Zone 2 recovery days

When I've got 2 days off in a row, typically:
1st day rest: Easy/off
2nd day: Zone 2 1hr.

Or if it's a 3 day rest block the 3rd day is zone 2.

Zone 2 is defined as 76-85% of your steady state power/hr.

What I've found is that zone 2 is actually just a hair above what I'd do if I wasn't following a plan. It's just a tad bid uncomfortable on the legs. My legs are typically fatigued after an block of work (2 or 3 days) and the zone 2 intensity feels harder than it should be. Especially when you compare the intensity to the much higher power outputs of SMSP intervals.

But I've found that it's really important to the success of the next day's intervals to get the intensity into Zone 2 even though I'd rather be piddling along. Too much rest actually makes it diffifcult to go hard for the next day's intervals.

This is the same reason why I NEVER take the day before a race completely off. In fact I always do some high intensity such as 5x1 on 2 off +1 hr zone 2. I need some priming of the legs prior to going really hard.

It's also interesting to note that the day after a race is a good time for me to go tempo or medium hard. But two days after a race the fatigue has set in and it's much more difficult to ride hard.

This morning I did 45mins on the trainer, which is more like 50-1hr on the road because there is no coasting on a trainer. Yeah I know I should have done an hour but it's tough to sit on that thing w/o a set workout.

Tomorrow is that start of a 3day block. First day is 2sets of 8x2on 2off.