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The week of May 18–24

May 18–24 · 12 sessions · 7 of 7 days

Volume

Training time
10h 23m
Sessions
12
Days trained
7 of 7
Energy
7,438 kcal

By discipline

Run

4 sessions · 3h 21m · 31.2 km

Bike

6 sessions · 5h 45m · 32.9 km

Strength

2 sessions · 1h 16m

Heart rate zones

  • Z10–1313h 28m33%
  • Z2133–1454h 32m44%
  • Z3146–1571h 43m17%
  • Z4158–17034 min6%
  • Z5171–1843 min0%

Time classified by heart rate, summed across every session with HR. Strength work mostly sits low; the runs drive the top end.

Polarisation

  • Easy77%
  • Mid17%
  • Hard6%

Easy is Z1 and Z2, mid is Z3, hard is Z4 and Z5. Base building wants most of the time easy and only a little hard. The middle is the slow lane.

Analysis

The goal in this block is simple: train more, and train often enough that it becomes the default. This week did that. Twelve sessions, something on all seven days, a little over ten hours of work.

That is close to double the week before, which was eight sessions and under six hours. The jump came from adding sessions and one long easy ride, not from grinding any single day harder.

Running held its shape: four runs for 31 km, up from 24. The bigger lever was the bike. A long 33 km ride on Sunday at an easy 116 bpm, plus five indoor spins, did most of the extra volume. Easy aerobic time is cheap to add and quick to recover from, which is exactly what you want when the aim is volume rather than intensity.

The zones back that up. More than three-quarters of the time sat in Z1 or Z2, and Z5 was almost nothing, three minutes across the whole week. That is base engine work. Sharpening comes later, and that is correct this far out from a race.

The one number to keep honest as the hours climb is the middle. Seventeen percent in Z3 is fine for now, but the easy days have to stay genuinely easy so the extra volume builds me up instead of wearing me down.

Speed is not the headline yet, but it showed up: the progression run closed at 6:00/km and the threshold reps held 6:26. As the body adapts to the load, those come down on their own. For now the win is simply having trained twelve times in seven days.