Looking for some advice about what to focus on this winter as there’s a ton of very confusing methodology out there.
For context, I am 50 next year, training for l’etape and have about 5-6 hours to train - sometimes this is longer if the weather is nice enough to be outside.
My question is what would be best periodisation? I get that a low intensity high volume method is probably no good as I have limited time, but should I then stick at a threshold approach, reverse periodisation, what about polarisation. How would I figure this out?
The way that I work it with Pav is to do a lot of intensity during the winter going after threshold power increases. Then as weather gets better start to increase duration. I have found that this works really well for me. Can’t remember which periodisation this is. It may be your default option anyway, just because you don’t have time for more.
I would recommend what @Kicikacsa suggests - when you have limited time (& the weather is crap outside!), you might find better results from training power in winter and shifting to endurance in spring.
Obviously you need to work out the timing and ensure that you address weaknesses in winter, so if you have significant challenges riding the bike for a coupe of hours, then you probably do need to work on that during winter too or you’ll end up not being able to get enough endurance training done in spring ahead of l’etape.
That said, I’m not a coach, so do agree with @uktester too - speak to Pav!
