Am I Training Too Much or is my FTP wrong?

do 5 x 30s at 115% FTP on wednesday to keep the legs alive, but just cruise the rest of the time.

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Most of my riding is group rides at the moment also, NP gets up there when you are pulling turns, bumps the TSS way up

I’m catching this thread nearly 18 months after it started! Your comments are on point. I only run a 3-day per week TR plan indoors, then ride outside 1-2 days. PLUS 2 days in weight room, often 1 yoga session. I’m 45 and holy hell, it’s a lot!

It’s dawned on me that 3 killer workouts, typically MWF or T-TH-S, is just too much interval training for the average human. I’m better off as you said CRUSHING Monday, tempo, a fun outdoor ride (which always includes coasting regardless of intensity), or at least backing my intensity by 10-20% on the scheduled Wednesday, then CRUSHING Friday. Less is more! And often I find myself being apprehensive on that middle workout for fear of bombing the 3rd.

At least for us middle aged guys :slight_smile:

And 800 TSS is WILD HUGE!

Wow, that’s a crazy amount of intensity. That would crush most masters.

It literally sounds like the perfect recipe for burnout, plateau city or regression.

Any updates?

can you share your TR career/profile link? if that’s ok!

Sure - I’ve made it public. Here it is: Career - TrainerRoad

So post this discussion and doing my head in trying to progress in every way possible, I gave up and decided I was probably maxed out in my ability and decided to get rid of all the numbers and just go with it. I swapped my Tuesday and Sat fast session with an indoor session from the LV plan which didn’t really change things much. So very recently I’ve scaled back the intensity to 1, maybe 2 days and I think I’ve made some improvements but have not tested my FTP and done a load of outdoor riding just because I have been on holidays and I’ve enjoyed riding with my friends. This week has been a little bit of a change where I had two intense sessions and today felt a little washed out. I’ve also been trying to take it easier on rest weeks for 4 days with zone 2 rides only.

I do planning on doing an outdoor FTP test inline with the testing protocol from the Time Crunched cyclist 2 x 9 minutes to ensure there is not a real disparity between indoor and outdoor FTPs. After that I do plan on going back to structured training but I will probably choose to do it outdoors rather than on the trainer. Yes I know…tut tut but the weather and being outside makes me happier than being on a trainer watching a screen. Given that I ride 10 - 12 hours in a regular week, and reading the time crunched cyclist advice I plan on taking a new approach - using a “classic endurance training approach”.
Please feel free to tell me how much of a buffoon I am based on what I’ve said and my career. I think that maybe I am an addict…:smiley:

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If it helps…

This is a generalization, as are all training recommendations. So, it may not be appropriate to you. However, based on what you’ve shared, I believe in order to improve, you simply have to take control of your own throttle, a majority of the time.

Continually smashing groups rides is ‘generally’ a bad idea. Occasionally, they are a fantastic idea. At your age, I would recommend just 2 intense days per week. Everything else, Z2 or a bit of tempo. Give yourself some time to adapt to this general lower intensity.

The structure is dead easy, when you’re not doing your group ride or intense training day. Just ride endurance. Sprinkle in a bit of tempo. Simple.

Try just doing one group ride a week and one structured interval day working your limiters, or whatever is appropriate for your goals.

So, just two days intensity per week.

Options
2 Structured interval days
1 Interval day, 1 group ride (my recommendation)
2 Group rides (most fun)
2 Structured interval days (worst option for happiness)

Ponder engaging this very simple protocol.

I call it, Hybrid Polarized.

It’s polarized by days, not zone distribution. The zone distribution is usually pyramidal, which is probably the ideal ratio for most cyclists. I’ve personally had great success with this incredibly simple protocol.

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In my humble opinion, I think its hard to say. You are riding a lot. But, the training and riding are too different things. When I ride over the summer, my FTP goes down by 20 watts or so. I build it back with almost exclusively training on TR in the winter and spring. I ride unstructured in the summer. My TSS is much much higher in the summer. But, I don’t equate this to training.