First FTP test
Comments
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ChrisAOnABike wrote:Well I just rode up the Alpe d'Huez!
The Drivo came with a free 'RealVideo' of the Alpe, and as I couldn't go out on the bike as I was teaching from 5 to 6.30, by which time it was dark and pishing down with rain, I thought I'd do a bit on the trainer rather than just opening the wine.
I wasn't planning to do the whole thing, but I got to a quarter of the way up and thought I'd do a bit more... then I was half way and thought I'd carry on a little further, and then I was three quarters up and it would have been rude not to finish.
There's a long flat section before the climb, but I averaged 142 watts over the 1:35 it took me for the whole route. So the FTP test earlier wasn't a million miles out.
I've got the wine open now though...
I don't think you can climb Alpe d'Huez in 1:35 with 142 watts... you used a simulator and a very generous one.
To put things in perspective... Alpe d'Huez is steep enough to give a linear return of speed versus power... which means that plugging your numbers, you should climb it in 47:30 minutes with 282 watts... which would be very very nice... but very very unlikelyleft the forum March 20230 -
Pretty sure you can climb the Alpe in 95 min with 142w (give or take) if you only weigh 74kg and don't take into account the bike weight. Obviously with the latter, it would be slower in real life by probably 15 min.
To do 47:30 at 282w, you'd have to weigh about 55kg
So not sure where you're getting that from, none of those stats relate to the OP?
OP, if you can do 142w for over 90 min and still be in a state to think straight about it, it's nowhere near your FTP let alone your 20 min peak power. That's good news.0 -
Well I guess I'd better make my confession sooner rather than later, and I'm super-embarrassed about this, so be gentle with me!maryka wrote:OP, if you can do 142w for over 90 min and still be in a state to think straight about it, it's nowhere near your FTP let alone your 20 min peak power. That's good news.
I made a schoolboy error when I fitted my new chain and set the bike up on the turbo. You know the little guide thingy on the jockey wheel, that the chain is supposed to run inside? Well I only went and threaded the chain on the outside of it.
Yes, I know...
No wonder it didn't shift all that well. And no wonder it was a bit noisy. :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :oops: :oops: :oops: :oops: :oops: :oops:
And yes, I only went and did the FTP test in my OP like that. I wonder how many watts I lost in friction round the mech.
Oh god, I am so toe-curlingly embarrassed. It's only because I'm a bit pissed tonight that I can bring myself to 'fess up.
Anyway. I did the RealVideo of Alpe d'Huez after I'd rethreaded the chain. But it was a lot quieter, and shifted a lot better. So hopefully my actual FTP is a bit better than 143. I'll do it again and report back.
You can all laugh and point now, god knows I deserve it... but I sure as fark won't ever do that again.Is the gorilla tired yet?0 -
maryka wrote:
To do 47:30 at 282w, you'd have to weigh about 55kg So not sure where you're getting that from, none of those stats relate to the OP?
.. .which is my point... I don't think you understood my post.left the forum March 20230 -
Did anyone?ugo.santalucia wrote:maryka wrote:
To do 47:30 at 282w, you'd have to weigh about 55kg So not sure where you're getting that from, none of those stats relate to the OP?
.. .which is my point... I don't think you understood my post.0 -
A bit OT but anyhoo...
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So from that chart you would require more than double your power to half your time.0
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Alex,
Is there much validity in the various body shapes being constructed of particular muscle types? ie are Mesomorphs predominantly made up of both fast twitch types, Ectomorphs of predominantly slow twitch and Endomorphs of fast twitch? If true, then as you say, a persons genetic makeup will determine what training they respond to and what method of weight management. Seems a lot more scientific than my Army days and the PTI yelling run up that hill and wondering why the same bloke was always at the back. :-DI ride a bike. Doesn't make me green or a tree hugger. I drive a car too.0 -
There are different phenotypes for whom different training strategy may be more or less suitable than for others (depending on what you are training for). I wouldn't necessarily classify body shape as being immediately indicative of muscle fibre type mix. In fit athletes there is tendency towards those attributes, but when unfit/overweight, all bets are off.philthy3 wrote:Alex,
Is there much validity in the various body shapes being constructed of particular muscle types? ie are Mesomorphs predominantly made up of both fast twitch types, Ectomorphs of predominantly slow twitch and Endomorphs of fast twitch? If true, then as you say, a persons genetic makeup will determine what training they respond to and what method of weight management. Seems a lot more scientific than my Army days and the PTI yelling run up that hill and wondering why the same bloke was always at the back. :-D
As for weight management, well one can get into all the diet stuff (and please let's not go there) but no matter what type you are, it's comes down to applying strategies that help you manage your energy balance while ensuring an a macro- and micro-nutrient mix appropriate for your needs.0 -
mamil314 wrote:It would seem that ugo., somehow, reached conclusion that doubling the power would half the climb time
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That is about right... at those gradients (in excess of 8% average for AdH) the impact of aerodynamics is negligible, as the vast majority of power is used to overcome gravity, which means more or less you get a linear increase of speed with linearly increasing power. If you double your power, more or less you double your speed and therefore you more or less half your time.
