CTL building strategies

[rmur17]

Hi

I've attached my PMC for the last few months and would value any advice or input at all.

My current CTL is 62.4 which I've been steadily building at a rate of about 3 per week on a mixed diet of 2x20 minute SST and 60 minute L3 rides during the week, a longer L3 ride on a Saturday and a long L2 ride on a Sunday. I've adopted the no "formal" rest weeks strategy for the last 4 weeks or so and have ended up I feel with a more structured approach. I'm hoping that in the Spring I will end up better than I was last Spring, that's the plan!

Anyway, I had a bit of a setback last night and your thoughts would be appreciated. On 06.11.2007 I did my first FTP test using the exact recipe from the bible, I averaged 308W for the 20 minutes making my FTP at the time 292W. 2 months having passed I planned another FTP last night and during the 5 minute full on effort I did Ok but was struggling to hold the power I had managed 2 months ago but did raise it by 10W to 352W. When it came to the 20 minute TT I held my previous FTP initially thinking I'd be there or thereabouts and I was planning to increase the power if I could but I just crashed out and couldn't continue, I was unable to come close to my test of 2 months ago, it just didn't have what was needed in my legs, or anywhere else for that matter.

So, this was dispiriting, am I now less fit that I was in spite of 2 months of solid work or have I just lost my top end from the end of last year?

All advice greatly appreciated.

PBUK

well we're not robots. IIRC, there's a natural variation around 4% in our ability to produce power aerobically day-to-day. IMHO, that fact is one good reason not to get too hung up over tests.

Personally I don't do any specific FTP tests and simply use the power I can repeat workout to workout over the weeks and months to gauge progress. From my historical files, I *know* that whatever power I can hold indoors on my patented ergo workouts (30-40min duration), I can hold outdoors for 1-hr and thus that becomes FTP.

Now how has your working interval power progressed since November? IMHO, one should be doing efforts most of the year at or around FTP. If the power you're acheiving in those is going up ... well so must FTP. No increase in power? Then it's unlikely FTP is increasing.

Despite that, if you prefer a rigourous test --- you just may have been in a -4% day due to a myriad of reasons that I doubt anyone could fully explain. Could be as simple as residual exercise fatigue, could be work/family stress, could be a low-grade bug, could be improper eating/low glycogen stores.

So sorry if I'm beating it to death, I honestly don't see much reason for these structured tests. It's better, IMHO, to structure your training such that you fulfill one of Dr. Coggan's mantras: "Training is testing"

 

[frenchyge]

Sorry to have misled you with the date though, I'm in the UK and my last test was on 6th November 2007 not June, I forgot to switch the day and month.

No, my mistake. I did spot the DD.MM.YYYY convention on your chart, but it didn't click when I read your post.

No need to switch things because that's the way the Yanks do it.

 

[Piotr]

That PMC looks strange to me, although I can't quite put my finger on why. Are you carrying ride data forward from last year, or using seed values to start the portion of the chart you posted? Also, what kind of weekly IFs are you seeing? Default time constants?

Would you mind reposting that with the daily TSS values shown? You can turn TSB into a line and then add TSS as a bar series in another color. Choose, say, 200 best values so that it shows them all.

As promised, here's my updated chart. I "deseeded" the the starting values and it didn't change much. My weekly IF averages ranged from .717 to .831, and looking at weekly TSS totals (from 250 to 670), it doesn't seem I worked too hard. But then again to paraphrase Dr. Coggan, the less you train the less you can train . At a CTL of 60 perhaps doing 600+ TSS is a bit over-reaching.

 

[frenchyge]

As promised, here's my updated chart. I "deseeded" the the starting values and it didn't change much. My weekly IF averages ranged from .717 to .831, and looking at weekly TSS totals (from 250 to 670), it doesn't seem I worked too hard.

Based on the shapes of your ATL curve I expected to see some shorter rides, but I'm kinda struck by the number of short rides you have in there. Are those mainly your 2x20 workouts, or are they some active recovery rides? 25% of your rides are <65 TSS and another 25% are <90 TSS. I think that's really the reason your ATL/TSB doesn't spike up/down much.

A 2x20 workout at .9FTP gives about 65 TSS, but looking at your IFs I wonder if you're not too far down on the intensity-duration curve to be getting the best benefit from your SST. 1.5 hours at .85 IF gives 108 TSS, which seems like a pretty meat-and-potatoes SST workout to me (3x30 at .85FTP gives 125 TSS with w/u & c/d).

