FTP Training 4mins

markwb79

what are the thoughts about this work out?

4mins at 90% FTP, 1 min rest, repeated on a 45minute climb. Descend and do it again?

Many thanks.

imposter2.0

Depends what you are trying to achieve, obviously - although I don't see sub-threshold intervals as being particularly useful. Why not just ride up the climb at FTP?

markwb79

Imposter wrote:

Depends what you are trying to achieve, obviously - although I don't see sub-threshold intervals as being particularly useful. Why not just ride up the climb at FTP?

Sorry - As a way of increasing FTP

Thats what I said, but the reason was about the damage it does to your body if you are wanting to train again the next day.

wallace_and_gromit

I'd have thought that if you're doing 4 minute intervals then you should be doing fewer of them but faster.

A session I have used to good effect for rowing, running and turboing is 5 minutes on, 1 minute off, repeat for 5-7 times. Target pace during each work piece approx what you'd do for a flat out 15 minute effort. This works out as about 6% faster than my 1 hour flat out TT pace on the turbo.

This works well on top of a solid base of aerobic training, and a couple of these sessions each week for 6 weeks or help build towards a sustainable peak of around 3-4 weeks for racing and TTs.

Obviously, on a test sample of just me, it's hard to assess the effectiveness of this session against alternatives, but hurts like b*ggery and can be fitted into an hour inc warm up and warm down, all of which are good characteristics of weekday sessions in my view.

dawebbo

What you can recover from all depends on what load you are looking to do per day, over how many days and what you are used to. That said, I see little value in breaking up tempo efforts into such short intervals, I'd sooner do the whole climb at 80%.

trim_shady

If you're in you're 20s to 30s you should be able to consistently ride at the sweet spot (~85% to 90% FTP) day in day out without accumulating significant fatigue.

This winter I've had great success 2x20 at sweet spot on the turbo during the week with 1-2 longer weekend rides with great success. More on the style of training I've approached is described here http://forum.slowtwitch.com/cgi-bin/gfo ... 85#4193285. This is only speaking from personal experience however I've found that shorter intervals have had less benefit for me unless I reduce total volume and increase intensity (VO2 max intervals).

I'd recommend breaking up the 45 minute climb into two 20 minute efforts with a rest in between. If you find fatigue building up then take more rest/low intensity days.

Tom Dean

Agree with the above, and you might not find many 45 minute climbs near Amsterdam.

You're welcome.

PompeyPaul

Here is an interesting study which details out interval duration % of FTP etc and what "product" you get as a result of carrying out the interval

http://www.sportsci.org/2009/ss.htm#_Toc245522381