3 Training Sessions To AVOID At All Costs

This episode of the Get Fast podcast is brought to you, as always, by Trivalo Coaching, where we help triathletes and cyclists like you train smarter to race faster. You are joined, as always, by your host, former Australian Ironman champion, Jared Donnelly. And I am Jordan Donnelly. In today's episode, we are talking about three training sessions that you should never do. Three training sessions that you must avoid. In one of our recent podcasts, we we talked about three training sessions you absolutely must include in your training week. And in this episode, we're looking at three common training sessions and scenarios that most athletes out there are actually doing, which you should absolutely should not be doing. Three training sessions that you want to be avoiding like the plague. So I can't wait to get into this. But before that, what's caught your attention this week? Dad?

The most significant thing that I came across this weekend, just gone by, was.

Not a world stage thing. It was very minor, but it just made me think about how catastrophic things can be in your own little world if things don't go your way.

The example is we did a time.

Trial on Saturday, and I think my power meter might have been reading slightly off on the day. And did you calibrate it? I did. I did. I calibrated it, and it was a number that I was not used to seeing. And no matter how many times I calibrated it, it wasn't going to go back to the number I'm used to seeing. So I had an inkling that there was something wrong, but I had to start the ride and do the race and just follow what I thought was the right numbers. And anyway, as I was starting to ride the race, we were doing roughly 10 minutes out, 10 minutes back, repeated twice.

So 40 odd minutes.

And on the way out, it was a little bit of a headwind. So looking at the power, I felt like I was riding quite solid, but the power was reading about 10 or 15 watts lower than normal.

There's a few checks and balances that.

I have just so that I don't panic. And one is the average speed. But that's okay if it's not windy. If it's calm, you can rely on average speed after power. So heart rate's another thing. But you have to wait for at least five or six minutes for heart rate to get to its, you know, a point where you're working because you've started at resting heart rate of 70, and it might take five minutes to go from 70 to 140 to 150. So that's not reliable data either in the initial stage of the race. So really, by the time I got to the 10 minute mark, I was convinced that my power was reading low. And I was looking at my average speed and my average heart rate. And I knew that they were concerned, still in control and not. Not riding slow like the power was telling me I was. And one of the indicators I used was when I turned around, the riders who were chasing me hadn't really gained on me. So that was the first indicator. I am relying on them not blowing up their race and relying on their race plan a little bit. But that's one of the things I used. And by the time I got back to the end of the 10 minute mark, I had an out and back average speed. And it was as high as it's been on that course, in fact, ever. So that gave me a really good feeling. I felt comfortable. My heart rate hasn't spiked yet. I've ridden really fast, average speed with low power. So then I used the numbers that I'd used on the way out and back and repeated that and tried to improve it a little bit. And that was a way around something that could have been catastrophic. If I had have saw 280 instead of 300, which I normally see, I would have tried to ride 300 and blown up after 14 or 15 minutes out of the 40 minutes and had a pretty average day. But because I had backup plans. So I just thought that would be something that I think the listeners, you know, don't panic in these situations, have something as a backup. And of course the heart rate after.

15 or 20 minutes really started to.

Get where it normally is.

And I was using that a little bit and the lower power number to kind of work out how much more I could push. And obviously as you get towards the end of the event, you can push as hard as you like because the risk is less. So that was the first thing. And then the next day you wouldn't believe it, but I broke the derailleur on my bike. So I had to get back home, change bikes and then rejoin the ride. And we were doing an hour's climb up Mount Donabewang, which is a local hill. And it is a long climb, 17k for an hour.

And I was on a different bike that I don't use on the hills. And I hadn't ridden that bike for so long, I'd forgotten what my threshold number power was on that bike. And so I was guessing again. And here I was in exactly the same position as I was the day before with no real power, but I was using cadence gears that I normally would ride in. That was one thing I was looking at, trying to hit around that 70 to 75 RPM. And so therefore I know what gear I should be in. And the power, the power number was reading low again. But there are other riders on the ride that I know who are better than me or worse than me, and I was in the right position on the climb. So, you know, As I got 15 minutes, 20 minutes in, 30 minutes in, I understood the number that I should be riding at and was able to maintain that. So it was another example of just knowing so much about everything you do. Really helps in making better decisions so that you get the outcome of the training session or the race. One was a training session, one was a race. And that's what caught my attention is far out. This can be catastrophic for people or you can still get an outcome.

