LIVE Sweet Spot Group Ride Q&A (Podcast)
Remember, the goal of a freestyle sweet spot ride is to achieve as much sweet spot as you can. Time and zone, but you got to feel it out. And when it gets too hard, you back off. You go down to tempo.
You go down to high zone, too. It's a training technique I've developed over the past 20 years. But there's no intervals, no prescriptions. A lot of people have trouble with it because you have to feel it.
So, it's kind of a concept workout. But that's what we're using the group to to do today. It's not a race, everyone. This is a this is a training run. >> Anyway, the point is I was a little skeptical despite my good results so far, but I I went to Coach C and asked how to handle and it's been great.
The hip is already feeling much better after a week adapting. had to take a week off basically off the strength, but >> it's been pretty phenomenal how indepth and detailed the guidance was on how to deal with it. >> That's awesome. That's I'm so glad to hear. That makes my day. >> Yeah. I trained Coach Cap myself.
I I put in all my everything I've learned from 20 years [snorts] into the into the model. Yes, there's more going in, but I put like everything I could think of. So, if anyone has a use case where Coach Cat didn't necessarily give them an answer they wanted or they didn't trust it or is wrong, for sure, let me know and I could fix it. >> Frank, it's not absolutely >> amazing. this morning discussion about this beautiful. >> That's awesome. So glad to hear.
Speaking of nutrition, on a day like today, you're going to be chugging carbohydrate and you should be taking in 70 to 90 grams per hour. I had a banana before this. I got 45 grams of carbohydrate in each bottle. I'm going to have two of those per hour.
So, that's 90 grams right there. If I don't drink two, I'll have a gel 30 gram. It's really important with this indoor training cuz you're sweating so much and we're sweet spotting with no coasting. Two weeks ago, after 75 minutes, it felt like I was bonking.
So, definitely eat up even though it's only a two-hour ride. All right. I think the uh this A group is kind of forming here. All right, I'm going to form the B-group, everyone.
If you need to ease off from the the front, the front A group is in the 354 watts per kg. And this is going to be 3 to 3.5. >> I'm having trouble typing on the app. I'm so sweaty. All right, we're back everyone.
Just cruising along here. Settle into your sweet spot. >> Some of my best power numbers have come from when I go by feel. >> Yeah. >> The power when I'm by myself even. >> What should my heart rate be doing right now? >> Um, well, if you're in your sweet spot, it should be in your sweet spot zone. Do you know that? >> What sweet spot was? >> Well, if you >> in terms of power, but I did not do anything with heart rate. Well, we have that if if you go into your profile of the Coach Cat app right now, click training zones and toggle from heart rate to power.
Sorry, from power to heart rate and and if you've entered your threshold heart rate, you you'll see it. It's it's very close to I just joined today because it's with Insiders Peg. >> Yeah. Awesome. Oh, >> I calculated my sweet power zones based on what you put in the chat.
Yeah. >> So I know that means I need to stay between 250 and 275 and that's fine. >> Yeah. And so heart >> closer to 250. >> Yeah. Heart rate is going to be very similar. 84 to 97% of your threshold heart rate. And and when you're in both heart rate and power, you know you're right there. you and you know it's it should feel hard but not like threshold intervals hard and it feel a little harder than tempo that's why I use the expression not too hard not too easy just right like Goldilocks >> sounds like I'm probably doing it right >> yeah if you're having trouble breathing and you know your RP is a six to six to seven maybe an eight you're there you're sweet spotting Heart rate is the place where metabolic training ends. >> Yeah, Z dog, I see you. >> Is that you on that the the recumbent bike? >> If that's what you're seeing, I swapped out of that.
That's not what I'm seeing. It must have >> Oh, okay. Yeah. >> All right, everyone. We are >> We're coming up on the first 30 minutes completed.
And for your nutrition, that means time to eat. I'm gonna take a big old gulp of my drink mix and have a gel. Also, what is everyone's temperature in their room? Me, I got the windows open.
It's 49° in here and it feels great. >> What's that? >> 63 with a fan on. >> There you go. Yeah. If anyone's over 70. Oh boy.
We used to have an exercise physiology lab at Fast Cat. You know, we did V2 and lactate, and the general of sports medicine recommended ambient room temperature be 65 degrees for optimal testing, and we would have the AC on to to make that possible all year round, but 49 right now with no wind is kind of nice. >> 55 in Mr. Connecticut. >> Yeah. Well, I have a So, I should clarify.
I think it's like 30 degrees outside, but I use a a temperature gauge sitting right here by my computer to monitor indoor temperature and it's 49. >> Yeah. I'm in my son room with the windows open. >> Yeah, >> it's 30 outside. >> Yeah. My wife will be very mad that we're wasting energy, but it's only for two hours, right? >> You got to get one of those gizmos that hooks you up to the generator, right? Each turn of the of the pedal generates a little power. >> Now you're talking. commercial. >> Yeah, like that Lance commercial.
