So I’m seeing similar behavior as some others have posted regarding FTP dropping using ramp test after SSB1 (basically if your not doing VO2 work then your fitness doesn’t fit the zone the ramp test looks at) I’ve been doing wattage based structured training for a few years so I’ve personally already worked through those early big gains we all see when we first start doing structured wattage based training workouts for the first year or so. Is it me or is this thread concluding the ramp test is a good for athletes that are new to structured wattage training?
The consensus seems to be (assuming you have been doing wattage based training for at least a year or so) that you want to use the 20 minute test at the end of SSB1, the 8 minute test at the end of SSB2, the ramp test at the end of Build, and I suppose it doesn’t matter what you test at the conclusion of speciality since you have whatever fitness and ftp you are going to have for your A race. For the moment I’m assuming that ideally we are following the following plan order: ssb1, ssb2, build, speciality, A race. Certainly if we put in 7 months of work during training plans we would like to know where we end up at the conclusion of the entire training plans but from a pure performance perspective I suppose it doesn’t really matter. It is whatever it is.
It seems to me that the goal at the beginning of each training plan is to complete the workouts with as much adaptation as possible. To that end we want the ftp to be high enough that we eek out every possible training adaptation while not being so high that we crack and can’t complete workouts.
My instinct tells me the ramp test was probably created to create a very simple, easy to understand, and easy to execute test for athletes/riders new to wattage based structured workouts but may not be as useful for athletes that have been working in the ftp world for awhile and have to manage functional power year-over-year rather than just entering the realm.