rsbob 

Have read quite a bit about not over stressing the heart with Zone 5 rides and building scar tissue but the benefit according to Fast After 50 is retaining VO2Max which should better allow us to climb hills and get around speedily (there a plenty of hills to cross to get anywhere). Then there is the camp saying that consistent Zone 2 riding is the most beneficial because it does not strain the heart leading to scarring or stress, but then VO2Max will decline precipitously which will make hill climbing more difficult (not that I am trying for KOMs, just getting over the 5-10% hills without getting gassed.

So, performance oriented cyclists (I am not addressing the cruiser set - which I can very much appreciate) would it be best from a health standpoint to do one or two high intensity sessions a week and keep the rest in Zone 2-3 or just stay Zone 2-3 and lose VO2MAX ability to climb without difficulty?

PeteHski

From everything I’ve read I certainly wouldn’t give up on doing at least 1 high intensity training session per week. But I also wouldn’t do too many HIIT sessions either. You need to be fully recovered to do them properly and get the benefits. A Polarised training plan is a good option, with lots of Z2 time along with 1 or 2 VO2 max interval sessions.

My target events require VO2 max power efforts (typically very steep 1-2 km climbs) and so I need to train for that. Otherwise I’m just going to get dropped out of the group.

Are these VO2 max intervals going to damage my heart in the long term? I think the jury is still out on that one. I think we are the first generation of Guinea pigs.

Darth Lefty 

With my bum ticker zone 3 is a rare visitor and zone 5 is a fantasy. Go fast while you still can!

Jughed

I can only manage 3 weeks max of 2x per week VO2 max sessions. After that I need a rest week, then I can do another 3 week block. For a max of 3 training blocks.

Everything I read, from multiple sources, including Friel - VO2 max sessions are only effective in short bursts and one will quickly reach peak power, then no longer make any real gains. And they are typically done to tune up for peak events.

And that longer Z4 threshold intervals are easier to maintain over the long haul.

And naturally, with a ton of Z2, some Z3 and Z1 recovery in the mix.

RB1-luvr

at 59 I take the conservative approach and keep the high intensity workouts to a minimum. As a result, I finish last or second or third to last in Masters 50+ cx races, but I'm fit enough to complete in them and that's ok for me.

MoAlpha

I tried to max out low intensity work at the expense of harder efforts over the past year and found that for me, 67 yo and riding 10-15 hrs a week, that it just didn't cut it and, worst of all, it was not much fun. This summer, I went back to my usual Tues and Thurs group rides with mainly younger, faster riders, which give me a big dose of V02max, and slowed down on the long weekend rides. That resulted in a major improvement in my numbers and enjoyment over last season.

I am cognizant of the potential risk of high intensities on the aging heart, but I don't do a lot of high intensity all year and it's a risk I'm willing to take. Balancing the risk is a strong association of higher VO2max with longer lifespan and healthspan, which appears to be a stronger effect than the negative one of exercise on heart health. The risks of a lifetime of intense exercise are real, but have never been demonstrated prospectively and anyone who claims to know the magnitude of the risk or tells you what to do with any confidence is going way beyond the available evidence.

PeteHski

That's a completely normal cycle i.e. 3:1 build/recovery week cycle. For older athletes a lot of training plans recommend a 2:1 cycle, which is what I now prefer.

Jughed

Yep, 2:1 is even better for me...

It's just how often you do the training blocks of VO2 efforts. From what I've read, it's not a continuous thing. A few blocks per year at key times. If I'm understanding it all correctly.

PeteHski

For me short VO2 max intervals (sub 1 min e.g. 60/30s) are all year round. I will do longer and harder efforts in the build up to an event, which for me is typically 3-5 min VO2 max intervals, 20-60 min FTP efforts, and 1-2+ hour tempo rides. My base rides are typically Z2 and I actually tend to do longer base rides during the season vs winter. A reverse of the traditional approach - mainly because I spend all winter on the trainer.

wolfchild

Zone 2 only for me on a bike...I get my anaerobic workouts from weight training and kettlebell training....I really like and enjoy zone 2 rides, it just makes me feel really good, I don't do HIIT intervals on a bike....HIIT should only be done no more than once a week or even once every two weeks.

asgelle

We're so lucky to have someone here who can see into every rider's abilities, goals, and training history to prescribe an individualized training regimen just for them.

rsbob 

I am a fast recreational cyclist that enjoys getting PRs as well as fastest for my age group (65-70) in Strava. Aged 68.

