Can I realistically achieve 300 Watts FTP this summer?

tonysj

Hi All,

I've been cycling on roads for 2 years and being retired have plenty of time on my hands. I'm 56 yrs, 77 kg in good health and cycle 3 times a week, mainly on the Turbo due to weather.

Last July I did the FTP on a Turbo Trainer and achieved 279 Watts which I was very happy with. Today I did the FTP again on a Turbo following a set warm-up etc and managed 274 Watts so again well pleased with that as I'm limited with riding due to the weather and having to use the turbo outside in a garage.

Now I don't follow any online programmes, Swift, Trainer Road or other and have no training plan to follow tending to use GCN Turbo workouts on YouTube but I really want to push myself this year with my cycling and want to achieve 300 Watts on my FTP. My current VO2 Max is 50 and has slowly increased over the past 12 months but only by 4 points.

Is this realistic for me bearing in mind my age and that my ability is likely to decline the older I get?.

I don't have any ambitions to race but I do enjoy riding with friends on Sportive events. I tend to ride solo mainly when I'm in Training Mode because I push myself when I go out on a ride and others either don't want to ride at that pace or cant keep up.

I'm not in a cycling club but seriously thinking about joining one this year, I do ride in a club that's a Social riding club which is more about enjoying cycling and riding up in the Peak District stopping for Cafe breaks but I do enjoy those rides as well.

I could do with a few pointers on how to make progress which I can do without incurring any monthly cost or subscriptions as I have a very limited budget/income.

Can some one offer me advice on where to go and the type of sessions, indoor at the moment, that I need to follow.

Regards.

Tony.

ric/rstsport

Hi Tony,

It's impossible to know whether you could get to 300 W or not. There is no actual science that can determine your potential. The only way to find out is by trying.

Additionally, there's (significantly) insufficient information to determine what training you should do to improve. For e.g. with the coaching we offer, we use a 15 page questionnaire to get initial info from a rider.

what i can likely say with a reasonable amount of certainty is that 3 days per week isn't a whole lot of training -- upping it to 4 or 5 days should help increase your fitness.

Ric

tonysj

Ric/RSTSport wrote:

Hi Tony,

It's impossible to know whether you could get to 300 W or not. There is no actual science that can determine your potential. The only way to find out is by trying.

Additionally, there's (significantly) insufficient information to determine what training you should do to improve. For e.g. with the coaching we offer, we use a 15 page questionnaire to get initial info from a rider.

what i can likely say with a reasonable amount of certainty is that 3 days per week isn't a whole lot of training -- upping it to 4 or 5 days should help increase your fitness.

Ric

Thanks Ric,

I appreciate its a Big ask on a grey area and specific to the individual on whats likely to work best for them after they have been accessed.
My current 3 days of cycling are generally fairly hard efforts, Hiit, Threshold, Under/Over, Pyramids etc leaving any days off the bike as recovery. Would you suggest that if I upper the frequency to 4 or 5 days cycling should I still stick with them as all hard sessions or drop 1 or 2 into endurance/recovery type of intensities?
I did have a look at a training plan over 5 or 4 or 3 days posted by a member on here that was interesting and I thought it may be worth following as at least it would have some form of structure whereas at the moment I'm just picking a GCN turbo workout I fancy and doing that and there's not that many available online lol.

Regards.

Tony.

lettingthedaysgoby

Dan Lloyd from GCN is doing a series where he’s trying to achieve pretty much the same as you. Have a look at their latest video for details...

ric/rstsport

TonySJ wrote:

Ric/RSTSport wrote:

Hi Tony,

It's impossible to know whether you could get to 300 W or not. There is no actual science that can determine your potential. The only way to find out is by trying.

Additionally, there's (significantly) insufficient information to determine what training you should do to improve. For e.g. with the coaching we offer, we use a 15 page questionnaire to get initial info from a rider.

what i can likely say with a reasonable amount of certainty is that 3 days per week isn't a whole lot of training -- upping it to 4 or 5 days should help increase your fitness.

