Sorta, it’s a 9 point difference between the low and high end though, and none of my ftp tests results prior have changed things by more than 3-5 points at a time.
Do other people see more substantial gains when doing ramp tests between training blocks? My understanding is that it would always be marginal gains (hopefully).
Depends on the OU session…
I had the same thing, as even though my PLs decreased, the workouts didn’t decrease as they should have. I had to manually adjust them so they were “productive” instead of “stretch”. Seems to be a very common glitch right now.
Due to work I delayed doing Goddard until this morning. I refreshed my calendar this morning and AT offered a change from Goddard-4 to Needham. I didn’t accept it.
Then had an equipment issue when doing Goddard - the battery on the power meter started to fail so the first threshold interval was more like a 3 minute VO2max interval, had to pause and when I restarted the effort was way less. Interestingly my PLs have now shifted down from the screen shots above.
I also got this but yesterday my Sweet Spot PL was 3.9:
Same experience. I used FTPd and it gave me 313 (0.6%) up from 311. It seemed too low based on how workouts felt and I had been seeing a consistent 2% increase each ramp test. So I performed a ramp test and got 320 (2.3%). Ramp tests have worked well to anchor my training for years, so I went with 320.
Now in week 6 of SustainedPBHV workouts since then have felt spot on. I’d recommend trusting your experience and go with what you believe to be the most accurate. And yes, 9w is significant if I’m doing anything over SS.
You’re pretty experienced with understanding training - can you expand what you mean by “spot on”? You mean intensity wise, or the types of workouts you would prefer as well?
The way AT works, you should almost always get workouts at the right intensity. But there certainly is a decent amount of variability on how that intensity is distributed for a given FTP setting based on the PL. So you would have had higher PL with the lower FTP setting from the FTPD. In both cases workouts should be spot on in the intensity. The open question is on if the difference in stimulus due to distribution of intensity is significant - and your thoughts would be useful.
Pre-AT, FTP input was a hard anchor for training. Now it is a soft anchor and much more nuanced on what changing it means.
TR will argue that they are seeking optimal distribution of intensity through FTPD + AT.
I’m currently in the probably doesn’t matter enough to worry for most camp. But definitely watching with interest.
Yes you are right in theory and it’s definitely more difficult now to determine if it’s an appropriate FTP and how to measure fitness improvements. As FTP goes up PLs go down so workouts are no longer a good gage of relative fitness as they have been in the past. There’s more responsibility of knowing oneself when comparing fitness over time and certainly year over year. I guess if you can’t do the new lower suggested AT workouts then your FTP is likely off.
However in my situation following the FTPd and Ramp Test results I had Stretch workouts that put back to the same PLs prior to the FTP increase. So workouts felt “spot on” with a 8w (2.3%) increase at the same PLs.
Very useful info, thanks for the follow up.
So I have been avoiding FTP tests for a bit, since I had a move from Italy back to the US, and some life changes etc. Then I started another block of training and have been crushing it pretty hard.
FTP Detection said I was at 303 from 295. So I accepted. Then it hit me with Septeret.(Log In to TrainerRoad)
I was able to pass it… it hurt, but these are supposed to hurt. I’d say the detection is pretty spot on, if I could complete this workout. Agreed?
All in all, I am pretty happy with AT. I think i was falling in the trap of not recovering enough, fueling enough, and pushing too hard on easy days and was stagnant. I started listening to the plan, and changing fueling strategies, and my FTP is climbing again. On top of that, I’m losing weight and almost 4.2 Watts/kg!
I moved your post under the main TR one, to keep the similar feedback grouped, per TR preference.
A couple more workouts after a +12W TR recommended FTP led to the first SS workout (Truchas-2) which was a death march even at “Achievable.”
Background - the detection suggested “FTP” was 245->257W; I was skeptical but tried it for science. SS PL dropped from 8.9 to 7.1 after the change. But the first workout in SSB2 LV was not even “Productive” - it was an “Achievable” level at 5.4. Even this looked a bit hard for SS compared to my prior efforts - I had my doubts, but tried it, and it was definitely still way too much to call it SS. Barely got through it - felt like 2x20 min FTP intervals, which is pretty much what it was in feel and HR. No obvious excuses for sleep/nutrition I can blame.
