[Scott Johnston]

Great questions, and very cool that you have paid attention to what training seems to work well and which seems too difficult to recover from.  I would recommend dropping the gym ME progression and substituting uphill power hiking intervals.  They will have their own strong ME training stimulus but in a more sport-specific way and have a stronger cardiac training effect.

We normally find Z2-3 tempo training works very well with fit athletes such as yourself for increasing specific endurance.  However, it needs to be controlled in terms of the volume and intensity.  And it would also need to be accompanied by only Z1 training and some short speed.  1-2 Z2 to low Z3 tempo workouts in a week have proven very effective with our fittest athletes.  Not suggesting you change your training at this point in your cycle. You’ve got something that is working well.  I’m tossing that out there for your consideration in the future.  Something to try.

Scott