Calculating future TSB



Porkyboy

New Member
Apr 28, 2006
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Hi

Thanks to help from here I can now work out what weekly TSS to aim for to raise my CTL by xx and this has worked well. I now want to do the opposite to try to make sure I arrive at about the "right" TSB dor an event in 2 weeks time (100 mile hilly sportive ride).

So, how do I work out what TSS I need to ensure that I arrive with a TSB of 10-15 in 2 weeks time, or do I just guess! I can't do it from experience because I've not been using this system for long enough.

My current CTL is 101.8, the event is 2 weeks from today. I have been watching several charts with various CTL/ATL constants. I've been using the default value but being almost 50 I'm getting the feeling that values of 42 and 9-10 probably better reflect reality in terms of recovery as my current TSB on the chart using the default value of 7 is -0.5 but I feel quite a bit more tired than that!

Is there a magic formula?

Thanks in anticipation!

PBUK
 
First, regarding the time constants: there is far less variability across individuals and even sports with the CTL constant than the ATL constant. Unless you use the Race Day program, you will have to go trial and error to some extent to find your best fit constants in the PMC of WKO+. Higher ATL constants with age is a reasonable variation to look at. After analysing my 2007 data (I'm 51), I found that a CTL constant of 42 days and ATL constant of 10 days fit best with my performances.

Second, regarding planning your taper: I do this routinely in my PMC before races. I have a fairly reliable history of rides/efforts that I do during a taper. These rides generally produce reproducible TSSs. For example, a 60 min easy ride is known to give me x TSS, and a 60 min 6x3min interval session gives me y TSS, and my 30 minute opener ride gives me z TSS. I then simply go the calendar section of the PMC and enter my plan for each day of the taper leading to the race. I can then look at PMC to see that I am arriving at my target TSB. If I am off target, I go back to the calendar and modify individual days in the taper until my TSB on race day is on target.

If you don't have known TSS to work with, you can manually enter workouts on the calendar using anticipated time and IF. You can delete your hypothetical days in your calendar and replace with actual days as you perform them, checking PMC for effect if your actual deviates much from your planned hypothetical. Then, readjust your taper as necessary as you go.

Works well for me, n=1
 
Steve

Fightin Boba said:
First, regarding the time constants: there is far less variability across individuals and even sports with the CTL constant than the ATL constant. Unless you use the Race Day program, you will have to go trial and error to some extent to find your best fit constants in the PMC of WKO+. Higher ATL constants with age is a reasonable variation to look at. After analysing my 2007 data (I'm 51), I found that a CTL constant of 42 days and ATL constant of 10 days fit best with my performances.

Second, regarding planning your taper: I do this routinely in my PMC before races. I have a fairly reliable history of rides/efforts that I do during a taper. These rides generally produce reproducible TSSs. For example, a 60 min easy ride is known to give me x TSS, and a 60 min 6x3min interval session gives me y TSS, and my 30 minute opener ride gives me z TSS. I then simply go the calendar section of the PMC and enter my plan for each day of the taper leading to the race. I can then look at PMC to see that I am arriving at my target TSB. If I am off target, I go back to the calendar and modify individual days in the taper until my TSB on race day is on target.

If you don't have known TSS to work with, you can manually enter workouts on the calendar using anticipated time and IF. You can delete your hypothetical days in your calendar and replace with actual days as you perform them, checking PMC for effect if your actual deviates much from your planned hypothetical. Then, readjust your taper as necessary as you go.

Works well for me, n=1
Thanks very much indeed for this, I'd not even thought of doing that and I'm going to give it a try. Just mapped out the next couple of weeks very roughly using an ATL constant of 10 and this should bring me to event day with a TSB of 17, gotta spend a little CTL sometime! From then on I'll rebuild for a few weeks until La Marmotte so should be back up with a CTL of about 90-100 again by that time.

Sound reasonable?

Thanks again.

