https://www.active.com/...g-performance?page=2

This says about 7%/decade...in my experience, I didn’t notice much going from 40 to 50, maybe a slight decline. I had more of a decline going from 50 to 60 (300 watts to about 280). Since turning 60, over the last 3+ years a much faster decline...I’m maybe at 260 when I’m fully baked at this point. Enjoy it while you got it!

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Randy Christofferson(http://www.rcmioga.blogspot.com

Insert Doubt. Erase Hope. Crush Dreams.

Sounds about right. If you have been training consistently for 20-30 years, your watts/power will decline as you age
It's different if you pick up the sport in your late 30s or early 40s, you can pick up WATTS as you go older but only to a point...
Aging is not all that:)

Since starting with a Power Meter around 5 years ago at the age of 43, my FTP has increased from 270 to 335

I have been riding with a friend who is 68, he has been a cyclist for many years, but has been putting in monster miles since retiring 3 years ago. His FTP has increase in 2020 from 250 to 280. We recently rode 115km in 2h50m at an average speed of 40kph (25mph)

I think that if you are at your peak at the age of 40, you will see some decline. However, for most people, who never maximised their FTP potential at a younger age, there is actually scope to increase FTP as you get older

This is for VO2, but I guess FTP is similar to this (being approx. 75% of VO2 generally ?)

Probably notice the vo2 decline more than the FTP? So 5min power rather than 60?

My solution to this issue was at 55 , I retired my power meter.

Any decline immediately stopped. I haven’t lost a watt in 5 yrs :)

😁

Yeah. But you are saying you changed your training, monster miles etc. Assumption was that training remain same. Obviously if you are untrained and start really pushing FTP, your FTP will increase no matter your age.

I will retire my old SRM when I turn 50 then and forget about watts...

It has been extremely noticeable since age 60. Before 60, only a slight decrease. After 60, like dropping off a cliff.

Yes, I did change training. I was very fit in teens and 20's, inactive from late 20's to early 40's then became very fit in my 40's.

I think in your 40's you can still get your FTP back, FTP will slowly decline, but more significantly it gets really hard to get it back if you lose it.

A few years ago I kind of did the same thing. I still use the power meter to do winter training on Golden Cheetah, but the constant watching of the power output on my road bike during the other 3 seasons is pretty much gone.

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"...the street finds its own uses for things"

I thought the rough rule of thumb was 5% of threshold performance per decade or 0.5 percent per year. 0.5 is almost not noticeable, but 5% is.....we just have to wait 10 years to find that out. It's why when you go to 70.3 Worlds, or Kona or ITU worlds, when you enter the water for your age age group wave, everyone around has a X0 on their calf rather than X4. The X4 guys are working off 2.5% lower potential which is absolutely massive for any competition.

To get around this problem I have retired my power meter (or at least I have not put it back on my bike in 5 years). When I ride my ancient computrainer, I get to see my watts.....but they are higher than 5 years ago, but that's just fake.....I am 8 lbs heavier so of course I can generate more watts since I am a "bigger athlete" now....but that sucks on the run or climbs, so hoping to shave down to race weight when racing starts back in earnest now that the stock market is all excited from the Pfizer trials news today.

Here's a good youtube video on this topic.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yohOrJHsUKw


My own observation watching some masters racers and seeing my own power into my early 40s is that, if you stay in shape, power probably doesn't drop much, if at all, until the second half of your 40s (I feel this is especially true for amateur athletes that probably never maximized their power at their 'athletic peak'). It's pretty clear that late 40s/early 50s shit gets real though.

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Dimond Bikes Superfan

My 2 cents watching my peers (now I am 55-59), is all the swim and bike performances of the top guys stay pretty static and the only place things go down in the late 40's is on the run. This largely continues to apply right to 54 when the swim and bike of the top guys stay close to people in their 30's, there are just less people who have the motivation to stay at that level, just like there are less people at that age who want to keep kicking ass in their professional lives.

The run for sure. Its a disaster than I think is much worse than 5% decline per decade at threshold speeds. The Boston qualifier times roughly reflect that expectation too

^This. Since turning 60 I've been working hard to just hold my FTP which dropped a lot in the prior 10 years. I'm not running anymore and with COVID now having me work at home, I put a lot more effort into my bike this year ... and gained a whopping 3 points on my FTP. At least I went up, but the work to reward ratio was ugly. Edit - I'm now 63.

