2x20 ITT simulation?

[Krazyderek]

I slapped on the aero bars to start getting my TT legs back the other day and i decided 2x20 would be a good workout to do so. I had to tinker with the bike a little bit but finally got comfortable. One thing i noticed it was definitly harder to pedal being a little more stretched out and lower on the bike but overall i felt fine.

However half way thru the first interval i started tried a faster cadence and ended with a good push. By the time i was 10mins into the second 20min interval i wanted to die, but i just kept pushing on just like i would in a race thinking it was good practice, this is also where you see my HR creep up from 180 to 191 by the end of the workout. My max HR is 195 recorded in the past couple months is 195.

So is this good? I definitly went over my FTP HR of 170-180 by the end of the second interval. Is that bad? Should i have tried to tempo myself a little better, does going anerobic during a 2x20min workout defie the whole point of it?

Oh ya, not 100% sure of my FTP but i know it's somewhere around 240-260ish.
Oh ya #2, this was done inside ON ROLLERS.

Here's the power graph for the workout:

 

[Spunout]

100 Cadence looks better.

Watch your aerobar position, if it is much harder then it might not be just perfect. Elbows near the headset top cap, just ahead of your knees. This is probably the best payback from a professional consultation, setting these things up.

 

[beerco]

So is this good? I definitly went over my FTP HR of 170-180 by the end of the second interval. Is that bad?

If you stop wearing your HR strap, you'll never worry about it again .

Everything looks fine except you could probably stand to go a smidge harder at the start and middle. I say that with hesitation though because it's too easy to go out hard and have your power drop throughout the whole interval. IMO, it's better to go out a little bit easier to make sure you can complete the interval.

I don't see much point to the surge at the end of the interval. Better to spread it out throughout the interval. I just looked at my power file from the last tt I did and there was no surge at the end because I left it all out on the road.

 

[Krazyderek]

I'm definitly going to look at a shorter stem to swap out for aero bar days to pull my elbows back a little. My syntace bars are really comfortable but have next to zero adjustability. I don't really want to look at replaceing them but i'll look around at how other bars might fit my bike.

So you're saying if i started at 260w or even 270w from begining to end of both intervals it woud be a bit more "TT like" ? I always thought the lance approach worked pretty good, start off steady at a pace you know you can maintain, then inch up the speed little by little till your basically sprinting by the end of the race.

 

[beerco]

I always thought the lance approach worked pretty good, start off steady at a pace you know you can maintain, then inch up the speed little by little till your basically sprinting by the end of the race.

What you're describing is not the Lance approach though. If we assume a totally flat TT (like on rollers), the best time will be to hold a constant power for the whole duration. For good pacing, yes, start out a bit below what you're capable of for the duration, but not 30w below. If you can sprint at the end (and no, 340w is not a sprint) then you've left too much gas in the tank.

For your next session, I would try and hold 255 for the first interval and then 255 for the first 10 of the second interval. The last 10 minutes see if you can increase the power by a few watts or so. If you can or feel that you have gas in the tank, try the next session at 260 or 265w. I wouldn't jump right in at 270w though as it might be too high and you won't complete the interval.

Finally, there are other ways of skinning the cat like Bill Black's Hour of power surge workouts etc, but for working on and testing FTP, I like the even effort 2x20 workout.

 

[Krazyderek]

So just a little update on this, i tried doing another 2x20 today at a much more steady pace to try and really target my FTP. So i picked the average of my last 2 intervals... and decided to try and stay as close to 250w as possible. I think i did pretty good. Wattage tends to flux by 10w up or down even if i tried my hardest to pedal as smooth as possible but it averaged out so all is good.

Obviously my HR was a bit more tame for the same amount of avg work. Thought i still experienced that "hitting the wall" sensation about 5 minutes into my second interval where i really started to feel the pain in my legs, but i resisted the urge to change anything and just kept pushing on steady and watching the minutes tick off till i was done.

