Is it normal for your FTP to fall even tho you continue to train?

I think picking a recovery week from one of the Low Volume plans is a good place to start.

Realize that this down turn may seem like a mistake, but may well lead to the recovery you need to make that next step up to the level you want to be at. The body simply can’t handle continuous stress like that indefinitely.

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Getting stronger on the bike isn’t any different to that than under the barbell. You grow, get stronger and recover away from the gym, not in it. Your workouts signal for your body to adapt and you need to give it adequate time to do so.

Recovery weeks are a vital investment where you’re going to see the returns for all your hard effort. Squandering this away because you’re too impatient or unwilling to simply cut back volume & intensity or have time off for all of a week is unintelligent.

Like you, I like to ride, a lot and I enjoy training. The thought of having a week of taking it easy is far from exciting for most but it sews the seed for further progression.

I actually find that I’m usually looking forward to a week of lower volume & intensity and that my workouts & time on the bike has me feeling (that despite progressing well and being seemingly stronger than ever) I kinda want a little bit of a break. On reflection this is a good check for me to know that I’m training hard enough.

I find 2 60-90 minute rides around .65-.70 IF at the start of the week to be golden, with something a bit longer on Saturday around .75 IF and something a little longer on Sunday back around .65 IF to be perfect for shaking any fatigue and restoring my enthusiasm.

I keep NP as close to AVG as possible and this stops any unwanted significant rises in power or HR (presuming you’re outside) and also TSS down too. Ideally these are Z2 Aerobic/Endurance style rides with a brief bit of tempo if needed outside for any short rise or climb.

I.E:

Monday - Rest
Tuesday - .65 - 60/90 minutes
Wednesday - Rest
Thursday - .65-.75 - 60/90 minutes
Friday - Rest
Saturday - .75 - 120 minutes
Sunday - .65 120-150 minutes.

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Thanks. @mcneese.chad. I did that the week of Oct. 8th before I tried to start the Sustained Power Build MV and so that is where I am at. now. My hope was to do mid volume build until Dec and then roll over to SST MV thru the new year. But now… ugh.

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I’m with you, @webbsb. Few athletes like hearing that they really need to take a break, especially when they’re riding a wave of improvement. But as @mcneese.chad stated, these temporary downturns are necessary to continue the process of positive adaptation.

Typically, the intensity is below 60% and the rides are no longer than an hour, but as with anything training-related, it’s subjective. In any case, it should feel easy, the entire time. The duration of the hiatus is subjective too, but like I stated earlier, you should feel eager to resume training.

Just start back with the same plan but backtrack a bit, perhaps a week or two earlier in the plan. And you can jump into a Build plan too if you feel ready. The assessment will account for any small slip in FTP and get you gradually back on track.

Strength training is tricky as it’s still a form of stress when recovery is the priority. Keeping the volume low (reps low/weight high) might very well do no harm, but you’ll have to try it an see. Definitely don’t go the moderate weight/high rep route though because it’s that metabolic stress from which your body really needs the break.

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OK, @BennyC, Early on (a few months back) I was just too goal focused to really stop. I was so close to my watts per kilo that I was after. And I ‘DID’ do recovery weeks that were the 60%-70% jobbers that are in the TR workouts. E.g., Pettit, Brasstown etc. So it is not like I was out hammering all the time. I just never took complete time off. BUT! I would take 2-4 complete days off and then come back swinging.

I was just wandering that since my FTP kept falling that maybe those TR recovery workouts were still too much… Hum.

“unintelligent” Seems a bit harsh, when I was just in a routine and just practicing consistency. Not being consistent kind of scared me that I would loose my fitness, and therefore would have to start back over. I thought that I could keep my FTP where it was and just roll back to SS-base to maintain.

I guess some things just have to be learned the hard way, for me.

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Thank you @chad. I am going to do some very easy workouts (50% of FTP and less) for a week and then come back at it. It is very hard to just stop, ya know. I like routine. I like structure. And as you can tell from my TR-Training Stress Chart I am dedicated and consistent. We get our bodies in this routine where we train, we eat, we sleep, we listen to Thursday’s podcast;) and life is good. But you take the training away then what? You can no longer eat the same… hard to sleep because you lie in bed thinking about when you can start back… or should I have done that polarized training thing instead… you can’t listen to Thursday’s podcast because it reminds you of training and you are trying to not think about it :grin: And then! if you do listen to the podcast you see where @Jonathan has been off the bike for a long time and comes back and still has an FTP close to 300w :confounded: and so there it is… hahah. the vicious cycle of trying to achieve your goals and still have balance.:exploding_head:

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Learning to rest is not easy but it’s well worth it. It took me 4 years to learn this! This year by resting well I crushed my goal! I didn’t believe it before but rest can also actually be fun when you realise what it’s doing. Work + rest = training. Good luck in crushing your next goals.

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Ok, so I thought that I was resting buy doing hard (Tues), easy (wed), hard (thurs), med/hard (sat) and med (sun) for 3-4 weeks and then doing a recovery week of 60%-70% FTP workouts (The recovery weeks in TR) and then repeating.

I just kept doing all that and starting over. With of course some weeks I would take like a Mon-Wed off completely and then get back after it on Thurs.

