A recent article mentioned a study on descending ladder intervals. https://www.outsideonline.com/health/training-performance/ladders-interval-workouts-research/
I’ve read a lot of the interval content here, and it’s been very helpful, but I don’t recall anything on this style. It makes sense to me that one could maintain quality longer by decreasing the length of the work period as fatigue builds. Thoughts?
Hello, I have had great success with these types of sessions.
One of which is below Ultimate Session (wattages are for a specific athete - usually I would say – max effort with best possible pacing for intervals of same duration)
- 30m gradual ramp 130-225w
3x
-
40s 370-390w 85-100rpm
-
20s 80-120w 60-80rpm
-
2m easy 145-190w comfy rpm
3x
-
40s 370-390w 85-100rpm
-
20s 80-120w 60-80rpm
-
2m easy 145-190w comfy rpm
3x
-
40s 370-390w 85-100rpm
-
20s 80-120w 60-80rpm
-
2m easy 145-190w comfy rpm
3x
-
30s 370-390w 85-100rpm
-
30s 80-120w 60-80rpm
-
2m easy 145-190w comfy rpm
3x
-
30s 370-390w 85-100rpm
-
30s 80-120w 60-80rpm
-
2m easy 145-190w comfy rpm
3x
-
30s 370-390w 85-100rpm
-
30s 80-120w 60-80rpm
-
2m easy 145-190w comfy rpm
3x
-
20s 370-390w 85-100rpm
-
40s 80-120w 60-80rpm
-
2m easy 145-190w comfy rpm
3x
-
20s 370-390w 85-100rpm
-
40s 80-120w 60-80rpm
-
2m easy 145-190w comfy rpm
3x
- 20s 370-390w 85-100rpm
- 40s 80-120w 60-80rpm
The other…Ultimate Plus. This is based on FTP as. %…but again would normally prescribe the same as above.
Warmup
- Minimum easy aerobic warm-up, go longer if time allows. 20m ramp 30-60%. Gradually build in range.
Main Set - complete all intervals as max sustainable effort with equal pacing across the intervals with same duration.
9x
-
1x max sustainable 30s 130-200% 90-100rpm
-
1x just roll 30s 40-60% 70-90rpm
-
self-selected rpm 1m 40-60% self
8x
-
1x max sustainable 25s 130-400% 90-100rpm
-
1x just roll 35s 40-60% 70-90rpm
-
self-selected rpm 2m 40-60% self
7x
-
1x max sustainable 20s 130-500% 90-100rpm
-
1x just roll 40s 40-60% 70-90rpm
-
self-selected rpm 3m 40-60% self
6x
-
1x max sustainable 15s 200-600% 90-100rpm
-
1x just roll 45s 40-60% 70-90rpm
-
self-selected rpm 3m 40-60% self
-
nice easy cooldown at comfy cadence 15m 30-60%
3 Likes
Hello @Angstrom,
Thanks for sharing. I hadn’t seen this research yet, but it is quite aligned with the recent conversations we’ve hard around Time @ VO2max that we’ve been discussing on the podcast.
Let me think about this a little deeper.
Hi @steveneal, I’m thinking of giving that first session a go over the next few weeks and wondering about target power for the intervals. I know you say max sustainable with even pacing, but I’ve just done a 5 minute max test (355W) so wondered if this would be a useful guide to what this power should be given your experience of the session?
Given my experience with the intervals…I wouldn’t assign you a power number.
I would ask you to work through the session a few times…to learn how to produce max power on the given day.
When done you would have the 40s intervals really close, the 30s all really close the the 20s…well they should get slightly better everytime finish with max.
A few sessions either too easy or too hard won’t hurt your training, and in fact they will help you as an athlete.
I don’t let my athletes look at the powermeter…or cadence…just a timer.
I want to see what they have in the tank when we try these.
Give it a go…Steve
1 Like
I’ve done longer intervals riding on feel and managed to pace them pretty well, just not sure about such short, intense ones. I like a challenge though…
I plan to do one or two of the sessions a week over the next few weeks and hopefully the extra focus will add a bit of motivation - see if I can nail the pacing and nudge up that 5 minute power when I next test after this block…
1 Like
Interesting what type of intervals are you doing at the moment?
I’ve not done any proper intense intervals since last summer. I have been doing endurance and @steveneal style tempo 2x20 - 3x20 - 2x30 etc. with HR limit of 145bpm (HRmax 182/FTHR 165). Intensity has been limited to the occasional 5km Saturday morning Parkrun - so a threshold type effort of 22-24 minutes. The only on bike intensity has been a couple of zwift races in early January.
Usually I would have done a fairly traditional progression starting in October with endurance gradually adding tempo > threshold > threshold+ (8-10 minute intervals) > MAP/anaerobic. Thought I would try something a bit different this year.
A favourite session from previous years was descending intervals before re-ascending and trying to match second half efforts to the first without looking at numbers. So, 4, 3, 2, 1 minutes, then 1, 2, 3, 4 and I managed to get quite good at pacing once I done it a few times. I’ve never really tried pacing those short micro type intervals though so will be interesting to see how it goes.
1 Like
Sounds awesome.
The descending / ascending intervals are a great idea.
I also use these (they are quite popular in cross country skiing).
So yes to same durations in the same energy domain for the durations.
Then another time try varying durations like 3 - 5 - 7 - 2 - 4 - 6 so that you are going at slightly different intensities within a chosen energy domain but have to learn how to pace the different durations. When I do this I always give the same recovery, that recovery duration would be long enough to recover well from longest intervals, so therefore you would have longer recoveries before the short intervals so you can push more.
Gave it a go last night and I seem to have done the opposite 
- 40s intervals varied by 34W from lowest to highest, 20s by 21W and 20s by only 16W
How did you like it? @novet
The variation by wattage doesn’t tell the entire picture, the % variation would help more.
Yes @steveneal liked that one, just the right balance between tough and manageable. Strangely enough my legs felt really good the next day which I wouldn’t usually expect after a session like that. Perhaps my legs just liked doing something different after a few months of tempo…
This is what it looked like:
Glad you asked about the %variation as it looks a bit different now I’ve put into a spreadsheet. The variation was mostly pretty small with a bit of an high W outlier in both the 40/20’s and 30/30’s - oddly occuring exactly in the middle of the block both times.
nice job!
Work towards something a little like below…you did a pretty awesome job. Try and find your limits while being consistent … with the 40s and the 30s…then each 20s interval slowly empty the tank.
1 Like
Great, thanks for the feedback Steve.
My legs did feel like they were fading in the last 10 seconds of the final interval so I’m not sure there was much more in the tank…only one way to find out I guess…
1 Like