Now we are ready for the 3rd day of the VO2 Max Booster Program. If this is the first time you read about the VO2 Max Booster Program, please check out why you should train intensively for 14 days to make remarkable improvements to your VO2 Max.
Day 3 – Reduce Volume, Increase Quality
One of the secrets behind this program is time-effective focused interval training. Working with higher intensity means you need less time to achieve great results.
As you can see, most of the training days only last one hour. I know one hour is not much. Many riders take trips of two, three, or even more hours when they hit the road. I understand the reasons: it is nice to spend hours with your friends on the road when the weather is beautiful.
Nevertheless, reducing training volume is one of the central points in the VO2 Max Booster Program. Reducing volume is the key to increasing the quality of your training. Doing shorter workouts makes it easier to complete the training program as planned. They allow you to focus all your concentration on maintaining the correct power output during the intervals.
As a consequence of reduced training time (and thus increased attention/motivation), it makes sense to improve the overall intensity of your workout so that you will receive great results in less time. Interval training is often a lot easier to do indoors. When you don’t have to pay attention to traffic, you can spend all your time concentrating on maintaining the correct power output, cadence, or heart rate during the intervals. That isn’t easy outdoors, especially if you are not familiar with interval training.
Day 3
Total time: 1hr training
10min incremental warm-up
3 x (5+10min) 90% / 50% of your VO2 Max test result
5min Easy-rolling
Next step: Day 4 – More intervals (Did you miss Day 2?)
I have always been under the notion that you shouldn’t train at high intensity every day. This 14 day program seems to go against that. Is this going to be tolerable to be doing this program on a back-to-back high-intensity workout basis?
Thanks.
TLC, I guess today’s task answers your question:
https://www.training4cyclists.com/vo2-max-booster-program-more-intervals/
Best regards,
Jesper
Which one of us is doing the math wrong? I get 70 minutes for today’s program. 20 minutes of warmup, 45 minutes of intervals (3 * (5+10)), then 5 minutes of cool down.
20+45+5 = 70
Jason, You’re right. Thanks 😉
Thanks Jesper. I figured you intended to have a shorter warmup, but I wanted to make sure I wasn’t misunderstanding the interval section.
Jesper, I am a rower who cycles for the cross training benefit. I am about to start your VO2 max booster plan. My average watts for 5 mins cycling on my Tacx was 350W. I am trying to understand where that fits in the cycling community. Can you provide any information that would calibrate me. I am male, 47 years old and in regular training. Thanks.
Day 3 is a tough workout. I struggled especially with the first of 3 90% intervals but seemed to have an easier go with the second and third intervals. I have read about how tough Day 12 is. looking forward to the challenge!
I’ve gone through this program intermittently a couple of times, but this is the first time I’ve gone for a full 90% on this day’s intervals… and these proved to be REALLY hard for me. I managed exactly 90% on the first interval, power dropped to about 85% on the second, and the third I had nothing.
Thanks for putting out this interesting program; I’ll post up with my results in a couple of weeks!
Postscript: when I got on the bike (on the trainer) for day 4 of the program, I noticed that I made a mistake on day 3: my brake was rubbing! While, of course, this wouldn’t affect my powertap’s readings, it certainly did make it hard to keep a high cadence, since the wheel was dragging through the dead spot in my pedal stroke… I’ll just have to come back and do this day again in a few weeks. Which is not a very exciting prospect… 🙂