Next couple of workouts are going to be l5 and 6 intervals to prep for a hilly race in 2 weeks(i'm expecting some attack's on the slopes), but next week i should be able to fit in another 2x20 and i was going to try and push up the wattage to 260 and see what happens.

Comments & suggestions welcome.

 

[RapDaddyo]

It depends on what your purpose is. If you want to do a performance test at max power, you might want to try a full hour. I doubt that your 60m MP is 260W, but the relationship between 2x20 power and 60m power varies from individual to individual. In my case, I would divide my 2x20 power by 1.08-1.10 to estimate my 60m power. You might be different, even 1.00.

If your purpose is to define a target power for routine 2x20s, then you seem to be pretty close with your 250W efforts. I don't think that doing them at 260W will result in a significantly different adaptation. If I were doing them, I would opt for a lower power (e.g., 250W) and more volume (e.g., 3x20s or 2x30s). But, if your schedule doesn't permit this much volume, you might want to bump them up to 255-260W. Interesting to see the (typical) HR creep in the 2nd set.

 

[frenchyge]

Comments & suggestions welcome.

Interval 1: higher power, higher cadence, lower HR.... cooler temp?

Personally, I do like to push it over the last couple minutes of the last interval of the set. It's not necessarily for TT simulation, but helps me to check how much gas I had left in the tank. As the average power of that last interval creeps up over a couple weeks, at some point I'll know I can raise the target power for the entire set and still complete the workout. It just gives me a little stretch.

 

[Krazyderek]

It depends on what your purpose is. If you want to do a performance test at max power, you might want to try a full hour. I doubt that your 60m MP is 260W, but the relationship between 2x20 power and 60m power varies from individual to individual. In my case, I would divide my 2x20 power by 1.08-1.10 to estimate my 60m power. You might be different, even 1.00.

If your purpose is to define a target power for routine 2x20s, then you seem to be pretty close with your 250W efforts. I don't think that doing them at 260W will result in a significantly different adaptation. If I were doing them, I would opt for a lower power (e.g., 250W) and more volume (e.g., 3x20s or 2x30s). But, if your schedule doesn't permit this much volume, you might want to bump them up to 255-260W. Interesting to see the (typical) HR creep in the 2nd set.

I was actually thinking about that today. keeping power the same and perhaps doing a 3rd rep. But doing 2x25, then 3x20, and finaly 2x30 would seem a good natural progression.

My target with these is simply to increase my MAP and define a target power that yeild's the greatest results. Of course i'll be spending the bulk of my winter doing this but i didn't want to lose sight of it during the summer. What i took away from today's workout was a good feeling for my pain threshold, in other words it felt really hard but ultimately i just told myself, "it's just muscle pain, you feel fine, you only have 11more minutes and you're done". Although my muscles were soar, i wasn't doing to low of a cadence, and my HR was well within sustainable limits meaning if this had been my wattage i was trying to maintain solo on a break away i would have had the ability to pick up and sprint for the line had i saw the pack coming up behind me a 1km from the line.

 

[frenchyge]

What i took away from today's workout was a good feeling for my pain threshold, in other words it felt really hard but ultimately i just told myself, "it's just muscle pain, you feel fine, you only have 11more minutes and you're done".

That's what really resonated with me in your previous comments. The biggest reason I like to do my 20min intervals at or near FT (as opposed to somewhere lower in L4) is because it gives me the chance to deny the pain and just watch the minutes tick away until I'm halfway done.... almost done..... done. It's a good mental workout, as well as physical, and feels more like racing practice than just sitting on the trainer.

30min intervals at ~95% FT are just easy enough that my mind is able to wander a bit. It's just enough to take the edge off, and is a nice change of pace on occasion.

 

[Krazyderek]

another update, next 2 events on the race calendar are both TT's, both just around 40k. I'm still working my way the wattage during my 2x20 with good results, yesterday i did 270w pretty steady and my HR only hit 175 of 195 max so i think things are going pretty good.

I also played around with the cadence a little bit. I discovered on a long endurance ride that i can get a good hour out of my legs grinding (for me) at 95, which keeps my HR a little lower and speed and power higher, i'm also not quite as out of breath compared to 100-105+ cadence. I'll condinue to play with cadence as i slide the wattage up a tad more and try to extend to longer efforts.