To this day, I have not done what are considered classical intervals. Instead I do a fair amount of hill climbs at Zone4 and mostly 5. The climbs can take anywhere from two minutes to ten. It’s not the same as sprinting for a minute, recovering and repeating but I am working hard with my heart rate up in the 160 to 170 to 180 area with a max of 192. I typically do 4 or 5 such climbs in a two or three hour period. Today I did 47 miles with 2500’ (with an 16% climb) and a couple of days ago 42 miles with 3000’.

Asking the braintrust; besides the climbs - which are very taxing - should intervals be added to the mix as well? Or maybe just one interval session per week? Yeah I am putting you guys in the coach’s seat.

Kai Winters

You are doing 'intervals'...you just seem to be misunderstanding the term and effort.
Nobody, nobody at all can do a full gas sprint for one solid minute. The best TdF sprinters usually start their sprint around 200 meters to go which is around 15 seconds.
Intervals vary in time and intensity but certainly doing the hill climbing you describe are intervals, they are just not the usual 'structured' intervals you also describe but the intensity is the same considering the zones you are doing these in.
I'm 68 and still race as well as participate in weekly club rides which are very high paced. I do structured intervals. My favorites are 30 seconds on/off with the on being out of the saddle, full gas for 15 seconds then holding that speed until complete. I usually do these in groups of 4 to 6 with a full 15 minutes of soft spinning followed by another set but the second set is until I can't hold the sprint speed, then I know I'm out of gas and soft spin to cool down and enjoy the rest of the ride. I also do one minute intervals with two minutes of recovery usually sets of 4 and maybe two sets if I'm feeling very good. I do this generally once a week but won't if I have a race that weekend. I'll do a few sprints just to say hello to my legs but focus on easier rides to build energy stores for the upcoming race. I also use hill climbs as intervals. They are longer and at a lower pace than the 30 on/off but they are also very beneficial.
Intervals are very useful for initiating attacks, covering attacks, bridging, etc. For pure exercise meh maybe not so useful but certainly so for competition, etc.
Zone 2 is mitochondrial building. It is the foundation upon which the HIIT is built.
I also use Fartleking from my old 10k competition days. I use Strava segment hunting as the Fartlek intensity portions and ride at Z2 for the rest. It's a nice breaker upper from more structured training.
It all works if you work at it. Recently finished 3rd overall at the Tour of the Catskills 52 mile event.
Just do it and enjoy yourself at whatever pace you prefer.

PeteHski

The main theoretical advantage of doing structured intervals is that the intensity, recovery and training stress are all fully controlled. They are measured doses. So if you get the dosage right you get the most benefit for the least cost in fatigue. Structured intervals can also be used to target very specific parts of your power curve and cadence range.

The hard part is getting the dosage right, but I have had my best results using Wahoo SYSTM training plans and their 4DP performance test. I also use PILLAR (app based adaptive training plan) which is a polarised approach using very simple VO2 max intervals. These are effectively my coaches. Previously I’ve used various Training Peaks plans, which were also good, but they are static plans unless you invest in a personal coach.

You are currently doing unstructured intervals, which are fine, but less effective and efficient in terms of boosting your full power curve. I do plenty of unstructured intervals when out climbing or racing on Zwift. They have the advantage of being more fun than structured intervals, although I find Wahoo SYSTM quite entertaining with their video based workouts.

So yeah I would look to add structured intervals into your training regime. But I wouldn’t do then randomly without following a plan of some kind.

An indoor Smart trainer in ERG mode is also the most effective way to do structured intervals. You can do them outdoor too, but they are much harder to control. The only structured intervals I sometimes do outdoors are full-on sprints. Everything else I do on my indoor trainer.

