Kolie Moore's FTP test protocol

That was my debate on it as well! Thank you.

Also, should I be aiming for 100% or anywhere in the 96-100% is good?

No, no 100%. Go for 96-97% and work with TiZ. It is better to do 4x15@96% than 3x15@100% (yes this is only couple of percent but you will definitely see the difference)

With 100% you will spend good portion of the intervals above your FTP in suprathreshold territory. Leave these 100% for the time when you feel that your FTP definitely went up. It is always better to stay little below - benefits are the same but recovery is better.

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Awesome! Will do! I’m excited to see how it goes!

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I didn’t think there was an end, why did you stop at 35 minutes? I thought the idea was to find FTP and TTE at said FTP?

Because he used a programmed workout in erg mode for the test, so had to program an end. But because he got to the end, it makes his tte at least 35 minutes.

If you actually want to find tte, you have to make the test longer than your predicted tte, especially when programming it as a workout.

To be honest I don’t know why people insist of doing this in erg mode, or programming it at all. It’s not like you’ll forget suddenly what you have to do or how many intervals are left.

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Yeah, i just use a free ride or program a 60 - 70 minute block just as a bit of a visual. I dont follow it as such. I do follow a warm up before to 60 - 70 minute block though.

Because in this instance I wasn’t particularly interested in killing myself just to find that my TTE was 36 minutes rather than 35.

In all honesty, I can’t actually see how adding in a ramp at the end of the protocol can actually tell you what your TTE is. This test, im my opinion is about establishing where you feel comfortable and at FTP. It was obvious from the test that my FTP is right where I thought it was and that as soon as the ramp started it really began to bite.

The second part of this will just be to see how long I can ride at that intensity and call it TTE.

I found it helpful in that the ramp is much easier to get right. I may well try doing it in resistance mode at some point but as I’m happy with my FTP estimate I actually don’t see much point.


On a wider note about the protocol, I have a few thoughts:

I quite liked it as a confirmation exercise but it’s not really a very good test per se, as I don’t see that there is very much adjustability away from what you target based on how far you get. The ramp rate at the end is critical to how long you can go. I chose 1% of FTP per minute which matched my starting ramp (and would match a starting segment of 95%) on this basis you get to 35 minutes and have ridden at an average power of 100% of your target. Any time riden beyond this adds to both your average power and your TTE.

The trouble is that your starting to really dig into your W’, FRC, HIE or whatever you want to call it and trying to call that failure point TTE.

You really are limited as to how long a TTE you can get from the test based on how much work you can do above FTP after the 25 minute mark. I have a W’ of about 27 kJ and that would be completely depleted after 17 minutes of ramping from 100% to 117% of FTP (even from fresh), with an average power for the whole test of 102.5% of FTP but that’s almost a paradox in the sense that I’d then have been riding below FTP for the main part of the test and the first 2 and a half minutes of the ramp… Hmmmm

I doubt that effectively balancing a 10 minute section of the test at 95% FTP with a xx minute section at xxx% FTP average is really a fair swap for determining TTE particularly if you go longer and the first part of the test and start of the ramp are actually under FTP. I guess we’re back to the problem of using work done above FTP as a substitute for actually just riding at FTP.

Perhaps it’s just a case of needing to know, within a few percent, what your FTP is to carry out the test and using it as confirmation rather than for determining it in the first place.

Mike

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I hear you but this test should not be done as a battle of percentages :slight_smile: the whole idea is doing this by feel - if you feel that middle part is too easy, you ramp it up however you want, if your middle part feels right - you do not ramp anything. The more experienced you are the better you know your real FTP, the less guidance you need - then you remove the below FTP part and ramp part. This is not a ramp test where everything is determined and should be done to the letter.

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If you read the Moore article in the OP, you’ll see that the ramp is only used for those new to this kind of testing. As a rider advances to Progression 2 and 3 (via experience), there is no longer a ramp.

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Yep, as those above said…once I ‘feel’ ftp I don’t ramp…just hold that feeling. Might try to nudge up watts a little if I think I can but the ramp is more for people doing test for 1st / 2nd time to give them idea of ‘tipping point’.

I did it first time…tried sticking to ramp and died. Ended up with avg of 306W for 25 mins… Few days later, having a much better idea of my ftp and how it should feel I repeated the workout but ignored ramp and went by feel…averaged 309W for 40 mins.