In terms of prep for 40k TT in august and late sept, does this seem to be a good path? Should i now try and up the time to 2x25min? 3x20min? 2x30 mins? and then just try and work my rest from 5 mins down to 2 minutes?or something similar ? Or should i just try and do a TT, (on the rollers or on the real course?) and see how i'm feeling about the full 42k.?

 

[RapDaddyo]

I also played around with the cadence a little bit. I discovered on a long endurance ride that i can get a good hour out of my legs grinding (for me) at 95, which keeps my HR a little lower and speed and power higher, i'm also not quite as out of breath compared to 100-105+ cadence. I'll condinue to play with cadence as i slide the wattage up a tad more and try to extend to longer efforts.

I think you will find that your HR will be directly correlated with cadence (they will go up and down together). So, if you experiment with cadence to find your lowest HR (at a constant power), this will drive you toward a low cadence. Some do this under the mistaken belief that, other things being equal, riding at a given power at a lower HR is a good thing (assumes HR is a proxy for effort). Basically, this strategy results in increasing torque to offset the decrease in cadence, changing the muscular stress. Cadence does matter, but I suggest that you ignore HR when experimenting. For example, I find that I can sustain a given power longer at a relatively high cadence (95-100) even though I know that it will result in a higher HR. I prefer the lower torque corresponding to the higher cadence.

In terms of prep for 40k TT in august and late sept, does this seem to be a good path? Should i now try and up the time to 2x25min? 3x20min? 2x30 mins? and then just try and work my rest from 5 mins down to 2 minutes?or something similar ? Or should i just try and do a TT, (on the rollers or on the real course?) and see how i'm feeling about the full 42k.?

Personally, I would increase my total L4 minutes even if it meant dropping power to the low end of the range (91%FT). So, I would opt for some combination of efforts for 60mins total. As to longer duration efforts (30-60mins), I do find these useful on a regular basis (e.g., weekly) because I think there is a mental adaptation associated with these. These are not physiologically better (or worse) than a set of efforts that total the same duration (e.g., 2x20s = 1x40), assuming the same intensity. But, they are mentally much more difficult (at least for me), requiring much more concentration and focus. As with any adaptation, I adapt to the mental demands over time. Basically, I learn to relax and maintain power over an extended duration. I also think that pacing is crucial in a TT of any distance and the classic mistake is taking it out too hard in the first half, then dying until you can see the finish line, then sprinting to the finish. This is basically caused by an overestimation of one's 1hr power, usually the result of rarely, if ever, doing longish L4 efforts.

 

[acoggan]

another update, next 2 events on the race calendar are both TT's, both just around 40k. I'm still working my way the wattage during my 2x20 with good results, yesterday i did 270w pretty steady and my HR only hit 175 of 195 max so i think things are going pretty good.

I also played around with the cadence a little bit. I discovered on a long endurance ride that i can get a good hour out of my legs grinding (for me) at 95, which keeps my HR a little lower and speed and power higher, i'm also not quite as out of breath compared to 100-105+ cadence. I'll condinue to play with cadence as i slide the wattage up a tad more and try to extend to longer efforts.

In terms of prep for 40k TT in august and late sept, does this seem to be a good path? Should i now try and up the time to 2x25min? 3x20min? 2x30 mins? and then just try and work my rest from 5 mins down to 2 minutes?or something similar ? Or should i just try and do a TT, (on the rollers or on the real course?) and see how i'm feeling about the full 42k.?

So from 250 W to 275 W in a little over a month, and with no change in your average heart rate...nice work! Ain't it wonderful how the body responds to a progressive overload?

 

[frenchyge]

In terms of prep for 40k TT in august and late sept, does this seem to be a good path? Should i now try and up the time to 2x25min? 3x20min? 2x30 mins? and then just try and work my rest from 5 mins down to 2 minutes?or something similar ? Or should i just try and do a TT, (on the rollers or on the real course?) and see how i'm feeling about the full 42k.?

