Build Me Up support thread

General Discussion
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Hi, 3 time BMU finisher there, also did a good chunk of training on TrainerRoad’s Sweet Spot and Polarized plans (94-96kg/1.86m). Just a comment on how hard the VO2 workouts should be, and how tought to complete a 1+ hour Sweet Spot WO.

If you think the VO2Max are hard, that’s because they supposed to put you through the grinder. I believe Chad (from TR) said that if you get off the bike after a properly executed VO2Max workout without the feeling of almost destroyed, than you did something wrong :slight_smile:

And about changing the effort level - This is the way. As one’s FTP changing daily (assuming it was precisely set after a test which is an almost impossible task to begin with), next day it could be higher a few watts, or lower, you could be more tired, more rested, better fed, etc. So change the effort level as you see fit, it doesn’t mean you doing something wrong. Also, almost everybody has one or more weak spot, and an FTP test /value is only a very small chunk of your profile, so don’t get hooked up by one number (FTP).

Sweet Spot / Treshold like efforts (like them Unicornz) are though in themselves, and if you haven’t executed such WOs until now, it’ll catch you by surprise, raising the suffering to a whole new level. After a few instances, you’ll get used to it, and while “it never gets easier, you’ll get stronger”, so you’ll withstand the cascading acidosis in your legs :slightly_smiling_face:

One thing to keep in mind, which helped me A LOT with high level efforts: keep them legs spinning! Like seriously spinning, practice high cadence (95 and upwards). After 2 years, my comfy cadence raised from 85-88 avg RPM to 102-107 RPM. And Whenever you head into a segment in the workout where you have at least Sweet Spot effort (84% of FTP and upwards) raise the cadence BEFORE you hit the segment (5-10 seconds before the gate). That will make easier to start the effort even if you are not used to high cadence.

To everyone doing / completed the BMU: Congratulations! You’ve been in the Grinder, and came out stronger on the other side both physically and mentally! :clap:

One motivational stuff (I like to listen to it on Spotify before EVERY hard workout in the past 4 years, still gives me goosebumps :slightly_smiling_face: ):
YouTube: Rise and shine - Athlete and running ultimate motivation - YouTube
Spotify: Rise And Shine - Motivational Nike Commercial - Rise And Shine - Motivational Nike Commercial | Podcast on Spotify

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142

Thanks so much for taking the time to throw down your experience on BMU Andras! It totally resonates with what I’ve been learning throughout the plan so far.

For the first two VO2Max workouts I just casually sat on the bike, threw on some random news podcast, and started riding like I would in any Z2 workout, but I’ve found they are hard enough mentally that I have to psyche myself up for them, and really focus the whole way through every interval. Now I’ve switched from listening to random podcast of the day to workout music on YouTube for those efforts which I think has also helped, so thank you for sharing a few of those links since I haven’t found one that I love yet - so I’ll try one of those out on Serrated today.

I’ve also found that once I can’t meet cadence targets things get sooo much harder. I’ve put special focus on really prioritizing the cadence targets as much as I can, and if early on I can’t keep cadence targets then that’s my trigger to bump the difficulty down a notch otherwise I’m just not gonna make it through. I’ve allowed myself to miss cadence targets near the end when I think I can power through, but I do find that my legs feel more beat up the next day when I do that, so it has a knock on effect to the rest of the week.

Anyhow, thanks again for sharing your experience with the program!

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143

Also worth to get to know how ERG mode works, and what is Spiral of Death in ERG :wink: All About Erg Mode in Zwift | Zwift Insider

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@Andras_Beck out of curiosity, have you done any of the other workout programs? You mention you did BMU 3 times - was that once in 3 separate seasons, or did you do them back to back within a season?