It's funny, isn't it, because we are so power driven and we really push power, we push people to learn about power to the point where we almost say at the start, forget about your speed, forget about everything else and just focus on understanding your power and understanding your power numbers. Because it's. At first it's confusing and it's a little bit. There's a lot to understand about it. And then now you're saying the more experience you get, you then need to translate that knowledge to, okay, what does my power equate to, speed wise? You know, when I'm riding at my threshold, power, what does that normally give me? Speed wise? What kind of cadence is that? Normally, when you have all that data, what does this actually feel like normally? And so, so when you have all this data, when you get more experienced on race day, if something goes wrong, you can then back it up with this stuff. Whereas if you don't know that the first time you try and go to feel or go to speed or go to cadence, you're gonna be completely out of whack because it's going to feel easier at the start. You're probably going to blow up. And I guess it's a really big point that the more experience you have, you can actually use speed, et cetera, to your advantage. Whereas if you don't have that experience, speed's gonna throw you off.

Yeah, there's so many assets that you've got in your armoury you don't actually realize you have and, you know, power is the number one. And then you've got all the other things, such as Obviously, the feeling that you have and that, you know there's problems with all the other options. Power doesn't lie. It is what it is. The number is what it is. You either push it or you don't. And that's the number.

But in your case, it wasn't what it was.

That's right, yes, for this example. But that's why the other things, which are less valuable, they've got more error margin for error, such as heart rate, because of the lag, such as average speed, because of the wind cadence, you know, that can be helpful, but it's not really that helpful. And, you know, there. And going by feel, obviously you feel fresh at the start and that can throw you out completely. So there's four things that can help you with the five total things that you should be relying on that can help you make better decisions. And that's what we're saying.

That's really good. And that's a really good. And what caught your attention this week? What caught my attention this week is a little bit of a funny anecdote, is one of my friends tried to start cycling the last couple of months and it's been hard to watch them get into the sport of cycling, because cycling and triathlon, they are tough sports to get into. There is a lot of setup, there is a lot to get right. And when you don't get it, it can be really frustrating. And I guess for him, he didn't know how much stuff that was needed because you just think, I need to go get a bike. Once you get the bike, then I actually need to buy a helmet with it and some shoes as well. And you need to buy actual nicks so that. Yeah, because you can't sit in the seat for more than 10 minutes if you don't buy nicks. And then once you get your shoes, you have to make sure you get the right pedals for them. And so he ended up buying a friend's bike and then didn't realize that you're supposed to buy shoes and cleats. It was just normal pedals. And went for his first ride and both tyres were flat and had to walk home because the tires were flat after a kilometer. No spears, no spares, no. It was just really, really hard to watch. Yeah, no pump came home and didn't know how to use the pump and they just weren't having a very good time. And to be honest, in the first month they went for two rides because there was just so much set up around it that was going wrong. And they said they're really not enjoying it anyway. Once they went for their ride, they didn't even enjoy it. They were so slow and everyone was flying past them. I just said, to be honest, if I had those pedals, I wouldn't enjoy the ride either. You would never see me go for a ride without cleats now, because it just makes such a difference. Um, and I know that recreational riders are different, but really, it's just been hard to watch for the last two months. The person go for two or three rides and just keep trying to almost not shortcut, but trying to fix little problems at a time. Whereas if they just were just able to know what they needed at the start, get the whole setup properly and realize that, okay, this is what the setup's going to take. This is everything I need. If I'm willing to be a cyclist or it's the same for triathlons, get into it. If I understand that I need to do all this, I'm going to do it and do it properly. It's going to be going to be a much more enjoyable experience. Whereas if you try and do it the other way, where you think you don't need everything, because eventually you do, you end up just being frustrated. And it's been very hard to watch and it's not worth doing because it's just. I said to him, I wouldn't want to cycle with all that stuff either. You know, you want to do it properly. I found that really funny to watch, to be honest.

