Page 2 - To peak or not to peak

06-12.-2007, 12:04 PM	#16
vladav Registered User Join Date: Feb 2007 Posts: 66	Re: To peak or not to peak DRW (Lol, your acronym looks alot like Dr.W) Thanks! That was the info & context I was hoping for! (No need to be sheepish on my account - some people pay good money to have the best info digested and served up in simple terms . Others are too poor...) Thanks, DaveG

06-12.-2007, 04:04 PM

#17

vladav

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Join Date: Feb 2007

Posts: 66

Re: To peak or not to peak

Quote:

Originally Posted by daveryanwyoming

...but you will almost certainly spend away CTL as you transition to a high end L5, L6 and L7 focus...

Dr W,

Re-reading your post, I'm curious how you mean "spending away CTL".

Are you saying focus above L4:
1) Degrades some of the Lactate system gains?
2) Simply doesn't Build CTL? (no doubt because of work/recovery capacity)

Dave

06-12.-2007, 04:30 PM

#18

daveryanwyoming

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Join Date: Oct 2006

Posts: 1,359

Re: To peak or not to peak

Quote:

Originally Posted by vladav

.... Are you saying focus above L4:.. 1) Degrades some of the Lactate system gains?...

Nope

Quote:

...2) Simply doesn't Build CTL? (no doubt because of work/recovery capacity)...

Yep, it's pretty rare to maintain CTL at an exact level so you tend to build or lose.

Harder workouts imply less total training time at level, IOW less TSS. That's another way to look at the whole SST concept, you build more TSS by holding reasonably high intensity for reasonably long durations. When you transition to higher intensity work or serious racing you either have to cut workout length, increase recovery, or both. That tends to drop your average daily TSS which means your CTL will start to sag. Do it long enough and you'll start spending away your base. It's really hard to train a lot of L5 and L6 or to race a lot (if you're trying to be fresh for each race) and build (or maintain) CTL at the same time.

-Dave

07-12.-2007, 01:44 AM

#19

rmur17

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Join Date: Oct 2004

Posts: 926

Re: To peak or not to peak

Quote:

Dr.W

wrote ..... Harder workouts imply less total training time at level, IOW less TSS. That's another way to look at the whole SST concept, you build more TSS by holding reasonably high intensity for reasonably long durations.

Seldom can I add anything to his posts but expanding on that point ...

We ALL have a maximal Power-Duration curve. One that's partly genetic, partly trainable and is also dependent on one's *current* training state
For the majority of people once we get onto out beyond a few minutes in duration the 'droop' in the Power-duration curve falls within 5-10% loss in sustainable power per doubling of duration.
Dr. A.Coggan has more or less proven that across a wide variety of workouts and races that NP is a effective measure. Therefore IF is an effective personalized measure.
If we consider a baseline workout of duration T1 and intensity IF1, the related TSS(1) = T1*IF1^2
And compare that to a maximal workout of double that duration 2*T1, the intensity will range from 0.90 to 0.95IF1.
TSS2 will range from (2*T1)*(0.90-0.95)^2*IF1^2 or approximately 1.6 to 1.8 times TSS1
If we consider a workout four times longer, TSS4 would be approximately 2.6 to 3.2 times higher.

That's why is possible to rack up larger daily TSS and ultimately CTL when performing longer workouts. IF our P-D curves dropped much more rapidly or if TSS employed a much higher exponent of IF, that would not be the case.

Now of course one still has to recover from those workouts. Yadda, yadda, yadda ....

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rmur

07-12.-2007, 02:52 AM

#20

daveryanwyoming

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Re: To peak or not to peak

Quote:

Originally Posted by rmur17

....That's why is possible to rack up larger daily TSS and ultimately CTL when performing longer workouts. IF our P-D curves dropped much more rapidly or if TSS employed a much higher exponent of IF, that would not be the case...

Awesome analysis Rick! I was thinking about estimating TSS for a couple of representative workouts to demonstrate the concept, but you nailed it! It gets a bit trickier when you introduce typical recovery intervals but it makes an awfully good argument for say 30 minute long intervals vs. the 10 to 20 minute variety at a slightly higher power.

-Dave

07-12.-2007, 03:46 AM

#21

rmur17

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Posts: 926

Re: To peak or not to peak

Quote:

Originally Posted by daveryanwyoming

nah. Just math -- now if i could get some graphs put to good use ....

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rmur

07-12.-2007, 09:19 AM

#22

giannip

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Join Date: Jul 2005

Posts: 222

Re: To peak or not to peak

Quote:

Originally Posted by daveryanwyoming

I shoot for a CTL ramp rate of 3 to 5 TSS/day/week most of the winter and haven't had trouble with that build rate yet.

Ok here goes.....PLEASE don't laugh

do you mean that your CTL raise 3-5TTS / day so if today mine was at 55, tomorrow it should be 58 - 60 ?

I know it's probably the dumbest question in history on this forum but for som reason I'm confusing myself...........

07-12.-2007, 10:11 AM

#23

daveryanwyoming

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Re: To peak or not to peak

Quote:

Originally Posted by giannip

...do you mean that your CTL raise 3-5TTS / day so if today mine was at 55, tomorrow it should be 58 - 60 ?.....

No, that would be a much higher ramp rate, but don't worry no laughter on this end, it's a bit confusing to talk about.

CTL is measured in units of TSS/day or in other words the average daily TSS(for a long averaging period). CTL ramp rate is measured in terms of how fast that CTL rises over some period like a week or month. So a weekly ramp rate is in units of TSS/day/week or you could say it's in terms of (average daily TSS)/week.

