One-Hour Workout: Unders and Overs
Enhance your sustained power durability and mental resilience with this aerobic bike session.
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Learning to work just above and below your threshold is a great way to boost your fitness without inducing huge amounts of fatigue. This session, from Adam Daniel, a trainer at Wattbike, is designed to improve your body’s aerobic efficiency and resistance to fatigue.
Daniel said: “If you’re looking to improve your FTP (functional threshold power) or increase the duration at which you can hold yourself near threshold, this workout is perfect for you. This session will improve your body’s aerobic efficiency and resistance to fatigue. This will help you to improve your endurance, which is perfect if you’re building towards a 70.3, Ironman, or sportive.”
He added: “By keeping the sustained effort on throughout the workout, you’ll train your brain at coping with the demands of middle distance racing, as well as the physical benefits.”
The workout starts with an easy warm-up, followed by a series of short high-effort intervals. The main block of intervals starts with three rounds of three-minute endurance efforts with two minutes recovery between each. The final two efforts ramp up power over six minutes (broken down as three minutes, two, then one), with two minutes recovery between each. For those who ride with power, the workout is given as % of FTP; for those who don’t, the workout is prescribed using RPE (rate of perceived exertion).
One-Hour Workout: Unders and Overs
Warm-up
5 min. at 4/10 RPE
5 min. @ 5/10 RPE
High-effort intervals
Effort 1: 30 sec. @ 77% FTP/RPE 5-6/10, followed by 30 sec. at 127% FTP/RPE 9/10
Recover: 30 sec. @ 77% FTP/RPE 5-6/10
Effort: 30 sec. @ 134% FTP/RPE 9/10
Recover: 30 sec. @ 77% FTP/RPE 5-6/10
Effort: 30 sec. @ 141% FTP/RPE 9/10
Recover: 30 sec. @ 56% FTP/RPE 2/10
Endurance efforts
Effort: 3 min. @ 85% FTP/RPE 5-6/10
Recover: 2 min. @ 70% FTP/RPE 3-4/10
Effort: 3 min. @ 85% FTP/RPE 5-6/10
Recover: 2 min. @ 70% FTP/RPE 3-4/10
Effort: 3 min. @ 85% FTP/RPE 5-6/10
Recover: 2 min. @ 70% FTP/RPE 3-4/10
Ramp
Effort: 3 min.@ 106% FTP/RPE 8/10
Effort: 2 min. @ 113% FTP/RPE 8-9/10
Effort: 1 minute at 120% FTP/RPE 9/10
Recover: 2 min. @ 49% FTP/RPE 2/10
Effort: 3 min.@ 106% FTP/RPE 8/10
Effort: 2 min. @ 113% FTP/RPE 8-9/10
Effort: 1 minute at 120% FTP/RPE 9/10
Recover: 2 min. @ 49% FTP/RPE 2/10
Cool-down
Easy spin for 10-12 mins.