Ric

Thanks Ric,

I appreciate its a Big ask on a grey area and specific to the individual on whats likely to work best for them after they have been accessed.
My current 3 days of cycling are generally fairly hard efforts, Hiit, Threshold, Under/Over, Pyramids etc leaving any days off the bike as recovery. Would you suggest that if I upper the frequency to 4 or 5 days cycling should I still stick with them as all hard sessions or drop 1 or 2 into endurance/recovery type of intensities?
I did have a look at a training plan over 5 or 4 or 3 days posted by a member on here that was interesting and I thought it may be worth following as at least it would have some form of structure whereas at the moment I'm just picking a GCN turbo workout I fancy and doing that and there's not that many available online lol.

Regards.

Tony.

Hi Tony,

No, i'd include some endurance work.

Training intensity, is dictated by: (amongst other things)
your training time availability (shorter is more intense)
frequency of training and consistency (the more you do, the easier it has to be)
your current fitness level (low fitness may not want higher intensity)
health (poor health lower intensity)
goals (e.g. high intensity interferes with weight loss)
etc

cougie

If you're retired then three days a week isn't much training. Plenty of people in full time work who train more than that so you can certainly do a bit more.

N0bodyOfTheGoat

I've no idea how typical it is for someone my age (just turned 45), but I've gone from an estimated FTP of ~275W to a new best of ~293W (based on 95% of best 20min efforts) since mid November, since dusting off the turbo.

When turbo sessions in our kitchen last January at up to approx 24C were new to me, as was using a power meter, my estimated FTP was ~238W. With improvements and adaption to the heat, this was raised to ~277W by early April.

From mid April to late October, my FTP from outdoor rides was mostly in the ~270-279W range, but dipped to ~260W towards the end due drastically reducing power training through the hot summer and getting a cold.

No real structure to my training since November...
Riding my 5 mile each way commutes harder recently, either the whole journey or sections
Doing power training (either sustained 20min+ ones at ~300W, or a series of shorter ~375-425W efforts) on my three work days in a pretty physical job, polarising my training even more,typically under 45min workout excluding warm up and warm down
The odd longer ride where I'll stay under ~250W and average much closer to ~200W
Typically 4/5 sessions a week, every now and again I might throw in a 6th day

All we can do is see how far we can push the envelope! :twisted:

OnTheRopes

Get some structure to your training. You need to know where you are heading.
Ride at least 5 days a week, none of those recovery but some should be endurance pace.
At your age (mine too) you need to programe in some recovery weeks.
Read the Cyclists Training Bible by Joe Friel for some structured ideas or the Allan/Coogan book Training and Racing with a power meter (you dont necessarily need a power meter to use this book).

I would suggest periodising your programme into Base first and build second. Work on your aerobic endurance first and then muscular endurance. Once you have this nailed then you can start looking at Anaerobic Capacity work. If all that makes no sense then read the suggested books.
Good luck

bigmitch41

I recon 10% is achievable, we are very similar numbers wise, im also shooting for 300 next ftp. For the structured workouts I set my ftp at 300 just to push the numbers a little higher, not sure if this is good or bad but its what I am doing under the ftp builder program.

Good luck!

sloppyschleckonds

As Ric has said, add some endurance work to your cycling. (I'm loathe to call it training)

Day 1 Pedal Soft/ Rest
Day 2 Pedal Medium
Day 3 Pedal Hard
Day 4 Pedal Steady
Day 5 Pedal Soft/ Rest
Day 6 Pedal Steady
Day 7 Pedal Medium

imposter2.0

All I would add is that if you are only currently riding 3x per week, then there is plenty of scope for improvement. Furthermore, if most of these rides are currently on the turbo, then there is even more scope for improvement, by getting out on the road and learning to cope in all weathers.

Either way, you should be able to improve significantly on where you are now.

kingstongraham

I think it was Rick who said ride as often as you can, and go hard as much as you can be bothered. Works for me.

Riding outside more often will not do much for your FTP if you are likely to ride more often and push harder when you are indoors at this time of year.

If you are only riding 3 times a week, the correct place to ride is where you will actually get on your bike and ride, and the correct way to ride is the way that means you will actually get on your bike and ride.

daniel_b

My two pennies worth.