Yeah, I think the decision you make, like, I remember exactly that scenario when I very first started. I was in exactly the same position. And the reluctance to admit that you have to spend money to get yourself set up properly is something you fight with the whole journey of when you start. And no, I'll be right. This bike will be fine. It's a piece of crap bike, but it'll be fine. You know, the tyre is our last one ride and I'll get a puncture and I'll be walking home. But all these things happen because you're just taking shortcuts the whole time. And you really need to think clearly about when you want to take on triathlon. The setup cost is if you want to compete or just be a recreational cyclist, there's a vast difference between the two. Being a recreational cyclist, you still need to set up with the basics that are going to make it enjoyable, because if not, you're going to hate the experience. And as. As your friend has already experienced that it's something that will absolutely turn you off. And yeah, it's, it's a really good point to make that you don't realize because we're so involved in the, in the sport that, that it is hard for a newcomer to come in and, and actually understand what the requirements are for the setup. Whether it's triathlon or cycling. It is an enormous first step to, and I've said to many people, be, be a little bit assured that this is what you want to do because you could end up spending a couple thousand dollars and end up not liking it and you've kind of wasted your money.

Yeah. Yeah. I guess the upside is with a lot of this stuff there is resale value on, on bikes, that kind of thing. So if you do buy a time trial bike and you don't like it, you actually can resell it for usually a pretty good price. Yeah.

Unless you're a novice and you're getting.

Into the sport and you don't know.

That the price of that bike, you just pur.

Just is. Yeah, we have spoken about that a bit though. I think it's worth mentioning that depending on your goal, but if you want to enjoy the experience, it's worth spending the money on a TT bike, for example. And if you're happy to, you know, get through the event like you always say, and you're not worried about your performance, then getting the basics is all you need. Just make sure you have the basics set up right. But if you're going to be disappointed because you didn't perform well and performing well is whatever it means to you, but if Your goal is sub six hours for a 70.3 and you're going to be disappointed if you don't achieve that, then it's well worth thinking about upgrading your equipment and getting a TT bike in that exact example.

We used the example last couple of weeks where I did a time trial.

On the road bike, then I did a time trial on the time trial.

Bike and I averaged three kilometres an.

Hour slower on the road bike.

So if you put that into a 90k time trial, which would be between two and a half to three hours, it's possibly between nine and 12 minutes slower for the same person riding two different machines. So that puts it in perspective for me. I was going, whoa, I don't think I'd be happy with that outcome.

Yeah, absolutely.

Good.

So on that note, we'll get into the topic of today's podcast. We're not here just to sell and try and make people buy TT bikes, but it's Just a common thing that comes up with a lot of athletes is, should I get one, should I not? And in this example, it was just a reminder for me that you will enjoy the experience more if you can get set up properly. But anyway, getting into today's topic. So three training sessions that you must absolutely avoid in your training week. So you've got a bit of a different spin on this. But take us through what is the very first training session that you'd like to avoid, you'd like an athlete to avoid throughout their week?

Well, I suppose it can be controversial what we're about to say, because there are, there are positives and negatives for everything that we're going to talk about.

I feel like you say that a lot. I know everything we say is going to be controversial.

Yeah, because, because some people just, they, they haven't thought through the options. And even when you and I discuss this, you know, we, we have a debate about, well, is that valuable or is it not valuable? Because it comes down to what is the outcome that you're trying to achieve with each session to make sessions worthwhile or worth or worthless. And definitely the bunch or squad or individual event session where you're doing a group session has the least value. And that's kind of how I want to frame it a bit because I don't think there really is such a thing as a bad session. It's a session that didn't get the.

Outcome that would be, you know, a.