If the simulator used by the OP was accurate, that would mean that someone weighing 75 kg (OP's weight) could probably challenge Pantani's time with just over 300Watt, which obviously makes no sense at all.
I weigh less than the OP... if I could climb AdH with 140 Watt (let alone doing that in 95 minutes), then going up big mountains would be a breeze... I could just pedal without sweating too much (or sweating at all) while looking at the views and chatting with others... it's an experience I am not familiar with... :roll:left the forum March 20230 -
So I've signed up with TrainerRoad, thought I'd do another FTP test. This time with my chain fitted correctly...
It's the standard 20 min FTP test that TR suggests.... half hour warmup with some harder intervals, then 20 mins at the max sustainable. I found that if I kept my HR at about 152, I could just about keep going, although I went a bit harder towards the end when I was confident I could finish.
177 watts this time.
How does this look? I found it pretty hard to maintain the power constant:
Is the gorilla tired yet?0 -
Looks good to me.0
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Looks good to me too. Your 20minutes has a very light smile shape (higher at the beginning, dips in the middle, higher at the end), which is an ideally paced test.0
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that's good. keep at it.0
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Kind of proves my point, that you first need to become smart enough to know how to get the best out of yourself for 20 minutes on a stationary trainer.
My feeling is that you will most likely progress quickly towards the 200 Watt mark without any real progress in your aerobic power output, simply by getting better at doing the test.
At that point any further improvement will be a real improvementleft the forum March 20230 -
A ~10% learning effect for a longer test effort is a LOT.ugo.santalucia wrote:Kind of proves my point, that you first need to become smart enough to know how to get the best out of yourself for 20 minutes on a stationary trainer.
My feeling is that you will most likely progress quickly towards the 200 Watt mark without any real progress in your aerobic power output, simply by getting better at doing the test.
At that point any further improvement will be a real improvement
If OP hits ~200W, they really have improved their aerobic capability.0 -
Alex_Simmons/RST wrote:A ~10% learning effect for a longer test effort is a LOT.
If OP hits ~200W, they really have improved their aerobic capability.
Going from 140 to 170 he has already improved over 20%... if only 10% can be attributed to learning, then we have to accept that he improved over 10% in a week... which does seem to me a LOT.
As I said earlier, I've only tried once, got 210... but every data I have based on climbing for 20 minutes would suggest I am around 250, which is about 20% moreleft the forum March 20230 -
I'm pretty sure I haven't really gone from 143 to 177. See my confession earlier - the original 143 was measured with the chain routed wrong through the jockey wheels (yeah, dumb I know), so with quite a bit more friction than needed. Note that on the smart trainer, the power is measured at the axle, not at the pedals.ugo.santalucia wrote:Alex_Simmons/RST wrote:A ~10% learning effect for a longer test effort is a LOT.
If OP hits ~200W, they really have improved their aerobic capability.
Going from 140 to 170 he has already improved over 20%... if only 10% can be attributed to learning, then we have to accept that he improved over 10% in a week... which does seem to me a LOT.
As I said earlier, I've only tried once, got 210... but every data I have based on climbing for 20 minutes would suggest I am around 250, which is about 20% more
I don't know how many actual watts would have been wasted in friction.Is the gorilla tired yet?0 -
ugo.santalucia wrote:Alex_Simmons/RST wrote:A ~10% learning effect for a longer test effort is a LOT.
If OP hits ~200W, they really have improved their aerobic capability.
Going from 140 to 170 he has already improved over 20%... if only 10% can be attributed to learning, then we have to accept that he improved over 10% in a week... which does seem to me a LOT.
As I said earlier, I've only tried once, got 210... but every data I have based on climbing for 20 minutes would suggest I am around 250, which is about 20% more
His originally estimated FTP was 143W was from a 20-min test effort at 150W but done with a protocol that had pre-fatigued the OP so much that it wasn't a valid test of capability. And then we have the mechanical problems with chain.
Now the OP has done a test without overly pre-fatiguing and attained a 20-min average of 173W, which suggests an FTP in the ~160-165W range.
As for for more room on the learning effect, yes there is also some but have another look at the power and HR trace of the most recent test. If we can reasonably assume the final minute or two were spent getting everything out then that was a very well paced effort, and the HR trace showed exactly the sort of response you'd expect from a well paced effort. A couple of minutes to climb up, then a gradual rise through the effort.0 -
Had a bit of an eye-opener yesterday regarding Strava's estimated FTP based on best 20min efforts up Zwift's radio tower cat2 climb "Mount Zwift (full reverse)," with the full workout including warmup being ~40mins.
