Plan recommendation for Sidney, May 27 to June 5, 2026
Prepared for Sidney McGill on 2026-05-27.
This document compares the two training plans available for the next nine days and recommends which one to prioritize.
Plan A is on TrainingPeaks and is owned by Coach Gunnar.
Plan B lives in the workspace athlete/calendar/ files and is owned by Coach Luca.
The recommendation, summarized below and detailed in the rest of the document, is to prioritize Plan B because it is built around the demands of Ghost of the Gravel and around the current SI and back recovery picture. Plan A is a coherent general-conditioning week with strong fueling instructions, but it does not contain the sustained-pressure or gravel-surface work that Ghost will require, and it reintroduces heavy strength and sprint work earlier than the recent flare supports. The two plans agree on three of the nine days; the document maps the other six day by day, names the trade-offs in plain terms, and ends with a simple decision guide and two operating rules for the week.
Bottom line
Recommendation: prioritize Plan B (Luca).
Plan B is the stronger plan for the next nine days for two independent reasons:
- It is built around the race Sidney is preparing for. Ghost of the Gravel is a 4.5-hour sustained-pressure gravel race four weeks away with a working target around 4:35:00. Plan B trains exactly the qualities that race rewards — threshold extension, gravel-surface sustained pressure at race cadence, and ceiling support — with race-day fueling and equipment rehearsed in the sessions. Plan A does not contain a single sustained-pressure session, threshold session, or gravel-surface session in the entire ten-day window.
- It is built around the body Sidney actually has right now. Plan B treats the recent SI and back flare as a real constraint and removes heavy strength, opener bursts, and all-out sprints until stability is confirmed. Plan A reads as a normal build week and reintroduces heavy bilateral squats, split squats, opener bursts at 110-150% FTP, and 12 x 15-second all-out sprints within the first six days of the first symptom-stable ride.
The recommendation is decisive, not marginal. Plan B is the right plan to follow.
Why Plan B is the better choice
It builds the right qualities for Ghost
Ghost rewards the rider who can hold high sub-threshold pressure for hours on imperfect surface, eat aggressively without GI failure, and still race the final hour. The physiology required is sustained aerobic pressure, threshold durability, gravel-specific handling, and gut tolerance at 80 to 90 g of carbohydrate per hour.
Plan B trains all four qualities in this window:
- Threshold durability on June 2 (2 x 22 min at 94-99% FTP).
- Sub-threshold sustained pressure on gravel on June 4 (3 x 20 min at 82-88% FTP, gravel surface, race cadence).
- Ceiling response on June 5 (default 3 x 1 min openers, optional full VO2 5 x 3 min if cleared).
- Race-day fueling and equipment rehearsal built into May 30 and June 4.
Plan A trains none of these. Plan A's two stimulus days are Openers (May 30) and ZIPP (June 2), both of which are short-burst neuromuscular work. Neuromuscular sharpness is useful for cyclocross starts and surges. It does not move the needle for a 4.5-hour gravel race where the limiting capacity is sustained pressure.
It respects the clinical picture
The SI and back flare from approximately May 20 through May 25 was not minor. It included radiating leg pain down one leg and ride-limiting back symptoms. May 27 was the first symptom-stable day. Plan B treats the next four to six days as confirmation days. Heavy hinge, heavy squat, opener bursts, and all-out sprints are removed by default and held back until five to seven consecutive symptom-stable days are in place.
Plan A makes no visible modification for any of this. The single coach comment in the window — "No plyo jumps today" on the strength sessions — is the same recurring note that has appeared on prior strength sessions and is not a flare-specific intervention. The May 29 heavy strength, May 30 Openers, June 2 ZIPP, and June 3 heavy strength are all prescribed as if Sidney is mid-build with no clinical history.
It is written down
Every dated calendar file in Plan B contains a per-session Objective, Goal, Reasoning, Workout plan, Structured workout, Fuelling section, Constraints, and Notes. Every key day carries explicit decision gates ("if Saturday created lingering fatigue," "if back is irritated," "if Thursday is not clean"). The plan is auditable and adjustable.
Plan A is sparse. Most workouts have only a title, a duration, and a one-line description. There are no coach comments on any bike session. The fueling language is excellent where it appears, but the planning detail behind most sessions is not visible.
What Plan A does well
Plan A is not bad coaching. It does several things genuinely well, and these elements are worth keeping in view:
- Race-day fueling language is the best in either plan. "80 g/hr, no gogo squeeze/clif bars, drink mix/gel as in a race" is direct, memorable, and was already validated in execution on May 27. Plan B has adopted this language on its own key days for the same reason.
- Two real rest days. May 28 and June 5 are unambiguous rest. The fatigue-management instinct is correct.
- Aerobic backbone is solid. Three planned 3-hour endurance rides anchor the week. The duration and frequency are appropriate for the time of year.
- Coherent week-level rhythm. Plan A is a real plan, not random sessions.
