Subtitle: Stop wasting your commute. Here is how to turn junk miles into a secret weapon for fitness.
For many riders, the commute feels like dead training time: too interrupted for perfect intervals, too stressful for pure recovery. It drifts into the grey zone, adding fatigue without clear adaptation.
A recent Enduroco discussion from Suresh asked: “I commute 45 minutes each way, three times a week. How do I let AI design workouts around that?”
The junk-mile dilemma
Riding 45 minutes each way, three days per week is 4.5 hours of volume. That is meaningful.
The problem is pace choice. If every commute becomes kind-of-hard Zone 3, you are too tired for quality intervals but not specific enough to drive strong gains.
Strategy: polarization
As Coach Ankit advised, stop treating every commute like a race.
1. The mullet commute
- Morning (business): strict Zone 1/2. Arrive fresh.
- Evening (party): use the ride home for selected structure.
- Execution: Sweet Spot or Threshold blocks can work if stops are manageable.
2. The ghost ride
When traffic makes structure impossible:
- ride unstructured and label it correctly
- let Enduroco AI count stress without enforcing strict compliance
- keep key structured sessions for controllable windows
Advanced option: double threshold
Some athletes split sub-threshold work morning and evening.
This can be effective but generates heavy fatigue. Only attempt with strong sleep, fueling, and recovery habits.
Conclusion
Commute volume is still volume, and volume is useful if managed intentionally. Go easy when needed so you can go hard when it matters.