But then again to paraphrase Dr. Coggan, the less you train the less you can train . At a CTL of 60 perhaps doing 600+ TSS is a bit over-reaching.

Perhaps, but at 60 CTL it takes (60+30)*7= 630 TSS in a week to generate a 5-CTL rise for the week. That's aggressive, but not extreme for most people. Maybe you could try reducing your ATL constant some to see if the ATL/TSB curves match your PE better.

 

[Piotr]

Based on the shapes of your ATL curve I expected to see some shorter rides, but I'm kinda struck by the number of short rides you have in there. Are those mainly your 2x20 workouts, or are they some active recovery rides? 25% of your rides are <65 TSS and another 25% are <90 TSS. I think that's really the reason your ATL/TSB doesn't spike up/down much.

I initially intended to block my SST/L4 rides in three's (Tue, Wed, Thu) followed by a recovery ride, then harder weekends (Monday usually off). After I started feeling too fatigued or getting sick I decided to forgo the Wednesday SST ride in favor of a medium recovery ride (L2) of at most 90 min. Those may be the 60 TSS rides you're seeing. I also took a few Fridays completely off. This all stemmed from my fear of getting sick and demotivated... again. Like I mentioned before, I think I'm over that slump now I think. Though I wonder what effect on my training will next weekends team camp have (4 days of LSD). Perhaps that's a different discussion.

A 2x20 workout at .9FTP gives about 65 TSS, but looking at your IFs I wonder if you're not too far down on the intensity-duration curve to be getting the best benefit from your SST. 1.5 hours at .85 IF gives 108 TSS, which seems like a pretty meat-and-potatoes SST workout to me (3x30 at .85FTP gives 125 TSS with w/u & c/d).

I think I started the season a bit too motivated. As I mentioned before I think the shorter rides with 2x20, 2x30, etc. did not suit me as well as I think a more typical 60-120 min L3/SST approach would have.

Maybe you could try reducing your ATL constant some to see if the ATL/TSB curves match your PE better.

You just inspired an idea. It's a bit OT, but what if there was an arbitrary PE scale built into WKO+ for each ride. You'd rate your ride say 1-10 depending on how you felt. You could then juxtaposition the PE curve against the TSB curve to see whether the ATL time constant needed adjustment.

 

[frenchyge]

I initially intended to block my SST/L4 rides in three's (Tue, Wed, Thu) followed by a recovery ride, then harder weekends (Monday usually off).

That's probably what my weekly routine will look like later in the season when I'm wanting 600-800 TSS weeks, but not now (for me).

You just inspired an idea. It's a bit OT, but what if there was an arbitrary PE scale built into WKO+ for each ride. You'd rate your ride say 1-10 depending on how you felt. You could then juxtaposition the PE curve against the TSB curve to see whether the ATL time constant needed adjustment.

Not too far OT. I typically record some sensations about the workout in the notes section of the journal, for later reference if needed. A numerical PE scale would be good, but that's probably spreadsheet-land since WKO+ just released a new build. Probably a good idea for folks that find they're non-typical with regards how much TSS or ATL they respond to.

 

[Alex Simmons]

You just inspired an idea. It's a bit OT, but what if there was an arbitrary PE scale built into WKO+ for each ride. You'd rate your ride say 1-10 depending on how you felt. You could then juxtaposition the PE curve against the TSB curve to see whether the ATL time constant needed adjustment.

I have always thought that some user definable indexes would be very handy in WKO (and have made the suggestion in the past). So you could track a few others things like a ride rating, general well being, hours of sleep, that sort of thing. Flicking between that and a spreadsheet I suppose ain't that big a deal but when you are managing multiple riders....

 

[Piotr]

I have always thought that some user definable indexes would be very handy in WKO (and have made the suggestion in the past). So you could track a few others things like a ride rating, general well being, hours of sleep, that sort of thing. Flicking between that and a spreadsheet I suppose ain't that big a deal but when you are managing multiple riders....

Yes, I'm a little surprised your suggestion wasn't heeded, but now we have...(drumroll)... HR decoupling.

 

[vladav]

Yes, I'm a little surprised your suggestion wasn't heeded, but now we have...(drumroll)... HR decoupling.

It's a savy business decision:
CyclingPeaks = One time sale + Upgrade charges
TrainingPeaks = CashFlow, CashFlow, CashFlow

Who the hell would pay a regular fee for HR decoupling? Ergo CyclingPeaks "Upgrade(?)"