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I did them once back to back (2018 autumn start and 2019 end of winter start), and one time 2019 autumn. I also did 12 week FTP (which is sorta kinda polarized from the middle), and I did Activitus 2hr group workouts which are based on Aktivitus 10 wk workouts ( Zwift workouts: Aktivitus 10wk Ironteam & Endurance | What's on Zwift?) .Aktivitus WOs are a crapton of fun as group workout ( I think they still doing it, check out in the Companion app) , and really special to do when you execute them alone :slight_smile:

A friend of mine just doing his 5th (or 6th?) BMU, he really loves it, and it fits his rider profile.

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146

Ok week 9 done (this is week 10 in the 12 week plan).

This was the first week since Week 6 that I didn’t have to drop difficulty on anything, and I was pretty much able to keep the cadence on every section which surprised me a lot since this has been the highest TSS week so far.

Baffling Beau: I found this one to be easier than Circus. I had to drop the difficulty of the last two intervals of Circus and still fell apart at the very peak of the last interval for a few seconds, but for Baffling Beau I made it all the way through. It was still very difficult and I had issues with the cadence at the very end, but I didn’t need to touch the difficulty at all.

Exemplar: I decided to save Potpourri until end of the week, so did Exemplar right after Baffling Beau. As others have mentioned this one did not feel as hard as the description would suggest, the description says one of the hardest workouts in the plan, but I found the VO2 ones much more difficult personally. Not that it was easy, but made it through and hit all the cadence targets, and at no point did I think I would fall apart.

Serrated: I took a rest day between Exemplar and Serrated because I heard Serrated sucked. Which it did. This was the hardest one in the week for me, so I am glad I did a rest day. I didn’t think I was going to get through the first interval, but somehow did, then I told myself I would do just one more rep, then one more, and I kept telling myself this until the end. I have no idea how I got to the end of this one, but I did. Surprised I didn’t mentally fall apart on this one, I came so close to giving up multiple times.

Exigent: Exigent was not easy at all, but it was easier than Serrated. I found the VO2 intervals in this one actually felt a bit like rest compared to the VO2 intervals in Serrated. Hit all cadence targets in this one and didn’t need to give myself a rest day between Serrated and Exigent.

Potpourri: I did this on the last day with the goal of giving myself the most rest possible before the last painful week. This one is meant to be a lot of focus on tempo zone, it was of course the easiest workout of the week, a lot of cadence changes (60rpm vs. 100rpm), but nothing that was a problem.

I’m glad I changed the order around on this week because I’ll be a slight bit more rested for next week which I have no idea how I’m going to get through since it seems so much worse.

Next week is Tenacity, Aspire, Breakfast Returns, Thew, and Ruckus. If anyone has tips on how to approach this last hard week please share :slight_smile:

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147

Thanks for the week rundown @SeattleSauve! I was a lazy lump over the weekend so decided to do Serrated on the Monday to leverage all that rest - it did suck and I needed to drop the difficulty down 10% in the middle of the final set.
Did Baffling Beau on Tuesday (today) and decided that Zwift placed this AFTER Circus in order to instill a sense of progress - the medium high power/longer “off” times are far more comfortable than the high power/15 sec reps of Circus.

Good luck, and “enjoy” that final hard week of the plan!

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148

Ok, last week is DONE! This is week 10 in the 10 week plan (basically week 11 in the 12 week plan).

I was lucky and shut off all my updates so I was not affected by the bug introduced by the update this week - which would have totally mucked with my ability to finish the plan. It will no longer be possible to do the 10 week plan, but there is more flexibility introduced which should help folks doing the 12 week plan.

Anyhow…
I managed to make it through all workouts this week without dropping any difficulty, and “mostly” hit all cadence targets, so I was pretty happy with that.

I found Breakfast Returns, and Aspire the most painful with Thew as an honorable mention (it wasn’t fun either). Ruckus and Tenacity were not easy, but felt more manageable to me.

I did Breakfast Returns, Ruckus, and Thew back-to-back, then a one day break, then Aspire and Tenacity with no break in between those two, and I think that worked out well. Oddly my legs felt totally fine the day after Aspire.

