm sure it's not perfect though, I know power is better.

Alex_Simmons/RST

bobmcstuff wrote:

Alex_Simmons/RST wrote:

If you are quickly hitting and sustaining a HR that occurs when riding a hard 20-min or threshold type effort, then it's very likely that your power output started far too hard and then faded throughout the effort. Well paced efforts will see a gradual rise in HR all through the effort, and initially it may take 2-3 minutes for HR to reach "threshold" level, even though your power output has already been there for some time.

That is how I used to do it - but following a similar post by yourself previously I now set up my intervals so there is a gradual HR rise (rather than going straight from recovery to z4 or whatever).

I'm sure it's not perfect though, I know power is better.

Cool.

From the perspective of the impact on performance, pacing them better is better for racing (e.g. in time trials), but perfect pacing isn't necessary for improving fitness. It's when pacing is so bad that you really aren't doing the same work that the benefit is reduced. It's about doing enough (consistent) work at the right level, not the precise wattage, that matters.