Personally, I didn't have complete faith in my ability to jump from 2x20 to 1x60 at the same power, so I started mixing in some longer intervals: 2x30 or 1x40 at ~.95-.97FT. I felt that gave me a small taste of what the race effort would be like. That'd be my recommendation.

 

[RapDaddyo]

Personally, I didn't have complete faith in my ability to jump from 2x20 to 1x60 at the same power, so I started mixing in some longer intervals: 2x30 or 1x40 at ~.95-.97FT. I felt that gave me a small taste of what the race effort would be like.

And, what did you find when you tried your first 1x60? Actually, what did you find when you tried your first 1x40?

 

[Krazyderek]

Part of the huge improvement is that i've always held back just a tad, partialy from being scared and the other part being a wimp/lazy. This is a great tactical suprise on race day though lol... but i'm starting to realize and get to the level where i've got to train up to my capabilities or i'll never go anywhere.

I used to do 1x40 with 2 minute intervals, 2mins at 240w, 2 mins at 260w, repeat with no rest for the entire 40 mins and it didn't feel as hard as yesterday. Maybe i'll try 260w and 280w for the 2 minute's. Then see if i can push that up to a full hour of it. But i'll also keep upping my steady efforts to 2x25min, and 2x30min, and i might use the first time trial (non-points) race to see how the work has paid off and then i have another month to fine tune things for the provincial ITT's in sept.

Yes how did the 1x60 go when you first tried it? was it a big jump?

 

[RapDaddyo]

Yes how did the 1x60 go when you first tried it? was it a big jump?

In my case, I discovered that my 60min power was nowhere near 95% of my 20min routine 2x20 power. It was closer to 90%. When my FTP was ~270W, I could knock off 2x20s @ 300W any time I felt like it. Even today, it's not 95%, it's closer to 91%. I attribute that to fitness and that the ratio will eventually move up closer to 95% as my fitness improves. IOW, I view it as untapped potential. But, if I had gone into a 40K TT with the mistaken belief that my 60min power was 95% of my routine 2x20 power, I would have ridden the course in the classic pattern -- overcook->die->sprint. Whereas, if I rode a 40K TT tomorrow, I would take my routine 20min interval power and multiply by 90%. If I felt good after the first 20K, I would add ~5-10W, but not before 20K.

 

[SolarEnergy]

My 60 is about 95% of the routinely 20s. Not too sure what that mean though. Euh well. My fav workout is 60min TT. On a Formula 1 race track no traffic, trying to race against pace lines.

I admit I should do 2X20 more often.

 

[RapDaddyo]

My 60 is about 95% of the routinely 20s. Not too sure what that mean though.

I think that's fairly common. I think I am the one with the abnormal MP curve, due to one of three factors: (1) I haven't built up my endurance yet to sustain my 20 min power longer; (2) I have a higher than normal VO2MAX and AWC relative to my FTP; or (3) I am weak mentally and can't tough it out to 60 mins. Or, who knows, maybe all three. Anyway, so long as my FTP, VO2MAX and AWC are all >100W, I'm a happy camper.

 

[Krazyderek]

I think that's fairly common. I think I am the one with the abnormal MP curve, due to one of three factors: (1) I haven't built up my endurance yet to sustain my 20 min power longer; (2) I have a higher than normal VO2MAX and AWC relative to my FTP; or (3) I am weak mentally and can't tough it out to 60 mins. Or, who knows, maybe all three. Anyway, so long as my FTP, VO2MAX and AWC are all >100W, I'm a happy camper.

i'm kinda in the same boat, hence i'm worried about my TT abilities..... in most races i make it to the line just keeping my eye on my main competitors, only reacting if they do something... and then just throw all my chips into the sprint and usualy win with a quick move at the last second.... of course that's cat 4 lol... Even if i don't do all that well in the time trial's over the next month and a half, it gives me a good reference to set a goal for my FTP over the winter since that will probably be the bulk of my focus to get me up to cat 3 level for next season.... hopefully