I’ve just registered on Intervals.icu. I track all my data with a Garmin watch, and I’m looking for expert advice to structure a sustainable, long-term training routine.
My ultimate, non-negotiable goals are Ultra-endurance events: I want to build the body and the engine capable of finishing a Marathon, an Ultra-Trail, and eventually an Ultra-Triathlon. I currently have a full-time job, so my training time is precious, and I have zero experience in triathlon racing yet (though I own a trisuit and the basic gear to start).
Here is a detailed breakdown of my current fitness, data, and habits (averaging 4 to 5 sessions per week):
Running (1-2x/week): I usually run around 10 km per session. My current baseline is 5:50/km at an average of 160 BPM. I feel like my cardio is working a bit too hard for this pace, and I want to fix this engine leak.
Cycling (2x/week): I ride about 30 to 40 km per session on a road bike, averaging around 26 km/h.
Swimming (1-2x/week): This is my strong suit. I have a solid competitive/structured swimming background. I can effortlessly swim 1500m sessions with good technique. (Currently doing a bit less swimming due to my schedule, but the baseline is there).
Strength (1x/week): I include one core/strength session at home to prevent injuries.
My Main Challenges & Objectives:
Building the Aerobic House (Zone 2): I want to dramatically improve my fat-burning efficiency and cardiovascular capacity. My goal is to lower my heart rate significantly while running at a decent pace, and to be able to ride much longer distances without exploding my cardiac drift.
Consistency over Intensity: With my job, I cannot afford to burn out or get injured. I need a real, bulletproof routine that fits a working lifestyle but prepares the cellular foundations for Ultra distances.
Transitioning to Tri: I need to understand how to safely balance these three sports without overtraining.
My Questions for the Community:
Given my data (especially the 160 BPM at 5:50/km), how would you structure my typical training week on Intervals.icu for an Ultra-endurance pathway?
Which specific custom charts or metrics should I set up on my Intervals dashboard to monitor my aerobic decoupling (cardiac drift) and my long-term consistency?
Are there any free pre-built training blocks or plans on the platform that fit this “low-intensity high-volume progression” philosophy that I could import?
Thank you so much for reading through this long post, I am eager to learn from your data and experiences!
Wow, this is fascinating! Thank you so much for sharing this data. This is exactly what I am trying to achieve. Right now, during my runs, my heart rate goes up to 160 BPM for a 5:50/km pace, which feels too high for long-term ultra goals. Your ‘strict HR cap’ model seems perfect to help me lower my heart rate and build that durability. Did you use your Garmin to strictly monitor that 135 bpm ceiling during the rides? I’m definitely going to try this approach!
Make sure to check out the MadScienceMeetsRealLife link that is mentioned in the thread. Plenty of gold in all these sources, especially for Ultra and Tri.
Steve’s thread is a perfect start point. Easily digestible and the foundation for such a strategy.
Based on your experiment and my constraints (working full-time, 4-5 sessions/week), I structured a typical week. I would love to get your thoughts on it according to my current level:
Tuesday (Run): 45-60 min with a strict Garmin HR cap at 145 BPM (forcing myself to walk if it triggers).
Wednesday (Swim): 45 min / 1500m (my strong suit, structured/easy).
Thursday (Bike): 1h-1h15 of intensity/strength (Garmin cap OFF, 3x6 min high gear/high watts efforts).
Friday: 30-45 min core/bodyweight strength.
Sunday (Long Bike + Transition): 2h to 2h30 bike with a strict Garmin HR cap at 132 BPM, followed occasionally by a short 10-15 min brick run.
Do you think these HR caps (145 for run, 132 for bike) are correct to start with? And is one intensity session (Thursday) enough to build the engine for ultra distances without getting stuck as a ‘diesel’ runner?
Thanks again for your time, your data is a game-changer for me!"
It’s difficult to give advice based only on summaries/averages without seeing the session files, and obviously without deeply knowing your context (looking at your training history, trying to identify relevant sessions with bigger efforts, longer durations, etc).
However, one thing is important: it is possible that one long session may be worth more than several short ones. This is an important starting point, and I’ve seen athletes modify their training routines (especially regarding family/work enmeshment) once they understood and adopt this.
