Varying your load pattern over a microcycle

[ShortAndStout]

I was talking to a coach who suggested that doing the same workout day-after-day was less effective than mixing it up, even if the overall intensity is lower. For example, a daily 45 minute UT1 workout is less effective than the same schedule separated by 20 minute UT2 workouts. He suggested that the reason for this wasn't a recovery issue (especially at my level, 3-4x a week) but rather an adaptability one - doing the same workout doesn't create new stimulus so you're more likely to plateau.

I'm curious what you guys think. Intuitively this makes sense, but I'm not tracking how a 20 minute slower session is more beneficial in the long run than a 45 minute UT1 session, or whatever equivalent you think makes sense.

[MPx]

I agree that the example sounds completely counter intuitive, but I also completely agree with the underlying principle. If you do one workout, then your body gets used to it and adapts to being able to do it with the least effort. But that's it. Depends on your goals of course but if you want to become a faster erger over many distances then you need all sorts of adaptations to take place. Hence most formal plans include short (very intense) intervals, long hard intervals, and various types of steady state sessions most of which might be UT2 but also UT1 and even "grey". They all get your body to make different adaptations and the various stimuli keep you improving for longer. Also stops the boredom of always doing the same thing!

[contdrift86]

Google "polarized training protocols". Basically the TLDR is that 80% of the time you should do easy work, so the 45 min UT2 sessions, and then 20% of the time you should work hard AT/TR/V02 Max type sessions.

Broken down if you train 4-5 times a week like this:
Session 1 - UT 2 @ 50-60% of 2km watts
Session 2 - Threshold session @ 70-80% of 2km watts
Session 3 - UT 2 @ 50-60% of 2km watts
Session 2 - V02 Max @ 105-115% of 2km watts
Session 5 - UT 2 @ 50-60% of 2km watts

Sessions 1,3,5 should all be 45 minutes.
Session 2 should be something from 5-15 minute intervals, with 2-5 minutes rest.
Session 4 should be 30-120 seconds in length, with 2x the time in rest. So if you're doing 30 second sprints, rest for 60 seconds each interval.

[p_b82]

The advice given is correct - it can be applied to anything really - do one thing repeatedly and you get very good at that one thing.

So when extrapolated to rowing, to improve we need power, technique, aerobic fitness & mental toughness - so we need to work on multiple different disciplines to improve all 4 aspects until we find our own limit on the effort/reward scale.

[Dangerscouse]

He suggested that the reason for this wasn't a recovery issue (especially at my level, 3-4x a week) but rather an adaptability one - doing the same workout doesn't create new stimulus so you're more likely to plateau.

I agree. Plateauing can be a difficult thing to identify as you're sometimes inclined to make excuses to start with eg a bad day, stress, nutrition etc, all of which can be valid reasons too, I hasten to add, then you settle into it and it feels hard enough even though you're not fully working to capacity.

The body does need a good variety of stresses to ensure adaptations as the body is hard wired to be efficient (or arguably lazy) so as soon as it can cope, you'll not be progressing, or any progress will be notably slower. Admittedly, there is also an issue of your own personal ability to keep progressing, but that's not something to consider atm.

[jcross485]

Less than elegantly stated, "if you always do what you've always done, you'll always get what you've always gotten".

In order to make progress, the stimulus will need to be more difficult over time. That doesn't mean going from 2:10 steady state to 2:05 in a month and continuing to go that much faster every month, otherwise you would be a world record holder pretty quickly. It could mean adding a small amount of volume over the course of a week at the same pace, it could mean doing that volume at a slightly faster overall pace, or it could mean doing the sessions with less or no breaks like I am doing now. There are a lot of ways to progressively overload, those are just a few examples.

I think this is why things like the Pete Plan are so popular (and effective) in rowing, although there are some very minor modifications I would make to it to make it a bit more sustainable, especially for older rowers. You'll see the same in other arenas (Jim Wendler's 5/3/1 in strength training, for example). You get a relatively condensed macrocycle of 3 weeks as opposed to a 12 week program where you are constantly training but also testing in a way on the hard sessions so that you can see if you are progressing on a frequent basis. Every 3 weeks, you are attempting to better the same session done previously which is a way to program progressive overload.

[Dangerscouse]

I'd also add that training with accumulated fatigue is another important skill to learn. Fatigue isn't to be strictly avoided, nor to be confused with under recovery.

Quoting Vince Lombardi, and apparently, paraphrasing Shakespeare, "fatigue makes cowards of us all" but in those moments you can really understand what reserves you've got and the ability to keep going even when you think you can't.