It's killing me but.......... - Page 204

Forgive me, I can't recall Friel's zones, so can't really say. Does he have power training levels? I thought they were HR based. or more to do with type of workout than intensity? Been a long time since I looked at that book.

Here is a representation of power training levels based on FTP and on MAP:
Alex's Cycle Blog: A Graphical Representation of Training Levels

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Custom Training Plans -- cyclecoach.com -- My Blog -- Power Meter Hire in Australia

I think it's time to get things into perspective. The point of this thread was not to achieve an FTP of 300W per se, but with RapDaddyo's excellent coaching to progress beyond what you and I thought we were capable of achieving.

As far I'm concerned, thanks to RD and others I made improvements which I hadn't even dreamed of. Of course with the benefit of hindsight I should have realised that riding at 400W for any length of time for a 66 old was an impossibility. However, having said this, I did do a 400W interval, albeit on the biggest cog. What wattage I was actually riding at I have no idea; Roger of Racermate said he would try and figure it out through testing and get back to me. He never did.

I think some idea of the wattage can be gaged from my last Lake Biwa ride when I managed to stay with the Nagoya racing team. And Btw, to the guy who said with a 300W FTP I should have been able to stay with them up the first climb; the reason I didn't is because I mistook the short climb for the much longer 2nd climb, and eased off thinking I couldn't maintain the pace we were going at for 2km, when in fact it was only a half km climb. I soon got back with the leading guys though.

Now, for those who regard figures as being of the utmost importance, you will be getting accurate figures henceforth, with no interval done at less than 14/15 mph and probably 3-4 cogs down from the largest.

Returning to the first paragraph though, if you follow the guys in the know in this thread and other threads you will with self-discipline make considerable gains.

One final thing, even with a year off from serious training, I find after a few rides out in the mountains I'm still able to generate considerable power at will, sailing along on the flat yesterday, motoring along at 38kph solo (for longer than I could do a week or so ago).

For those who have just tuned into this thread for the first time, before I started logging into this thread, drafting behind some guy one day on the same stretch as above, it was all I could do to hang onto his back wheel at 30kph!

Was RD's return just an apparition?

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Thanks Alex. That's a more detailed and explained table than Friel's.

His is based on critical power (CP60) which I thought was the same as FTP :

Z1-recovery- <56%
Z2-aerobic- 56-75%
Z3-tempo- 76-90%
Z4-threshold- 91-105%
Z5-aerobic capacity- 106-120%
Z6-anaerobic capacity- 121-150%
Z7-power- >150%

How is CP60 or FTP different from MAP ? Is MAP a stronger effort?

Thanks,
-Greg

Hello again,

To Tyson , when are we going to start getting our weekly or daily episodes of your training ,its like waiting for christmas.
And one for Alex : Using the power levels from A Coggan's book (ie) 1 - 6 ,could you relate that to HR levels ,OIOW are they the same
(ie)Power Level 1 = HR Level 1 ( Active recovery and so on )
Sorry it seems a bit vague but its the only way i can try explain it.

Cheers.

It pretty closely correlates to FTP, if one means the CP as determined by the Monod & Scherrer model (by using two or more maximal well paced efforts of between 3 and 30 -min duration to establish the work-time relationship).

Those levels above (with the exception of L7) are the same as Coggan's levels and I suspect Friel has based his on Coggan's.

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Custom Training Plans -- cyclecoach.com -- My Blog -- Power Meter Hire in Australia

Andy Coggan also provided HR and RPE "equivalents" in his table of power training levels here:
Power Training Levels, by Andrew Coggan

but read the caveats....

you can't really always equate HR & power, there is often not a good correlation, especially out in the real world of riding outdoors.

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Custom Training Plans -- cyclecoach.com -- My Blog -- Power Meter Hire in Australia

FTP is the maximal average power you can sustain in a quasi steady state for about an hour.

MAP is the maximal 1 minute average power at the end of a power ramp test to enxaustion, typically with a ramp protocol of between 15W/min and 25W/min (ramp rate chosen depending on sex and performance level of rider). MAP is highly protocol dependent.

FTP is typically ~ 72%-77% of MAP.

__________________
Custom Training Plans -- cyclecoach.com -- My Blog -- Power Meter Hire in Australia

As I said a couple or so posts ago, I haven't been on the trainer for a year. As soon as the weather turns I shall be on it. At the moment we are experiencing unseasonal warm weather, and as I now live near the mountains, I'm out on the bike at every opportunity. I believe the weather is due to change for the worse next week.
At present I feel very strong due to all the hard work I put in in the past and am seriously considering coming in starting at 220 Watt intervals. Maybe I'm being ambitious, but only time will tell.
FYI, the first time on the trainer I shall do a 5 minute warmup @ 150 Watts, then another 5 minutes winding the watts up quickly in 10 watt steps to hopefully at least 250W. This should give me some idea of what I'm capable of for 20 minutes. Tyson

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Nice job Alex! It looks like you will beat your pre-accident form any time now!

I'm having the opposite sort of week. I tired myself out over the weekend, took Tuesday off, died in training on Wednesday anyway, took yesterday off, and quite honestly still feel kind of dull today. Ugh.

Cheers Alex,

i understand about the HR and Power levels not correlating on the road but would the levels be nearer the mark when working indoors on the trainer especially at SST and L4 when everything is controlled.

Cheers.

Yeah, in general indoors with steady efforts is your best bet in terms of correlating power to HR, especially if you pay attention to cooling (big fan) and hydration.

Check out this, especially Figure 1. for an idea of how HR to power relate indoors vs. outdoors: http://www.midweekclub.ca/articles/coggan.pdf

-Dave

Cheers Dave,

i stopped using the HR monitor when i got the powertap,but i am thinking of using it on the Turbo sessions as a double check on the effort,i actually think that my FTP is lower than i thought it was because i've just done 70mins at was i thought was 82% but it felt very hard.And yesterdays effort was equally as hard all beit at 90%.

Cheers.

A very big emphasis on proper cooling or otherwise the HR will shoot through the roof when all the blood goes to cooling your body not to mention your workout is ruined.

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"It takes all the running you can do, to keep in the same place."

I have a big 20" 4 speed fan which works very well i have had 2 fans working and i still sweat buckets.So how Tyson used to go on in that gym doesn't bear thinking about.

The lack of cooling air indoors is a real limitation. I read about an experiment done with a group of elite cyclists riding at high power output indoors without a cooling fan at room temperatures. The test was to determine how long a rider could hold 350 watts, and how their core body temps would react over time. IIRC, at a mean time of 12 minutes, with body core temps climbing 2-3*C, everyone gave up exhausted and overheated.

Considering that we're only about 25% efficient (ie, total energy burned vs work to the pedals), that means at 350W output a cyclist is generating over 1000 watts of heat output which has to be lost via the skin.....that's hot stuff