Today I was prescribed Frissell -2 which is 4x9-minute intervals at 95% FTP with 3-minute recoveries at 50% FTP. I was feeling pretty fatigued today due to to bad sleep and increased stress and legs not great but I still wanted to try my best at the workout. I was able to get through the workout with a few times of getting out of the saddle for 30 seconds during the 9 minute intervals.
Does getting out of the saddle to pedal during a threshold interval still produce the proper training stimulus or does it kind of ruin the intent of the workout?
In my post ride survey I rated the workout as Very Hard due to having to pedal out of the saddle to get through the intervals.
For what it’s worth, my out-of-saddle FTP is about 20W higher than my in-saddle FTP, both indoors and outdoors. Power data on max efforts confirms this across all threshold-ish durations (30min through 70min). That said, I think I’m unusual in this regard. On steep climbs, I’m relatively stronger!
I’ve never ridden a hill both steep enough and long enough that it makes sense to stand the entire time, but I’ve ridden several in the 45-55min range (I’m lucky to live near some large-ish mountains). Indoors, I’ve done 70min. Here’s an example of an outdoor, ~14km 8% average climb. The only times I sat down were for the occasional 2-5% portions.
