I’ve considered this as well. However for the last few months that I’ve been extremely diligent in my tracking I’ve used the same metrics to guide caloric needs and my weight has been rock steady. This leads me to believe that intake and output are pretty spot on. My wife refuses to allow a scale in the house 
so my weights are garnered on work days and never with consistent timing or fluid status so it’s a tough variable for me to lean on currently.
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Yeah, I think the first decrease is irrelevant because he said he entered his FTP manually rather than testing on TR from the beginning. It could be that his FTP would have been lower than 299 via the TR test and therefore 299 could have been an increase.
I would really take a short step ramp test with a grain of salt. The difference of your estimated ftp being 290 vs 299 is finishing at 386 avg vs 398 (above number divided by 0.75). That’s like gritting your teeth for another few seconds or so. I don’t think it’s indicative of you actually becoming less aerobic fit but more likely just having a bad day. That’s a 3% decrease in estimated ftp (ie basically no change at all). You probably have meaningful changes along other points of the power curve so I wouldn’t worry about it.
How is your racing going? Are you better than before your training block? That’s what really matters. Seems like you lost some weight too which is a good thing for your health and longevity. Lol older you might be glad you gave up 3% ftp to improve health if you actually did shed a bit of fitness/muscle through your dietary change
Starting to think you’re probably right. No doubt that rest recovery is an influencer. When looking back at these FTP tests you always wonder how much more was in the tank. I was never falling off the bike not able to turn the pedals another stroke so in these scenarios I do believe getting the most out of an FTP test is also a mental war as much if not more than physical. My AT adaptations think I’m improving my fitness so I reckon I’ll just ignore the FTP tests for now and just keep grinding.
Can anyone recommend the direction I should go when the race season finishes in a month? Base build or short power build? Only crit racing is on next years calendar.
How did you test your FTP in trainerroad vs. the 20 minute zwift test? Did you do the ramp test?
Are there any organized events you’re interested in in the fall? I just finished my crit season for the most part, and am now training to do some fondos and things with climbs and what not. Used Plan Builder to give me a progression to work from. Once that’s done, I’ll stay off the bike for a while before working out a plan for 2022 based on target Crit dates, which probably means I won’t start base training in full until late December or early January.