So the CTL ramp I'm talking about is how much your CTL rises over the course of a week. Realistically it goes up faster after hard training days and dips a bit on rest days but you can still look at the weekly rise or ramp rate. So if you're at 55 today you wouldn't want to be higher than 63 or so a week from today if you want to stay safe. If you know you can tolerate a faster build you can dig a deeper training hole and force your CTL to rise faster but a lot of folks have run into problems with rapid builds.

When your CTL is lower it's pretty easy to ramp it too fast and dig too deep a training hole. When it's up higher it's a bit harder to accidentally overshoot the ramp rate since it takes harder workouts to make your CTL rise. For example, at a CTL of 55 it only takes an hour of Tempo to make your CTL rise. When your CTL is 100 it takes a full hour at FTP just to stay even or perhaps two hours at high Tempo to drive your CTL up. Alex's advice a while back to watch your CTL ramp rate is always good advice but it's really important when coming back from a long layoff when your CTL will be relatively low.

Hope that makes sense.
-Dave

Last edited by daveryanwyoming : 07-12.-2007 at 10:23 AM.

07-12.-2007, 10:52 AM

#24

Alex Simmons

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Re: To peak or not to peak

Quote:

Originally Posted by daveryanwyoming

Indeed, if someone does have a sustained CTL ramp of >8TSS/wk and isn't getting symptons of digging a deep hole/getting sick, then it's highly likely they have underestimated their FTP or they are just starting out from a very low base.

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07-12.-2007, 12:24 PM

#25

frenchyge

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Re: To peak or not to peak

Quote:

Originally Posted by daveryanwyoming

It gets a bit trickier when you introduce typical recovery intervals but it makes an awfully good argument for say 30 minute long intervals vs. the 10 to 20 minute variety at a slightly higher power.

Agree that Rick's breakdown was great, but I don't think it makes that argument. Not that I disagree with the above statement (

) but it's important to remember that we're talking about training stress, rather than training benefit. Unless one's goal is to set new TSS or CTL records, the TSS should be comprised of training that is specific and beneficial to one's events. Personally, I think that makes an argument that there's a time and place for 10min, 20min and 30min intervals in one's training program.

I realize you get it Dave, but I thought I'd mention the caveat before someone else concludes that maximum TSS equals maximum training.

07-12.-2007, 04:05 PM

#26

daveryanwyoming

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Re: To peak or not to peak

Quote:

Originally Posted by frenchyge

... Unless one's goal is to set new TSS or CTL records, the TSS should be comprised of training that is specific and beneficial to one's events. Personally, I think that makes an argument that there's a time and place for 10min, 20min and 30min intervals in one's training program....

No argument(as usual) frenchyge, but this discussion was offered in the context of maintaining CTL and how moving to higher end work or racing can cost you some CTL. Sooner or later everyone's got to spend some of that training base for high end work, tapers or race recovery, after all that's why we build the base. But I'm with you 100% that appropriate training mix and working on weaknesses is key and big CTL numbers alone won't win races.

-Dave

07-12.-2007, 11:44 PM

#27

rmur17

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Posts: 926

Re: To peak or not to peak

Quote:

Originally Posted by frenchyge

Agree that Rick's breakdown was great, but I don't think it makes that argument. Not that I disagree with the above statement (

aye I was thinking of longer workouts when I wrote it ... but it does hold true if you compare indoor workouts. Doing a 20-min core very hard vs. doing a 40-min core very hard, it's basically impossible to obtain the same training load, i.e. raise the intensity enough in 20-min than in 40-min. And the same goes for 60-min vs. 120-min. I know that sounds frightfully obvious but IMHO very hard efforts anywhere in that range are danged close to having the same physiological effects. If we accept the TSS recipe of intensity and duration and the CTL formulation with TSS as input training load, then (for that range) maximum daily TSS IS maximum training this time of year (IMHO).

Now that assumes your CTL needs building yadda, yadda. If you're already near, at or just coming off long-term CTL peaks then I'd view things a little differently (this is where I was last year).

Personally after missing a couple of training weeks due to work travel and close to another two with the flu, my CTL (down from 110 to 70) definitely needs building before I start really hitting ATT again. But this is very close to where I was in fall.2005 and after a couple of months of SST, I was back to PB levels. Training logs are a good thing.

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rmur

08-12.-2007, 01:51 AM

#28

acoggan

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Re: To peak or not to peak

Quote:

Originally Posted by Alex Simmons

if someone does have a sustained CTL ramp of >8TSS/wk and isn't getting symptons of digging a deep hole/getting sick, then it's highly likely they have underestimated their FTP or they are just starting out from a very low base.

FWIW, at a recent coaching seminar Frank Overton showed data from one US pro who was able to raise his CTL at a rate of ~8 TSS/d/wk for ~3 mo without, e.g., getting sick, and it was only when it was approaching ~150 TSS/d that he had to back off (mostly, apparently, due to declining motivation). As Frank pointed out, however, this fellow did nothing but eat, sleep, and ride his bike...IOW, other stresses in his life were minimal, and he was doing everything that he could to maximize his recovery from workouts.

08-12.-2007, 08:19 AM

#29

giannip

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Join Date: Jul 2005

Posts: 222

Re: To peak or not to peak

Quote:

Originally Posted by daveryanwyoming

So if you're at 55 today you wouldn't want to be higher than 63 or so a week from today if you want to stay safe.

Ok great thanks.

Quote:

Originally Posted by daveryanwyoming

When your CTL is lower it's pretty easy to ramp it too fast and dig too deep a training hole.

looking at my CTL I'm not even digging a crack, let alone a hole. Then again I was off the bike for 2 months straight so wanted to get the legs going again.

I've done about 14 workouts and CTL only about about 1.5

08-12.-2007, 08:30 AM	#30
giannip Registered User Join Date: Jul 2005 Posts: 222	Re: To peak or not to peak my CTL is 24 , down from 60 when I stopped .......so I have long way to go. Should be fun

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