Pace by feel. Ignore the numbers until afterward. Your consciousness should be centered on your physical sensations (ie really getting in tune with your body) and a positive mental attitude.
PPP: power calibrates PE; PE modulates power
Sounds good in theory but does not work in races. When you look at your numbers a lot during training it does calibrate your PE like others are saying. If you are staring at it during a TT it will not help you out at all. Your power numbers will bouncing around all over the place trying to meet a number while going by feel will save a lot more energy. Now, if you get to the 22 mile mark of a 40k and you are looking at it to try to motivate yourself to push out every last ounce of power then that is one thing, but the middle 75% of the race you should go by feel IMO.
If I need to go hard, staring at a number only gets in the way. I much prefer getting familiar with what it feels like to be on the edge… and of course slightly over… have to know what that feels like.
IMO a race or even a hard workout is like meditation… and numbers just distract me from what I need to focus on. I understand that others might have different things going on… whatever works.
I think that you can do it both ways. When you’re sitting inside of your little training bubble, you can use real time power feedback to objectively push yourself during intervals. When you’re out on the road, or in a race, you have to realize that anything can happen. Inevitably, your power meter will betray you and the only feedback mechanism at your disposal will be PE. It’s probably a good idea to learn your Power-PE profile in training, versus the middle of a race.
I think people tend to worry about their FTP number too much. There is variance in FTP depending on riding position, altitude, where you are in your training cycle, and a bunch of other factors… as well as uncertainty in the NP algorithm. Its purpose is to give you a ballpark estimate of your training load and intensity… that’s it.
Get it close…adjust it if/when it looks necessary… and forget about it.
FTP is a great performance marker to track, but it can indeed be affected by those factors. I wouldn’t lose too much sleep over a few watts either way, and as long as you’re consistently testing the same way every time, you’ll at least be making relevant comparisons.
I couldn’t dissagree more with everything you wrote, especially for long course.
Pacing by feel is OK for some but not for the majority of people I train with.
jaretj
When you look at your numbers a lot during training it does calibrate your PE like others are saying.
For me, even that gets in the way. I calibrate after the fact… as in “wow, my power really trailed off… guess I went too hard in the beginning”.* *To really train PE I think you need to be in PE mode… not number tracking mode.
Now, if you get to the 22 mile mark of a 40k and you are looking at it to try to motivate yourself to push out every last ounce of power then that is one thing, but the middle 75% of the race you should go by feel IMO.
At the 22 mile mark it’s time to start over using that obscure ass muscle*, going cross-eyed, coughing up blood, etc… if I’m not already. The PM is the least of my concerns.
*Something I’ve only encountered at the Moriarty 40k… all 3 times I’ve done it. Never happens on shorter TTs which I do frequently, or any other ride. There is a muscle that attaches to the inner pelvis not far from the sit bones, and the femur. It can both raise and lower the leg, but it doesn’t have much leverage, so it isn’t much used normally. But when all the other muscles get thoroughly fatigued it apparently gets called into service… and is quite sore for several days after.
what would be wrong with using the PM as a motivational tool on days that are supposed to be really hard?
Stare at that motherfer and do not let is drop below X where X is an ambitious goal?
if all your workouts are like that then you/your coach arent training effectively.
How so? There are several things you could mean by this, so I’m just asking you to clarify.
Obviously, an entire schedule of workouts shouldn’t be set so that the athlete is using the power meter as a “whip” to crack himself with, but certainly the HARD workouts (as Jack has suggested) can and often should be done this way.
I couldn’t dissagree more with everything you wrote, especially for long course.
Pacing by feel is OK for some but not for the majority of people I train with.
It takes practice. I do a lot of long road rides (3-6 hrs) and pace very well via PE. Lots of 20-40min race efforts also.
The problem IMO with number tacking is that it’s a completely wrong mental space to be in. Your “lizard brain”… which should be in control when you are in the zone regarding a physical task… does not know how to read and evaluate numbers.
Obviously, an entire schedule of workouts shouldn’t be set so that the athlete is using the power meter as a “whip” to crack himself with, but certainly the HARD workouts (as Jack has suggested) can and often should be done this way.
Only if you are prone to fooling yourself. If you practice training PE you won’t… you will know what it should feel like when you are going as hard as you can… or slightly over. And if it really is a hard workout you will be thoroughly spent at the end… and you will know what that feels like too.
Prone to fooling yourself how?
If PE is your preferred guide, why even use the power meter?
Again, I’m asking to understand your point of view. At this moment, your point of view seems to make owning a power meter a complete waste of money because you aren’t using much of the value of it.
It has lots of value! I use it to verify that my PE was correct. Until I got the PM I always went too hard in the beginning, because it takes awhile for the sensations to kick in. Plus it is great for evaluating progress, strengths and weaknesses, aero field testing, etc.
I’m going to go back to the OP for a bit.
When I got my PM I learned that your FTP was the power you could exert at a steady state for 60 minutes. So, what did I do? I went down into the basement and rode on the trainer for an hour. My intention was to have nothing left after an hour. Oh my. Did that hurt. And, it hurt for a good two days after.
I then heard/learned of the other methods of “calculating” your FTP. I even tried the 20, 2, 20 x 0.95 and the 20, 2, 20 averaging the two 20 minute periods. Power Agent calculates it using your 4min and 20min peaks.
