I am a power training enthusiast and recently tried to create a training plan for myself based on the pyramid training model. However, I can’t figure out the proportions for each power zone. I want to ask everyone, how should I set up my aerobic training days and intensity days, and how many intensity sessions should be scheduled per week?
What frequency and duration? How many days a week do you have available and how much total time?
More frequency and longer duration will have a pretty big impact.
Where are you now? How much experience and training history do you have? What was your total exercise time over, let’s say, the last 6 weeks?
What are your primary goals? Long endurance steady state events or rather short explosive criteriums?
Thank you for your response. I currently have about 10 hours of training time. I am an XC mountain bike rider, and my main goals are to participate in cross-country races and improve my FTP. Right now, I do not understand how the pyramid training model should allocate each power zone and how to formulate a training plan.
10 hours is a very nice amount. My advice, with the little information you gave:
First thing to do, if not already done, is expand aerobic capacity. Giving you a good base to get through the, normally quit longer, XC events.
Once you have that base, maintain it by doing enough longer rides with little focus on intensity. I wouldn’t blindly focus on FTP because that’s not what will decide your race. Progressively longer intervals at high tempo/sweetspot is in my opinion a better target.
If you can get that in without feeling fatigued, add VO2 and Anaerobic intervals which will give you the necessary edge on steep hills.
Don’t get to rigid on pyramid or any other distribution, measure progress by measuring performance. Adapt if progress stalls.
10 hours a week is probably 4-6 training sessions a week. Start with 3-4 aerobic sessions. Mostly aerobic - I know that XC will always involve efforts but those should not be your focus on aerobic rides. And add 1-2 sessions with progressive Tempo/Sweetspot. When getting closer to race season, hit those VO2’s and Ananerobic while dropping some time in Tempo or even Aerobic. 2 sessions a week with higher intensity should be quit good. You can add a third if you’re digesting all that work without problems.
Back-off intensity when feeling tired!