PBUK
 
Porkyboy said:
Steve

Thanks very much indeed for this, I'd not even thought of doing that and I'm going to give it a try. Just mapped out the next couple of weeks very roughly using an ATL constant of 10 and this should bring me to event day with a TSB of 17, gotta spend a little CTL sometime! From then on I'll rebuild for a few weeks until La Marmotte so should be back up with a CTL of about 90-100 again by that time.

Sound reasonable?
Sounds reasonable, although TSB +17 may be a wee bit more than needed for a hilly 100mile sportive ride, particularly if you want to preserve some CTL for La Marmotte.

Play with the taper planning a little more. I think that you'll also find that TSS tapers tending to be more abrupt/short can bring the TSB to the same target with less expenditure of CTL than TSS tapers tending to be longer/gradual.
 
Hi Steve

Fightin Boba said:
Unless you use the Race Day program, you will have to go trial and error...
Not heard of this, could you enlighten me or post a link to some information please?

Thank you.

PBUK
 
Porkyboy said:
Hi Steve

Thanks very much for that. Anyone out there got any idea whether it's any good, whether it actually works?

Thanks.

PBUK
Give it a try and let us all know how it goes. :D
 
Porkyboy said:
Hi Steve

Thanks very much for that. Anyone out there got any idea whether it's any good, whether it actually works?


PBUK
I downloaded the trial the same time I downloaded WKO+. I ended up going with WKO+ because the calender page is so much better. Race Day puts more emphasis on performance prediction, but I'm too lazy to mess with all the parameters and tests. WKO+ is just much better for logging training.
I did like the clean and simple interface of Race Day, and the way it would graph future TSB, ATL, and CTL (although race day uses different terms for each parameter based on BikeScore).
 
Hi

swampy1970 said:
Give it a try and let us all know how it goes. :D
:) At the moment I'm running with the suggestion made by Steve Palladino and have put the estimated TSS values of my planned workouts into the calendar of WKO+ and am getting my predicted TSB values on the PMC. It seems to be a very simple and easy way of approaching the issue of trying to arrive at what you believe is the right TSB on the day of an event. The proof of the pudding will be how I feel on the day but it will be interesting and there are so many other variables anyway. Seems a good way of managing a taper to me and I am currently on target to arrive at the start line with a TSB of about +15. The event itself will produce a TSS of about 400 which, according to the chart, will put my CTL back to 99-100 from where I can continue my build towards La Marmotte. It's certainly a better approach then where I was before which was guesswork!

Cheers.

PBUK
 
Hi

strader said:
I downloaded the trial the same time I downloaded WKO+. I ended up going with WKO+ because the calender page is so much better. Race Day puts more emphasis on performance prediction, but I'm too lazy to mess with all the parameters and tests. WKO+ is just much better for logging training.
I did like the clean and simple interface of Race Day, and the way it would graph future TSB, ATL, and CTL (although race day uses different terms for each parameter based on BikeScore).
I think I will also end up keeping it all under the WKO+ roof using Steve Palladino's advice. One can deal with just so much in terms of different software packages for different purposes! :confused:

Cheers.

PBUK
 
I personally like the combination of WKO and the "PMC Template_Modified.xls" spreadsheet that can be found in the file section of the Wattage group.

After loading the CT or PT data into WKO I insert the daily TSS, IF and duration in the spreadsheet.
The speadsheet calculates TSB and also has many other nice features such as 3d, 7d, and 28d Rolling TSS Totals.
I also find the CTL Ramp Chart quite useful.

It is also very easy to add future data in the spreadsheet.
I like to create meekly TSS models and then copy and paste them over the span of several weeks to see what future numbers will be.
 
betulla said:
I personally like the combination of WKO and the "PMC Template_Modified.xls" spreadsheet that can be found in the file section of the Wattage group.
I like this as well. I can easily plan my whole season this way -- and adjust my plans as things come up.