One Hour Power

What percentage of your FTP should you be able to hold for an hour in training?
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  • Harry182
    Harry182 Posts: 1,169
    45HKXsE.gif
  • imposter2.0
    imposter2.0 Posts: 12,028
    What percentage of your FTP should you be able to hold for an hour in training?
    Mate, that's what FTP means....
  • fat daddy
    fat daddy Posts: 2,605
    yeah FTP is the amount of power you can hold for an hour ...... so 100%

    but !

    I have found the reality of this to be different if obtaining your FTP from a 20 minute test that then "calculates" it for an hour.

    my FTP calculated from a 20min test is a meagre 250w .... yet if I try to sit at 250w for an hour after about 30mins I go into the red and die ! literally - die ..... died at least 30 times now ... in rfeality I can only hold about 230 for an hour .. making my actual FTP about 230

    I blame this on most of my rides being 30 min long commutes - my body has learnt to ride for 30 mins
  • dabber
    dabber Posts: 1,924
    If you did a 20 minute power test then the resulting number should then be multiplied by a %age number to come up with your ftp... a popular %age number is 95%.
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  • stueys
    stueys Posts: 1,332
    The reality is that very, very few people can actually hold their ftp for one hour. As witnessed by some of the pro's not being able to hold ftp for their attempts at the hour record.
  • VamP
    VamP Posts: 674
    Stueys wrote:
    The reality is that very, very few people can actually hold their ftp for one hour. As witnessed by some of the pro's not being able to hold ftp for their attempts at the hour record.


    Well that is the definition, so they either had a bad day, or their FTP was wrong.
  • "For about an hour"
    I'm sorry you don't believe in miracles
  • Alex99
    Alex99 Posts: 1,407
    Is this our old friend again? Maybe one should ask, if I can bench press 130 kg, then what will my FTP be and will I turn pro?
  • napoleond
    napoleond Posts: 5,992
    edited April 2017
    I use whatever my best recent hour long effort or last 25m TT power is for setting FTP
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  • VamP
    VamP Posts: 674
    "For about an hour"

    In as much as a trained individual is at a steady state around this duration, so there should not be a dramatic difference between MMP 50 and MMP 70.
  • okgo
    okgo Posts: 4,368
    VamP wrote:
    Stueys wrote:
    The reality is that very, very few people can actually hold their ftp for one hour. As witnessed by some of the pro's not being able to hold ftp for their attempts at the hour record.


    Well that is the definition, so they either had a bad day, or their FTP was wrong.

    Riding a track (especially at 30 deg) is nothing like riding outside.
    Blog on my first and now second season of proper riding/racing - www.firstseasonracing.com
  • Alex99
    Alex99 Posts: 1,407
    okgo wrote:
    VamP wrote:
    Stueys wrote:
    The reality is that very, very few people can actually hold their ftp for one hour. As witnessed by some of the pro's not being able to hold ftp for their attempts at the hour record.


    Well that is the definition, so they either had a bad day, or their FTP was wrong.

    Riding a track (especially at 30 deg) is nothing like riding outside.

    So, FTP is temperature dependent. Makes sense really as gross efficiency will change.
  • okgo
    okgo Posts: 4,368
    Not really but it doesn't help. But the track is not as easy as it looks, it slingshots you out and its not a linear effort from when I've ridden on it. It takes a lot of practice for riders to get good at riding the track. But even Wiggins rode under his true FTP by some region despite being one of the finest track riders there is.
    Blog on my first and now second season of proper riding/racing - www.firstseasonracing.com
  • VamP
    VamP Posts: 674
    I guess you'd need to measure a track FTP, much like many have a turbo FTP that is often significantly different to their outdoor one. I expect people who spend a lot of time on track have a way of resolving this, whether formally or informally.

    I don't have PM on my track bike, so haven't any data.
  • buckles
    buckles Posts: 694
    Before my 1 hour power test, I remembered that my coach said that his team 'always give it 110%', so I rode at 110% FTP for the hour.