By the way, thanks for the optimism (“Work + rest = training. Good luck in crushing your next goals.”) :+1: — way to be “Excellent to Each Other” @Nate_Pearson

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Or perhaps not enough of them :thinking:

It wasn’t a personal dig but an objective observation :smiley:

You asked for advice and have received plenty of it which you seem to have heeded and I hope you find yourself back on track. Rome wasn’t built in a day :sunglasses:

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Thanks man! :fist_right::fist_left:

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Hang in there @webbsb. You’ll get it dialed in and see the numbers creep up again. This training stuff is so personalized and takes time to learn what works for best for you. I had to chuckle at your comments about routine/training and how it affects all things around you. It was like you were narratating a day in my life.

From one type A person to another… Give yourself the recovery time you need and you’ll see the improvements you’re looking for. I know it’s easier said than done but you’ll get it.

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Thanks man! I really appreciate those kind words!

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I can see myself very well in your situation: from time to time my w/kg seems to be the only thing that matters – all the time, everywhere I go.

My solution for the problem is that I (try to) accept the fact that holding your FTP is difficult. Like you I train hard through base, build and specialty; but after that, I let it go. After peaking in late May with FTP of 275w, I went down to 265w in a couple of weeks. After that, I started doing long endurance work outside to enjoy summer. That bumped my FTP back to 275w for my next build phase. During the build from mid July to mid August I actually lost some watts (most likely due to trying to lose some weight simultaneously). However, it brought me back to proper fitness for some late summer races. After the racing was over, I have tried to maintain my fitness with 450-500 TSS weeks but, once again, my FTP has come down to 260w. Soon, after two weeks of off time, I’ll start to build my fitness again from SSB I.

To put it simply, I have good fitness for a month or so, and outside that I have fitness high enough that I can still enjoy everything I want to do on my bike. If you really look at it, having one’s FTP in 260w instead of 275w isn’t such a huge difference if you’re just riding easy and sprinting for the town signs. Letting my FTP go a little has truly allowed me to change my riding radically: during late summer/early fall I have had only one 1h proper training session, one 2h endurance session, and two long (2,5-3,5h) rides outside. Compare that to the stuff you have in SSB2 or General Build mid vol – quite a lot easier.

Also, one point to add about losing fitness: it may come back surprisingly fast. As mentioned above, after my break in early summer, I had my FTP down to 265w but got it back to my peak 275w with just 4 weeks of mostly endurance work (doing traditional base 2 mid vol outside with added volume). That is why I can be a little less frustrated about losing fitness: I know that soon it’s going to come back again when I change from maintenance to building again.

When it comes to not hitting your target of 4w/kg, I may have had a similar feeling. I did hit the 275w but during the two separate build sets I had (before my first peak in spring and during the summer), I never got above that number. It makes you mad to realise that you are stuck even if you are working as hard as you can. However, I try to approach it like this: I don’t know how much benefits I’m going to get from my training and that’s why every cycle is an experiment. If the results from the experiment are not what I was looking for, I have to analyse the process, come up with improvements and do the next experiment. As in many other places in life, not every experiment is a success – but there’s a huge amount of information out there to come up with improvements in your training “process”. To give you an example, my next experiment is to do the base, build and specialty with 15% added TSS. This is because: 1) I think I can handle it and 2) generally more training tends to give your more benefits.

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Try not to lose sight of the enjoyment of riding your bike :sunglasses:

It’s very easy to get caught up in the numbers and become disappointed or frustrated when things don’t necessarily go how we would plan or like.

Not quite being on top of things for a short period isn’t the end of the world so don’t let it drag you down :+1:

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Thank you @matiassaarinen :+1:

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Well said sir :+1:

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JoeX, What are the signs of overtraining?

Hi junio,

@chad is probably the best person to ask, but I would say things that are out of the ordinary routine indicate you need a break; sessions that should be hard but achievable becoming impossible was the biggest indicator for me, others might be your sleep pattern disrupted, frequent niggles or minor injuries, heart rate not behaving as it usually does - that sort of thing.

Of course lots of things can be the cause, so I try to focus as much on sleep and nutrition as I do on training to give me the best chance of absorbing the training stress.

JoeX,
Got it thanks. This season I’m focusing on sleep and to a degree nutrition. Not sure if I have had any uber hard sessions as I have progressed thru SSB Low Vol 1 , SSB Mid Vol 1, and have just started SSB Mid Vol II week 2, Todate I have not struggled to complete any workout??? But I also suspect I havent had any killer workouts either.
As for sleep it is a large focus for me this season goal using FitBit data hahaha and I think they are robbing me of some hours of sleep but its all good as its a focus.
Nutrition is also a focus but with an asterisk meaning counting calories is too hard but over all I’m eating well and in moderation.
Injury nothing major little nagging pain in the hip but I think its due to lack of corrrect form working it out via stretching and massage… we will see.
Heart Rate havent focused on it with regard to changes. but will start to monitor it now.

thanks

if it’s not a bother I’d love some feedback after the hiatus+next cycle of training. It’s always interesting to hear personal experience vis-à-vis theory and general practice

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