Hey guys, just wondering if you test your FTP during the season or just in off season. I’m about to start my season at the end of the month and after doing planbuilder I noticed that I have them scheduled. I am planning to do 99% of my workouts outside during the season and I don’t really see a point of testing since I’m mainly looking to maintain winter gains. Obviously the planbuilder is designed to peak me for the A events and understandably testing would determent if I’m getting there but I trust it regardless. Just wondering what you guys do.
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Yep. Almost exactly 6 weeks from my last test, and I’m testing tonight. The last week of workouts has felt suspiciously easy. FTP tests, especially the ramp test, aren’t actually that taxing. They’re hard in the moment, yes, but you’re not losing days of workout ability. In fact, I’m not even doing anything special today. Normal sleep, normal food; I’m not trying to ‘peak’ for my test, just asses my realistic ability. It’s important that you keep the workouts in line with your ability.
Agree, I was planning to replace them with actual workout but I guess I can get on the trainer a little during the season 
You could even do the FTP test and then tack on like 45min of endurance after a short rest. Don’t stress too much though; you’re not losing 3 days because you decided to evaluate.
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If you don’t want your FTP to improve than you don’t need to keep testing. I certainly hope a lot of people that I’ll be racing adopt that attitude!
But, if you are going to be keeping up with structured training outside than you’ll want to throw the bike on the trainer now and again to bang out that FTP test so that you can ensure you are keeping your training targets on point.
I try to ride outside as much as possible myself. But, if I know it’s difficult to do a certian type of warmup outside I’ll come in even during nice months to get the workout in on the trainer.
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Good point. I will say I don’t think that not testing means no FTP improvement. Yes if you test your training zones will change slightly but I’d argue that there are more important things to go after while in season versus pure FTP which to me is a measurement of how well you built your base up. My question was just would you keep your structured training based on last ftp you did while indoor and just skip those tests because there isn’t outdoor variant of it, I’m also taking into an account that some people and me included have different ftp values outdoor vs indoor or at least that’s how it feels, for example same effort results in lower HR when done outside which means that I’m more efficient outdoors hence the FTP transfer might already be putting me in the wrong zone. What I usually do is look at more data vs just power so if I know that for xx power zone I’m usually in xx hr zone I can up the intensity outside if needed. I’ll definitely keep testing, that’s not an issue, but I’ll add extra work outside on those days since my bike handling needs to improve.
i like to use race data but also do a one hour and some 20m tests through the spring and summer; great training and great place to get data for FTP decisions.
I wrote this if it helps at all.
Cheers!
Brendan
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