I think this is a great point. There are days that I am willing to hurt. And it is no fun at all. Then there are days I don’t. I tend to have the opposite issue. My FTP is most likely a bit higher than I test. I say this cause I find many of the workouts a bit too easy and tend to bump them up by as much as 7-10% sometimes depending on the type of workout.
Right. We probably agree. It seemed like you were making it the main reason this fellow won’t get to 4 watts/kg.
No it doesn’t require pain or suffering.
It just makes me sad that people do or choose to view the experiences of such a wonderful sport in terms of pain and suffering (words with negative associations) as opposed to framing the experiences / sensations in terms that have neutral or positive associations.
Reframing what I experiences and sensations when cycling has made difficult workouts easier to tolerate, easier to motivate myself for, and I never dread or worry about workouts. That last minute of the last vo2max interval doesn’t have to be pain or suffering. It can be what going fast feels like, or what dropping people feels like, or plenty of other positive things that we try not to avoid (like pain or suffering.)
I’m out. Sports psychology is an under-rated topic around here I guess…
We have a winner.
I was thinking about what you wrote and I don’t know if “pain” is the right word.
I’ve had three back surgeries from herniated discs. I have been lying on my bathroom floor in agony after having my first surgery and being unable to move.
That was true suffering.
What makes the bike feel like suffering, to me, is knowing you can stop at any time and ease “whateveritis” that is screaming at you to stop, but keeping going.
You say:
I agree on ramp tests.
What about threshold efforts? 15 minutes into your final 20 minute interval? Whatever you call that, if your FTP is set correctly, is what I am talking about. When your body is screaming at you to stop, your heart rate is pegged, your legs are getting heavier and heavier. Whats that called?
Or the last climb of a race, and you are trying to stay with the lead pack, and they are almost dropping you and its everything you can do?
Some people call it suffering, call it whatever. Its that mindset of pushing yourself.
Not trying to get hung up on semantics here because we all mean the same thing. The word “challenge” motivates some people, “suffering” motivates others. Doesn’t mean they look at cycling negatively. You are putting your own views into someone else’s mind. (not you specifically!)
Its this ability, this toughness, to deal with this **** that separates the winners from the also rans, in my opinion.
You are ignoring the fact that people are driven by different motivations. Some people may be motivated by suffering.
They may even like it.
If you want to call it something else, then do it.
I think figuring which forms of pain/suffering/impossibility you are better at pushing through can be really useful for finding the ideal training regimen. If you’re able to progressively increase the length of time at particular wattage in a zone, if you’re better at increasing wattage at a given time interval, do that instead. Focus on progressing in the zone that you’re the best at pushing yourself in and you’ll probably break through in places that you’re worse at pushing yourself in.
sounds like a fun hobby.
We all handle our perceptions differently. I dont call it suffering. It is just another moderate workout if I succeed. I definitely dont have as fine a distinction in effort as TR. It is easy, moderate and too hard/fail.
Like you with your back issues, I have a chronic illness and view pain differently. Years of pain likely has me with a different threshhold. I stop if there is a hint of pain. Riding a bike isnt painful. Too often I break a body part pushing through pain. It could be old bodies just fall apart
Sounds nice and all, maybe sufferfest should change it to euphoriafest. And paincave should be happiness cave.
Sorry if it came out snarky.
We’re arguing semantics. Maybe you get a sense of euphoria. I do, when I made it through the interval.
Cycling is so hard, the suffering is so intense, that it’s absolutely cleansing. The pain is so deep and strong that a curtain descends over your brain….Once; someone asked me what pleasure I took in riding for so long. ‘PLEASURE??? I said.’ ‘I don’t understand the question.’ I didn’t do it for the pleasure; I did it for the pain.”
― Lance Armstrong
“His pace looked so effortless that one Spanish journalist asked Pogacar if he had been grinning so much because of the pleasure he was taking in crushing his rivals. But Pogacar tartly answered that he always has that expression on his face when he is in pain.”
"Cyclists live with pain. If you can’t handle it you will win nothing” ~ Eddy Merckx
These guys have some experience with suffering.
But what do they know about sports psychology?
I’d rephrase that to “comfortable with being uncomfortable” I don’t like the terms pain and suffering when it comes to training. yes, it hurts a bit when doing it when you stop it goes away.
It is something we have to learn to do. It’s a big part of my coaching for kids and youth.
If you tell yourself it’s going to be painful subconsciously you will pull back. but being uncomfortable means it will end it will not be that bad and you can get through it.
Just my take anyway
Back in my college days I remember training sessions so hard, when it came time to cool down, I jogged around the stadium, curled up in a ball for 5-10 min before trying to jog a fast walk. Workouts were brutal. On a full ride it was expected. But looking back I can’t help but feel I left a ton in practice. Some of my best efforts were in practice. In fact I ran a PR 8:52 for 3200 in practice. Then did some 400s after. Felt great. Then come race day only ran 8:48 and felt like a much harder effort. I guess my point is that you need to “suffer” in practice, no way around it, but too much suffering will lead to burnout, fatigue and possibly injured. For every time you go to the well you need to recover just as intense.
I was a walking zombie in season. Always tired but performed well somehow. I was told that’s the life of a distance runner. I wonder now though if there was a way to get the volume, the threshold, the intensity without being trashed all the time.
Now in my mid-40s I have transitioned to MTB and love it. Love the training, the racing, the “suffering.” But I have no desire to go back to that level of soul crushing fatigue. Looking back I raced practice. Wish I would have focused more on recovery and race the race.
