I hear that a lot, that we’re training too hard, endurance rides should be 50% of FTP, etc. I’m probably not going to change though. Why? First of all, I feel fine. Second, I just can’t wrap my head around the idea that a lower training load would somehow make me faster.
Maybe someday I’ll give it a try, but I just can’t see riding around that slowly being enjoyable.
Yes i have no idea why people are obsessed with telling other’s theyre training hard. In order to even make this statement, you need to know so much individuallized stuff about the person.
I’m starting to think it’s some sort of fetish.
You have no business telling someone they’re training too little or too much without having a multiple hour long conversation with them about their history and goals.
Edit: thanks for reporting this post. LOL
tl;dr - if you don’t race, it doesn’t particularly matter what you do, and you can ignore me. 
Ultimately, the best training is going to be what motivates you and gets you out the door. If you’re just not going to do 3 hours easy, but you’ll do 90 minutes at a more moderate pace, get out and do that. Hell, if you’ll do 3 hours moderate do that!
But if that’s all you do, your fitness is going to be a lot more one-dimensional. And you potentially can’t train as much since you will be more fatigued.
My goals require a lot more on/off type power delivery. I need to train at the high end to develop that “on” fitness. And I can’t do that every day. I also need the aerobic fitness that also builds the mechanism to clear lactate for the “off” part. I can do that at 50% of FTP, or 70% of FTP, with basically the same result. One of those lets me be fresh for those hard workouts. The other, less so. And I can do a lot more of that 50%. Is it boring? I suppose, but then I have more motivation to go hard when the time is called for. And you know what’s harder than a boring ride? A really friggin’ hard one.
In the end, it’s all about your goals. Some people just enjoy racing, and aren’t hugely bothered about their results. I want to get the most out of myself and test myself against other riders, so my motivations are built around that, so those long boring rides to me are just a different challenge that is needed to get to the goal I’ve set myself. So they are less boring to me. I also listen to a lot of stuff about cycling training during the.
I’m currently riding in a, well, “mountainous area” would be good description. I’m surprised with what a 35x36 gear combo does for this. Definitely still get to points where the cadence does have to drop to keep it on the easy side. But doable!
But I don’t live here, so maybe it’s easier to say that when I’m just visiting and also am not holding myself back nearly as much. That being said, where I actually live has basically no hills, and I only have a few routes that are really good for riding (I live very near a large city). You just have to make do with what you got!
You are right, changing cassettes could help a lot. It‘s also about the mental aspect: „Oh, another hill? Let me grind it up slowly for 12 minutes.“ It‘s boring and not motivating compared to upper Z2/lower Z3 where it feels like a small effort. (I know that a bit of Z3 doesn‘t destroy an easy ride, but it accumulates with the hills.)
No excuses! 
Dr. Seiler is one of the guru’s behind TymeWear. In this podcast he talks about respiration rate and that it’s by far the most accurate metric of training intensity.
@fabric5000 agree w you, of course, but w one modifier:
Not everyone has that kind of time. I do 3x / wk 60 - 75 mins Thresh, VO2 blocks when needed & able w race sched.
I know damn well adding 2 - 4x / wk 90 - 360 min Z2 - Z3.75 outdoor rides would, as Homer says, “…increase my killing power, eeehh ?” on the race course, but I just don’t have that time.
[ Forget indoor Z2; I’d rather do a 60 min ride w 80 grit sandpaper as a chamois than do 20 mins Z2 on a trainer. No movie on earth can save me from that hair - pulling, mind - numbing boredom. Outdoors: Enjoyment & bliss. Indoors: Ride, or get off the bike. ]
Zero attack on you, just overall & in general speaking:
Honestly, I have no clue how ppl do it, unless independently wealthy and / or “work from home” = have structured their career such that they generate $ from 1 - 4 hrs / day of actual productivity, and then just ghost away for much of the day.
Who does the laundry ? Dishes ? Plans meals, groceries ? Fixes things, upkeeps, tends the indoor plants, buys replacement clothes, gets the snow tires swapped off, hunts for replacement cars & negotiates w the bank, etc etc etc ?
How do they weekend adventure and spend quality time w their loved ones, get enough “alone time” w their partners, visit close & important fam enough ?
And if you’re multisport, like me… when the heck are these ppl getting in the pool ?!?!? In the middle of the night ?!?! 
Do these people live out in the countryside on these picturesque old - timey estates, with “grounds”, and dozens of servants to take care of all these things ?
My point: For me: It doesn’t “depend on my goals” ; and saying it does kinda digs a bit… like:
“Well, if you really wanted to win, you would just do ________. You just don’t want it enough.”
My goals are the exact same as yours: I want to kick your butt, and be one spot higher than you on the podium. But I wake @ 6:45 every day, work [ work work, house work, life work, riding, maint bike, etc ] from the moment my feet hit the ground to ass hits the couch for dinner @ 9:00 - 10:30, bit of a movie, bed 11:00 - 12:30.
Under what rock can I find that extra 0.5 + hrs ?!?!
[ Not on Insta / SM at all, rly, and def not a “death scroller”. Have FB only to keep in touch w activity groups. Don’t video game for hrs / wk, no afternoon TV outside dinner movies, don’t watch sports on wknds, etc, etc, etc. Point: No, I wouldn’t
“… be surprised where you can find extra time, if you really look at your life…” or similar !! 