Better way of framing it. But, but certainly there are sessions that you should avoid. And definitely the bunch ride is one where I'm a fan of it to, to a point. If you can achieve the bunch ride with the outcome that you're specifically trying to, to perform. And for a cyclist, that is a really good session, as long as you can do the warm up and the cool down and the main set the way you want it to happen. And if you're trying to do a recovery ride and you select the bunch ride, that is a crap session to select because you're going to be going possibly at 50Ks an hour or 20Ks an hour, depends on who's in the bunch and what their day is. So that's an example of how bad a session that would be. If you're doing a recovery ride and you might think, sit there and say, well, why would you do a bunch ride? If you try and do a recovery ride? I see it every single day around where I ride, the guy's doing bunch rides and then someone in their bunch takes off and the rest of the bunch chase them. So what happened to the recovery ride that we all agreed on? So that's an example of how bunch rides or riding with groups. And same in running groups. You might start off with a group that says, today we're just going to ride easy tempo and that's what the run's going to be. All of a sudden someone in the squad is feeling good and his easy tempo starts to go into threshold and then he starts to really stride out and the competitive nature of the group will start to follow him. So all of a sudden you're getting a different outcome from the session that you originally agreed that you were going to do. And you've got two choices in the bunch. As a rider, you can let them all go, which is what I regularly do, but I won't put myself in that position anyway. Or as a runner, end up running by yourself and let the runners do their thing. So, yeah, they're examples of how selecting to ride with squads or running squads or swimming squads or bunch rides can be really useless to your program. And I think that's the point we're trying to make. It can be really valuable if it's done in the right way, but it can be really detrimental to your overall program. And again, it comes out, what are the outcomes you're trying to achieve in this today's session? Is it sub threshold? Is it intensity? Is it recovery? And if you can't establish that before you go with a bunch or a squad run or a squad swim, you should avoid it. So that is the number one thing that I think the majority of keen, enthusiastic, competitive athletes, whether they're swimmers, runners or cyclists or triathletes, that's the biggest mistake they make, is they're doing sessions that aren't related to what they were trying to achieve.

That makes a lot of sense. So really, if you're going to join a swimming squad, a running squad or a bunch ride on the bike, you must ask the question first, what is my objective of this ride? And is this group training session going to meet that? And more often than not, it'll probably be a no. But another point on this is that if you, if your objective of the session is to have a hard, high intensity training session and you're about to jump into a swim squad or a running squad, often this session is still too high intensity for a triathlete, for example, because you would say that triathletes don't need to be training that high intensity with their running or with Their swimming and it ends up ruining the rest of the week. Is that right?

Yeah. Look, I think we should split the swim ride and run. And we've talked about this a little bit last week when talking about the three best sessions.

So swimming and riding, you can really.

Do more intensity in those sessions as compared to running as a triathlete.

We're talking. So if you're finding that the running.

Sessions are too intense, you will actually struggle to do the next bike session because you're so sore from. Obviously it's a gravity style running action where you're holding yourself up as compared to on a bike or in the pool. So the fatigue levels are massive for running with intensity as compared to. It's very tiring swimming with intensity, there's no doubt about that. But, but on the bike and in the pool you don't have the same pounding that you get as a runner. So I'm suggesting that squad runners should be very careful about running any squad groups with intensity. As a triathlete, that is probably not the best scenario. You want to get your intensity from.

The swim and the bike.

But having said that, if you do too much intensity in the water, you will be very tired from that and it will affect you as a runner.

And a bike rider by swimming far too hard for too long. And you know, a lot of the.

Swim squads, they're specifically swim squads, they're.

Not triathlon squads where they're catering, knowing.

That they've got two other sports to train for.

So they end up doing, you know, three to four to five kilometer sessions.

Which is really tiring.

And especially if you're just beginning in the sport, you know, you should be.

Starting off with 800 to 1000 to 1200 meters and progressing your way over a period of however long. You've given yourself 6 to 8 to 12 months to work your way up. If you're doing Ironman to a three to a three and a half to 4K session, you know, you can't throw yourself into a 6,5K 4K session when you've just started swimming. And I see guys on the bike jumping into a six hour ride because their mates are going, you know, to this, to Sorrento on back as an.