If it feels right then no need to ramp in my view.

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Perhaps I should have been a bit clearer, I was talking about the baseline test only. What you wrote was what I was trying to get at - at least that’s what is trying to get out of my head and into words.

As a protocol the baseline isn’t very good for anything other than getting a feel of where your FTP is and I don’t think Kolie intended it to be anything other than that. If you’re not that close with you estimate there isn’t really that much scope for saying that based on the failure point I can call my FTP this: average power for a given time because that’s not what you’re actually doing in the test.

However, I think there are folk trying to say that they have done the baseline test and have a TTE of 35 minutes at a certain power. I just think you can’t say that for the reasons I gave above and you certainly can’t fail at the start of the ramp and claim a TTE of 25 minutes.

My own thought is that, as @RobertSims is suggesting, once you have dialed in where your think your FTP is with the baseline test, all that remains is to actually ride that to exhaustion maybe adjusting a little depending on how you feel during the test, which is exactly what progression 3 does. The other two test are problematic, again for the reasons of dipping into W’ and I really can’t see how they offer anything better that progression 3.

Just as a note, Progression 1 keeps the ramp and Progression 2 has an all out 5 minute effort at the end.

Why do cyclist like to reduce the length of test by going that wee bit harder?

Anyway, I quite enjoyed the baseline test and think it confirmed my FTP quite well.

Mike

Why do cyclist like to reduce the length of test?

Fixed that for you.

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Since I’m right here and I can hear you, I will give you my implicitly solicited thoughts. The article and tests evolved out of coaching a lot of people and sneaking FTP tests on them and learning where the hangups are. It’s why I always suggest you go back to the wko model to double check, but if you don’t it’s still close enough, even going past FTP. So take a step back and think about things from more than just the ivory tower ideal. I’ve got a pro on my roster who still uses progression 1, and they’re well aware (as am I) of the physiology behind ramping past FTP… and yet it’s still fine. You should think about why that is.

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Perhaps you’ll have to enlighten me.

Mike

is there a team created with these FTP workouts so I don’t need to recreate them all in the workout creator?

EDIT :man_facepalming: sorry searched the thread - Yes there is “1628-team-gold”

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I finally got a decent ride in using this workout, tbh it may not have been the best day to do it as I was in a lab for 2.5 hours yesterday doing some testing but I felt pretty recovered, on a better day I may have eeked out 3 or 4 more Watts. I’ve been sat on 250W for a while and from this ride I set myself to 246. I did a 20 min stint during an RGT race last week of 273 so all in all it’s a decent enough number

. .

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I did Progression 1 a week or two ago and my result was 248w also :+1: . I think on a more recovered day, was recovering from a cold, I would have been 252 - 254 ish but the 248 is good enough for me to start winter training, better with a number you know is within you than an over inflated or ego number.

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Baseline test is 35 - 45 minutes.
Not 35 minutes and stop, 35 is the minimum.

IMO the clue is in the “gradual power increase until exhaustion” i.e not ramp excessively to hit a target FTP and call it done.’

In my opinion, you didn’t follow the protocol you made your own variation.

I’m guessing that ramping to 110% or plus is not the intention, would like that clarified though. I would have thought around 105% is max unless you really under estimated your FTP coming into the test.

BASELINE TEST, 35-45 MINUTES OR TTE

    • 10 minutes at 92-95 percent of target FTP
    • Increase to 100 percent of target FTP for 15 minutes
  • 10-15 minutes gradual power increase until exhaustion

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Perhaps that’s the case and making the ramp to 105% over 20 minutes would give the same average power. Shame that 10 + 15 + 10-15, as stated in the article, does not ever equal 45. I agree that a little more clarity would be good.

Mike

That is a little confusing. Here’s the text written in to the workout:

> To get FTP, assuming you’ve ridden at least ~25 minutes, just manually select from the start of the test interval to where you stopped in workout analysis - the average power is your result.

Does this not imply that as long as you “survive” the 10min + 15min that you can use this as an estimate? I took the test at a 10% lower than ramp test estimate and barely survived the 25min. So I used the average of that as my new FTP.

I am actually questioning how well this new value works with the TR LV plans, as my workouts have gone from hard but doable, down to pretty easy. I realize that the ramp value is incorrect for what I can do for a true hour, but it seems to work with their workout plans