[jroden]

<p>Best thing you can do is start a cycle where every third or 4th week is an easy one.  When it's time for your race, you simply plan to have the easy week fall on your race week.  I think a lot of triathletes just do droning mileage and compulsively overtrain, then get all giddy and crazy when they taper once or twice a season.  This is not the way to do it.</p>
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<p>Coming into your race week, add one or two days off exercise.  Do your endurance riding, but cut the volume down a dit.  In the days coming into the race, do one 5 minute hard effort and a few 30 second efforts in the days before your race so you will not feel sluggish, you want your body to clear some lactate and be working, but no so much it stresses you.  Doing these 5 minute "blowouts" before interval workouts is a good idea also.</p>

 

[jroden]

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<div class="quote-container"><span>Quote:</span>
<div class="quote-block">Originally Posted by <strong>tpenn40</strong> <a href="/forum/thread/69141/cycling-training-question#post_1927137"><img alt="View Post" class="inlineimg" src="/img/forum/go_quote.gif" style="border:0px solid;"></a><br><br><p>Thanks JR!</p>
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<p>So for race week I'm thinking an endurance ride of 30-35 miles, a ride in the 15- 20 mile range at medium pace, then another ride around 20 miles or so with a 5 min hard effort, then a few 30 seconds efforts as the last workout before the race. </p>
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<p>Also - what pace/intensity should the endurance ride be?  My best pace for a sprint tri bike leg is 20.9 mph for 11 miles, and I rode one of my 40 mile rides recently at 20 mph with the first half at about 19.5 mph.  I also did a long ride this weekend with a group and we took it really easy, avg about 16 mph. </p>
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Well, if you look at the numbers at face value, it would suggest you are a bit of a "one speeder" which I suspect corresponds to that pace you call "medium".  Pace varies a lot based on hills and wind, but assuming everything is equal, maybe you would do a distance ride at say an 18mph sort of effort but it's OK to have some harder segments, but then during the week you need to spend some blocks of time at 23 and some shorter blocks at 25.  Even if you can only manage a few minutes at the higher speed, that's the dimension you need to work this time of year.</p>