Quantifying training volume

[Arsen Gere]

How much you ride on bike is easy to measure in terms of the mileage.
The same is true for running, swimming is easier to measure in kilometers with a lot of metric pools around.

But when you put all this together, some weeks you may be tired due to long rides other times it might be due to swimming more regularly and overtraining can be an issue.

So I came up with an idea of tracking volume but not intensity by using multiples of distance in some sports. What I mean is swimming is harder to cover distance than running which is harder than cycling. I wanted a simple forumla for quick calculations and I use :

(25 * swim kilometres) + (5 * run miles) + (cycling miles) = total volume.

I use this in a spreadsheet to track my total weekly volume.

Saturday Sunday ... Totals Volume
r b s r b s r b s
7 0 4000 0 75 0 7 75 4000/1000 (5*7) + (75) + (25*4) = 210

So for me this is a period of higher volume work and I have values of around 400-500, some weeks higher run mileage some times a long Sunday ride or if the weather is bad more swims.
I find it useful to monitor progress and if I am feeling tired I might need a rest day adding in somewhere but I know why I am tired and its not a cold coming on or poor diet.

I can plot this as a chart and see the volume rise and fall for each discipline and for the total so I don't neglect any one area and I don't increase volume too quickly and get hurt.

What do other people use?

 

[Flying_Monkey]

That's a formula that is as good as any shorthand I've seen. But actually, I really don't even try to combine the three things. They are so different and work such different muscles that I just keep the volumes separate. I mean I can feel if I am overdoing things in general and I always have one complete rest day per week or so. This of course changes when it comes to doing more bricks in late winter / early spring. But even then, I don't add up the bike/run sessions and the swims.

 

[fimm]

My boyfriend (who take tracking rather more seriously than I do) tracks both distance and time, using a spreadsheet. He also tracks total hours per week and I think that is how he defines "harder" vs "easier" weeks. He's been doing this for a few years now, so he likes to see how what he is doing compares with previous years (I'm not sure how useful this is!).

 

[Flying_Monkey]

Men, in particular, will do this with almost anything though. I think it has more to do with psychological satisfaction than what is actually effective for training. Mind you, psychological satisfaction can be important in training.

 

[loops]

I have no idea what I did last week! I swam today so I'll run tomorrow, nice idea though.

 

[007fair]

I feel the temptation for yet another statistical spreadsheet coming on. resist! resist!

 

[loops]

Can someone create a simple formula so I can play?

 

[Arsen Gere]

Loops,
Just create 7 merged sets of 3 columns for the names of the days, Saturday Sunday etc.
Then under each one of the merged 3 columns put the amount you do, it's kind of in my op.

Then on the right create 3 columns one for each Swim, Bike, Run,
So the Swim is the sum of the Sat/Sun/Mon... Swim columns in metres * 25, Divide this by 1000 to get km.
The next column is the sum of the bike columns
The next is the sum of the runs in miles * 5

Finally create a total column which is the sum of the 3 above.

As your weeks progress these columns develop meaning.
You can plot on the same scale the swim/bike/run columns. I used this to show that my 400m time was decreasing as I swam less distance, by doing at least one 400m tt and recording that on the swim page. I put this down to aerobic fitness for swimming.
I have separate pages for Swim/Bike/Run and another page with observations and comments about injuries, weight, heart rate.

If you have bother I can knock this up in a spready, if you pm me I'll send it to you.

Incidentally I did a muscle endurance turbo session on Sunday with a declining load, ie gets easier as time goes on. I compared this to last January and for the same speed - hence load or power output my HR was about 5 beats lower consistently. My legs still hurt a lot but it showed the aerobic phase I am going through is paying off. ( Allowing for differences in temperature food etc)

I got a bit of a kick out of this because I have no other real reference and I felt like I was slogging away on slowish road miles.

 

[Arsen Gere]

fimm,
I record times on the separate pages I have for each sport. I know a lot of people use time rather than distance, it's just my personal preference.
I am doing slower aerobic stuff, lower intensity, longer duration at the moment so I want to see the distance or time rising,
I'll start to ramp up the intensity next year and the volume will come down as I mix in intervals and muscular endurance sessions.
Some weeks I might do a higher leg for one sport and reduce some of the others but try to keep a base for each.
The graphs allow you to see this, I should probably post a picture.

 

[loops]

Loops,
Just create 7 merged sets of 3 columns for the names of the days, Saturday Sunday etc.
Then under each one of the merged 3 columns put the amount you do, it's kind of in my op.

Then on the right create 3 columns one for each Swim, Bike, Run,
So the Swim is the sum of the Sat/Sun/Mon... Swim columns in metres * 25, Divide this by 1000 to get km.
The next column is the sum of the bike columns
The next is the sum of the runs in miles * 5

Finally create a total column which is the sum of the 3 above.

As your weeks progress these columns develop meaning.
You can plot on the same scale the swim/bike/run columns. I used this to show that my 400m time was decreasing as I swam less distance, by doing at least one 400m tt and recording that on the swim page. I put this down to aerobic fitness for swimming.
I have separate pages for Swim/Bike/Run and another page with observations and comments about injuries, weight, heart rate.

If you have bother I can knock this up in a spready, if you pm me I'll send it to you.

Incidentally I did a muscle endurance turbo session on Sunday with a declining load, ie gets easier as time goes on. I compared this to last January and for the same speed - hence load or power output my HR was about 5 beats lower consistently. My legs still hurt a lot but it showed the aerobic phase I am going through is paying off. ( Allowing for differences in temperature food etc)

I got a bit of a kick out of this because I have no other real reference and I felt like I was slogging away on slowish road miles.

That looks doable! thanks anything that shows progress is encouraging!

 

[heliphil]

try downloading Sportstrack - free I believe and you can record and view all you training

 

[Arsen Gere]

Thanks for the Sportrack ref. It looks pretty good and gets a good write up in the health section of this forum too.

I've gone over my sheet for the past year and the totals come in around swim: 270km run: 900 miles and bike: 4400 miles so not a bad guess. So the swim in miles is probably a better guide than in k (170 miles). 25 * 170 = 4250 and 5 * 900 = 4500.
A bit of fun really, but it provides some motivation too.