_ About the support plans
I already wrote about the importance of these new, adjusted, support plans last week. Because this is such a huge improvement to our app, I, of course, want to have new support plan in the app for every goal distance. This week I implemented them for goal distances between 15k and a half marathon.
If only it were that easy to say: “I take the support plans of the 10km and increase the volume +x% each session or increase the reps of an interval session.”. Yes, the job would be done very quickly. But it wouldn’t get a ‘guaranteed quality’ stamp…
So every training week was reworked to get a balanced build-up towards the specific goal plan. Sometimes I dare to worry a bit too long about a (rather) small adjustment: why do I increase the LSD in week x but not the interval reps? And why am I adjusting the interval distances for performance level x or y, but not for z? That ‘worrying’ is to your advantage: we don’t take it lightly, those adjustments.
So do you have a race coming up that is between 15k and a half marathon? And is that race more than 10 weeks away? Then it pays to reset the goal and enjoy that improved support plan.
_ About the recovery plans
Finally we can also add recovery plan in the app! Another giant step forward.
Because recovery plans are very important in several ways:
Your body must be able to recover. Each race has a cardiovascular impact, but also produces a certain mechanical load. You need to recover from both, and depending on the race distance, that takes some time.
During your recovery you should train differently than during your specific race preparation. Less frequent with fewer kilometers and at a lower intensity. Yes, I’m a big supporter of what they call ‘active recovery’. But being too active will cause troubles eventually.
You also buy time (mentally) and avoid the ‘black hole’. Reminisce about that achievement, don’t think about the next goal yet. Just stick to the (recovery) plan.
You lower the acute training load (ATL) and will go back to a more balanced chronic training load (CTL). That is very important, also for the app. We were often asked why we predicted a slower time for your next goal, when you were already running faster. That had to do with this imbalance between ATL & CTL. Because just like you make progress during your resting period, our algorithm calculates in the same way. Your loads must be in balance before we can calculate a new peak performance.
As promised, I first designed the marathon recovery plans. These are VIP (Very Important Plans), because most mistakes can be made after sustaining such a high training & race load. And those mistakes can reverberate for a long time in life and limb.
And so I designed 10 recovery plans, where your match is based on performance level and training days.
Again, if you’ve now scheduled a marathon race, you’ll need to reset that goal to generate the recovery plan. From now on, we will link that recovery plan to every generated marathon training plan. You’re of course not obliged to follow that recovery plan, but we offer it and stand behind it 100%. So be wise.
May I also point out that we chose to make this a free feature? The future of Trenara depends on the number of subscribers. So the easiest way was to put that extra service, because it really is, behind a Peak or Peak Pro subscription. We deliberately do not do that, in the hope of convincing more people to take out a subscription thanks to a elaborated free version.