Although I know that is genuinely true, for many. ]
I do race, marathon MTB focusing on big mountain backcountry stuff, and also want to get the most out of myself that I can. If I really thought it would make a difference to do my endurance rides easier, I’m sure I could find a way to do it, but I’m not convinced. I do three hours at 70% all the time and it doesn’t leave me feeling too fatigued to do intervals later in the week. That’s the most I can realistically do consistently on a weekday, other than two a days which I experimented with last year, and also didn’t feel bad.
Can I follow you to see how you’re training?
Going 5mph up a hill is a total mental killer. I totally get it, after doing a bunch of it last week. and then having to actually pedal downhill, at a certain point it’s hard to. keep it in zone 2 - you just naturally want to go a little faster because it’s fun!
The other thought is - z2 is a big range - if you have to go to the high end of Z2 for 5-10 minutes on a climb, it’s not the end of the world.
I’m in the fortunate camp of my job gives me enough flexibility that I can get out for a longer lunch, or get out a bit earlier and catch up worth work later. And mentally it’s not too taxing on me, and physically not at all.
My remaining kid at home is independent and between my wife and I can divvy up schlepping duties to work around when I want to ride. And then on the weekends he hardly wants to hang out with us.
I’ve then extra l lucked out that my wife is glad to be rid of me for these long rides on the weekend. She wants her me time too, and generally she does her own working out during a portion of that time. She’s also been very accommodating of my travel racing and riding plans, which are starting to really ramp up. She’s been doing more cooking as well recently, which has been nice, since for years that was all on me.
I’m in a good position to do all this, everything has lined up at the moment, so I’m seizing the time I have. I couldn’t have done this at all when my kids were young, and that’s partly why I stopped - I knew I wouldn’t have the mental energy.
All the more power to you for getting in the training you do. The key is to optimize the time you have. The problem is that, by and large, fitness is pretty closely tied to volume. You can only add so much intensity. And the more stress you have outside of riding, the more that impacts your ability to do that intensity, and the older you get the less you are able to recover. So it’s all a very delicate balancing act.
I have a friend who’s my age and at least until recently was the CEO of large company - if you add a few clues you can figure that one out. He’s able to work way harder than me and train as effectively as I do. He’s out doing awesome at long gravel events, and we’re pretty evenly matched at cross. I don’t know how he did it, and now that he’s retired as CEO, I can’t imagine what he’ll be like on the bike.
I’m on Strava:
Results:
Well you definitely actually do a lot of very easy riding. I’ll give you that.
It looks like most of your harder days are group rides. Do you do intervals sometimes too?
Yeah, I’m not joking around on the riding easy.
Last week was a total anomaly, I was at a training camp so mileage was up and I was doing a lot of hilly rides with a group.
Typically I’m doing 1 interval day a week. I’ve been trying to do one group ride on the weekends, but it just hasn’t been working out, so I’ve thrown in an interval day instead. That’s it for my planned hard rides, those 2.
I really wanted to get some more group rides in to practice my group skills (mainly conserving energy) and sprint positioning, as those are my weak points.
My first race went well, better than expected in fact. I have a 3 day race weekend starting tomorrow, we’ll see how well I’ve managed my recovery since that high load week!
Nice, good luck this weekend!
I also have two MTB races over the weekend, 68 miles and 11k feet of climbing on Saturday then 37 miles with 7100 ft of climbing on Sunday. Gonna be brutal, but I think I’ve prepared the best I can with my consistent 3+ hour rides at 70% haha.
That Saturday race - oh wow! You got your fueling plan/strategy figured out for that? Do you need to bring it all with you?
Funny you ask… Last year was the first time this race was run. For backcountry endurance races I guess I always assume that there will be drop bags. Last year I was in my hotel the night before the race, reading over the brief again, and realized there was no mention of drop bags. I texted the race director to ask, and didn’t hear back so I just condensed my drink mix down to three bottles, two on the bike and one in my jersey pocket and filled my hydration pack to 2L. There are aid stations, and I refilled my pack and grabbed a little solid food around mile 45.
This year I’m doing two bottles each with 300g of carbs, and 2L in the pack. I’ll probably grab a little solid food too at some point if I feel like I need it.
Took a month off to rehab an old knee injury. Easy 1 hour ride on Monday to ease back in.
Last night was a ~2 hour group ride and
first warm ride, elevated HR from the heat and fitness drop, lighter winds, took a lot of headwind pulls for the slower riders
and by the end
“I was training too hard”
LOL
Back on the easy train and give it two or three months to push ftp back up from 190-200 to 250-ish. Finally starting to feel the recovery challenge of being in my early sixties…
Is your device actually measuring windspeed and tail / headwind, or just based on local weather data ? That wheel / web plot is really cool.
its on Intervals, might be a supporter / paid feature.
here is data from a vineyard’s weather station about midway on the course:
temperature, dew point, humidity, wind direction, sustained wind, and gusts.
The Intervals data is close but not the same
I’m guessing its from another weather station, maybe from one of 4 airports in the metro area.