What am I on? >> I'm on I'm on my bike 5 hours a day. >> It was awesome at the time. It didn't age well at all. >> If that's not a real thing, it's still cool. >> Well, occasionally if you follow like people that live off the grid, they have, you know, solar panels and all that, but they have generators that they can pedal for >> energy. We coached an athlete a number of years ago. He's a scientist in Boulder.
He had a off the grid home on Maui in the jungle. He was showing me pictures and he had an indoor bike that powered whatever he needed it to to supplement the solar panels. >> Just the coffee button. What does that do? What what function does that provide? >> You get three minutes of riding with the group that you're with.
It'll keep your place while you do nothing. It opens up after 30 minutes on a ride. It ends in the last, I think, 5 kilometers of a ride. It comes back every 30 minutes.
So, if you use it now, you can use it again 30 minutes later. It basically lets you go have a cup of coffee. But really, it lets you go pee. All right. [laughter] >> Awesome.
Thank you. >> And this What button is that? That's the feather. >> That's the coffee cup. Coffee cup. The original icon for a potty break did not. >> Yeah, most people save their coffee breaks.
I guess they're smart. I don't know. >> All right, we got some free Coach Cat email in our inbox. Thank you very much. You are entered.
Let me see who we got. I'll read them off. Isaac Van, Mark Richardson, Lee Lauderman, Kelly Winen, Robert Castro, Martin Man. You you these it's for new new riders only.
Sorry. We'll have to figure out a contest for existing users. This hill is tough. >> I think the prize for a lifetime member ought to be give us one more year of life. >> That's a great idea. I would love to do that for you. >> My vote for getting that out there. >> Oh, shade. [snorts] >> But I support that statement.
What if you could add years to your life if you followed the plan? >> Isn't that what we're all doing anyway? >> That's right. Exercise and nutrition, two biggest interventions to improve health span and life. >> Hey Frank, it's Mike question for you. >> For sure. >> I was able to get my training peaks to match what my profile has, but there's no way you do that in Zift. So, you kind of got to fudge your numbers when you're looking at your graph. Um, I mean the biggest thing to have consistent across platforms is your FTP.
You know, make sure whatever you have it set at in Coach Cat is the same elsewhere. Is that is that what you're talking about? >> Yeah, I do that. I have it set. Um, and like I say, I just I know that when I'm looking in the green band cover green band, I'm going to be close to sweet spot on Zift. >> Oh, >> are you But you know, it might not be exactly the same numbers.
Yeah. Well, I'll tell you a little secret about sweet spot trading because I talk about it a lot and I use it to, you know, market, you know, the company and attract people to, you know, hire us. A lot of platforms long ago, Training Peaks being the first one, they would not add sweet spot to their training zones, despite the fact that I asked them over and over and they were jealous. They didn't come up with the concept and so they they wouldn't add it.
And to this day, you have to add a custom sweet spot zone to your training peaks in order to get it. and Zift with this green bar and they haven't really adopted sweet spot at all. But what I tell athletes, I mean, everyone has heard that cycling is a is a cerebral sport. You know, it's like chess on wheels, like strategy tactics. And the thing I tell athletes, you need to commit your zones to memory.
So, go into your profile right now. you take a look at your your sweet spot zone. Say it's 240 to 266. And then when you look at your real time power output, you're doing a calculation every time. Am I in the zone?
Am I pedaling too hard? Am I pedaling too easy? And you adjust. And when you do that, you're it's like you're using your brain, which is a better way of ensuring you're in the sweet spot zone. >> Mikey says that's dangerous in Colorado. >> Yeah. >> Brain is going to take your muscle. >> Are are you making it are you being funny or you serious? >> Physiology. your brain is gonna take action before your muscles get it. >> The the am so the amount of oxygen your >> So your physiology doesn't really work that way.
Um that's not true. You can use your brain a lot and still make great wattage. [laughter] The there is no such thing as preferential use of oxygen from your brain at the expense of your muscles. And that's >> wifey says that >> I said Mikey says that's not a problem because I don't use mine. >> I'm sorry. I didn't hear what you said. >> I said not a problem because my wife says I don't use long.
So >> you could just tell her that you're you're taking a break. You're shunting your your oxygen to your muscles. >> I was mentioning glycogen sugars over oxygen break. Sorry. >> Oh yeah. Yeah.
The amount of glycogen your your brain is sucking up out of your circulatory system is minimal compared to your muscle. But when you bonk and you start to feel dumb or confused, yes, your your brain is getting less less glycogen. Your legs are too. This is the amazing thing about racing a bicycle is completely engaged and obsessed with your body is I think it's fun but I just doing it like I don't know about you but racing is the one thing for me that completely not taking me much of >> yeah when I'm bike racing I very rarely look at my power except if I'm going really hard or really easy.