All the methods gave me a number plenty close enough to pace my training off of. For me the 20, 2, 20 x 0.95 is within about 5% of a full 60 minute effort, averaging the two 20min sessions to too high, and the Power Agent method is just a bit low (conservative).
For me, the 60 minute test is the best. The additional 18 minutes is worth the investment.
As for watching the PM during the test: Just you try to stop me from watching it! That stupid little number is the only thing in the world for those 3600 seconds.
In the end, at some point you just have to push harder on the pedals.
… the PM is good for… 1) Not overdoing the first 5 minutes of a race… if you are prone to that (I am).
I’m prone to overdoing it too. On a really long race, I’ll set my Garmin power zones to alarm if I exceed my 20 min FTP. If I’m pushing over the top of a hill, I’ll ignore it, but if I’m pushing too hard at the bottom of a hill, or right out of the gate, I know I need to curb my enthusiasm.
One time on a 400 mile draft legal race, I jumped in the back of a group of two riders that did a breakaway just out of the start. My alarm was going off just drafting these guys in the flat. So I immediately knew I had gotten in way over my head. I decided to just hang on until the first hill, then recover while climbing easy, and wait to join the mere mortals in the next pack. Without the alarm, I may have tried to climb with them, and that would have been a big mistake.
If I need to go hard, staring at a number only gets in the way. I much prefer getting familiar with what it feels like to be on the edge… and of course slightly over… have to know what that feels like.
IMO a race or even a hard workout is like meditation… and numbers just distract me from what I need to focus on. I understand that others might have different things going on… whatever works.
I agree and disagree. I find the PT invaluable over the winter months when I’m stuck on the trainer. And if you’re doing well designed structured workouts with power (and your FTP estimate is accurate), you can get a good reference point for what different physiological zones really feel like. It’s just more information and I don’t think that’s ever a bad thing. There’s good data out there that shows certain workouts in certain power zones can be more effective than just going out and riding hard, depending on what your objective is. I worked almost purely on FTP over Jan/Feb and the targeted power workouts helped a ton.
On the other hand, I do tend to stop training with power once racing season gets underway. If you’re training with people who are much stronger than you, you don’t need a power file to tell you your eyeballs are hanging out. If you’ve built that good base and threshold fitness over the winter, you’ll maintain that through hard training and the real explosive stuff is absolutely fine to base on feel alone.
It has lots of value! I use it to verify that my PE was correct. Until I got the PM I always went too hard in the beginning, because it takes awhile for the sensations to kick in. Plus it is great for evaluating progress, strengths and weaknesses, aero field testing, etc.
I’m really confused.
So you do use your power meter for pacing, but you’re telling others that they should be using PE.
Here’s my stance on things…
I agree that an athlete should always be finely tuned into his PE. PE can be misleading though, and with the availability of the objective data that the power meter provides why not make the best use of both of them? There are times, during long intervals especially, where the PE can become overwhelmingly high and the athlete would stop, however if he is watching the average power and real time power on his computer, he can dial back the wattage a bit and still succeed in doing the interval at the proper prescribed intensity. Over time, this ultimately leads to more and more successful workouts and a higher return on training time invested than listening to his PE and dialing back too much or giving up on the interval.
This issue is overly complicated to describe in one or two posts, but Seasonschange posted the sweeping statement that using the power meter as a guide for interval intensity is ineffective. I really disagree with this statement if he is saying that this should never be the case.
Your statements seem to agree and disagree with my outlook at the same time. So I’m unclear on what you are saying.
Obviously we are not going to agree…
It appears that you are able to restrain yourself during your racing and that going off of PE works well for you. I would also say it works for some others.
For myself and many others that I work with this is not the case. We go too hard in the beginning during long course events and need to limit ourselves for the first 3/4 of the bike portion. Without doing that we do not run well afterwards and a possible 1:35 to 1:45 Half turns into 2:00.
I have been working with power since 2006 and consistantly find limiting myself to my abilities on the bike results in a much better run. I’ve tried practice and racing without a power target and have not had a successful run afterwards while doing that.
My brain does understand numbers and it is in control of my efforts all of the time. For that reason it is the right mental space to be in while on the bike.
jaretj
to rid yourself of most of your AWC before going after your FTP
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Bingo. I was going to try to explain that, but you hit the nail on the head. Your FTP is the slope of the work/time curve, the AWC is the intercept. You need to get rid of this offset, otherwise your FTP estimate will be too high.
or we could avoid testing all together by looking at the rest of your training data
testing is training
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Something I’ve only encountered at the Moriarty 40k… all 3 times I’ve done it. Never happens on shorter TTs which I do frequently, or any other ride. There is a muscle that attaches to the inner pelvis not far from the sit bones, and the femur. It can both raise and lower the leg, but it doesn’t have much leverage, so it isn’t much used normally. But when all the other muscles get thoroughly fatigued it apparently gets called into service… and is quite sore for several days after.
I experienced something similar in a 40K last summer. It’s the hamstring insertion point into the buttocks. I feel it slightly on a 10M but the last 20 minutes of the 40K were agony. I sat down in a chair afterwards to take off my shoes and literally couldn’t stand up because of how p*ssed off it was.