Example, when they've only done a 90 minute endurance ride. Sure, they'll get there, but how much is it going to take out of them for the next week or possibly two weeks from that endurance ride where they've really pushed their body way too far? Same with a running group. You know, if you, if you start running with a group and they're doing an hour and a half training session and your longest run's 45 minutes. You kind of struggle and not only in the session, but the days after. So that point about what is a bad session to do, sessions that you're not actually prepared for, ready for, but you know, the squad is the big problem, the bunch riders, a big problem. So we use it sparingly and it is in our program because we use it to our advantage, not to our disadvantage. And that's what I see happening as a bike rider. I see so many guys repeating. And that's the next point, the same session, which is a bunch ride seven.

Days a week on the running front before we jump onto that and jump into that second point. It reminds me of something you say all the time, which is that triathlon is not a high intensity sport. Granted, a sprint triathlon is a bit more high intensity, but even then it's still an hour race. You know, it's not, it's not short. So why are triathletes jumping into running groups and running squads where it's really high intensity sessions, you know, 6 by 1k or something like that, 6 by 500 meters, trying to keep up with the runners. You can, like you said, it's all context dependent. So you can do that once per week, maybe max, but doing that multiple times per week, it's not conducive to the sport of triathlon. You're trying to be an endurance runner and so you need to be doing more running off the bike, more endurance sessions, more variety that way, rather than just repeating the high intensity sessions with the running group, which is going to ruin your week.

Yeah. The law of diminishing returns is if you push something too far for too.

Long, it will break.

And you know, we have said many times in order to progress your fitness.

You need to have some sort of.

Overload, you need to train with some intensity. And, and that's, we still stand by that. But there's ways of getting it, as we've said many times, you know, as a triathlete, you can get that from swimming and riding and possibly one session per week as a runner, just so that you get the feel of what you want to do on race day. And if you are doing a sprint triathlon, it's a 5k flat out. So you are running at your threshold. If you're doing a half marathon or a marathon, it's obvious you're not running flat out. So you need to do your sessions that Relate to what you're going to do on race day. You want to maintain your fitness as a runner. Your skeletal and your muscular systems, they need to be able to withstand the fatigue factor that's going to happen after in an Ironman, you know, a six hour ride and an hour swim. After seven hours you're going to run a marathon. So think about that. That's what you're actually trying to do. After seven hours of the toughest swim and toughest ride I've ever done, I'm now going to run a marathon. So you're not really going to be.

Running with much intensity but you need to have fitness to be able to.

Sustain that three to four hour, some for four and a half to five hours of walk running. So we need to not be so concentrated as an ironman runner in 400 repeats because they're just not relevant to what you're trying to achieve in the Ironman. Sure you will be a faster runner by doing 400 repeats, 1K repeats, but you want to, you want to make sure the intensity is so similar to what's going to happen on race day. So you would try to do, you know, 3 by 15 minutes or 2 by 20 minutes at around that marathon race pace that is going to be more relatable and more so much accurate measurement against what you're going to do in the race as what you're going to do in training. So that's the session where you can get some fitness build. But you know, a lot of the time we're trying to do some strength running and they're all the good sessions but the bad session is pushing the intensity too much so that we've already identified that it's not actually what you need in an Ironman. But the risk of injury is so evident with the majority of triathletes who don't even get to the start line because they've done Tuesday, Thursday, Saturday hard running and they're, they're so broken by the time they get to the start line that they're, you know, they've missed half of their running sessions anyway. So, so we're saying that yes, you need some intensity but try and get it from other, the other two sports. As a cyclist, of course you can, you can risk more because the, you're not, you're not doing, you know, the bike's protecting you a lot more. So you will still get sore legs by doing strength efforts and lots of hill climbing and lots of endurance. You do have fatigue, muscular fatigue, the same in the pool with high intensity swimming and endurance swimming. But at the end of the day, you can recover from them better than you can from a runner's point of view.

That brings us to our second point, which is what you just mentioned before. It's not necessarily a specific session to avoid, but to avoid doing certain sessions too many times throughout the week.