Here are my stats for the 10 weeks (This does not include other rides such as TdZ, TdW):

  • Total Distance: 1,378km
  • Total Time: 62 hours
  • Total Elevation: 40,107m
  • Total Calories: 40,583
  • Number of times using the “Road to Sky” route: 30
  • Number of times completing the Alpe: 19
  • Best Alpe time: 1h0min25s (After the “Malevolent” workout)
  • Number of times completing Mt. Ventoux: 3 (During Purple Unicorn, Aspire, and Tenacity)
  • Best time for Mt Ventoux: 1:34:48 (During the “Aspire” workout - which had a 30min warmup so not a bad time)
  • Biggest win: Completing Mosaic without dropping difficulty after failing hard in LOX
  • Biggest failure: Somehow didn’t complete Cucumber.
  • Most painful week: Week 7.

Workouts failed:

  • Week 1: Red Unicorn (FTP was set too high)
  • Week 2: Orange Unicorn (FTP was set too high)
  • Week 3: Yellow Unicorn (FTP was set too high)
    — This is where I reset my FTP from 289 to 276 ----
  • Week 4: Purple Unicorn (This one just sucked, I think FTP was set correctly)
  • Week 7: LOX (Don’t have an excuse for this one)
  • Week 7: Kirizuma (Burned my legs out on Spaded Sweetie)
  • Week 7: Cucumber (I know… I know… Spaded Sweetie really wrecked me)
  • Week 8: Circus (Almost got this one)
  • Week 9, and 10: NOTHING!! Crushed them all!

Note: When failing a workout I would take a short break, get back on the bike and complete the workout, sometimes dropping the difficulty.

OK, so I took a ramp test at the start of this plan (which overestimated my FTP), so I will probably take a bit of a break, then do a ramp test next week. If I do, I will post the results. I am very confident I made gains over this last 10 weeks, but not sure if that will show up in the ramp test or not. We’ll see.

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149

Hi all, i finished BMU a couple of weeks ago and my FTP raised from 185 to 222. To be fair: 185 might have been a bit too low because I managed to do all the workouts. This week I started BMU again and now with the new FTP. I only did Devedeset and it was hard work. So maybe this time 222 is too high. In an hour I will do Zone benchmarking en Friday Red Unicorn. If this last one is too much, I’ll decrease my FTP to 210.
After the first BMU I did the Gorby workout and had to lower the power to 90% for the last interval. And I wanted to do the McCarthy special, but looking at it was enough to skip that one. Definitely too hard.
Curious if I can do that last one after finishing BMU again.

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Completed the difficult 11th week sessions - in descending order of difficulty for me: Aspire, Breakfast Returns, Tenacity, Thew and Ruckus.
Unfortunately, my innate inability to TT and lack of pacing skills led to a 6W drop in FTP on the final FTP test. Somewhat disappointing, but not unexpected because I never really do well at that test. Zwift automagically increases my FTP during events anyway - even if the results are somewhat accurate, outdoor riding season is rapidly approaching and I believe the improvements in fitness will come out in real life at that point.
I hope. :crossed_fingers:

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151

I started the BMU program but i’m a little behind. The program says it’s week 7 but I’m only on week 3. I do recovery rides in between workouts like 60-90 min zone 2 riding and would sometimes delay the workout because of scheduled group rides. i prefet riding outside when i can.

would the program end itself once it reaches week 12? or do i need to complete all the workouts for it to be flagged as complete? My plan is to take all the interval workouts but i won’t be able to follow Zwift’s schedule

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Hi - this used to be the case but now you can take as long as you like and workouts do not expire like they used to. I also do what you do and have just taken a week skiing so I am now a couple of weeks ‘behind’. It’s not a problem. Good luck!