If I were supervising this training process, I would first ask the following questions, since the answers are fundamental for strategizing how you will reach your goals:
Regarding the long sessions (Sunday): you mentioned 2h to 2h30. But is that your actual time limit? As your fitness improves, how do you see your available time evolving for at least one long session per week over the next months/years?
For cycling: what is your terrain like? Does your region allow you to perform a prolonged, continuous, uninterrupted pacing, even at low intensity (Z2)? I work with some people who live in very hilly areas where it is impossible to ride for more than 10 minutes before reaching a steep descent. In those cases, the athlete’s first real contact with long uninterrupted efforts often happens on the smart trainer.
You mentioned having a strong swimming background. In that discipline, which distances did you competitively excel at?
Do you currently have knowledge or guidance regarding nutritional strategies, both for daily life and for training?
Thank you for these highly relevant questions. It makes total sense that context and long-duration dynamics change everything. Here are the answers to help strategize:
1. Time evolution for Sunday long sessions: Right now, 2h30 is a comfortable starting limit for my current fitness and schedule. However, as my fitness improves over the next months, I can definitely scale this up. On Sundays, I can free up to 3h30 or even 4h if needed as the ultra-distance goals get closer. My work/family constraints are flexible on that specific day.
2. Cycling terrain: I’m lucky to have access to both types of terrain right outside my door. I can easily choose a completely flat route for steady, continuous Zone 2 pacing, or head straight into pure, steep climbs when I need to work on power and intensity.
3. Swimming background: I used to competitively excel at short distances in swimming (sprints). Pacing and high anaerobic power in the water are things I feel very comfortable with, but extending that efficiency over very long durations will be part of the work.
4. Nutrition strategy: To be honest, this is a blank canvas. I try to eat healthy in my daily life, but I currently have no specific structural knowledge or guidance regarding targeted sports nutrition for training, fueling long sessions, or carbohydrate intake per hour. I am completely open to learning here.
Looking forward to your thoughts on how to adjust the strategy with these elements!
Based on my previous activities, I’d like to establish a sort of typical weekly training plan that I can gradually increase based on your advice, taking into account my current fitness level. Specifically, how many sessions would you recommend, at what pace, heart rate zone, and any other relevant comments, as these can be adjusted over the weeks? I have my first ultra-marathon planned for November; it will be an 80km race.
I just want to check my understanding. You are training for an 80km ultra-marathon (run?) in November. Currently you are planning to run 1x per week for 45 - 60 minutes. You describe the ultra-marathon as a race.
If my understanding is correct, then you are at odds with sources such as, for example, this
There’s a bit of a nuance here because the core of this strategy is to nudge up Work Capacity. When talking volume, almost everyone will think duration/distance.
What I’m experimenting with the last couple of weeks is to increase work by wearing a weight vest with slowly increasing ballast for my walks. My running performance is weak and I have never been able to run more then 3-4 times a week without becoming overly fatigued and getting heavy legs. Even when keeping HR below LT1. I do get 90-100 min per day of pedestrian activity, simply by walking my dog in the evening. But during the week I can’t extend time further then ~100min. I can’t walk any faster then I do now because I lack the technique for it. I do walk at 9:30min /km without any fatigue build-up and my HR is 90% of the time below 100bpm at that pace. By increasing ballast (weight vest) with 0.5kg 3 times a week, I do increase work. Pace remains about the same and HR goes a bit higher. This slow increase in effort of my walks, results in better running pace on run days, thus also a slow increase of work capacity without negative effects up until now. I’m curious to see how far I can take it that way.
On bike days, I walk in the evening, and I don’t run. Overall work volume is nowhere near what Steve is doing. I’m around 6700KJ per week at this moment and ~14hr of volume in time units, average 450-500 kj /hour. And I think I’m a bit older
I too think that your training volume is too low for such a demanding event. I would suggest to plan a more modest event for november this year and give yourself more time to build up to that capacity. Things must remain fun and healthy.
Yes, I want to prepare for an 80km ultra trail, but I also want to train for ultra triathlons, and that’s why I wanted to consult with the community to find out what training sessions I should be doing during the week to achieve my goals. I hope my message is clear.
