To be honest, I think this is trickier than a lot of people make it out to be. It takes some time to learn where your limits are. It takes time.
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Except for winning races digging deep isn’t really necessary in endurance training in fact digging deep might even be detrimental because of the additional fatigue it causes without much additional training effects
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There are also limits to digging deep. If you are an average middle aged cyclist, no amount of digging deep is going to keep you with the A group where you are outgunned by 100 watts on FTP.
Digging deep can also be to one’s detriment - like hanging with the front group on a 5 hour gravel fondo until you blow up and then having a really crappy last 4 hours on the bike.
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Focusing on where you’re going not on how many seconds are left helps too. “I can make it to the next lamp post”, or in zwift whatever you’re seeing ahead. Some pro on youtube suggested this.
I’ve never pushed myself harder than in a finish line sprint against a well matched rider. I don’t push quite that hard for an ftp. (Should I?)
And practicing those harder efforts, hills, races, intervals, etc., helps me get experience on just how hard I can go.
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There are a few tricks, but before you apply them, it helped me to distinguish when I am physically tired (i. e. my muscles are struggling to produce power) or I am mentally tired/weak (“I don’t want to do another 10 minutes of this!”). It is not a good idea to push past your physical limits on a regular basis, because you will usually have to pay a price for that.
So let’s assume you are mentally tired. Signs of this are with me:
- I start a new interval and think “Oh, I really don’t want to do 4 more of these.”
- My RPE is high, but e. g. heart rate recovery during rest intervals is good.
- I am distracted and am thinking about something else.
Here are a few things that help me:
- I fuel my workouts religiously. For hard intervals I take in 110 g/hour.
- I focus on the interval ahead, “I can do this one!” Before the next interval starts, I check that my body is alright and conclude “Yup, my body is fine, I guess I can do another one.”
- I break down long intervals into many shorter ones. E. g. I vary my cadence by shifting gears every 1–2 minutes. Sometimes I alternate cadences, sometimes I do a progression from 100+ rpm down to 70ish rpm. I would also stand up for 20–30 seconds (at even lower cadences). I try to focus on the cadence I like best and “am looking forward to that”.
- For over/unders I pretend that sweet spot = recovery. I know it sounds stupid, but it works for me.
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Yay! I was hoping someone would bring balance to the thread.
OP, if you’ve been prescribed 7 × 3 minutes all-out VO2 Max intervals and you’re pretty much absolutely done at the end of interval 6, and you have another similar workout in 2 or 3 days’ time … you should probably shut it down. The SFR for that last interval isn’t great.
If it’s the last workout of the block … empty the tank.
Context is important.
If you’re bailing after 10 minutes of a 15-minute FTP interval, and you’ve got evidence that a 15-minute interval should be accomplishable for you at current levels of fatigue, you may benefit from some of the techniques and advice given above.
I’m intrigued: what conversations have you had with your coach about this?
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After such tests, and you’ve had time to recover a little (2 mins is enough), almost everyone thinks, maybe they could have done more. Most likely couldn’t, or at least not enough to matter.
Fitness is not won by killer workouts or tests where you dug deep. It’s won by consistent day in, day out, completing your workouts, and recovering ready for the next bout of work.
Don’t think you have to bury yourself in training. It’s usually detrimental.
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Split your approach into two paths, mental and physical.
The base line here is we’ve all been where the OP is and building coping strategies and resilience is key.
So I’ll replay my approach.
Oh this is hurting, I glance at the time left, @#@@%! I try and slow my breathing down, big deep breaths, inhale, hold and slowly exhale, repeat. I focus on smooth and consistent cadence which takes care of the power target. I consciously relax my upper body, starting with my head, neck, shoulders and wiggle my fingers in the bars.
This all helps the interval to be completed. As for the mental approach, once the benefits of deep breathing kick in I recognise that the discomfort isn’t that bad. Once I start to feel fatigued again the relaxation comes in. This provides an opportunity to last longer. The key ingredient for me is to learn to suffer more which is a skill that takes time and suffering to build.
I use past failures to fuel my mental approach, it helps me push through. Getting dropped on a group ride, two key moments from this summer help me with that aspect. Not completing a workout really stings me and that in itself fuels my stubbornness to eat the pain for as long as possible .
Lastly good tunes are also your friend here but digging really deep is when I don’t notice the music as everything is hurting, it depends on if its my lungs wanting to burst or my muscles screaming at me. That’s another positive as it’s an indicator as to an area of fitness which requires focus.
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I have stopped a lot of ramp tests at 20:03 or so (i. e. I stopped pedaling when the clock hit 20 minutes), I think there is something to the claim you could have held on for a few more seconds. I reckon I could have held on 10–20 more seconds several times.
But you are right in that the difference is literally just a few watts, so it doesn’t skew the results too much.
