DopeyBadger
Imagathoner
- Joined
- Oct 15, 2015
Here's an article (Part 1 of 3) that talks some about the use of a training load calculator (link).
*I do often wonder if the Hard, Moderate, Easy is an applicable idea to endurance running (like a marathon) training.
I mean my "Fitness" is about 62.9. Does that really mean I should limit myself to a hard workout of 94 - 125.8. Because an easy LR of 13 miles (90 min) is a stress score of 118. My M Tempo of 13 miles (16 total) was a HRSS of 149. A 19 mile LR is about 165. I guess it's possible these workouts are just too aggressive for my current chronic training load.
And another describing the appearance of the graph trends (link).
So a form that stays constant means your training load is increasing at a steady rate. In theory, if you continued to increase at a steady rate you'd never drop out of "optimal" training. But we know that can't be true. Because eventually you will hit a wall of sorts physically that tells you, "this isn't optimal anymore". So there has to be some reason we can't stay in optimal forever, nor should we. And I think that comes down to the muscular/skeletal system in running. The training load (Stravistix) is very good at approximating training load via heart rate. But one of the key fallbacks to using this tool as a sole method of evaluating training load in my opinion (I wasn't able to find anything to back this up) is that I think it misses the mark on muscular/skeletal recovery. There's good research to show that bone remodeling happens every 28 days. Important for runners, but much less important for cyclists. The data suggests that having a cutback week every 4 weeks is a vital component to avoiding bone injuries because that "recovery week" allows the muscles/bones to rebuild and recover. But if someone stayed in a constant state of "optimal" and a steady form value it may (or may not) suggest that they may be lacking in cutback recovery weeks. So I think it's important to see some ebb and flow in the form value. Sometimes in the -20 range and sometimes in the -10 range. If things are moving consistently but with cutbacks, then you should see the value rise and fall. I think the one place where you might not see some ebb and flow is when someone is returning to fitness from an injury. When returning to a prior training load previously achieved, I could see the argument for a consistently increasing training load without the need for cutback weeks.
How To Analyze Runners' Training Load In WKO4 Using The Performance Manager Chart
Here's how mine looks:
Dec - Jan = Dopey Challenge
Jan - Feb = Stress Fracture
Feb - March = Biking
March - Mid-April = Recovery Running
Mid-April - Now = Training for October Marathon
There have been a few bumps in the road along the way (stung by wasp in mid-April, HM in June, missed 1/2 run 2 weeks ago). I did intentionally cutback this past week's mileage from what was scheduled because I didn't want an aggressive increase in training load (from 48 miles to 70 miles was too aggressive, so I went from 48 to 60). Thus, I have stagnated my training a bit here the last few weeks. You can see my ebb and flow with the sole purpose of reducing training load to attempt to stave off a bone injury though through most of the training from March to now.
This training on the other hand did lead to a stress fracture. This was post marathon October 2017 to Dopey 2018. Not much ebb and flow. Stayed right on the line of optimal for most of the training. Ended up with a stress fracture with the first run back in mid-January.
I guess we'll see if the change pays off.