Making light of pain and suffering is sports psychology. It’s ok.
Lots of great advice here. I commiserate with you in terms of expectations.
I’ve sort of given up on increasing FTP and moved to enjoying my time on the bike and maintaining/improving fitness/maintaining muscle mass. At 58 I realize that maintaining optimum weight and muscle mass makes sense for medium and long term.
With real acknowledgment of body dimorphism in this community - perhaps change in body comp would help you in terms of fitness and help toward your goal.
Ultimately at my age I had to accept that the power for my 20 yo self at 70 kg and 13% BF would be very different than my 58yo self at 81 kg and 18% BF.
Good luck on the journey and happy riding !
Listen to wind warrior . OP had a nice initial bump. Wind warrior lays out a strategy for more sustained growth.
Its a fair take, and shows the diversity of people.
Simply the fact that someone labels it as “suffering” or “painful” doesn’t mean that I don’t enjoy the challenge of it.
During a race, for instance, I am all business. Am I having fun while gravel racing? I wouldn’t necessarily say its “fun”. not all the time. Some times it is, but its also a few hours running at almost max. My fun comes from watching my improvements, knowing I gave my all, etc. At races I see people that just go there to have fun and enjoy the atmosphere. Great for them, but that isn’t me! I have fun rides to do that. A race means 100%, to me. Even if 100% means last place.
We are all driven by different things. I am just saying that we all look at things in different ways and what motivates someone might not motivate someone else and vice versa.
Back to the OP’s original “am I wasting my time”, I concur with some of the other posts…
- you might never hit 4w/kg. If you desperately want 4w/kg then you might have to look in the mirror and decide if you’re as lean as you really can be. Because weight loss will bump the w/kg faster than training all winter for perhaps 10 or 20watts
- you shouldn’t have to be knocking down the percentage on sessions. I have a friend who constantly tells me his FTP is X, yet when I ask him if he can do even 10mins at that power he can’t. Clearly not even close to his true 1hour or sustained power! You should be able to do around an hour, regardless of the rabbit hole argument of what FTP is, if you’re doing say 2x20min or 5x10min then FTP needs to be set right. These efforts should feel like the effort is gradually escalating, not on the rivet from the start and clinging on till the end.
- training consistently to the right numbers is how to improve. Sometimes training a little easier, coercing the body to improve rather than smashing it every session will nudge it along.
- choosing another training regime or software system etc won’t get you to 4w/kg any quicker or more certainly if you don’t train in the right manner
If you really want that 4w/kg (or perhaps a goal more relating to continuous improvement) then engaging a coach would help, as there are lots of views on this forum and it’s not easy to know which advice to take, how to implement it and have confidence in what you are doing when you maybe don’t see immediate results. A coach will set you on a structured path with sessions that will work together and have a good awareness of how hard to train and what numbers to use regardless of what some ultimately flawed ego stroking software estimate might say. (And thats no criticism of any of TR or any of these systems, but it helps to have an awareness when the number it gives isn’t right). And no a coach won’t be cheap, but at what cost that 4w/kg 
I am similar 4 year and no watts change give 2 or 3 watts. At least I haven’t got worse and my endurance feels better, poor 52 year old physiology. Probably my last year on TR, time for a change.
Looking at my FTP history since joining TR my FTP (AI FTP detected) is only 1.8% higher in just over 2 years, but I am happy to have maintained and besides my cycling has improved in other ways to one metric
Others have suggested that these workouts are potentially too challenging for you, or carrying fatigue or based on progressions from outside workouts that you didn’t quite nail in compliance. In addition, be aware that significant drops in intensity may change the energy system target which may undermine the purpose and therefore adaptation while still carrying fatigue onward. For me, backpedals were a recent revelation mentioned in a few AACC podcasts (I’m still catching up the backlog) that mean I can achieve more time in zone than i used to - previously once I started failing, ERG would bog down and I’d quickly fail. Now, I’ll consider a short bail-out and TR is very good at controlling the ERG to allow me back into the interval without “spiking” the power. Definitely a plus over other training systems.
My broader point, have a look at the following blog post on bailouts, that suggests a hierarchy to adapt when particular types of workout on a particular day are too hard.
[https://support.trainerroad.com/hc/en-us/articles/201954934-Workout-Bailouts]
I understood that AT takes into account interval compliance and would therefore mark-down a intensity reduction. I don’t know if that is also true of back-pedals - quite possibly as it always reduces the overall interval power due to the ramp-down and ramp-up around the backpedal.
@IvyAudrain, what can I say? A superstar.
I agree that the jump from LV to MV looks pretty daunting. I know that’s it’s been discussed lots in the forum and on the AACC podcast. And pretty much what @mwglow15 has said. Let me expand my sugested progression.
LV (3 efforts).
LV + TrainNow endurance.
LV + 2 additional TrainNow endurance.
LV + TrainNow endurance + unstructured/group ride >endurance.
OR perhaps MV (4 efforts + 1 endurance)
HV
MV + unstructured/group ride >endurance. This being similar to HV with one endurnace swapped out.
HV + Zwift race + unstructured/group ride >endurance + run(s) + swim(s) + new baby + new job + keto diet.
You know where you’re aiming.
Excellent constructive feedback from the forum. Well done @Murdoc for being so open to suggestions and responding to the criticism and suggestions openly and with good intent