+1

I'm about to turn 56. I do a 30 mile round trip commute, 3-4 days a week depending on my need to drive, that I use either for zone 4-5 intervals or a steady-state pace (top of zone 2 or just into zone 4). I do a ~50 mile fast club ride each Saturday that takes everything out of me; I have to prep well and carb-load to have any chance of keeping up. If I can, I do an easy Sunday recovery ride. I'm most of the way through Friel's Total Heart Rate Training, and see none of the over-training symptoms he describes. So long as I eat right (I wasn't eating enough for quite awhile, and that had me fatigued), I feel I can keep this regimen going without rest weeks. Frankly, having to do a "rest week" would really piss me off.

To try and summarize the little argument that occurred in this thread, Friel uses a "flirt with over-training to really stress your body, but rest (rest days and rest weeks) to make sure it doesn't cause real over-training" approach, while the linked article suggests close monitoring of each exercise to detect reduced performance, and backing off on that exercise to avoid overtraining. Both are trying to keep you "on the edge" of overtraining.

One of Friel's points when he says "you only get stronger when you rest", is that it is during your sleep (according to him - I have no indpendent knowledge) that human growth hormone is released, which is a necessary part of building your strength. It also has to do with periodization: going beyond what you could maintain day-after-day, then backing off to recover.

Do I have it right?