    However, the Garmin didn't save the power data, so I got back on the turbo and tried again. I was so tired from the first effort that I screwed my pacing up on the second one, realising 10 minutes in that I'd started off too hard (130% FTP). However, rather than easing off and reducing the pace, or starting all over again, I thought well, eff it. Now that I'm riding at this pace, I might as well keep it up, otherwise it's a wasted effort. So I continued riding at 130% FTP for the remaining 50 minutes.

    My legs were a bit sore afterwards, but it was good training.
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  • AK_jnr
    AK_jnr Posts: 717
    So you rode at 130% of your previous FTP?! Some gains that is!
  • itboffin
    itboffin Posts: 20,052
    60% of the time it works all the time.

    well someone had too
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  • What percentage of your FTP should you be able to hold for an hour in training?
    Within a few %, perhaps less depending on fatigue level and other environmental factors, bike position, nature of terrain and so on.

    For everyone else, the duration one can sustain FTP for is typically in the 40 to 70-minute range.
  • diy
    diy Posts: 6,473
    I think the 25m TT performance is the best comment. I very much doubt I could do 100% of my FTP when training for an hour... I just wouldn't have the right frame of mind to hit my absolute max in a training scenario. Its like indoors vs outdoors, I can never get my HR as high indoors as heat, ventilation and cooling become a massive factor.
  • Guys I've decided to hijack/spam this thread.

    Why is FTP defined over one hour?

    What is special about a threshold and one hour.
    If it really was your threshold surely you could hold it longer

    you could have higher threshold over 20mins. etc etc.


    Any metabolic reasoning here or just arbitrary. Obviously longer is better as the anaerobic sprint at the end is minimised.
    BTW how many people go anaerobic at end of ftp test to increase their numbers (is it not cheating!)
  • Guys I've decided to hijack/spam this thread.

    Why is FTP defined over one hour?
    It isn't. It never has been.

    People confuse FTP with ways to estimate FTP.
    What is special about a threshold
    Because it represents a narrow band of power - a threshold level - where key physiological processes can be maximally sustained in a quasi steady state, above and below which there are distinctly different physiological processes in play and implications from riding at such levels. Ride above threshold and fatigue will occur fairly rapidly as non-sustainable metabolic processes are required to meet the energy demand. Ride below it and you can sustain such an effort for quite a long time.

    Your threshold power is the most important physiological determinant of performance capability in endurance cycling events (and by endurance I mean anything from a few minutes to many hours). It is an integral of all the underlying physiological and metabolic processes (e.g. VO2 max, fractional utilisation of VO2max at lactate threshold, gross efficiency, glycogen storage and utilisation rate amongst other things).
  • Obviously longer is better as the anaerobic sprint at the end is minimised.
    Yes, a well paced maximal effort ride of about an hour will have and "anaerobic" energy contribution of only around 1-2 percent. The shorter the test, the greater such non-sustainable energy metabolism contributes to supply the energy demand.
    BTW how many people go anaerobic at end of ftp test to increase their numbers (is it not cheating!)
    It's quite OK to do this, provided you use at least two tests over different durations, e.g one of a handful of minutes and a longer one of between 20-30-minutes. By calculating the slope and intercept of the energy v duration plot from these tests you can then determine your "critical power", which will be analogous to FTP, and your "anaerobic work capacity", your non-sustainable energy capacity which is available to meet energy demand beyond such threshold (critical) power.

    Typical values for such non-sustainable energy supply capacity, are in the 10kJ to 20kJ range, of course some people have a higher capacity and some lower. So when this non sustainable energy reserve is depleted during maximal well paced test effort of about 20-minutes, that represents approx 8W to 16W of the average power you can sustain. If you do a 20-min test and average, e.g. 240W, then non-sustainable energy reserves may be responsible for 3% to 7% of your power output (or more if your AWC is higher).
  • bobmcstuff
    bobmcstuff Posts: 11,196
    Alex I think the key point and one you've posted several times is that most people could expect to hold their FTP for 40-70 minutes - not one hour necessarily.
  • Alex, exactly the response I wanted.
    I'll be making my plot some time soon.

    Cheers
  • the duration one can sustain FTP for is typically in the 40 to 70-minute range.