I use Trainerroad, and have done so for 2 years iirc.

Prior to that, I had pretty much zero structured training, and any I had was outdoors.

I work full time, and have a young family - up until recently I have been running with the mid volume programs - they are 5 sessions a week, and 4 of them are fairly hard.
On occasions I would complete a hard session and either follow up immediately with the endurance workout, or do them at opposite ends of the day, so would normally get through it in 4 days. Average time spent per week is 6.5-7.5 hours.
They have high volume programs as well, but no way I can find the time for that.

When I started, back in January 2016, my FTP was circa 140, last summer I managed to get that up to 253, but am now back down to around 220ish due to a number of things.
I've been back training since early December, but have gone for the low volume (3.5 hours) program, and am currently on HIT maintenance, and then will go to low volume base, before moving to build - hoping later this year to shift back up to mid volume, but struggling with home life and work to fit it in at the moment, so this is the best compromise for me currently.

It might be worth you asking in the Trainerroad thread if anyone on there has a free months trial they could gift you.

It's completely transformed my cycling, I really relish and enjoy my outdoor rides now, mostly because I simply have some power (for me) in my legs.

For what it's worth, I think 300 is likely an achievable gain by the end of the year for you, but I think you have to increase your volume, and also if you sustain any injuries or catch any colds that is bound to set you back a bit.

I tend to ride with two screens, one for TR, and one for some other entertainment - I tend to use Eurosport player, and then the likes of iplayer\itv player\4ondemand etc etc
Though I used to ride with one screen, and just had TR running as a narrow bar, which you can position horizontally where you want on the screen.

ric/rstsport

KingstonGraham wrote:

I think it was Rick who said ride as often as you can, and go hard as much as you can be bothered. Works for me.

Riding outside more often will not do much for your FTP if you are likely to ride more often and push harder when you are indoors at this time of year.

If you are only riding 3 times a week, the correct place to ride is where you will actually get on your bike and ride, and the correct way to ride is the way that means you will actually get on your bike and ride.

Possibly me! although i would have likely said, " ride as hard as you can, as often as you can". However, if it was that, then that was to do with weight loss. (For e.g. though, if you're riding 5 days per week and you're at say 10 hrs then it might not be all that intense due to the fatigue that would be building). As anecdote, i'm currently on day 375 without a break and i'm going as hard as i can (but some ofthat is REALLY low intensity).

ric/rstsport

SloppySchleckonds wrote:

As Ric has said, add some endurance work to your cycling. (I'm loathe to call it training)

Day 1 Pedal Soft/ Rest
Day 2 Pedal Medium
Day 3 Pedal Hard
Day 4 Pedal Steady
Day 5 Pedal Soft/ Rest
Day 6 Pedal Steady
Day 7 Pedal Medium

If the wheels are rolling, it's training

daniel_b

Just to add - the first structured training I carried out, was with the help of this book:

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Time-crunched-Cyclist-Powerful-Time-Crunched-Athlete/dp/1934030473/ref=sr_1_2?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1546874572&sr=1-2&keywords=the+time+crunched+cyclist

Looks like there are two newer editions available, not sure what difference there is.

I've never looked into creating workouts for your turbo manually, but others on here may know how to achieve this - if you could go that route, it would eliminate the need, imho, for a trainerroad subscription.
And presumably, being retired, unless you are on Grandparent duty, you may well have the time to invetigate the methods and create the workouts, and then once created you can pick and choose them as required.

tonysj

Thanks Guys. Some very interesting advice from a number of people.

I definitely need to increase the number of sessions to 5 at least and Ric 375 days on a bike of either description is a Mega achievement/commitment and I take my hat of to you. Great Effort....
I've had a month of TrainerRoad about 12 months ago and although I had improvement following a programme I didn't really like the Follow a graph on screen type and prefer the real video riding and info of cadence, effort on screen ie; GCN workouts.
Will get the 2 books mentioned Friel and Allen/Coogan for more insight into training.

I have some work to do in organizing a plan so Thanks All.