Earlier this week, I managed a new PB of 292W for a 20min stretch of the climb, which raised my Strava etimated FTP to 283W.
Yesterday, I did three laps of Volcano Flat, which took just over an hour. My average power was 236W for one hour, the middle lap was 252W and I had to start the third lap a bit easy to recover.
It's only a comparison of two rides, where I might have been a bit more fresh earlier in the week, but 95% of 283 is not 236.;)================
2020 Voodoo Marasa
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I think I read a trainerroad? blog that mentioned the reality of untrained riders and riding at ftp for an hour thing. They said they woukdnt be able to last an hour at their ftp level until they actually train for it (As part of their training plan). Ftp is mostly a way of setting zones for training or, if you're more experienced, maybe a way of setting a target pace for TT's etc?0
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FTP is a proxy for a biological equilibrium, when the lactate you generate matches the lactate you can process for a significant duration, if you work harder the lactate rises until you fail, so a 20min FTP test is a proxy for a proxy.
The biological value is useful because it helps define what is happening in your body, so you can establish effective training patterns to modify the modifiable, and have a basis to evaluate progress. But in itself, not too useful unless you are doing 25 mile (or 20 mile...) time trials. Ideally you sort this out with blood tests. In the real world I think you need to take any 20min or other 'test' with a pinch of salt rather than as science. When you do workouts you need to pitch them at 'just achievable' and an FTP result will help inform. But 'my FTP is 200W, therefore I can ride Alpe du Zwift at 200W' doesn't necessarily follow.0 -
Strava FTP is complete tosh.
Mine is currently at 418w. I'd struggle to hold 360w for an hour.0 -
paul2718 wrote:FTP is a proxy for a biological equilibrium, when the lactate you generate matches the lactate you can process for a significant duration, if you work harder the lactate rises until you fail, so a 20min FTP test is a proxy for a proxy.
The biological value is useful because it helps define what is happening in your body, so you can establish effective training patterns to modify the modifiable, and have a basis to evaluate progress. But in itself, not too useful unless you are doing 25 mile (or 20 mile...) time trials. Ideally you sort this out with blood tests. In the real world I think you need to take any 20min or other 'test' with a pinch of salt rather than as science. When you do workouts you need to pitch them at 'just achievable' and an FTP result will help inform. But 'my FTP is 200W, therefore I can ride Alpe du Zwift at 200W' doesn't necessarily follow.
Thisleft the forum March 20230 -
How long is a piece of string? I measure rides in smiles per hour, rather than miles per hour, personally. Unless you’re racing, I’d tend to regard ‘power’ and ‘speed’ as just curiosities, not really anything to be terribly concerned about, if I were you. As long as I can make enough power, to be able to get to the cafe at the top of the worst climb on a route, quicker than I can walk it, that’s good for me.0
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Thanks for confirming that you have nothing to contribute to this thread.Milemuncher1 wrote:How long is a piece of string? I measure rides in smiles per hour, rather than miles per hour, personally. Unless you’re racing, I’d tend to regard ‘power’ and ‘speed’ as just curiosities, not really anything to be terribly concerned about, if I were you. As long as I can make enough power, to be able to get to the cafe at the top of the worst climb on a route, quicker than I can walk it, that’s good for me.
In case you hadn't noticed, what's good for you doesn't necessarily apply to everyone else.Is the gorilla tired yet?0 -
ChrisAOnABike wrote:
Thanks for confirming that you have nothing to contribute to this thread.Milemuncher1 wrote:How long is a piece of string? I measure rides in smiles per hour, rather than miles per hour, personally. Unless you’re racing, I’d tend to regard ‘power’ and ‘speed’ as just curiosities, not really anything to be terribly concerned about, if I were you. As long as I can make enough power, to be able to get to the cafe at the top of the worst climb on a route, quicker than I can walk it, that’s good for me.
In case you hadn't noticed, what's good for you doesn't necessarily apply to everyone else.
nice. Milemuncher is expressing an opinion. have you done any more tests to see if you've cracked the test protocol yet. is the bike ship shape so you can concentrate on doing your best? its interesting to see people improving... hoping you are.0 -
Unless you're doing 25mi TT's or are in a racing category necessitating knowing an hour-power, the hour-power ftp mess is a bunch of crap. I feel whatever test contributes to you being successful in what you want to do is what works best. 8 min, 20 min, hour, whatever. Just make sure it gives you zones you can target to achieve the responses in the body through stress that you want to happen.
You guys need to get accounts over on Slowtwitch.com Andrew Coggan jumps in almost every topic over there regarding testing and ftp. There's a lot of learning to be had over there. Yeah, it's triathlon, but the training zones and ftp test talk and blood test talk is almost purely cycling centered.0