Yep. So whether we pick on the bunch or whether we pick on high intensity, or whether we pick on recovery, you don't want to repeat them over and over.

You need to have variety.

So what, you know, bunch session is a great session, but if you keep doing it five times or six times or three times, it now becomes a session to avoid. Because you're repeating the same activity with the same intensity the majority of the time. You know, it might be between 80 and 90% day after day. You're never training in the 110%, you're never training in the 40%. So that's what's wrong with that repetition training. When you're missing out on the variety of other things that can enable you to train harder because you've recovered better. So without having those things, we've said this many times, but we're trying to identify things that are going to be detrimental to the progression of your program. So not only do you not progress with fitness gains, you actually get tired by doing the same things over and over again. So what are the three mistakes we've identified? One, the second one is repeating sessions. It's not an individual session. If you repeat too many recovery sessions, you're not going to progress for different reasons. If you repeat too many high intensity sessions, you're not going to progress. You will to a point and then start to regress. If you repeat too many endurance rides in one week, you're eventually not going to progress. So that's, that's our measurement of, of what the value is of each session is. Will I progress with this if I can do it for an extended period of time? And you know, whether we're talking about nutrition or whether we're talking about anything, if you do it with extremeness, it's unsustainable. We've said that so often. So you need to be moderate in everything. So you need to have a variety of moderation rather than extremeness in everything. So extremeness example is doing four weeks of bunch rides, seven days a week, 28 days high intensity bunch rides. And people go, who would, who would do that? I see majority of people doing that, majority of bike riders doing that.

Not even seven days. Even just Five days.

Yeah, well, there are so many who.

That's what they do. They do the bunch ride every day. And unless there's someone really good in.

That bunch ride to say, hang on.

A minute, today we're going to actually.

Not ride that hard.

But I guarantee someone who's missed three sessions, who joins that bunch, who's fresh.

He'S gonna go, stuff that I want to ride hard today. And then the competitive nature takes over and therefore that session becomes useless.

Ties in really well with that first point is that if you are doing all your sessions with a bunch or with a group, then you're dictated to by the group rather than your own individual goals and your purpose of the week.

Yeah, and you know, the example I could use which really hits home is if you're doing a time trial and you see, let's take an individual cyclist.

Doing a time trial and he gets passed and he thinks, I normally beat.

That person, what am I doing wrong? All of a sudden he starts doing, trying to keep up with that person, which is doing their race plan. You're already happy with your race plan.

In a triathlon, you get out of the water and you're on your bike.

Thousands of people are passing you.

You start questioning what am I doing?

Am I right here or am I the only one out of a thousand people that's doing the right thing? Well, yes, you actually are. So they're examples of, you know, just because the masses are doing something doesn't mean that it's right.

That's perfect. So that kind of ties in with the last point as well, which is they all kind of tie in together really well, but the doing the wrong sessions for the individual. So what do you mean by this?

So I think that the example I.

Would give is someone who's preparing for.

Let's just choose a gran fondo 6.

Hour or an Ironman 12 hour.

And if you go and do a.

6 hour ride in your first week of a 25 week program, that's potentially not a good idea.

You could possibly do it, but that's.