Like in a criterium, I never look at it. I'm looking at [laughter] the every I never take my eyes off the road. In a time trial or a hill climb, I'll glance down at it, make sure I'm in the right spot, use it as positive feedback. >> I have a quick question. As far as as far as spot like group ride, is it okay to like every like so often just go for 10 minutes, back off? >> Yeah.
Yeah, that's one technique. >> Yeah, if you uh somewhere on your head unit, one of the metric screens time and zones when you're doing a group ride, then you realize in real time how long you're spending in each zone because often when we're in a group ride, we think we're going harder than we actually are. [snorts] And when we get home, we want to zone one time all the other zones. So, it's one way to keep track of that. >> Totally. >> I did not know that existed. That's great. >> Yeah, I kind of do that already. That's why I was asking if it's all right.
It kind of messes up the plan. >> No, I think it's good. >> It goes back to what Page Frank always talks about is going off to a field. And when I prescribe group rides for my athletes, we always go with a purpose. We don't go just to do a group ride. We go to do work and to practice certain scenarios.
And you know, that's a good time to go to the front, sit in the front for a few minutes, and then go back to the smoker's lounge and recover and then do it again. My own experiences. Uh, one of the things I love about the same program, at least the ones I've done so far, is there's often a Saturday just group ride. >> Yeah. >> The instructions are go kind of medium hard, ride for a bit, back off when you need to. And so for what it's worth, that's this ride for me today.
A little longer than the FDF 1.5 hours, but that's okay. >> Yeah. >> So as my group that I'm with maybe pedals later, I pedal a little lighter. When they go, I go and occasionally I'll go even if they're not going. Yeah. And that works out well for weekends.
And that allows you to really listen to your body. And so tomorrow if you have another zone 2 ride, you know, you keep your eye on your recovery on today's ride. I mean after today's ride and that'll help you decide how much how little you do tomorrow. Exactly.
And real quick note on the time and zones, you can do that for heart rate as well. >> Yeah. I find heart rate actually has greater fidelity time in zones because it's more steady whereas power bounces all over the place and you even though you're in sweet spot you know if you do like a second above or 3 seconds below it's going to bend up that time in the higher and lower zones but heart rate doesn't do that it's a really good heart rate is great for time and sweet spot same with zone two >> coach that it drifts also. So, at some point you're getting credit for something. >> Well, that that's with the caveat of provided you're not you don't have heart rate drift, but if you do, then it's not accurate. >> Got it. >> Yeah. What um >> all this data is is great.
You just don't want to get bogged down in the micro analytics of every data point. you know, is a lot of this is abstract when we're talking time and zones, whether it's power or heart rate. And you know, it really goes down to did you do more work today than you did yesterday? And can you recover again tomorrow or have to put yourself in the hole for tomorrow? Shout out to Coach Cat for giving me the quote rare Sunday off. >> Oh yeah, that's [snorts] important.
Let's just seek a life balance. It's like I think the description is when was the last time you took Sunday off? And the answer is probably never. And it's really important.
You can get ahead on your winning in the kitchen. You can get ahead on your bike maintenance. And the case of the holiday season, you can [clears throat] make sure you've got all your Christmas plans squared away. You can spend more time with your family, which I'm sure they'll appreciate because normally you're out riding your bike.
And the joke in my family with my kids is like, "Where's daddy?" And they say, "He's either working or he's riding this bike." But on the rare Sunday off, they don't that's not the case. >> Hey, for the the the the part about using time and zone on your bike computer in real time. What uh what bike computer is that? Is that Garmin? >> Yeah. >> Nice. Is that Justin talking? >> It is.
I thought I didn't realize you said the part. I heard you talking about the other stuff, but Oh, that's awesome. I'll have to check that out. >> Is that an available option on our screen? Does anybody know? >> I don't see it. >> I don't think so. >> But it doesn't like keep >> it down. >> Yeah. >> All right.
Just a etiquette friendly reminder. If you're if you're breathing hard, mute your mic. Little bit of a climb here. Everybody went quiet now that this climb started. >> Yeah, the climbs uh tend to take away the the talk, but now we're at the top. >> I started over a minute late.
Which coaches are with? >> Oh, yeah. Sorry. Um can you say what what's your name? Where are you from? >> Arizona, Tennessee. >> Right on.
What are you training for? >> To stay healthy above ground. Fantastic goal. Um, what was your question? I'm sorry I didn't hear it earlier. >> I started over a minute late.
So, I'm just wondering which coaches are with which groups. >> Well, I'm at mile 20.4 right now. And coach Jake is up ahead with the A group. Justin, where are you? He must be taking a break. >> I'm coming up on a horse first.
We're 18.8 miles. >> You're You're at 18 some miles. Yeah. >> Yeah. >> Yeah. I think a lot of the ways these group rides work is now that we're on the Discord, we're all together, you know. I mean, we're spread out in the game, but you know, you might as well be next to me in the in the Discord right now. >> Hey, this is >> Hey, Matthew.