GhostRider62

You can find whichever answer you want to find. There really are not a lot of good studies, our generation is the first to be exercising into our senior years. The best "studies" seem to suggest that maintaining training volume and intensity is best to minimize the inexorable decline in VO2 max. Bruce Dill (Harvard Performance Lab Professor) tested his VO2 max from the age of 37 until his death into his 90's if I am not mistaken. His only dropped 0.22 ml/kg per year on average with the largest drops after late 60's, IIRC. Many of the reports of training programs for senior (aka old) world record setting marathoners seem to focus on miles or volume, which they all do. The articles and anecdotes don't give enough focus on the building phase leading up to those marathons where the racers do 5km and 10km races every week or two. Most of the longitudinal studies divide the participants into 3 cohorts, basically low, medium, and high training but without much information of what that means. The conclusion that I reached for myself is that those older athletes who declined the least were those who still competed. So, this is why I test myself against myself (strava segments) as it seems that some level of very high intensity is needed. I own and have read Friel's books and have read his blogs back over a decade or two Interesting to me, Friel wanted to title Fast After 60 but the publisher thought that market was too small and it became 50.

Hitting 192 BPM HR at your age is astounding. Do you know your VO2 max?

I think staying healthy and injury free is probably the best way to maintain VO2 max as an older athlete. I've worked my ass off trying recover from a really bad crash 2 years ago and then COVID morphed into long covid. My Garmin used to lie and tell me my VO2 max was 71 and now tells me 48 ml/kg, which is probably right and normal for someone who rides a lot. I also did 18.1 or 18.4 METs on a treadmill with an exercise cardiologist specialist who works almost exclusively with endurance nuts. My resting HR was mid 40's and maxed at 183. Now, it is 177 and mid to upper 50's. (the ratio of the two multiplied by 15.2 approximates your VO2 max) At the time my weekly hours were around 15 hours with some weeks much higher but I only did one structured HIIT session every 7-10 days. Even in the off season (covid recovery excepted), I try to do a hard session now and then. Is that optimal for me? For another cyclist? Who the hells knows to be honest. But it has been sufficient for my modest goals and according to the exercise Doc, my numbers were absolutely extraordinary, "about what he sees from top HS cross country runners". I've had several echos done of my heart and CT calcium is zero and they tell me I have no blocks or fibrotic tissue. But the biggest decline for me has been injury and illness.

I did block periodization as part of a peaking process this year. I got a couple more percent on my 5 minute power compared to my normal peaking process. I destroyed a 4-5 minute climb time that was my PB set in 2016 and never ever thought I would touch it. I thought to add these facts because I frequently rail against excessive HIIT for fitness type riders, but that is not to say I do not do them. For me, they are hard to recover from and just have to be very selective when I do them. Everyone else will be different. I also started playing ice hockey again. So, there is that too.

These are some articles/blogs that point to some insights.....

https://www.sportsperformancebulleti...robic-capacity

https://umh1617.umh.es/files/2016/05...s-provides.pdf

https://alancouzens.com/blog/optimal_periodization.html

rsbob 

thank you for your thoughtful response. Am amazed at the insight and diligence many on this forum exhibit when discussing/answering.

I have not had my VO2 measured or had any stress tests other than pushing myself to my HR max. I find that when 180 arrives, my O2 uptake is not sufficient to sustain my effort for very long (whatever that means) and 192 means ‘game over’.

It is terrible to accustomed to a certain level of fitness, in your case, and to suffer injury and illness, which knocks one back substantially. But very heartening to learn you are again beating PRs (my goal as well) set many years ago. appreciate the references. Thanks again

Carbonfiberboy 

My current heart condition at 78, which is not great, is I'm pretty sure a result of one very hard and long ride per week done 52 weeks/year for decades, usually 45' or so of Z4 and maybe 10' of Z5 in that one ride. Otherwise it was mostly Z2. I remained a strong rider until I turned 77 and then all of a sudden, boom. Do I wish I'd done it differently and missed out on all the joy of doing those hard fast rides with all those fun people? Maybe not so much. I made a lot of dear friends, perhaps largely because of what I gave.

rsbob 

At 77+ or - did you suffer a cardiac event? It seems like your performance would slowly deteriorate rather than it suddenly going to he!!. It appears you are attributing your sudden decline to your history of Z4-5 efforts. Was it determined there was scaring?

Sounds like you are offering a cautionary tale about going too hard on a weekly basis.

Jughed

The variations from person to person are just flat crazy. I'm 51 and have to flat kill myself to see 172 BPM. I've seen it once at the end of my 3rd VO2 max interval. I'm typically in the low/mid 160's during VO2 max intervals - and its a long slow build to get to that point.

My Garmin lie o meter has my threshold heart rate at 147. Most people are just getting warmed up at that point!!.

