Between washings, vaccuumings, and packings this morning, I’m finding myself watching a podcast on Zone 2. One of the pro-level coaches that this guy interviewed talks about Zone 2, but seems to be more focused on explaining the reason for Zone 2, and not necessarily concerning your adorable little mitochondria…but the fact that Zone 2 simply allows you to train more. We all know that if you do a Vo2Max workout one day, you’d better take the next day off; or at least throw in a recovery ride. If we always go out hard then we are limiting ourselves to the number of workouts we get in.

Of course this doesn’t mean we don’t have hard workouts, but they are very few when compared to a pace that we can chat at. Anyhoo, this expert believes that consistency and ‘putting in the work’ is all important, and likes to ask athletes how many training days they have managed in a year, believing that this (overall, and especially over time) is more important than maybe any other number.

I just checked Strava and I think I’ll be around 200 activities for the year. A look back in time tells me a similar story, with a minimum of 150 during Covid (the 1 km radius in France made it hard to get much of a ride in). What’s your number, Dear Reader?