Hey, hey, question is is there any preference in regards to when you go to OJI, you see what you have to do today, you can send it over to whip or and I send it over to whip >> workout and I sometimes contemplate whether I'm going to use I don't know how you say it, but whip locked in, you know, uh so you're just locked into that. So if you're hitting a lot of hills or you're always hitting that. So >> yeah, the urg mode. >> Thank you. Yeah, that's right.
M mode. It's off. >> Yeah. >> Um preference on that. >> Yeah. Yeah. So this is a highly talked about topic.
URGK mode or not to urgge mode. And [snorts] it depends on the type of intervals you're doing. Now, before URGK mode existed, you know, we all did our intervals just fine. We looked at our power on our bike computer and we pedal harder, pedal easier.
So, there and we learned how to like do intervals by feel. When [snorts] URGK mode came along and people just let the power the the smart trainer control their water just they forgot how to do it and they they got dumb. They couldn't feel what a threshold interval felt like outdoors. And so like when you're doing your standing starts like I did yesterday, you got to turn the URGK mode off.
Those are just ballistic sprints and you the transition from you know that big power drop. It doesn't really work. But in the context of say you just want to do 3x10 sweet spot and zone out and watch a movie mode is fine. it'll keep you right there and you can just concentrate on well you can just zone out which is sometimes what you need in a workout but if you're doing V2 max intervals or one meditors anything hard you need to turn the urg mode off because you need to do those by your own how your body is feeling. If you're on a good day you want to push harder.
If you're on a bad day, you need to give yourself some grace and maybe pedal 5 10 watts less. And [snorts] the mode messes that up. And a lot of people do do workouts and it's a little too hard and they're like, I suck and they quit. And that's that's unfortunate because that's the URGK mode.
That's not using your range. We don't [snorts] we prescribe training in ranges 240, 265. We never prescribe training in precise you got to hit 253. Your body doesn't really work that way.
So it just kind of depends. I would encourage you to experiment with both and do not get beholden to using urg mode 100% of the time, especially for long endurance roads. Like if we like if you wanted to do this ride and you tried to do it in URGK mode, not possible. This is about variable power.
So, hope that answers your question and didn't make it more complicated. >> Yes, sir. Woo. Coming up to the top of this climb. Some I will say >> there was something with >> Yeah. >> Yeah.
For the intelligence of a bass the other I switched my crank once about a month ago knee pain. >> Yeah. No explan. >> Coach Kat told you your saddle height. That's amazing. How what information did you give it? >> I just said, "Hey, I went and how far should I move my saddle up?" And I dropped it five mil in the nose at the front like my headset and stuff.
This should go up and don't move the saddle forward or back. >> Uhhuh. That's amazing. And is how does that ride feel? >> It feels great. >> For the last week. >> Oh, that's amazing. Bike fit by Coach Cat.
I love it. >> I love it. >> Yeah. See what it would do. It actually >> Yeah. Yeah.
That's amazing. Well, you saved yourself 300 bucks on a on a bike fit. These days, I have some bike fitters that are friends. All right. >> And these days they're like, you know, >> these integrated stems are putting me out of work because there's nothing to bike fit anymore.
You just raise the saddle or lower it and you you can do the four aft a little bit and you can, you know, do cleat position. But a big part of bike fits before the the one piece handlebar was stem length and stem angle. That's with modern bikes. It's not even possible anymore.
And a lot of athletes come in and they need a different one and they, you know, what are you gonna do? Buy like a new $1,500 integrated carbon fiber handlebar? Not really happening. All right.
How many people after this ride and this weekend need to finish their Christmas shopping? >> Just starting today. >> Yeah, >> I'm definitely on that list. >> Yep. Same. >> Still climbing the hill. The Bigfoot Hills. This is a good course.
I like it. Not too much climbing, but not pancake flat either. Who else doing the festive 500? >> I do it every year. >> Right on. >> Well, you gota you got to ask Coach Cat. See what uh >> see what Coach Cat thinks.
What uh what phase of your training are you in right now? >> What phase of your training are you in right now? Uh right there is uh going into the base to race will start at the beginning of January most awe progression of uh base. >> Yeah. So the festive 500 definitely fits in with the uh the goal of your base phase which is to rot as much as possible. >> So you can ask for a revision with coach cat and it'll it'll add in all eight days of the festive 500 if you want. for the 500. If you want, >> it'll move your Yeah, it'll move your sweet spot phase around.
So, you can start when where you left off when it's when the 500 is over. You can do some days or you can do all eight. Kind of depends on your schedule. >> Kind of depends on your schedule. >> Okay. >> Louderman's been kicking some echo, I think. >> Yeah, though. >> It has been echoey lately. Doesn't sound like we fixed it.
