I’m not at a point where it makes sense to invest in power training equipment. However, I can get a “power profile” from a level 1 cycling coach for around $100 and change (for 2 sessions). For anyone that trains with power, is there anything to be gained by generating a profile if you can’t accurately train against it? Or, put another way, can you effectively expose the fundamental strengths and weaknesses over the course of a couple of hours on the meter?
I don’t think a power profile is really useful for a triathlete, just the functional threshold power. We don’t do a lot of sprinting or go for king of the mountain, just time trialing.
Then if you don’t train with power what would be more useful is your average speed and HR for a 1 hour time trial. You could base your training and racing speeds from that.
Lastly, a race rehersal at your planned effort on the bike could confirm your paces before a race. I don’t train for IM so I couldn’t suggest a rehersal for that but for a HIM I do a 45 min run, 2.5 hour bike, 45 min run. The second run needs to be faster than the first. If you can’t pick up the second run then the biking may have been too aggressive.
Good Luck
jaretj
It’s really of no value. One of the reasons for power profiling is to see where you need work, or what you might be good at. A one time test doesn’t really tell you that much since you won’t have anything else to compare it to. If you did it several times it might be of some limited value. But it’s something you could do for yourself for free with a powermeter so you have to weigh the cost of the PM vs the multiple tests.
Put it another way, it’s not something I would offer as a coach even though I use the power profiling charts quite a bit.