Tony.

ric/rstsport

TonySJ wrote:

Thanks Guys. Some very interesting advice from a number of people.

I definitely need to increase the number of sessions to 5 at least and Ric 375 days on a bike of either description is a Mega achievement/commitment and I take my hat of to you. Great Effort....
I've had a month of TrainerRoad about 12 months ago and although I had improvement following a programme I didn't really like the Follow a graph on screen type and prefer the real video riding and info of cadence, effort on screen ie; GCN workouts.
Will get the 2 books mentioned Friel and Allen/Coogan for more insight into training.

I have some work to do in organizing a plan so Thanks All.

Tony.

My experience, working with hundreds (thousands?) of cyclists is that increasing (slowly) the number of workouts/days you train each week is one important aspect of building fitness. adding in too much intensity is, often, counter productive -- especially for long periods of time. that doesn't mean you should only bimble around (you shouldn't) some of it needs to be in the middle ground.

as your fitness changes, so will your training requirements. what you need to do when you do 3 days per week at the beginning will be significantly different to what you need to do when you're trying to find the last 5 % of your genetic potential.

add into this competing difficulties of trying to increase fitness and lose weight (i don't know if you are trying to) and things can get difficult and ugly rapidly.

there are a few good books around to read. and some good blogs. i recommend reading allen and coggans book, plus also there's our five tips/course (at cyclecoach.com) and some of our blog.

good luck with your progress.

Ric

p.s. currently aiming to complete 2 years without a break

Typical Analytical

TonySJ wrote:

I did have a look at a training plan over 5 or 4 or 3 days posted by a member on here that was interesting and I thought it may be worth following as at least it would have some form of structure whereas at the moment I'm just picking a GCN turbo workout I fancy and doing that and there's not that many available online lol.

Not sure if you are referring to the winter plan I posted, but the most important part of that plan or any plan is understanding how you are coping with / adapting to the program. In this respect, we are more different than we are alike and, because of this, plans can at best be a guideline as it simply makes no sense to try to predict what your body is going to crave or be ready for five weeks from now on a Wednesday. It's just silly. Things come up. There will be a load/rate/recovery week frequency that will be right for you that you will need to discover over time by watching things like your resting heart rate, sleep quality, mood, motivation, stress levels, appetite, etc. and your performance on the bike in terms of perceived effort, average work interval heart rate and cardiac drift. It sounds like a lot but it's not. It's just overwhelming because there are so many different ways to skin a cat. Pick one and be consistent about it and monitor your status so you can ask informed questions that will help people to help you, etc.

There are few things you need to understand in order to make sense of your training; but you don't have to start from scratch to figure out where to start.

The variables you will be manipulating are intensity, duration and frequency. There a thousands of ways to manipulate these when you consider the various time periods and include recovery, etc. so it can be overwhelming.

You'll be manipulating these to progress your training as you get stronger in order to continually challenge the body.

You'll be manipulating these as you prioritize different energy systems as you go from more general to more specific training as you approach your event. And there are good reasons for this such as preparing the body and the time it takes to develop different systems and the shelf life of these systems, etc.

But you don't have to worry about that. Just go from general to specific. There are also indicators such as cardiac drift that can help you know when you're ready for additional intensity, etc.

These indicators are especially powerful indoors using fixed power under controlled conditions because repeatability and precision means that changes are more likely because of changes in your training status than they are because of power, environment, terrain, etc. variability.

One alternative is to start with a workout for each major energy system, like one long workout per week which is typical for maintaining endurance, a threshold workout and a VO2 workout. The specific interval structure isn't nearly as important as one some will have you believe. Just pick one and perform the workout at the highest power you can sustain for all intervals of the workout. I'm currently using 4x4 and 4x8 for my threshold and VO2 workouts and upping the power whenever I need to maintain maximum sustainable intensity. For endurance workouts, I'm doing 1 x 90 and adjusting power such that cardiac drift is between 5-10%. That's it. The vast majority of my analysis has to do with how I am recovering.

tonysj

Typical Analytical wrote:

TonySJ wrote:

I did have a look at a training plan over 5 or 4 or 3 days posted by a member on here that was interesting and I thought it may be worth following as at least it would have some form of structure whereas at the moment I'm just picking a GCN turbo workout I fancy and doing that and there's not that many available online lol.

