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Plan your basic training part 3

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4.5 min reading

Then it was time for the last part of our series on planning your base training, be sure to read part 1 & part 2 before you read on ;)


We have gone through evaluation & goal setting as well as how to plan and divide up base training. With these tools, you can put together a good schedule on paper. But it’s the training that actually happens which yields results, and therefore the focus of part 3 is to make the planning sustainable over time and fit into practice.


The absolute biggest service you can do for your ongoing performance development is to maintain continuity in your training, never stop training! But let the time of year and goal setting dictate the load. There is always a debate on how to train, what intensity to use, and how long or short the intervals should be. Train smartly, polarized, but as much as you have time for and can manage, and you will both see improvement and have fun!


But to maintain continuity, it’s important to be smart and base your training on your own life situation. Just because the elite in marathon run 200 km/week doesn’t mean you should do it too, even if you mathematically could manage. Many elite amateurs manage high training loads, but what distinguishes elite from amateur is the time for rest and recovery. While a professional can lie on the couch and take a nap between two sessions, you might have to work or pick up kids.

When planning your macro, meso, and microcycles, make sure to consider: 

  • Family/friends - Perhaps the biggest part of the puzzle. A parent of three has less time than a retiree or a young single person and needs to adjust to that.

  • Work/travel - Do you have time for morning sessions? Can you control your own working hours? Different work schedules give us different opportunities. Your planning should be based on you, not your idol or a friend.

  • Economy - Not everyone can afford to go to training camps abroad or take many vacation days. But a training camp can also be organized at home with good planning.

  • Other hobbies - Training is not everything in life, and having other interests to fall back on during injuries, illness, or just to not think about training all day is something we really recommend, even if it may feel difficult ;)

  • Holidays - Sets limitations due to family activities, but can also provide extra time off for fun long sessions or extra rest.

 

  • Training environment & equipment - Do you have access to a gym or the possibility of indoor training? Is it pancake flat or do you have long hills? This should also be taken into account.

  • The Swedish weather - Whether your base training is during the summer or winter, we are affected by the Swedish weather, which is not always at its best. If it is very cold or extremely rainy, it can hinder the ability to train as desired, so keep this in mind before planning your next 5-hour long session.

  

  • Injuries and illness - We can do a lot to prevent both injuries and illness, but despite that, most people encounter one or the other at times. Being able to adjust your training is of great importance. Maybe there are alternative training options that allow you to continue with much of your training.

On the right is an example of how “life” affects training over a year. 
Figure 1: example of a competitive cyclist's training over a year. The training starts with lower intensity in October and then increases during the remaining winter months. Unfortunately, illness in April & parts of May disrupted that important continuity. Could the high training load in March be behind this? It's crucial to sometimes hold back; otherwise, the first half of the season was ruined by illness, and the athlete had to fight for the rest of the season to get back into shape by the end of the season. It's clear that the Christmas break in December and the Mallorca camp in March were used to increase volume.

Summary and Final Tips 

  • The biggest service you can do for yourself is to maintain continuity throughout the base training. This is A and O for achieving good results in the competition season. It’s better to do 8 hours of training a week than to do 15 hours one week and then train only 2 hours or get sick/injured. As mentioned above, interruptions in training are something that should really be avoided.

  • It is also worth mentioning the importance of trusting your plan and allowing it to take effect. There will be periods when the body feels heavy and motivation wanes, but performance shouldn’t peak during base training. Not every workout will be easy and fun or yield personal records. But trust the process!

  • But here comes the paradox: dare to rest and step away from the plan if it feels wrong. The more you train and the more experience you gain, the better you will become at reading your body's signals. Sometimes intervals might be replaced by an easy workout or the long run may be shortened by 1 hour. It might feel tough to skip an important workout because you might be a bit raspy in your throat or have a twinge in your Achilles tendon, but think about the first point CONTINUITY!


Hopefully, knowledge and motivation are now at their peak, but remember that the base season is long here in Sweden and dark, cold months are ahead. So start a bit slowly and work your way back into structured training.