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153

That’s good to know!

by the way, I just did the Purple Unicorn today. Oh man my legs were burning during the workout. I had to lower the ftp down a bit just to finish it. Had a great start and was able to finish the first 2 intervals @100% but then I had to lower the FTP to 90% / 85% on the 3rd and 4th intervals because my legs were so fatigued. On the last 4.5 min effort, I set the FTP back to 100% and gave it all I got. Legs were dead after but it was fun. lol

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154

Cheers from Spain. I’m 46 and have been riding for three years, mostly IRL. I wanted to see how my ftp would go after this plan. I did a ramp test with 220 watts but for some reason intervals.icu estimates 243, so I set it somewhere between those, at 233watts.
After trying to do some base training, riding on the trainer for four weeks (january), stuffing 5 workouts a week although being mostly Z2 rides I found myself exhausted. I have come to realize that at my age recovery (rest) is essential and therefore I must rest one out of three weeks (some coaches find this mandatory for veterans).
I have started BMU on february, sticking to the plan for the first 3 weeks and now into the fourth one. I found Amalgam really difficult but I made it, let’s see how that purple unicorn feels.
The thing is I am just doing these workouts and nothing else (i have put aside races and RL rides), and i try to finish the hardest ones first with at least a rest day before. It should take me more than 12 weeks to complete the plan if I have to rest properly 1 week out of three. I’ll keep you informed.
Thanks everyone for your sharing your experiences

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155

4 weeks of base training is not that much. Depending on your riding history immediately prior to that, you might need a month or two more of zone 2 before starting with the Zwift workouts. The Zwift workouts are quite high intensity and most coaches would not recommend these plans without significant base training. If the workouts are too hard I would probably also set FTP back to 220. Good luck with your training.

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Thanks for your kind advice! Prior to that I did rides of two, three or four hours, but just on the road, it’s what I have always done before getting into this. It also helped me intervals.icu and the decoupling feature (it indicates I’m ready) to go further ahead and leave the base training behind.
For now I’m fine with the FTP I have set according to other peoples feelings up to week four

Ride ons

157

Hi All,
On my 3rd week of the plan, trying to increase my FTP before going on to more “volume” based training as part of my second Ironman 70.3 race TP upcoming this year.
So far it was all good, sessions has been challenging but really great and I managed to perfectly hit the right power and cadence during workouts.
Today I did the “Amalgam” workout after yesterday’s “Ham Sandwich” , it includes 2 X 10min intervals at FTP (185W for me right now), I just couldn’t hold it, other intervals were tough [Almost died on the “shark teeth” intervals…ah ha] but I could hold it OK.
Had to drop 10% on both 10min @ FTP intervals to be able to hold it (thus 165W average) - Do you think I need to lower my FTP for the rest of the plan to 165W?
I didn’t take the FTP test before the plan started, used my pre-race FTP result from last November.
As regarding to the complete week training I also do 2 strength workouts for about 45 min full body and 1-2 runs (easy) a week.
Any advise here?

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Good stuff Oren. Amalgam is a weird one - it is much harder than the TSS suggests. That second 10 minute@FTP interval is a killer, especially so early in the program. I have done BMU 3 times now and never got through the second FTP interval without a 30s break. If you only struggled on the second FTP interval then I think you should be ok to carry on, but as you say you struggled on the first one, I would look at dropping your FTP 5% and do an honest appraisal after Yellow Unicorn.

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159

OK, my update: started first week of January, had a couple of weeks out due to snowboarding and sickness, now back on it in week 7. Had to knock it down 5% towards the end of both LOX and Spaded Sweetie so I’ve obviously lost some form (came back from a week snowboarding with very tired legs, then immediately got a cold). Cucumber today which looking at my notes from last time I did it isn’t that bad, really not looking forward to Kirizuma though. Week 7 is really the first ‘week from hell’ if I remember correctly!

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@Nick_Strugnell Thanks a lot for the good advise Nick! :slight_smile:
Good to know I am not alone out there…
Yea, I did struggle on the first one as well, and had to decrease ERG 10% on the Companion app to be able to sustain both efforts,so 5% off FTP setting it is.
Cheers!
Oren.

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