What Plan A does poorly
- Heavy strength reintroduced too soon and too often. Two heavy strength sessions in nine days, each with 3 x 4-5 heavy back squats and 3 x 4-5 heavy split squats, within a week of radiating leg pain. The mechanical risk to the SI joint is real and is concentrated on these two days.
- Top-end neuromuscular work that is the wrong tool for Ghost. Openers (six sets at 110-150% FTP) and ZIPP (12 x 15s all-out sprints) develop max power. They do not develop the capacity to hold 82-88% FTP for hours on gravel.
- No gravel-surface session, no sustained-pressure session, no threshold session, no tempo, no sweet spot. The entire middle of the intensity distribution is missing for a build week.
- No ride longer than 3:00. Ghost is targeted at 4:35. The capacity to ride 4:30 to 5:00 at race pace on imperfect surface is not built in this window.
- Permissive recovery and long-ride language. "Easy ride" on Active Recovery and "3-4 if you feel good" on long endurance days both allow the ride to drift well past intent. For an athlete who is known to add load when she feels good, this is a real execution risk.
What Plan B does well
- Direct Ghost specificity. June 2 threshold, June 4 gravel sustained pressure on gravel surface, and June 5 ceiling support are the only three days in either plan that train Ghost's actual physiological demand.
- Race-day rehearsal built in. June 4 carries a full Equipment section (race tires, two-bottle setup, gel placement, repair kit, mechanical-abort criteria). Fueling on key days uses the same memorable language as Plan A.
- Symptom-led decision gates throughout. Every day this week has a contingency tied to a symptom or fatigue criterion. The plan adapts rather than commits in advance.
- Strength is event-appropriate. A single 25 to 30 minute maintenance lift on June 3, with explicit guardrails for the back (skip loaded hinge if irritated, skip split squat if balance asymmetric, replace hinge with cable pull-through if posture compromised).
- Saturday-dependent Sunday ladder. May 31 duration scales to what Saturday actually became, rather than assuming Saturday landed at the top of its range.
- Bounded athlete-initiated additions. Each file has explicit language: no extra gym work, no unprompted intensity, message first if something extra is on your mind.
- Auditable rationale. Every session explains why it exists.
What Plan B does less well
- Back-half density is real. Tuesday threshold, Wednesday endurance plus strength, Thursday gravel sustained pressure, Friday openers in sequence is four meaningful days in a row. If the front half does not stay clean, the back-half density can become too much.
- June 4 gravel session still loads the trunk and pelvis. Cadence has been raised to 80-90 rpm to reduce torque load, but sustained sub-threshold pressure over imperfect surface still engages the back. The contingency to stop the set if back tightens is the right gate, but the modality is the highest-back-risk session in Plan B's back half.
- Execution depends on Sidney's symptom self-reporting. The gates are good gates. They only work if Sidney reports honestly each morning.
- No top-end sprint work in the window. Plan B preserves high-end response through the June 5 openers but does not include sprint-specific work. For Ghost specifically this is appropriate. For the longer cyclocross season later in the year, sprint work will need to be reintroduced as a focused block in August or September.
Direct day-by-day decision guide
The four most important "skip Plan A and do Plan B instead" decisions are May 29, May 30, June 2, and June 3. Each of those days, Plan A's prescription carries real mechanical risk to the back. Plan B's prescription is the cleaner choice on every one of them.
The single most valuable Plan B-specific session is June 4 gravel sustained pressure. This is the closest match in either plan to what Ghost will demand on race day. If only one Plan B day lands cleanly this week, it should be June 4.
Two rules that apply every day
- No extra gym work and no unprompted intensity. If something extra is on your mind, message first.
- Stop immediately if shooting leg pain, increasing SI pain, mid-back spread, numbness, tingling, weakness, bowel or bladder change, severe rest pain, or pain waking from sleep appears. Any of those is a same-day clinical assessment trigger, not a "tough it out" signal.
Watch items for the next 72 hours
These are the data points that drive Plan B's gates:
- Morning back stiffness, 0 to 10
- Any radiating leg symptoms, yes or no
- Sleep quality
- Recovery from the May 27 combined gym-plus-ride day
- Fueling and protein consistency, particularly after key days
A short morning check-in on Thursday May 28 and Friday May 29 will determine whether Plan B's back half can run as written or needs to compress.
Bottom line, one more time
Prioritize Plan B. It is the better fit for the body Sidney is in right now and for the race she is preparing for. The four days where Plan B asks Sidney to do something different from TP (May 29, May 30, June 2, June 3) are the days where Plan A's prescription is most likely to cost her the next two to four weeks. The fifth day where the two plans diverge meaningfully (June 4) is the day that builds the most race-relevant fitness for Ghost.
Plan A's strongest elements — race-day fueling language, real rest days, aerobic backbone — are already present in Plan B's key days. Choosing Plan B does not give up anything important from Plan A.