I took a 3 week break from training this offseason, and my FTP dropped from in the 260s to around 250. First AIFTP adjustment put me to 254. At the end of this block at that FTP, I failed Reinstein, indoors due to rain, a Threshold 4.5 because of what I assume is the inability to shed heat despite two fans. Indoor threshold and long SS always give me problems with heat buildup. I took a day off, and got back outside and absolutely nailed Deception -3, which is 3 x 23 hardstart intervals. In hindsight, I only did 30s instead of 1m of the hardstart, but the power of the hard start was more than 135%. I tacked on an extra minute to the end of each interval, and averaged 6-8 watts higher than what was prescribed. I wasn’t planning on the extra power it just kinda happened. I ran an AIFTP test after my next ride, which was a group ride. It gave me a bump to 256, and dropped my PL in SS to 7.3.
I find it strange that even with the new FTP of 256, doing the same SS workout from 2 days prior as prescribed would have resulted in lower numbers than I had already done. Why would my levels in SS have dropped? Is AI not smart enough to figure out that 4 days prior I had literally completed a workout easily that now it was considering quite productive? I went on to have a quite successful Stromlo +3 followed up 2 days later with Redoubt +5 (9.2PL) doing that with a moderate response to the survey. I also was under the impression that if you complete a SS or Threshold workout about 9 that it would trigger a reassessment of your FTP, is that not the case anymore?
Sorry for the rambling post, I should wait until after coffee to use the interwebs.
you clearly failed the indoor workout where you cannot soft pedal. it doesnt matter if you “nail” outdoor workouts where you dont have to keep the power with ergmode. average power is not the same as keeping constant power on the pedal.
A SS level of over 7.6 when you can’t compete a 4.3 is a bit odd.
My assumption is that you have been doing SS workouts that are “too hard” - ie you can complete them - but they are more like threshold workouts than the expected SS.
There has been a few posts recently where people have been doing level 9 or 10 workouts and I don’t know what’s going on - these are not workouts that would have occurred in the legacy plans
Just because people can do them doesn’t mean they are the correct workout.
It sounds like you had an interesting mix of ups and downs with your training! It’s definitely odd how the same workout can feel harder one day and easier another, even with a slightly higher FTP. One possibility is that the system might not be fully accounting for your real-world effort and adaptation, especially if you’re pushing harder than prescribed. As for the reassessment trigger, I believe it still works that way, but sometimes the adjustments can be a bit delayed or not line up perfectly with every workout, especially if your training load or recovery is fluctuating. Keep an eye on how it feels overall, though—it could be that your body’s still adapting to the new FTP.
Nice work with your recent training – you’ve been nailing those higher-level SST workouts indeed!
When your FTP increases, your PLs will decrease by default, so that is normal/expected behavior that we’re seeing:
Progression Levels automatically adjust downwards after an FTP increase. This is because two factors affect the difficulty of a workout: your FTP and the Workout Level. If either of these factors increases, the scheduled workout gets harder and vice versa.
By reducing your Progression Levels (and in turn, upcoming Workout Levels) we can offset the sudden increase in workout difficulty traditionally associated with FTP increases. As a result, we can more accurately serve you the right workouts for your current capabilities, to keep your training on track and ramp up the difficulty of your workouts at a sustainable rate.
As for automatic reassessments of your FTP outside of normal AI FTP Detections, Sweet Spot workouts do not fall into that group of workouts:
If you pass a Level 9 Threshold, VO2max, or Anaerobic workout and you are not in the Specialty Phase, you will be prompted to use AI FTP Detection.
If you pass a Level 9 Threshold, VO2max, or Anaerobic workout and you are in the Specialty Phase, you will receive a suggestion to raise your FTP by 2%.
I also wanted to touch on this point:
Remember that higher numbers do not necessarily mean “better” when it comes to these workouts. Pushing higher wattages than prescribed often means you’re pushing your training into another zone – in this case, it’s possible that you’re pushing from Sweet Spot into Threshold, which isn’t the goal of these workouts. Especially at this point in the year, it’s often better to leave a little bit extra in the tank – save that power for the harder workouts and races that will come along later in the season.
Finally, I think it would be worth investigating your indoor setup – your outdoor workouts are looking bang-on, so it was a bit surprising to see that you had trouble with a Threshold 4.5 workout when you’re churning out these 9.X SST workouts. How powerful are the fans you have? Is it possible to train indoors with a window open? It just seems like there is a pretty large discrepancy between your indoor and outdoor sessions and there might be some improvements you could make to your trainer space to make that delta smaller.
Hope that helps clear things up – feel free to let me know if you have any additional questions and keep up the good work!