But the important stuff (above&beyond PerfMgr etc.) goes to TrainingPeaks where you have the privilige of regularly paying for it.

 

[wiredued]

Are the PT guys climbing the mountain of knowledge only to find the PE guys at the summit toasting marshmellows?

Not too far OT. I typically record some sensations about the workout in the notes section of the journal, for later reference if needed. A numerical PE scale would be good, but that's probably spreadsheet-land since WKO+ just released a new build. Probably a good idea for folks that find they're non-typical with regards how much TSS or ATL they respond to.

 

[frenchyge]

Are the PT guys climbing the mountain of knowledge only to find the PE guys at the summit toasting marshmellows?

There are certainly people who have climbed higher on PE alone than I ever will with a PT.

I like to think of the PT as a sherpa who carries the heavy loads and lets me know if I'm still on track. One still has to pay attention to PE if they want to continue the climb, however.

 

[daveryanwyoming]

Are the PT guys climbing the mountain of knowledge only to find the PE guys at the summit toasting marshmellows?

Yep, that's a good take on it. There have always been folks that figured out how to get fast -- real fast -- without any high tech methods. To paraphrase Andy, this stuff won't make the fast folks faster, but it can provide a more reliable path to race fitness for those that struggle with haphazard training methods.

On a personal level, over the years I've seen an awful lot of bikes without any sort of meters go up the road and leave me behind. But since switching to power based training and SST I'm going with them more often than not

-Dave

 

[Piotr]

Yep, that's a good take on it. There have always been folks that figured out how to get fast -- real fast -- without any high tech methods. To paraphrase Andy, this stuff won't make the fast folks faster, but it can provide a more reliable path to race fitness for those that struggle with haphazard training methods.

If I didn't know better I'd say that you just said that power training is for losers (paraphrasing Andy of course) .

 

[daveryanwyoming]

If I didn't know better I'd say that you just said that power training is for losers ...

Nope, just folks who don't stumble onto a good training path on their own and would prefer not to follow a bunch of dead ends before finding a method that works for them. IOW, folks who want to reduce the trial and error on the path to winning

 

[dazman]

Hi Dave,

Very Useful. I'm very much in the stage of transition from adhoc to a more structured program and this seems like a great way of saving time experimenting. It also addresses something that seems to have been repeated all over the place about the rest weeks... Nice to also see real values to measure how hard others are training!

As for the comments above on PT in general, I struggled for years without a PM to see real improvement. Mow I can measure it and with strategies like this see how to quickly improve it for key events, while keeping my eye on CTL to try avoid sickness. Without it I'm sure I could have improved but the mileage I would have needed for all the adhoc riding wouldn't have left much time for the family...

Cheers,

Some recent discussions here and on the Google wattage lists got me thinking about approaches to building training base during winter build cycles. A year ago I was still using a preplanned work/rest cycle ala Friel with 3 training weeks followed by an easier rest week. I abandoned that approach mid winter because I felt I was always playing catchup after that rest week both in terms of regaining training base and having to loosen up my blocked up legs before I could resume decent training. The introduction of the WKO+ Performance Manager and discussions here including some urging by Tom Anhalt(thanks Tom) changed the way I manage training load and how I look at work vs. rest.

I'm in my 12th week of winter training, almost entirely indoors on the trainer again supplemented by some XC ski skating and I decided to compare progress this year vs. a year ago. The attached files are screenshots of my PMC for the first 12 weeks of last season using a preplanned work/rest approach vs. the last 12 weeks using a combination of listening to my body and watching the PMC curves.

All in all I've brought my CTL higher with less effort and haven't had to regain so much lost ground after rest weeks. My CTL ramp is steady and I no longer dig deep holes followed by rest weeks. I'm halfway through indoor winter training(assuming a normal spring, not a given around here) and I'm still psyched to train.

Sure, I still get tired or have off days. But I look at workouts as falling into three general categories:

• If the TSS of a workout is substantially above my current CTL it's definitely training and will increase my overall fatigue
• If the TSS of a workout is near my current CTL it's maintaining and will usually bring about a bit of a TSB rebound
• If the TSS of a workout is substantially below my current CTL it's a "soft" workout and will bring about a bigger TSB rebound and lead to freshness.