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My playlist often serves me up with Britney Spears’ wise words “Work bitch!” at just the right time 
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+1
I actually learned this one from Coach Chad’s comments in the old SS Base plans. I even use it when I’m just bored with long intervals and need a mental break. “Count to 15 revolutions of push/pull in each quadrant”.
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Effect of swearing on physical performance: a mini-review
I think cursing is just one example, but hyping yourself up in any way definitely helps!
I think this is why they made everyone sit in the starting blocks for so long during the 100m final in Paris this year. I’m assuming that they thought Noah Lyles was gaining an advantage by getting so pumped up before the race. 
It turns out that they were wrong, but maybe somewhat right… 
He still won, but not by the margin that many thought he would. It would be cool to see what would have happened if they let them go in a timely fashion like they normally do…
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Whatever works for you is fair game!
I count minutes and fractions (2/7th done, 3/7th done, …). Counting definitely has helped me.
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In terms of a basic mental approach, work on developing a mental attitude that you are always going to go a little bit longer or a little harder before you quit. When the going gets tough, don’t think about the whole workout, the whole set, or when it really hurts even the rest of the interval you are in. Just always go a little longer than you want to or think you can. Its not about not quitting. Everyone quits eventually. Its a about quitting later.
Also, you need to come to grips with quitting and not let it ruin a whole workout. If you blow up on an interval, don’t bag the the rest of the workout but rest up a bit and get back at it.
Training with others works great for this. Actual head to head competion is the best way to learn to push harder and having training partners adds this element to the 95%+ of time that is spent training vs actual competitions.
Almost all professional and high end amateur athletes spend time training with others and it frequently gets very competitive. But good group training is hard to replicate for average adults. The easiest access to group training for adults are hard cycling group rides. Fighting not to get dropped will toughen you up quick!
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I know I don’t get paid to do this, so step 1 is have fun. It doesn’t really matter if I can push another 2 min on a threshold interval when it comes down to it. It may be beneficial to leave some for the next interval session too. Like people have said, if you want to bury yourself, do it in a race.
That said, of course you feel like you can do more after a 2 minute break. That’s why 2x30 is easier than 1 x 60.
I’m personally really turned off by how toxic people like Goggins and their message is. But I feel fulfilled by properly training and feeling like a superhero at the end of a build, not feeling awful and pushing through it to carry the boat or whatever.
This is a good book.
https://g.co/kgs/BzZT2LH
Practice on knowing your limits. Also, you don’t really need to dig all the way for training, but it’s good to know how to dig deep for racing.
I have a buddy who I can never beat even though his watts/kg isn’t very different from mine: he could just go longer. One day, during a ride, I mentioned the line beyond which I would not go: I backed off when my temples started to explode. “Exploding temples?” scoffed he. “That’s nothing. There are still two more stages after that.” That’s when I realized why I could never beat him, and I’m actually at peace with that.
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For me, it’s really helped to have a baseline of what a true maximal effort feels like. Best way to get this is through a short race, or even better a short race where you completely blow up.
I used to swim, and have done a handful of miles in races. There is nothing athletically that I have felt that compares to the pure suffer fest that is a race pace mile in the pool. It was around 15 minutes of pure agony.
Knowing what that max effort feels like gives you a great comparison for intervals. Whenever I’m starting to go deep and feeling the pain I can say “yeah this sucks, but it doesn’t compare to the Mile.”
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I would bet that 90% plus of people that are listening to Goggin’s message aren’t listening and pushing them to the unhealthy limits that he or many others do. For most people, it’s using his message to get out of bed and go for a run when it’s cold. It’s doing the 4 sets of squats that you know you should do, but hate to do, instead of just quitting at 3 sets.
Of course, some people could (foolishly) take his message to think that when they have a serious injury or sickness they should continue to push through when they should actually rest. Yes, Goggins does often do this personally, and some could interpret that he pushes it, but if people can’t make their own decisions to understand the difference between quitting because they lack mental fortitude and taking it off due to an injury, that’s on them.
One of my favorite Goggins clips. I’d imagine most here have woken up super early when it’s freezing cold and pushed themselves to get outside an exercise even when they don’t really want to.
When people ask me if I like running or biking, I often will mention that I actually hate it, despite how much I do it. And to clarify, I hate getting up early, I sometimes hate (and love) the level of exhaustion I get to. But, I love how I feel the rest of the day after I work out. I love how accomplished I feel knowing I completed my full workout, even though I probably didn’t want to beforehand. I also really enjoy racing, but until recently I have done very little of it. Making that change moving forward.
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As others have said, it’s very common to feel like you could have done more a few minutes after an effort, once you’ve recovered. With the ramp test, we’re probably talking about the difference of one more step of 20 watts which equates to 15 watts of FTP, if you really want, bump up your FTP a bit like 5-7 watts and do the workouts, the precision isn’t so razor sharp that it’s going to be the deal breaker or not