So, as a coach, I generally have my athletes do the Festo 500 if it fits in with their training, the goal of their training, which many of them are sweet spotting right now. Even if they're lifting weights, we can pause the weight lifting and resume when the 500 is over. It's so [clears throat] fun. It's so beneficial for you physiologically, especially if you're doing long races or stage races.
It's a really good bump in fitness as well. Great way to hit the new year, fit, fast, ready to do more training. And by the math, it's 38.3 miles per day. You know, the the 500 Festive 500 hack is to do it on a a flat course with a robo pacer group.
That's guess what? Your sweet spot pace. get in that group, draft, and achieve an average speed much higher than you could on your own. I mean, we're talking 23 to 28 miles per hour, depending on your your FTP, maybe even higher if you're coach Jake, and you just knock that thing out. It's just uh just eight days of consistency and you'll get tired for sure.
So, you got to pay attention to your recovery. Eat and drink well, get good sleep. You can, a lot of athletes will ride really long on some days and front load the the mileage because they know they have like a a day or two where they can't can't do it for whatever reason. And that's fine, too.
One of my friends during CO did the whole thing in the first day. He's a nut. But yeah, it's a good >> Yeah. >> Question points. Yes. >> Is that pretty OTS? >> Yes.
It's their version of of OTS. And so, yeah, it's just a way to quantify training. [snorts] And uh like for instance, right now I'm at 72 SP and you know, I'm probably like at 60 OTSish. That's an estimation. I don't have it in real time.
The thing about like about TSS is you can look at it in real time on your bike computer while you're training. And so we prescribe training in TSS or OTS a lot of times where we tell the athlete go out and do 200 OTS. This is a set amount of work and it's not a duration based workout but generally you allow one hour per 50 TSS. So that's like a 4h hour rod and um yeah it's a nice way to to quantify and periodize and progress your your training one of these days.
If I had if I had a golden 175 OTS. >> Yeah. >> Should I do this right at about 175 stretch point? >> Yeah, thereabouts. I mean, that's Yeah, I would say that's a good proxy. Make sure you have your FTP set, you know, about the same in in Zift as you do in in Coach Cat. And then, you know, then once you look at your data in Coach Cat, you can just, you know, compare like, did I hit >> 175?
And you know that's the other thing just like the urg mode comment. You don't have to hit 175 right on the dot. It's plus or minus 5 to 10%. You know so it could be whatever 163 or 192.
It's just a range a number to get you in the get you in the ballpark. >> Yeah. You're welcome. >> Hey Franklistic criterium racing. I'm uh just finished the first strength week. >> Yeah. >> Um I just for me I don't see that that test of 500 is something that really fits in with my plan. >> How how do you see it? >> Well, so you're a crit racer, right? Your your races are 45 minutes, 60 minutes, >> max an hour.
Yeah. >> Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. [snorts] Andy Kogan once famously said, "It's an aerobic sport, damn it." Everything we do, whether it's a 5K pursuit or the Leadville 100 Unbound 350, it's aerobic. And what you're doing physiologically by doing the Festive 500 is you're training your aerobic system and it's really good for you. [snorts] So from crit racers to track racers that do short stuff, psycho crossers, psychos is really popular right now.
Matthew Vanderpole, you know what he just did? He probably did like 24 hours, 25 hours last week, couple weeks ago in Spain getting ready for his psychos season. So festive 500 is is really good for all of us. Yeah, even if you're a crit racer and so what I one second.
So you can pause your weightlifting plan and ask [snorts] Coach Cat to revise it and pick up where you left off when you're done with the festive 500. Or you could just say, "Hey, I'm going to do some of the festive 500." There's no rule that you have to do all 500 miles. You could do some. And so you can customize your plan that way. >> I got strength starting next week, which is more like three days a week. >> Sorry, say again. >> I was going to ask if you could do a little bit of both. >> Yeah. >> I start the strength phase, which is like two days a week in the gym. >> Yeah.
I've had athletes that don't even they they do the festive 500 and their gym work, but they just had they have tons of time to train. But if you're time crunched, you know, you can pause it and do that. But but yeah, you can totally you can like do the festive 500 after you lift weights and a lot of athletes like, you know, they have all this time off during like in between Christmas and New Year's and so they do it. It kind of Yeah.
I mean, I have athletes that do full-blown training camps during this time because they take a week off and they live in a warm weather location and yeah, so we use they do the festive like outside and you know get in a 12 16 hour weekish. It's just it's just everyone's like got a unique situation though. I'm not an expert, but I've been on the strength plan for a while now. >> And I would think those first couple weeks would be ideal to combine with the festered 500 just because it's not if you've done anything in the past, those first couple weeks will feel not light, but like not bad. You're sort of figuring out your form, figuring out your one rep maxes, that kind of stuff. >> Yeah. >> I I don't think it would be so bad. >> Yeah.