Actually the wrong session to do at that time of your progression. And plenty of people do it. I've just selected, I'm doing the Ironman, let's start our program. And the Ironman's probably a six hour ride. Let's start with a six hour ride just to see I'm doing a marathon. I might run 30k in the first week. And these scenarios sound ridiculous, but I've seen it happen many times. And the other extreme thing is not doing enough of that. So the order of the individual day session and the order in the plan, they're the two. You can specifically look at both of those. So when should you be doing the six hour? When you're preparing for a six hour gran fondo, well, towards the end you've progressed from two hours to two and a half to three, four, five and you get yourself a month out to be doing a six hour and possibly a seven hour. So the come race day, you've built yourself up slowly, you've not fatigued yourself throughout the whole period, you're not a wreck. Every Saturday that you do an endurance ride, your body can adapt properly, so it's possibly not going to get sick or injured. So these are all the reasons why we would do these things in order. So that's the first thing. And then when to do them and when to do the other sessions, the good sessions and when to avoid those bad sessions. So for example, if you do do the Saturday six hour ride that you've worked well up to the next day, you wouldn't go out and ride flat out doing a high intensity session, you would need some recovery. So that high intensity session is a great session, but on the right day in your schedule. So a session can be great, but it can be also bad if it's on the wrong day and knowing what to do first. Is the six hour ride a good idea in week one? No. In week 14, yeah. So it is a good session one day and it's a bad session another day. Is a high intensity session a good idea? Absolutely it is, but it's not a good idea after a six hour endurance ride. So it can be a good and bad session. So where it sits in the program each day, Monday through to Saturday, Sunday, and where it sits in the actual block of the progression. So I think the headline is what are the three bad sessions? But it's more about where they sit, what to do and when to do it. So we want that high intensity session, we want that six hour session, but we want it at the right time, the appropriate time, so that it becomes a value session to us that hits the outcomes we're trying to achieve and not something that's going to be detrimental to our progression. That is the key thing that we're trying to identify in this podcast today to understand what to do and when to do it.

Would you say that's an underestimated factor in a training week is backing up too many hard days in a row? You think people overestimate the Ability to back up.

Yeah, the catch up session is. That probably could have been the fourth point. I missed that session. I'll just catch it up.

Well, that's okay if you keep moving.

Sessions around and are prepared to sacrifice.

One of the other sessions.

But for example, I'll give the example of someone who didn't do the endurance ride on Saturday and then did it on the Sunday and they were meant to do an endurance run on the Sunday, so they moved the endurance run to Monday and on Tuesday morning they were meant to do a high intensity bike session. At what point do they think they're going to recover at this stage? So the Tuesday morning high intensity session, if you want to do that, then Wednesday has to be some sort of recovery day and Thursday possibly again. So the decisions you make to move one session to play catch up and which session should you avoid? Well, definitely, as we talked last week, the three key sessions is not to avoid the endurance. So. So he has done a good decision by moving it back, but he needs to let go of one of the other sessions so that he can actually catch up properly, which is do the key sessions that count and then recover better. So there's an example of what we're.

Talking about here and another way to look at that is that even if you want to try and force yourself to do all the hard sessions because you are afraid of missing a session, you, you're going to end up not being able to do them well. You're going to not be able to push as high power, you're not going to be fresh, you're going to be extremely tired and the session's going to be poor quality anyway. So you might as well have recovered.

Yeah, not hitting the targets is just as bad as not doing the session. So if you're not going to hit the targets, then I would, I would recommend that you would be doing a recovery anyway, abandon it because the value of that session and the outcome is not being achieved. So that's a good opportunity to change.

Yeah. Well, that's great. That's a really good summary that pretty much gives us a good analysis of the mistakes that you can make in your training programs and what kind of training sessions to avoid. And they're factors that are probably just like you said throughout this whole thing, even with the extreme examples, they are common scenarios among athletes and triathletes specifically. So if you find yourself doing these things, you might need to reconsider. And I think a summary of kind of what you said is that you need to think about the goal or purpose for the session. And if you don't know the goal or purpose, then that's probably an indication that it's not going to be a good session for you. Or if the goal and purpose is dictated by someone else that isn't in line with your goals for your event, then that's not going to be going to be a good session. But if you can safely say what the goal and purpose is, then the session is probably going to be right for you.

Yeah, that's really well summarized. And, you know, using the recovery ride as the example, not using any other session. What's the goal and purpose of my recovery? To get a little bit of blood flow around my legs so that the blood can carry oxygen to repair the damaged muscles from the hard sessions. And if I go too hard in this session, I've just sabotaged that. So understanding what the goal and purpose of recovery is, even though it doesn't progress your fitness, but it enables you to train properly the next day, you've achieved it. So that's a great session. And that's the point of what we're.

Trying to say today.

As long as you can understand what you just said there with the summary, the goal and the purpose of each session will dictate the value of it.

Perfect. That's a great way to finish. Thank you very much for listening to this episode and we'll see you next time.