Power Training Through Winter

Ade Merckx

I'm perhaps one of the few without a PM but the range for FT building rides will be from 85-100% of your FT. Personally any ride 2/3 x 20's tend for me to be 95-100% of FT. However 3 x 30 or 2 x 45 will be at a lower percentage of my FT perhaps 86-90%. Not having a PM means I'm dependent on perceived exertion but when these rides are done on my KK I'm usually at the right level of intensity. Hopefull Dave and other will embelish what I've said I've never done them so I can't say. But the general advice on threshold workouts is to make the 'on' duration at least 15mins; but I'm sure you'll still get value at 10mins If after 6 weeks things feel easier its possibly time to increase duration or instensity Yeah me and you both mate. Hopefully not this year I guess as long as you get them done is what most important. Id go the group ride route personally

Steve_B

A 9% change for the entire interval group (not just a single 20-minute interval) is excellent progress.

I go by a combination of accidental discovery along with trial and error. If I'm feeling well, I might try a slightly higher power and see how long I can hold it. Sometimes it just falls onto my lap though and I just ride into the intervals, I can tell the power is up, and I just roll with it.

You need to do a lot of L3 to make it worthwhile so I prefer to do it outside. But just in case you were thinking of targeting L3, don't. Keep targeting FTP. You really don't need to target L3. There are good reasons to do some of it but to some extent, being able to do more and more work in L4 (i.e., higher power) will mean that you should be able to do more and more work in L3 (i.e., time) also. You will want to do some long bouts of L3 prior to racing to get your body used to longer efforts, work on glycogen storage and top off your CTL (you can acquire boatloads of TSS on a long L3 ride) but don't make it your training emphasis.

daveryanwyoming

+1 Steve, excellent post!

daveryanwyoming

When you first start training, especially if you don't seed your CTL and ATL starting values, it's hard not to ramp CTL quickly. The question is how do you feel after those fast CTL ramps? If you're feeling fine with your weekly training load then I wouldn't worry about it just yet. If you try to sustain steep CTL ramps after CTL has climbed a bit then I'd be more concerned about illness or burnout.

Looking at your charts, your steepest CTL ramps happened when your CTL was below 15. Well an hour of easy Tempo riding can easily give you a TSS three times that level which will bring your CTL up fast but if you're a normally healthy person with at least some regular activity then that probably isn't too hard on you. Basically our CTL probably doesn't ever really get to zero unless we're totally bedridden, or maybe it does mathematically, but we can still do some work without recovery troubles.

As far as TSB being mostly negative, that's normal and necessary during a build period. CTL only goes up if workout TSS is above current CTL on the average. And when your average workout TSS is above your CTL(pulling the long term average up) your TSB will be negative. The two go hand in hand. Sure TSB may become positive after rest days or light training but during a build it will be negative more often than not or you're not building.

Hope that helps,
Dave

RidwarePhil

Dave / Steve,

Thanks for the exlanation and encouragement.

I think my current plan of riding with club at the weekend for 3 hours should bring in the miles / L3 workload and be more fun than riding the turbo.

In the week I will follow your advice and work on FTP primarily until I get closer to racing season whehn I will switch in a few sprints and L5 interval sessions.

Thanks - now looking for the next 9% improvement - although I feel this one may be harder to achieve!

Phil

Steve_B

Just a point to note - My experience has been that group rides around here really don't put me into L3 for long periods of time. Unless you are riding with a more advanced group, you may not be getting much L3 time on a plain-vanilla group ride.

That's not to say that a good group ride is not what you want. On the contrary, they are fun and I think the variable nature of a group ride is a very good thing for a racer. There's a time and a place for everything though.

Because of organizational issues and because L3 ("tempo") in large quantities is seemingly unpalatable for most riders I know, I generally do most of my serious L3 rides on my own.