Been pretty much not training for 4 weeks due to illness Covid etc…first 2 weeks nothing at all and last couple weeks easy short Dans, Lazy mountain 1.0, Pettit. I am 62 years old. Heart rate still slightly elevated…but feeling pretty good. I don’t want to overdue it so I’m thinking of dropping my FTP 10% and starting a SS Base and maybe increasing the FTP back up 2%. each week or so as it moves along. What does everyone think of that strategy….any input is appreciated. Thanks
For kicks and grins, I’d suggest running the TR AI FTP Detection just to have another data point.
Did that before the easy rides, it dropped 1 watt…not really much of and adjustment and i know doing even a suggested train now ride would really be pushing it. Rather slowly ramp up.
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Good deal. Then manual adjustment based upon best guess makes sense.
Think 10% first week is reasonable?
Use RPE- that’s what I did this time I got sick this year. After 2-3 weeeks off, and then endurance only I did a month of sweet spot but all based off 6/10 RPE. First few times it was 240 and by the end of the block it was 260 - about 10W lower than it was pre illness. But allowed me to ramp at the rate my body was ready.
I only recommend using RPE if you’ve done structure in the past and “know” what SST “feels” like
Could be, but be open and willing to adjust.
Purely for reference, but I drop my FTP manually 7% after I donate whole blood, since it is something I have watched and seen over time. I’d say 10% seems like a safe drop for illness and time, but be willing to drop more if you do a workout of known relative difficulty and it feels worse.
Use Workout Intensity adjustment in the workout if needed and take any adjustment there into account and consider if a regular FTP change would make sense based on that.
I started doing intervals with heart rate, before buying a power meter. After 2 or 4 weeks off, I simply do endurance by HR, and some short tempo intervals with a HR cap. And toss in some 5-10 second sprints.
It takes a week or two for your blood to carry more oxygen and related endurance adaptations. During that time your FTP can increase quite a bit. The last time I took 4 weeks off, my estimate for ftp dropped to 200W (going by power-to-HR). Within 2 weeks it jumped up to something like 230W. This situation is the perfect reason to use HR (or RPE) instead of stressing about FTP changes.
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I triggered mine 4 weeks after COVID and it returned 3 watts higher than what I ramp tested, so fairly accurate IME.
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