TakingMyTime

Thank you all for the information and insights in this thread. I've been dealing with a precipitous drop in my fitness and energy level this season and you've given me a lot to think about. I do need to say that my mileage has also decreased this year which I blame in part for this lowering of my fitness level. 68 y/o with HR Threshold of about 152.

Iride01 

I saw my heart doctor today and ask her about this. She said it's only an issue if this is what you do all the time and it's only what you do. She said that for my three rides a week that even though I spend the better portion at zone 4 and some zone 5 that I still have enough time in the lower zones.

Carbonfiberboy 

Maybe so. Cause and effect are hard to suss out. It is interesting that I didn't get Afib like most of my overcooked friends. I did get 3 stents, one after a minor heart attack, but I don't think that had much to do with my drop-off. My issue is a gradual failure of my heart's overall electrics and then a more singular, abrupt failure. My resting HR remained stable at about 46 and my standing resting HR at about 54, while my ability at higher levels deteriorated. I started taking my HRV in December of '17. For those of you familiar with these numbers, my average SDNN declined from about 35 then to about 17 now.

I had a partial right bundle branch block over an unknown longer period. The abrupt change was that I developed a block between my atria and ventricles at HRs over 120, first noticed in October '22. The HR at which that block started became steadily lower until in June of '23 it was down to 110. It I tried to work my HR at over those limits, I passed out. I got a pacemaker to help with that issue this August. It's unclear if I will ever ride outdoors again, at least in our local hilly terrain.

I also developed an arrhythmia, premature ventricular contractions (PVCs) which have become more and more frequent putting a possible cap on my safe HR at about 115, at which point I develop periods of stable Vtach. I can no longer take my HRV as my PVCs come about every 20-30 seconds.

None of my 3 cardiologists have any idea why these issues developed. I rather think it had something to do with working my heart so hard for so long, but that's just speculation. It's taken almost a year to get these issues diagnosed because my cardiologists haven't seen anything quite like this.

If I keep my HR down, I can do a lot of things just fine, like hike, backpack, ride my bike on the flat, and go to the gym. My HR seldom goes over 100 with those activities.

Calsun

I can only measure my heart rate while riding and keep it in the 60% to 80% of the theoretical maximum for most of the ride. When encountering hills my heart rate will climb and may exceed 80% but that is not a concern. Interval training is the most effective overall and I find riding on hilly terrain makes this automatic as I push up each hill and recover on the downhill section.

ofajen

I’m not 100% sure I’m relevant, but I’ll share what I’m doing. I think it’s more of the polarized training rather than just Z2.

I’ll admit, I’m not as much of a performance oriented cyclist as I was a couple of years ago. I now structure my weekly exercise around running at least twice and often three times per week, daily walking, strength training at least twice per week and some biking added in.

But, whether intervals or threshold, running falls into the “hard” bucket, while walking is easy and so I generally am trying to keep the biking in the “easy” bucket. That is an adjustment for me and I’m training myself to use lower gears.

I really don’t have an interest in doing away with running at this point, so I will be doing some stuff in the Z4 and maybe a bit of Z5 each week. At least that is where I think I am. I think my zones correspond to a nominal max HR of about 185, though my tracker thinks my HR goes a good bit higher at times.

But a threshold level run only lasts 30-40 minutes before my feet get tired. My HR will be in the 150 to 160 range the whole time on a steady pace run and goes rather higher if I’m doing 200s. But HR is higher when running so I’m not exactly sure how to compare that to cycling.

Anyway, that’s what I’ve chosen. As others have said, we don’t really have research to specify all this stuff to three significant figures, so we just choose something that makes sense to us and do it.

Otto

deacon mark

I don't think I relate to anything here mentioned. I have been a long-distance runner and cyclist for 45 years. I now only cycle due to runner's dystonia but I ride about 8-10,000 miles year I don't train for anything just like to ride and get a workout. At 62 my resting pulse is like 39 and I find it almost impossible to get my heart rate above 140. On a long and hard climb I can get 145. The last time I saw 158 my supposed max was almost 2 years ago up a 6 percent grade for a mile. All my training my HR runs between 102-120 bpm. I rarely average about 115. According to garmin I am not work hard and while I am not out of breath of having and chest issues I just cannot crank it above that BPM.

My guess is I rarely take time off and if I did probably recovery and 3-4 days rest I would have much more power including HR but who knows. I just wonder if any other long time endurance folks see this trend in their training?