No, I'd agree. >> The hypertrophy session, I don't know. That would be challenging to do both. The hypertrophy is yeah tough. But I mean all the other phases for sure you could you could work it in. >> My legs look great after the two weeks of hypertrophy. >> Nice.
We when we first started podcasting we would read the reviews on on iTunes and one of the reviews were wife likes my legs now. And they were talking about the hypertrophy phase. So, I get a chuckle out of that. >> Um, I'm sorry. It was kind of garbly.
I couldn't hear what you said. >> Hey, Frank. M. Plateau is something I've been curious about. I raised a teenager and then again starting like 10 15 years ago as an >> officable, you know. >> Yeah.
So, so if I hear you right, you're saying you you feel like you've plateaued. >> Yeah. >> And you you want to break break through and >> Exactly. >> Yeah. Yeah. Okay. Well, got that's what we specialize in.
I mean, couple of questions. How many hours do you ride per week? >> I'm sorry. You're kind of garbly. Couldn't hear your audio.
Well, >> I think it's about 10 to 12 right now. I have to go back. Wait, you you're coached by Jake? >> Exactly. >> Wait, tell me your name again. >> Ryan >> way behind you right now. >> Yeah. Well, I mean, this is a conversation you need to have with Jake.
I I don't want to steal his thunder. >> And uh I don't want to uh be curious. >> Yeah. I mean, fundamentally, I if you got to you first need to define what training you've been doing that you've plateaued at. It's the what Einstein famously said, the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting a different result. So, you you need to analyze your training.
The easiest way to do that, look at your training load over time. Is it flat? Is it periodized? What was your peak training load you achieved last year?
Was it 60 or was it 90? And then I see a lot of athletes, they come to us, man, they just been doing the same thing years and years. Their training load is a flat plateau. All we do is rest them up and give them more training.
Get them on a good build and poof, FTP goes up. So you just you just have to like define what have you been doing and make sure you do something different. Like it's usually more more volume more intervals. I've never ever worked with an athlete where more volume and more intervals didn't increase their FTP when done properly in a you know sciencebased sciencebacked training plan.
Yeah. And then ti timing is also important like yeah you don't want to you want to time all this training all this all these intervals [snorts] in relation to like if you're training for an event or a group ride season or something. We see a lot of people they just train hard all year round you know maybe don't take a break don't do an offseason program. Don't lift weights.
Don't do a proper base. You know ride hard on Zip all the time. So, it's just working in a lot of the fundamentals of training. Also, rest weeks.
You'd be surprised how many how much faster you can get if you take a rest week every 3 to four weeks. It's sounds so simple, but it really really works. >> Can you lose your conditioning when you take those weeks? >> No. When when done properly, you get faster. I have all my athletes when I when I program in their rest weeks, I I do it strategically maybe before a B race or an A race or before a field test.
When you take your rest weeks, you get faster, provided you've been doing the proper training otherwise. >> Otherwise, what you guys call the regeneration week? >> Yes, that's a fancy term for rest week. Okay. Okay. That's where I was confused.
Okay. Well, okay. It's a certain term. >> Sure. Yeah.
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Rest week, regen week, [snorts] recovery week, all synonymous. >> Perfect.
Thanks. >> You're welcome. Somehow in all this talking, I've managed to uh find myself in no man's land, pedaling by myself. Hard to maintain the group when you're chatting and texting. It's all good >> when you're working. >> Yeah, when you're working.
Yeah. I wasn't getting enough glycogen to my brain, Douglas. Oh boy, another climb. I should tell that to my wife when I say something dumb.
Sorry, I've been riding too much. Right. >> There's no such thing. Just the blank stare. There you go.
What' you say? Yeah, they My wife hates that blank stare. What' you say? Sorry, I wasn't paying attention.
So, for anyone that might be getting off soon, this was ride two of of seven, and we will do ride number three January 3rd. And um like I was saying earlier, we're gonna program in some some festive 500 rides [snorts] times TBD, but generally in the mornings, maybe like 10:00 a.m. Eastern seems to be a good good time for most time zones. Um but yeah.
Yeah, this is ride number two of seven and they get a half an hour longer every time we do one. So, the January 3rd one would be 2 and 1/2 hours cuz we're building up. For the the athlete that was asking about riding more, yeah, that's we're going to we're going to ride more as we go along. We'll finish with the uh Uber pretzel ride number seven just like we did last year.
So, if anyone wants to ride the Uber pretzel, this is this is your good a great chance. All right, everyone. 30 more minutes. You can do it. Good time to have a caffeinated gel if you got one.
Little boost get you through that last 30 minutes. This is the these next 30 minutes really help work on your durability. Durability is your ability to basically hang tough, not get tired. Often referred to as time to exhaustion. really important if you're doing long bike races like gravel or fondos.