IOW, I don't always take days completely off if I'm getting a bit worked. A couple of "soft" days with TSS roughly half of my current CTL even if they're Tempo or low SST rides can lead to freshness and get me ready for more training. These soft days might be half an hour of Tempo riding with a short warmup and cooldown and they generally leave me feeling pretty good. At most a couple of days of these get me ready for more serious training without the blocked up legs of a traditional rest week. Sure I still take days completely off, but not very often and usually when work or family obligations get in the way of training. After all, CTL represents a very long term average training load, roughly what your body has adapted to after 3 or more months of training. It shouldn't be too hard to do a steady base building workout at half that level.

I'm not suggesting this as a year round protocol and expect I'll go back to more conventional rest days when I get outside in the spring and move to higher end workouts. But for base building, especially for those of us stuck indoors on trainers it's an alternative approach to managing training load.

Food for thought,
-Dave

 

[wiredued]

Did any of them publish there methods? I'm not completely intune to PE while cycling but I've had workouts were PE has trumped HR and even power measurements.

There have always been folks that figured out how to get fast -- real fast -- without any high tech methods.

 

[rmur17]

Did any of them publish there methods? I'm not completely intune to PE while cycling but I've had workouts were PE has trumped HR and even power measurements.

Hmmm ... not criticizing at all ... but could you explain further? Trumped in what way?

 

[frenchyge]

Did any of them publish there methods?

Sure, libraries and bookstores are full of them. Look for titles like "Train like the Pros" or "The Pros can do it, and so can YOU." The problem lies in figuring out whether the pros did it because they're genetically gifted and quit their day jobs to ride their bikes, or whether it was because of the magical nature of their training plans.

Yes, there are some very fast riders who just ride by instinct. There are also some very fast riders who utilize the tools that are available. The fact that those two groups of riders exist doesn't have any bearing on where any individual reading this forum is going to end up, nor which approach is most likely to work best for them.

 

[wiredued]

Lately I have done 3x20s using HR to pace them because I will be doing it that way outdoors in the spring the power is within 10 watts for the three when I'm done. A few weeks ago I decided to change the third interval to a 3x4 on Tuesdays for a maintenance dose of low L5 the first one is more like threshold with a high of 166bpm the next one 168bpm then the last 172bpm or higher if I have any thing left. I think this is starting to effect my Thursday and Staurday normal 3x20 pace on the second interval. If I try to get HR to the level I expect after the first five minutes of the second interval I get the feeling that spikes are being pushed into my legs about 4 inches above the knee more towards the outside so I back off a little and ride that line paying no attention to heart rate or power I think I actually close my eyes and put my head down (this probably won't work outdoors) until I am in the last five minute segment. The last interval paced by HR just like it always does I didn't notice any PE that I could use for pacing but when I was done all the intervals came to 261 watts about 98% FTP.

Hmmm ... not criticizing at all ... but could you explain further? Trumped in what way?

 

[rmur17]

Lately I have done 3x20s using HR to pace them because I will be doing it that way outdoors in the spring the power is within 10 watts for the three when I'm done. A few weeks ago I decided to change the third interval to a 3x4 on Tuesdays for a maintenance dose of low L5 the first one is more like threshold with a high of 166bpm the next one 168bpm then the last 172bpm or higher if I have any thing left. I think this is starting to effect my Thursday and Staurday normal 3x20 pace on the second interval. If I try to get HR to the level I expect after the first five minutes of the second interval I get the feeling that spikes are being pushed into my legs about 4 inches above the knee more towards the outside so I back off a little and ride that line paying no attention to heart rate or power I think I actually close my eyes and put my head down (this probably won't work outdoors) until I am in the last five minute segment. The last interval paced by HR just like it always does I didn't notice any PE that I could use for pacing but when I was done all the intervals came to 261 watts about 98% FTP.

okay. I used to wear the HRM religiously until a couple of years ago when I worked up to my current training schedule. Before then, I could tell pretty much when I was going to fail on an L4 interval - anything much over 165 bpm or approaching 170 and I was close to failure. Last year I noted in my typical 3d blocks that HR was just too variable. Some intervals it'd get up to 165 ... some it'd barely creep over 150 for exactly the same power. And as CTL rose, the correlation was even worse.

Indoors I pace by avg. power first and PE second. I really don't look at the instantaneous power display much. Outdoors L4/5 is usually on the TT bike/SRM and I honestly miss the AP display. Pacing is mostly by PE with an occasional glance to the meter.

Don't you have an outdoor PM?