Essentially this elaborate FTP detection approach, being calibrated to a ramp test, still seems to have the exact same shortcomings of the ramp test of leading to an inflated training FTP that does not at all facilitate longer SS/threshold work if you have decent anaerobic capacity, which seems to bias it.
And yes, AT has adjusted down to 4.0 after I called it “all out” - now I’m looking at even shorter SS intervals at same power I was doing longer intervals before.
Call me increasingly skeptical - I will give it another few workouts for variety, but I’m not seeing how this is better than the approach of Kolie Moore-like testing / long demonstrated power / working towards high PLs at a real FTP that I was becoming a fan of.
Today’s workout brought back the feelings of my unpleasant early years on TR getting too high ramp test FTPs, blowing up on plans by build, and eventually just giving up and going outside to do group rides and chase strava segments instead. My tone may reflect those feelings after lots of successful training prior to screwing with this 
I think you’re looking at it incorrectly. You’re at the very high end of SS difficulty. Of course it’s going to be challenging
A 2x20 SS with a short recovery in each 20 min block shouldn’t be that hard… It’s only rated a 5.4.
Vs say the level 7-9 I was doing before, when I was using a lower true FTP value.
Next one with the detected “FTP” I drop to a 4.0 PL with 3x12mins at lower watts… So way easier again.
As to which strategy is better I guess the jury can still debate, but the detected ftp + AT definitely drags things to a very different place.
I reread your post and obviously I’m looking at it incorrectly myself. But honestly, I can’t see how you were at an 8.9 level at but could barely complete a 5 something with a 12 point bump. For me 8.9 is like 3x30 at 90% which is pretty tough.
It’s a sharp and unfortunately resistant line for me that I wish I could crack through. But I did go back and look at SS workouts that were successful and they were all ~10W lower. +12W is just too much, although I figured why not try as I’d like to believe it!
Some of the 1 hr truchas variants with hard starts and nearly no rests hit those higher PLs, but I had been successful with some longer ones as well at my real ftp.
Maybe training with too high a ftp on shorter threshold workouts that are probably really vo2max efforts will help… It’ll be different stimulus of nothing else.
There are sweet spot workouts in the workout Library that go as low as 88% and as high as 95%. 88% of 257 = 226, 95% of 245 = 233 so even with that 4.9% bump in ftp there should be easier sweet spot workouts available than you were doing with your old ftp
Suggested ftp was 257 which was 6.6% increase so decided to test anyway to see how close it is and tested at 256 so I don’t know that I will ever test again now
Yep, as noted, there are plenty of easy SS workouts - next up AT pushed me to a 3x12 at lower watts. But there is quite a school of thought that if you can’t do a 2x20, you’re probably not at SS, and FTP is too high.
Essentially, accepting the detected “FTP” results in going from things like completing 1 hr workouts that spend 45-50 mins at SS or things like 3x20s, down to doing 3x12 mins, with reduced watts. Hard to see that being beneficial.
I’m more open to the idea that pushing harder on the threshold / VO2max work may be beneficial - even if those are also cut back significantly on duration, but the impact on SS seems to be not so great.
Everyone’s results will vary, but the request from TR was to hear where it’s also not working out so wonderfully. I’m probably in the minority but I’d guess that most of the Kolie Moore / long SS folks who are a huge subset of this forum won’t even come over here to try it because they’ll see “oh, it’s just like the ramp test that doesn’t work for me and doesn’t emphasize true longer power development - no thanks.” I, like a couple others who have posted, figured WTF, let’s try it for science - maybe the ML saw something in my capabilities that I was missing.
There are ones that are tagged sweet spot that go lower.
SS library has a large margin of error wrt FTP input.
@hvvelo i get your concern. But I think a lot of folks are putting too much weight into any of this being an exact science when it’s not.
Furthermore, it may be true that certain workouts are indicative of accurate FTP. And also that basing a workout program on “accurate” FTP gets results.
But are many ways to skin a cat. And the zones represent ranges that are not exact boundaries.