Not sure if you are referring to the winter plan I posted, but the most important part of that plan or any plan is understanding how you are coping with / adapting to the program. In this respect, we are more different than we are alike and, because of this, plans can at best be a guideline as it simply makes no sense to try to predict what your body is going to crave or be ready for five weeks from now on a Wednesday. It's just silly. Things come up. There will be a load/rate/recovery week frequency that will be right for you that you will need to discover over time by watching things like your resting heart rate, sleep quality, mood, motivation, stress levels, appetite, etc. and your performance on the bike in terms of perceived effort, average work interval heart rate and cardiac drift. It sounds like a lot but it's not. It's just overwhelming because there are so many different ways to skin a cat. Pick one and be consistent about it and monitor your status so you can ask informed questions that will help people to help you, etc.

There are few things you need to understand in order to make sense of your training; but you don't have to start from scratch to figure out where to start.

The variables you will be manipulating are intensity, duration and frequency. There a thousands of ways to manipulate these when you consider the various time periods and include recovery, etc. so it can be overwhelming.

You'll be manipulating these to progress your training as you get stronger in order to continually challenge the body.

You'll be manipulating these as you prioritize different energy systems as you go from more general to more specific training as you approach your event. And there are good reasons for this such as preparing the body and the time it takes to develop different systems and the shelf life of these systems, etc.

But you don't have to worry about that. Just go from general to specific. There are also indicators such as cardiac drift that can help you know when you're ready for additional intensity, etc.

These indicators are especially powerful indoors using fixed power under controlled conditions because repeatability and precision means that changes are more likely because of changes in your training status than they are because of power, environment, terrain, etc. variability.

One alternative is to start with a workout for each major energy system, like one long workout per week which is typical for maintaining endurance, a threshold workout and a VO2 workout. The specific interval structure isn't nearly as important as one some will have you believe. Just pick one and perform the workout at the highest power you can sustain for all intervals of the workout. I'm currently using 4x4 and 4x8 for my threshold and VO2 workouts and upping the power whenever I need to maintain maximum sustainable intensity. For endurance workouts, I'm doing 1 x 90 and adjusting power such that cardiac drift is between 5-10%. That's it. The vast majority of my analysis has to do with how I am recovering.

TA, Yes it was yours I was referring to as it was well structured and easy to understand for someone who hasn't used training plans before, Thanks for taking the time to post it.
I noticed that on your plan you use colour to highlight zones/FTP % and only go 120% as a Max I take it this can be increased IF I feel that doing that session I have more in reserve ( wishful thinking here !! ). Also the Cardiac Drift you mention How would I measure this?. Would it be to monitor my HR during an intense effort part as I finish that segment and see how much it rises from that point.
I intend to buy/read the Friel and Allen/Coogan books by the way so that may answer this for me.

I will sit down and work through your plan and how I approach it with schedules etc. I'm really looking forward to applying myself to the training and will post up any issues I need the knowledge or advice of others to assist with.

Thanks again to All for the advice.

Regards.

Tony.

supermurph09

When looking at your test do you feel it went to plan or could you have given more? If you could then maybe your goal is even closer.

On another note, how are you measuring power? Is it consistent? Worth knowing as you could be making gains towards that 300W FTP but your equipment might be fluctuating.

Typical Analytical

TonySJ wrote:

I noticed that on your plan you use colour to highlight zones/FTP % and only go 120% as a Max I take it this can be increased IF I feel that doing that session I have more in reserve ( wishful thinking here !! ). Also the Cardiac Drift you mention How would I measure this?. Would it be to monitor my HR during an intense effort part as I finish that segment and see how much it rises from that point.
I intend to buy/read the Friel and Allen/Coogan books by the way so that may answer this for me.

I will sit down and work through your plan and how I approach it with schedules etc. I'm really looking forward to applying myself to the training and will post up any issues I need the knowledge or advice of others to assist with.

