Okay, so in as much as you can’t “fail” and FTP test…
I’m coming into the important bit of my season. It was set to be the important bit ages ago, but now it’s the only bit.
Mostly completed my last block with precision, some of the longer VO2 intervals (Dade etc) had a bit too much backpedalling for my liking, but everything else was fine.
I rested up and then did a 100km ride on Saturday with some hard climbing and a few power PBs (not clever and not something I usually do, but fun). Monday night I did a ramp test and just didn’t have it in me to suffer like normal. FTP drop from 298 a month ago to 278.
I then did it again the next morning and got a bump up to 282, which i followed up with Lafayette -1 in the evening.
I came through that with plenty to spare, so are we putting that “bad” test down to fatigue?
My response to ensure good quality training has been to manually bump up my FTP a touch and see how I get on? Is this sensible?
FTP tests are a funny thing huh? I bet if you tested 10w higher you wouldn’t have questioned whether it was representative and would’ve run with that new number
If you think the test didn’t give you an accurate representation of your fitness then just manually adjust your ftp and see how you go for the next few workouts. There is ALOT of information about doing this on this forum so try a search to see what other people have done.
It could be that you struggle with V02 (you mentioned some backpedalling and the ramp test does call on your v02 capabilities a bit) so be careful bumping your FTP up too much. Or if you do, consider reducing the intensity when you’re doing V02 workouts
Yeah, I’m on a gravity plan and I think the volume of VO2 work is just a bit too much for me to recover from properly at the moment (two young children, 1 and 3).
My last test before that 298w was 297w, and as I mentioned, I haven’t been quite as consistent. I guess just dialling back those longer VO2max intervals is the way to go. I’m targeting UK hill climbs so I’ll only ever have to do one once!
I’m putting my big fluctuations in ramp test results down to ERG. I get the impression Elite haven’t got it right with ERG. It seems kick in hard at the start of sessions before you’ve had a chance to warm up. I think it put my knee out of sync lately, particularly on my last ramp test which recorded just 232w. My previous tests in June and July were 265w and 256w IIRC and whilst I expected to be down I didn’t expect so much.
My next training session coach Chad said to turn ERG and treat the 4x10min (with 2 min recoveries) as a gauge of how accurate the FTP is. My NP for the 46mins was 246w and .95x20=249w. The latter seems more feasible to me my next ramp test I am going to try with the ERG switched off also. If I still can’t get it right I’m going back to 20min tests without ERG. My last one (30 April) was 296w for 20mins = 281w FTP.