This is what Sweet Spot is good for. And so, you know, if you ever feel like you fade at the end of a race, rods like this really help eradicate that. So, keep eating and drinking, keep going. >> I've already probably hit a 90 minutes personal best cuz I've never trained this hard this long. >> That's awesome. Good for you.
Yeah. I'm glad that we were the inspiration for you to achieve that. >> Let's be clear though, right now, I really want to quit doing it on the metabolic training, but [snorts] I'm still here. >> There you go. >> When I passed when I passed your beacon, I thought, man, I can't be him I just caught up with what it was. Just keep going. >> There you go. Are you Kelly ATP? >> Yep. >> Yeah.
Yeah. You're like a minute ahead of me. That's awesome. What what um what are you training for >> specifically?
Nothing. >> Uhhuh. >> But I have a couple gravel metrics uh in mind for the spring. >> Mhm. >> And I have I don't know. I have some grav I'm going to do >> Okay. >> Like some 200, 300, 400, 600 km. >> Wow. >> Um >> Okay. >> I've done those before. >> Yeah. >> I'm good at that. >> Yeah. >> I'm good in I'm good at metabolic training all day. >> [snorts] >> I'm also good at 12-hour races. >> Okay. >> But but this is this is like what it feels like in a gravel race when I'm trying to hang on to the men. >> Yes. >> As long as I can. >> Yeah. To stay with that group. >> This is what it feels like right now. Yeah.
I'm doing good. >> Nice. >> Got to keep going. >> There you go. Yeah. Yeah. probably a little bit faster paced than your bre and your ult but it's good training because you know you can't go out and do you know ultra hours every all the time. So that's the other thing.
Sweet spot, you know, it's more efficient, more physiological adaptations than riding slower. So you achieve more. >> I'm leaving town tomorrow and won't be able to train for I don't know a week. >> Uhhuh. >> And so this is I thought a really good bang for my buck today. >> There you go. I think you're right. You should be good and tired by tomorrow or by now. that you need to train your upper end to bring up your endurance as well. >> It certainly helps.
Yeah. Yeah, it definitely helps for sure. I mean, if you're trying to maximize your FTP, you definitely want to do more than just sweet spot training. You want to train all zones, zone five specifically, it's wonderful at raising your FTP, especially after you've done a base phase, like a sweet spot training phase.
That's what we call switch from base to race where you do sweet spot phase and then you do those high-end intervals and you combine those two together. It's that's maximum FTP right there. >> Yeah. >> Yeah. You're welcome. Thanks so much for joining.
Yeah. Don't forget if you're not yet on Coach Cat, send us an email free Coach Cat to help at FastCat Coaching and we'll pick a winner this tomorrow morning. Any plans for a road trip camp? Maybe in the spring? >> Um, we don't have anything planned.
Um, how do you mean on on East Coast road camp? Where where are you where are you located? >> New Jersey. >> Uh, yeah. I don't know the roads around New Jersey enough to hold a camp nearby. I mean, >> be down in uh, you know, North Carolina, Blueish Mountain, something of that sort.
Yeah, I reached out to the uh George Henappy's hotel uh the cycling hotel in in um Greenville, South Carolina. They didn't get back to me, but I I've done the Oat Route in Asheville. It' be a great place to have a have a training camp. We are having a gravel camp in Bentonville.
Maybe that's why you're asking. Um March 5th through the 8th. We've done we've done road camps in the past in Boulder, Colorado. Um, but yeah, it would be fun to do a road road camp in Georgia, Asheville, Greenville area.
I think you could even do one in in Connecticut in the summer, but definitely not right now. It's too cold. >> What are you training for? >> Uh, well, I'm doing Valley of Sun in February. >> Yeah, >> that kind of base and then, you know, Mast's Nationals. >> Okay. We did a training camp at the cycling house in Tucson a couple of years ago. Speaking of the valley of the sun and uh yeah, it was pretty sweet.
I didn't really like the riding there to be honest. The roads were kind of bumpy and potholey and there was cars, but the weather was great. I mean, actually, it snowed, but Mount Lemon sucked. It was so freezing cold, but uh yeah, great area for for bike riding.
We go down to the Belgian waffle ride in Arizona in Scottsdale. That's pretty sweet. >> All right. >> Yeah. >> I need to come and discover that. I uh I was looking at doing some gravel racing like the R2D2 I think it's called in Vermont. And uh yeah, I need to come and discover all those roads. >> If you look at the strawberry >> Uhhuh. >> Yeah.
The roads are suck, but the railroads are just endless. >> Yeah. >> And beautiful. >> When is that Guilford race? March. >> I'll look it up on Bike Ranch. >> Yeah. I mean Jacksonville the heart of Jacksonville the best area and seems like it would be attainable for all the New Jersey, Mid-Atlantic, also New England, you know, Green kind of people. >> Yeah. Yeah, totally. >> There's no big climbing.
