When life gets in the way of training

Notes alongside the text say what each point rests on:

The same session isn't the same load every week

So an interval session that builds you up in an ordinary week can simply dig a hole in a bad one. The workout on paper is identical; what it costs you is not. That's why we adjust training to the week you're actually having, rather than asking you to keep pace with a calendar written in advance.

What we look at before changing anything

• Sleep over the last few nights, not just last night. One bad night costs something on the day. Three in a row change the week.

• How easy effort feels. When your usual easy run or ride feels heavy, or your heart rate sits higher than normal at that effort, you haven't recovered from what you've already done. It's the most honest signal there is.

• Resting heart rate or HRV, if you already track them. Several mornings in a row noticeably off your normal say more than any single reading.

• How you feel about training. Being tired but feeling better ten minutes in is normal. Dreading every session for a week is not.

None of these is a verdict on its own. Taken together, and set against what you've told us about your week, they're usually clear enough.

What goes first when the week gets tight

1. The hard session, for this week. It costs the most recovery and gives the least when you're already short of it. One week without intensity loses next to nothing.

2. The length of the long session, not the session itself. Ninety minutes instead of two and a half hours still keeps long, steady work in your week.

3. Frequency, last of all. Twenty easy minutes on a bad day keep the thread going. The habit of moving most days is the hardest thing to rebuild once it's gone, so we protect it before anything else.

A useful rule of thumb: a short easy session is almost never the wrong call, and a hard one on four hours of sleep almost always is.

Don't make up missed sessions

So the reference point is your longest session in the last 30 days, not the one you did before the gap. What we do next depends on how long the gap was.

• A few days. Carry on with the week as if nothing happened. Nothing has.

• One to two weeks. Some fitness goes, but less than it feels, and the base is still there. The first week back is shorter and entirely easy, and intensity returns in a few weeks.

• A month or more. We start from what you can do now, not from what you used to do. After a month off, the last 30 days hold almost nothing, so your old long session has become a large spike. And heart and lungs come back faster than tendons do, so you'll feel ready for more before your legs are. That gap between feeling ready and being ready is why the first weeks back feel too easy on purpose.

Illness

This is the one area where we don't negotiate.

• A fever, anything in the chest, or aching and unwell all over: no training at all, not even something easy.

• A head cold without a fever: easy movement is fine if it leaves you feeling better rather than worse. If in doubt, rest.

• Coming back: start short and easy, and step up only if the symptoms stay away. The more of your body the illness involved, the longer the way back usually is.

If after an illness your heart rate at easy effort is unusually high, or you notice chest pain, palpitations or breathlessness you can't explain, stop and see a doctor before going any further. That's a question for a doctor, not for us.

Travel

• Walking counts. A day on your feet in a new city is real aerobic work, especially in a week without much else.

• Strength needs a floor and nothing else. Twenty minutes in a hotel room is enough to keep it ticking over.

• An easy run is one of the better ways to see a place. Keep it easy; the city will still be there tomorrow.

• After a long flight or a big time-zone shift, the first day is easy or off. Jet lag is a load in its own right.

Sometimes a trip is the opposite of a gap: a week near hills, open water or snow is a chance for work you can't do at home.

One week, as planned and as it went

Here's a composite of a very ordinary week: about seven hours available, with running, cycling and strength.

Nothing that matters was lost. The base is intact, the habit of moving is intact, and there's no hole to climb out of next week. The intervals come back next Wednesday as if this week had been ordinary, because for an adult life, it was.

What the research doesn't tell us

Most of the studies above were done on young men, on competitive athletes, or in a single sport. Almost none follow a 45-year-old who runs, rides and skis around a job and a family. The running cohort is the closest match, and even it covers one sport.

So the evidence sets the frame, and the details inside it come from judgement: yours about how you feel, and ours about what that means for this particular week. That's what the correspondence is for.

For how easy and hard sessions fit together in an ordinary week, see the Norwegian method, without the Olympic hours.