3 hours on the bike. Allowing for warm up and cool downs, I would do as much sweetspot zone as possible, whilst allowing enough time for one intervals session per week to deliver 15-20 minutes VO2 (90-95% HRmax) work.
Others who know more may have other suggestions, but that is my 2p worth.
If I was planning for a specific event, I might consider periodisation of the training plan (i.e. base, build, race specific).
But, on three hours per week, I don’t think that would make enough difference to be worth thinking about.
Thanks for your input! Just to clarify, I think there’s a slight misunderstanding about my training volume.
When I mentioned 3 hours, I meant 3 hours just for the Sunday long ride, which I plan to build up to as my training evolves. Currently, my cycling baseline is around 80 km per week divided into 2 sessions (approx. 2h30 total for now), but this is on top of a full weekly schedule that includes running, sprint-background swimming, and strength training.
Given that my overall workload is quite global, doing ‘as much Sweetspot as possible’ for a long ride would generate too much fatigue and compromise my recovery for the other disciplines.
My main focus for the long Sunday block is pure aerobic endurance and structural adaptation for a full Ironman. With this exact context in mind, would you still recommend adding Sweetspot here, or should I keep it strictly in Zone 2 to safely build the mileage?
Very interesting thread and I like your long term vision, I share the same approach, although it is focussed on ultra trail/road and marathons “only” on my end. Basically I was targetting to build a endurance profile which actually I succeeded already as I completed my first ultra trail back in March this year while I started running from 0 in November 21 (and running 4 marathons in the same period). My own advice:
1/ For road only (up to marathon) I’m a supporter of Stryd and I belive that ecosystem together with the advice from coach Palladino are extremely efficient and you can build multi year objectives with reasonable volume depending on your level (there are different levels and plans). If interested in data I recommend WKO5 and/or Final Surge. My own view is that I struggle to see advantages of using Intervals but I fully understand others might have different opinion.
2/ Stryd doesn’t offer plans for +50k therefore indeed when you go further this is where Intervals become crucial to keep a close view on the Load metrics. While for anything like 50 to 80k I believe this is manageable to do only run workouts combined with strenght workout sessions, when going further this is where I think doing biking (or swimming) is almost a must.
3/ When going even further (+100k and 100 miles) I believe the limitation will be mainly: #1 nutrition (how much you can eat to compensate what you burn) and #2 time (as you’re not professional, the key is the recovery it means sleep (doing naps, sleep quality/duration). Again I believe that wellness metrics can be tracked with Intervals, however there I can only recommend to look at HRV with the work from Marco Altini. For nutrition this is a specialized job taking lot of time to optimize therefore I’d recommend to go with nutritionnist to delegate (at least I would do that when I will go +100k/m.
What I’m curious to monitor from responses and what you can achieve (and share back here) is how you handle the long term planning in Intervals calendar and track volume targets/durations per sport type. I know that yearly mileage/duration are good indicators and if you start to make estimations there how much increase year on year you should do this will be a good start. For my 80k ultra trail I peaked in my prep at 90km/week (mix of run on trails and road). I’ve been able to push my limit and for my next marathon prep starting this summer this will allow me to use the same target (full road) which will be challenging enough (more impact on body when running on road than trails). For the marathon after that one I should then be able to go above the 100k/week line.
All in all patience is the key (I think it’s a word of wisdom from Kilian).
The problem with prebuilt training plans offered by any platform is that none of them will take into account the specific characteristics of your performance profile, and that is exactly what caught my attention in the information you shared.
Anyway, most advice to focus on building volume and accumulating work within the low-intensity domain are good recommendations. That generally means consistently managing fatigue while focusing on your aerobic base and efficiency. You already seem to understand this well, which is a very good sign.
When I asked about your swimming profile and you mentioned being more comfortable with intense and explosive efforts, my experience immediately raises a small warning flag here. In cycling terms (which is the discipline I’m qualified to speak about) I would certainly focus on a few upper Z2 sessions (always HR-based), emphasizing low VI (power variability) and careful monitoring of decoupling (while disregarding the warm-up period). These sessions start easy but quickly become demanding and can be quite fatiguing. Also, including a diversity of approaches to torque training certainly will also be beneficial.
