I know one of the methods of determining FTP is to take your 60’ NP from a recent race, but what if that race (or this case a group ride) is highly variable?
Current FTP based on Friel 30’ trainer test on tri bike data collected with PT head unit: 261
Yesterday’s ride best 60’ on road bike data collected with 705: P 202, Pnorm 267, VI 1.32
During the entire ride (1h20m) I spent a whopping 24% b/t 0-20w. The ride pretty much is hammer, recover, repeat. All rolling hills with a couple shorter climbs.
Questions:
(1) Should I just ignore this workout with regards to resetting FTP b/c of the high VI?
(2) Should I ingore the workout b/c its on a different bike?
(3) Is it time I retest on the trainer? Last test was 2/6.
from what i’ve seen, 60 and longer NP tend to be pretty accurate. Since you are saying that there is a possible 3% increase in 6 weeks, i’d say thats very likely. Also, depending on what PM you are using, that is within the margin of error and within the margin of variability I see in my training from week to week. You can’t ALWAYS be on 100%. Your form with have slight peaks and valleys as it steadily climbs upward.
Paging Dr. Coggan…Dr. Coggan, please report to the current thread.
I’ll let AC answer more fully, but I don’t think that you’re road ride was an NP-buster and therefore is indicative of the power that you can produce for 1 hour (or greater in this case). So…your FTP must be at least as great as the Pnorm of the road ride. Also, it is common (though not absolute) that somw folks can produce greater power in the road bike position vs. tri position - at least until the body adapts to the tri position, at which point produceable power becomes more consistent between the 2 positions.
Also, you were almost certainly more “motivated” while trying to hang on the the road ride, than staring at your PM while doing testing indoors on a trainer. This alone can make a difference in the results.
My other concern/thought is given that 24% was b/t 0-20w (at least for the whole ride so I am sure its close for the peak 60’) I definitely could have ridden harder during the easy times to produce an even higher P and Pnorm. Some of the recoveries were longer than I needed. Then again, I suppose I shouldn’t take the motivation provided by the group without also taking the recovery minutes also.
Assuming I could have ridden the easy parts harder, would it be unreasonable to see a 5-8% gains in 6wks?
As far as my FTP history…
Did IMFL 11/1
Road ~1-2/wk
I got the PT in Dec.
Did first FTP test 12/19: 251w
Continued riding 1-2x / wk then bumped it up a bit…
Retested on 2/6: 261
Started training plan on 2/9 and increased riding to 4x/wk
You are certainly right…No doubt I was more motivated during the group ride vs. alone on the trainer.
I am pretty comfortable on the tri bike as all my winter trainer rides were on it. Granted I did tweak the position once or twice and I did have some slight L knee pain (b/c of a low saddle) when doing my FTP test on 2/9.
I was a bit concerned to change my FTP as some of my other workouts (FTP repeats on the trainer specfically) I had to work to keep it at 100%. I certainly wasn’t blowing the doors off of FTP and doing 105-110%.
Before you get too bent out of shape worrying whether 261 or 267 is the number, consider that each of those is within ~1% of 264. This is probably less than the error tolerance of the power meter, so I don’t even know that you can say they’re indicating different FTs.
Thanks for the post, but I think you missed the intent of my post. I wasn’t getting bent out of shape, as much as I want to learn if my best 60’ Pnorm during a highly variable group ride is a legitimate way to gauge FTP. My LBS has these rides going off weekly, and if I can accurately use this to determine FTP as oppose to re-testing, then I can use use that workout for something else.
I’m more concerned with the concept rather than my actual FTP this time or not. If I go out on the next ride and get a 60’ Pnorm of 275, do I change my FTP or not?
You got me now. I am guessing you are saying there are scenarios where 60’ Pnorm doesn’t equal FTP but this scenario is not one of them? Can you elaborate a bit for me?
You got me now. I am guessing you are saying there are scenarios where 60’ Pnorm doesn’t equal FTP but this scenario is not one of them? Can you elaborate a bit for me?
Thanks,
-Tim
Have you been clicking on and reading the link? What you’re asking about is #4 on the list. Note that the list is ordered so #4 is better than #1-3 but not as good as #5-7.
And to help with Robert’s somewhat cryptic answer, it sounds like you may have had some out of the saddle climbing. You can generate more power out of the saddle compared to sitting, so that will affect the calculation of NP. That is, those out of the saddle efforts can overpredict your seated hour power.
You have at least 3 variables going on here and deciding what to use as your FTP is difficult without more context. Potential causes of some change in wattage, without fitness improving include
Indoor to outside
Tri bike to road bike
stable to variable effort with group
Any or a combination of those could have accounted for your variance.
Follow up question you might want to consider is how detailed are you trying to specify FTP? I never have values that don’t end in a 5 or a 0. As someone noted, you’ll see day to day swings that can be that large. Just my $0.02
I guess I’m not trying to necessarily change my FTP based on this one ride as much as I wanted to get a better clarification of what FTP is…specifically, is a 60’ Pnorm group ride, that’s highly variable, rolling hills, with a decent number of times out of the saddle a good way to determine FTP? Based on the link that Robert posted as well as a couple other responses, I would say no.
Next question I ask myself, is can I use this type of ride as an indicator that I may want to retest my FTP? I would say yes.
This particular ride just happened to have Pnorm = FTP + 6…certainly within the margin for error. Given that I rode ~20% of this ride b/t 0-20w, its conceivable that the I could produce and even larger Pnorm in the future. Given the reponses though, I would only use this as an indicator that I should do my normal FTP test as oppose to take this result as my FTP.
Next question I ask myself, is can I use this type of ride as an indicator that I may want to retest my FTP? I would say yes.
This particular ride just happened to have Pnorm = FTP + 6…certainly within the margin for error. Given that I rode ~20% of this ride b/t 0-20w, its conceivable that the I could produce and even larger Pnorm in the future. Given the reponses though, I would only use this as an indicator that I should do my normal FTP test as oppose to take this result as my FTP.
Totally agree that this sort of a value indicates that it is a good time to retest FTP. Anytime you have a norm power value for 60 minutes in excess of FTP, it is good to ask the question of whether an FTP test is in order. Answer can go both ways but asking the question is totally appropriate.
I would consider your training environment when you do your testing. There is a notable debate about if you should have lower power values indoors versus out. Whether one should or not, a lot of people do have such a variance with indoors being a good bit lower. I would test where you do most of your riding.
We have a good local trail that has a nice ~11mi stretch that has a few gate/bollard crossing but no other real interuptions. I’ll have to take the tri bike out to compare outdoor vs. indoor.
This begs the questions, which do you then use? Or do you take indoor + X% when outdoor or visa-versa?