I agree triguy1956. I’m guessing you’re 64 or 1 year older than I. I started triathlon 20 years ago when I was 43. I reached my peak in 2007, at the age of 50. I went sub 4:40 at the H-IM distance with a 2:22 bike split. I could do a sub 60 minute Olympic bike split and a sub 2:10 race.

In 2010/2011 I had another good run and qualified for Kona twice (for ‘10 and ‘12), and almost won the Cheapeakeman 1/2 distance (1.2/66/10) outright and was 5 minutes faster on the bike than anybody else (got caught on the run with 2 miles to go). As I sat there at 54, I could see in the numbers I was just a bit off my peak, but I kinda thought that I could be an exception.

Wrong. 55-60 I saw a clear downward inflection in my times, power, OA place, etc. it got WAY worse since 60. One of my goals this year was to see if I could go sub SIX at eagle man, I thought I had a chance, but not a good one.

If god is willing, next October I’m going to do my 16th and last IM and my only goal will be to finish and enjoy the experience one last time.

I still train a lot. I put more hours in than anyone in the Big Kahuna Challenge but I am very slow and train with moderate intensity almost all of the time. I’ve tried to ramp intensity several times but I quickly break down. My knee is very painful, hard to walk first thing in the morning when I have to pee (usually about 2am, that’s another story)

I work on weights, I try to take naps. I have to keep my weight as low as possible (which is harder). I do flexibility exercises, I use the Theragun.

It all keeps going downhill despite all of this. But, that’s the game in your mid 60s, so bring it on. I know in 5 years today will be the good old days....

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Randy Christofferson(http://www.rcmioga.blogspot.com

Insert Doubt. Erase Hope. Crush Dreams.

I know this only goes from age 19 to 40 but it still gives some indications on what happens during ageing if anyone is interested:

https://journals.lww.com/...ging_Olympic.13.aspx

I just gotta get you on the 30,000m per week swimming program and we'll solve the big Kahuna points challenge. If we get you to do half of the mileage butterfly maybe we can make you the guy who beats the trend from 60-64 when you enter 65-69. But yeah, there is no beating the stats of time.

Our bodies a recorded history of our lives. While our brains are richer for that, our bodies end up being what our bodies end up being. My brain keeps writing cheques that are only worthy of my 25 year old body, so now I just convert all those frequent high stupid intensity track workouts to the pool...at least I won't break myself (well at least for now, it's not at the break point, but the gents in 70-74 tell me that eventually you can also break yourself in the pool).

Which one ... Kona? I'm 63 as well and finished my 15th last year but had to power walk the marathon since my knee is blown out and I don't want a full knee replacement (don't need it either as long as I'm not running). Every once in awhile, I envision doing another but then I remember how unpleasant it was to walk the entire marathon (plus T1 and T2).

I think it's not the same for everyone. A lot of people at that age remain very healthy and experience no obvious dropoff in performance. Others seem to start deteriorating rapidly -- maybe even in conjunction with other medical issues? Anyway, while just about anyone in their 20s or 30s can do some training and achieve very high fitness, I think the biggest difference is only some people can do that at 50.

If you look at the top 10 in the ST Big Kahuna Challenge on the trianing log, I think half of the people in the top 10 are 50 and over!!! It says nothing about the decline of our FTPs, but we can say that the guys in the 50's who are motivated are prettty darm motivated.

Have to be motivated since it takes 50% longer to do the same distance as before.

I will be 65 in January. Despite being more dedicated in my training, PT and other aspects of life, I realize all I can do is slow up the decline a little bit. But the mind never forgets what you use to be capable of. But my college team has me fully conditioned for hope and disappointed.

Yeah, I just did my military 1.5 mile "fitness test run" a few days ago. Pass mark for EVERYONE in 1984 was 10:15 or 6:50 per mile pace. If you did not break 10:15 you were put on "spazz PT" (sorry for the bad wording, but that was what it was called in a politically incorrect time in 1984).

I just did 10:45 so I would have FAILED. I did not even go through the 1 mile split at my 1.5 mile PB time which was 7:08 at age 20 (although I have beaten 7:08 mile a bunch of times on other days). With a winter of training during 100/100 I would like to see if I can get down to 10:15 for 1.5 miles and pass the basic 1984 fitness test "barely passing" mark. I THINK it is doable and believeing is partway to doing. But I am 9 years younger than you!!!