Yes! Definitely do maximum sustainable intensity for VO2 workouts. The %FTP is just there as a starting place for cyclists who need %FTP but %FTP is a poor indicator of VO2 max so yeah bust it!

EDIT - Also do 4 x 4 for VO2 instead of 5 x 4. The 5 x 4 are there in anticipation of being able to do an extra interval but it's better to increase power because ability to do 5 x 4 means that you are working below VO2 so more power for 4 x 4 is better. I hope that makes sense. Please follow up if not.

You can get cardiac drift from Golden Cheetah which is free and awesome.

Regarding understanding and adapting the schedules, etc. as you work through them, this might help:

https://forum.slowtwitch.com/forum/Slow ... /#p6811037

Good luck and be sure to holler anytime with questions.

Oh I almost forgot. DEFINITELY check out Fast After 50 by Joe Friel.

tonysj

Supermurph09 wrote:

When looking at your test do you feel it went to plan or could you have given more? If you could then maybe your goal is even closer.

On another note, how are you measuring power? Is it consistent? Worth knowing as you could be making gains towards that 300W FTP but your equipment might be fluctuating.

Sm09,
Hi, I'm using a Tacx Flow Smart turbo trainer. I appreciate its not the best out there but cost was an issue so went with what I could afford, and get past the Other Half.

I do find that as I'm having to use the gears and closely match Power/FTP% to cadence ( I'm following a GCN Turbo session on You Tube which has figures on screen to follow ) the trainer is playing catch-up sometimes so I anticipate this delay/fluctuation by selecting the gear before the prompt on screen by a few seconds and again riding past the change of Power or cadence at the end by a few seconds just to make sure I'm getting the full extent of that power input.

I do feel that the sessions I'm following recently have been challenging enough for me to feel they are at the right level, although I do tend to go way above the Power requested on screen initially ( catch-up mentioned above ) but ease off or change to an easier gear to maintain the required levels. Also towards the end of the session I'm struggling to maintain the Power or cadence a little as I've pushed hard. On the 4th of January I did a Under - Over GCN video session and have just checked the Over power figures and was hovering around 400 Watts for the 30 seconds which is 40% over my FTP - 140%. I'm not sure if this would be about right either way to be honest but I did enjoy it.
I'm not running any apps Swift or other and don't have any Tacx software to follow as with my Flow being a cheaper model the access wasn't free but on payment. A friend has the Tacx Vortex which includes free software : (

I have a Velocomp Powerpod power meter on my road bike and today on a number of hills was pushing 300+ Watts for most of the hills which I understand is easier to achieve outdoors anyway!.

Also noticed my H/R is not getting up to near its Max which was 182 BPM when I first started road cycling, most I hit toady was 155BPM so I believe this lower rate is due to my fitness improving over time.

All interesting stuff and I've decided to join a local cycling club who have a number of graded rides by different level of fitness riders, Green, Red and Black groups so that may assist with my ambitions of getting to 300 Watts.

Thanks.

Regards.

Tony.

tonysj

Guys,

Quick update as I've completed my 2nd FTP Test this morning after following the first 6 weeks of a training plan posted by Typical Analytical on here.

FTP is now 301 Watts ( -5% so 286 Watts ) for the 20 minute test I do. Happy with that after 6 weeks so will continue with TA plan for the next 6 weeks which is building on the past 6 weeks and see what happens.

I'm well please but I realise each improvement in Watts is likely to be harder to achieve but Im on track for a 316 Watts to clear 300 Watts so Thanks for all the advice guys.

Tony.

cougie

Nice work! Always good to see that training pays off !

penski

Nice increase, well done!

bagz3

What’s work well for me over winter is ditching the ‘junk’ miles. If you’re short on time, turn yourselves inside out on every ride. If you can only do 3 rides a week, this should work well. Can you squeeze in an extra 2 x 1hr sessions on the turbo between? I found these extra sessions on the turbo easy enough to squeeze in and great for active recovery, especially training on tired legs (heard the term “ride yourself fit”?). It’s all about diet too when training harder. I’ve been so much more focused and diet and recovery in this aspect to be able to really increase my training stress.