It's a lot of constant up and down >> rolling. That's how the riding is in Connecticut. It's >> very punchy. Um, >> yeah. >> Up and down. >> Yeah.
Very steep. >> Yes. >> Very few like more than 10 minutes. >> Yeah. I can't find anything longer than 12, 14 minutes around here. >> Yeah. >> 3 minutes in Nebraska. You need a headwind, Douglas. And we coached some folks that live in like New Orleans and Florida and they got like on-ramps.
That's their climbing. Honestly, if that's if that's where you live, I I I I have athletes get on Zift. I mean, I think you can do good climbing nowadays on Zift or Ruby. I mean, the I mean, I did up to Zift last Sunday.
It was pretty cool. Hour worth of sweet spot. >> Hey, Frank. >> Yes, sir. >> Yeah. >> Wait, sorry. I think I didn't hear I think you cut out. What were which event were you talking about? >> Get your attention. >> Oh, I've heard about that.
Yeah, some of the guys on my group ride did it this past year, summer. >> Yeah. Yeah, I I have to put that on the list. >> Hey, how many KJS are you at? >> Me? Uh like 1,308. I've kind of been zone twoing it while I've been talking though.
Yeah. >> Sorry, you're you're in and out. See? >> Yeah. I guess my mic is bad now. >> Yeah. Yeah, I can hear you now. >> Yeah.
Yeah, now I can. All right, Discord group, who's still here? Hey. All right.
Yeah. So, one minute to go. Thanks so much everyone for joining. Really enjoyed having you here and riding with you.
We will uh like I've been saying in the chat, we'll do it again January 3rd. And [snorts] I think we'll schedule some festive 500 rods. Just pay attention to the uh notifications you get from the uh the Zift Companion app with the the Fast Cat Coaching Club. But yeah, everyone have a >> Thank you so much. >> Yeah, you're welcome.
Thanks for joining. Everyone have a uh >> wonderful holiday and uh happy new year if we don't see you until the the January 3rd ride. Everyone's doing 226 kilogjles on January 1st, right? >> Thanks very much. >> Yes. Yes.
Peace out. >> Yep. Thanks for joining. Thanks for joining. >> All right, that concludes our Fast Cat Sweet Spot Saturday session. As you can see, a lot of good banner and discussion.
And uh I hope you enjoyed listening in and would consider joining us next time. We have another rod on January 3rd, as I'm sure you've heard. All you have to do is uh join the Fast Cat Coaching Club and the Zift Companion app. And then pay attention for rides that we post.
So, ride number three of seven is January 3rd. Hope to see some of you there. And if you're watching and you want a a chance to win uh a free uh year of Coach Cat and you get this in time, just send an email to helpfastcoaching.com with the subject header free coach and we'll pick a winner. Have a good one and thanks for joining.
What happens when you mix a live Sweet Spot group ride, real-time coaching, fueling advice, tech questions, and unfiltered athlete Q&A? Train Smarter. Ride Faster with the CoachCat App where the 1st month is FREE /app
You get a live, no-BS training session led by Coach Frank that covers how cyclists train.
In this ride & podcast, we dove into a dozen or more topics, including:
1. How to ride Sweet Spot by feel (no rigid intervals required)
2. Why Sweet Spot is “not too hard, not too easy — just right”
3. Fueling correctly indoors (70–90g carbs/hr and why it matters)
4. ERG mode: when to use it and when it hurts your training
5. Using time-in-zone instead of chasing perfect watts
6. Heart rate vs power for Sweet Spot Time in Zone Accuracy
7. Training consistency, durability, and long-ride fatigue resistance
8. How to adapt training when life, travel, injuries, or holidays happen
9. Festive 500 strategy for road, gravel, crit, and masters athletes
10. Strength training + endurance: how to blend them without burnout
11. Why most plateaus are caused by doing the same thing too long
12. How CoachCat helps revise plans, answer questions, and guide decisions in real time
🎯 Who this ride and podcast is for:
Masters cyclists
Time-crunched athletes
Gravel, road, crit, and fondo riders
Athletes training indoors on Zwift
Anyone tired of over-complicating training
🧠 Key takeaway:
Fitness comes from doing slightly more work than yesterday and recovering well enough to do it again tomorrow.
Sweet Spot training done right builds durability, raises FTP, and teaches you how to pace long efforts — without burying yourself.
🚴 Join us live again on January 3rd, 2026
Sweet Spot Saturday is part of a 7-ride progression series:
Each ride gets 30 minutes longer
Builds durability and confidence
Ride #7 culminates in the legendary Uber Pretzel
📅 Next ride: January 3 👉 Join the FasCat Coaching Club in the Zwift Companion app
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If this helped your training, hit 👍, subscribe for science-backed cycling advice, and share with a riding buddy who trains hard but wants to train smarter.
Train Smarter. Ride Faster. — Coach Frank 🐾