    How are you defining the stop point at 40-70mins? Power curve? Lactate? Heart rate? In other words how does the athlete know they are at their approximately one hour (40-70m) FTP limit?

    thanks maria
  • AK_jnr
    AK_jnr Posts: 717
    When they cant go on any longer? Or do we need to be told by a computer when we are fu****?
  • AK_jnr wrote:
    When they cant go on any longer? Or do we need to be told by a computer when we are fu****?

    not correct. If you do a 4km pursuit you cannot go any longer! If you do a trainer road 8min test you cannot go any longer (at that power). If you reduce the power you can always go longer......if you increase the power you cannot get this far......so there is no power switch that turns off at 40.0000minutes......and 70.000minutes
  • the duration one can sustain FTP for is typically in the 40 to 70-minute range.


    How are you defining the stop point at 40-70mins? Power curve? Lactate? Heart rate? In other words how does the athlete know they are at their approximately one hour (40-70m) FTP limit?

    thanks maria
    There isn't a "stop point" as such. The power-duration curve is very flat at around threshold power level, so even a handful of watts above and below mean a large difference in maximal sustainable duration (even with normal day to day variations in performance there will be a difference in maximal time sustainable at a given power).

    If you question is how to pace a TT, well that takes practice and the more such long hard efforts you do, the better you get at working out what you are capable of.

    If your question is how best to determine your FTP, then there are several fairly reliable ways to do that.

    Which depends on your individual circumstances but include, inter alia, maximal average power sustainable in a longer TT (e.g. 40km) or one that takes about an hour, the power you can repeatedly sustain for long interval work (e.g 2 x 20-min efforts) in training, the outcomes of power-duration modelling suitable for the task, e.g. using the critical power model from maximal power tests of suitable durations (e.g. a 5-min and a 20-min test), or say from the WKO4 model provided the last 90-days contains sufficient valid mean maximal performance data. You could also perform maximal lactate steady state testing if so inclined (time consuming as it requires multiple longish,~30-min efforts, each at different power levels plus BL monitoring equipment) or a valid proxy if careful (e.g. using a Moxy monitor).
  • Alex99
    Alex99 Posts: 1,407
    Obviously longer is better as the anaerobic sprint at the end is minimised.
    Yes, a well paced maximal effort ride of about an hour will have and "anaerobic" energy contribution of only around 1-2 percent. The shorter the test, the greater such non-sustainable energy metabolism contributes to supply the energy demand.
    BTW how many people go anaerobic at end of ftp test to increase their numbers (is it not cheating!)
    It's quite OK to do this, provided you use at least two tests over different durations, e.g one of a handful of minutes and a longer one of between 20-30-minutes. By calculating the slope and intercept of the energy v duration plot from these tests you can then determine your "critical power", which will be analogous to FTP, and your "anaerobic work capacity", your non-sustainable energy capacity which is available to meet energy demand beyond such threshold (critical) power.

    Typical values for such non-sustainable energy supply capacity, are in the 10kJ to 20kJ range, of course some people have a higher capacity and some lower. So when this non sustainable energy reserve is depleted during maximal well paced test effort of about 20-minutes, that represents approx 8W to 16W of the average power you can sustain. If you do a 20-min test and average, e.g. 240W, then non-sustainable energy reserves may be responsible for 3% to 7% of your power output (or more if your AWC is higher).

    Alex, very interesting stuff, but I still find some of the definitions a little confusing. You describe Critical Power (CP) and "non-sustainable energy supply capacity" (same as W' in e.g. Golden Cheetah?) in a way that makes total sense to me. In my words, you have CP, which is this power level where you're on this metabolic tight-rope or threshold. You can ride at CP for a "long time" (the "long time" is not a fixed period of time. Efforts of over say, 5 minutes will be dominated by CP). You can deconvolute CP and W' by doing maximal field tests at e.g. 2 minutes and 15 minutes and fitting a model. e.g. Golden Cheetah tells me that I have a relatively low CP compared to my W' (as compared to other figures I've seen) and this is borne out in the types of race where I have done well.

    I have thought of FTP as riding at CP for one hour, + W' spread over the hour. Reading your comments, I'm not sure how FTP differs from CP in your view. Once again, I don't know what FTP is :oops: