There’s a subtle difference between riding erg and resistance mode. Resistance mode is more like riding out on the road, microbreaks and such.
The issue I sometimes have with standard or resistance mode is finding myself between gearing for a certain setting. Sometimes I have to dial in the resistance setting such that I can find someplace where I can spin comfortably instead of being forced to be at 89 or 103rpm to maintain target power. Takes some tweaking, but definitely worthwhile vs erg for this stuff IME.
TTE has gone out since my last test, but didn’t manage to increase my FTP. TTE went from 36 mins to 41 mins
I took a few days rest, tested once mid day and my RPE was insanely high, bailed and then retested later in the evening same day and managed to get a new TTE all time best! Maybe legs were a bit fatigued from the mid day session to show an FTP bump?
Agreed. That’s why it’s not a big deal for me. Not enough that I would change the way in which I do the assessment.
For me FTP is like a guide, a starting point from which I can make further tweaks to get the workout intensity where I feel it needs to be.
Regarding getting an FTP bump from the test - if this is one of Alex Gold’s TR workouts, I think they are made to give you an FTP bump, but only if you make it to the start of the ramp. (Corrected!)
In KM’s original protocol, you shouldn’t stick to a pre-determined power, but so that you feel you are at FTP. So use your old FTP as guidline, but if you feel you are actually below FTP, than ride harder, and then use that as confirmation of your new FTP.
I’ve had a bit of a break from threshold work after usually doing quite a lot of it. So wasn’t expecting to be at my best for this, but wanted to test anyway as it’s been a while.
I set out at my latest FTP of 370w (TTE of 60 mins) last tested on 30th January. It felt about right for most of the time, but I barely made it to 40 mins. After a bit of recovery in Z2 I did another 10 mins and then 5 mins at 366w (99% intensity), which I definitely wouldn’t have been able to do the previous times when I’ve hit a 60 min TTE. So this throws up some doubts for me about the correct W and TTE to use going forwards. Just to perhaps muddy the water, I’ve not slept very well the last few nights. It’s a bit worse than usual, but I acknowledge that **** happens and not every training day is perfect.
When I don’t do sustained power work for a few weeks, my RPE during sustained power work goes through the roof. It seems to take me about a week to get back into it. I’d try this test again in a week after a few sessions and see how it goes before I made a call.
That said, making it 40 min on the first shot, absent other information, I’d say your FTP is pretty close to 370, maybe 365. But again, that difference could just be your sleep, diet, how hot it was that day… I’d feel comfortable continuing to train at 370 after that test given the other information.
Nailed it. The is a good workout and gives good results which can be compared with each other easily. I find the ramp test is more of a test of my willpower to see how long I can hang on.
KM effect on PL levels? I’m scheduled for FTP test today and had planned to do Kolie Moore Program 1 Longer Ramp, but I now see it’s listed as PL VO2 Max 11.7! Since it’s a TTE test, I don’t expect to complete the full workout. Has anyone on AT had experience with this issue? I’m afraid it will push my future VO2 Max workouts to an unachievable difficulty (assuming I don’t get an FTP boost which lowers the PL levels).
As an alternative, I’m considering the TR 20 minute FTP test, which seems more similar to KM than the TR shorter Ramp Test.
Just for clarity, ignore Workout Levels on any custom workout (which includes these KM test ones). TR stated that custom workouts are not properly handled in the PL system.
As far as impact on PL from the crazy PL rating of these tests… I am guessing that if you rate it as 4 or especially 5, it won’t likely have any impact on your existing PL. Considering this is essentially a push to failure (even if a long and steady one), it would seem like a 5 rating would be appropriate unless you bail for a time reason.
Yes, yes I have. I just did my version of a progression 1, which was a threshold 12.7 or similar. I bailed fairly early on, as my FTP had not improved Even with saying that I stopped due to workout intensity, AT moved me to a PL 10 for threshold. Working with support to get that fixed.
No idea if this would even work or is a thing… but what if you now build a custom workout matching your watts and TTE. Then add it to the day you completed the workout and then associate the ride to workout.
wish I could test it out myself
I had exact same problem. Due to lack of sleep (or at least that’s my excuse for now ) I had to bail after about half an hour. It looks like AT thinks I nailed it because it moved my VO2 Max to 10 as well.
Yup, I think depending on exactly how you create the workout will determine whether it gets classified as VO2 or threshold. I make mine so that the test intensities are based current FTP being correct - ie the main threshold segment of the test is 100%. I then adjust the workout intensity based on how much improvement I am trying for. Since the intensity adjustment is mostly ignored by AT (maybe, just maybe used for ‘superpass’), this results in my workout being threshold. If instead you make the workout with the main section being 10X%, and ramping up from there at the end, this may make it VO2max.
I thankfully am not getting adaptations suggesting level 10 threshold workouts based on this, so even though the progression level is messed up my workouts are OK (for me about a 5 seems about right).
This once again shows the limits and ‘not good’ consequences of AT being too focused on the planned work, rather than the actual work done.
I think an 'exclude from AT/prog levels" option that users can select on workouts will be required until AT gets much, much better (and really, maybe permanently for the same reasons you can exclude something from TSS or PRs.) Once they get unstructured outside rides feeding into AT, if you get wonky data on a ride it will mess up TSS, PRs, and now also AT. I don’t think AT will be smart enough to ignore stuff on its own for a long time, so this kind of manual adjustment will be required.
This also fixed custom outside workouts on Garmin. Previously any outside workouts, Garmin or Wahoo, that were manually matched were all fails and did not update PLs. The fix was rather simple - make them all passes.
In my case, I got the ‘struggle/fail’ survey, and I selected workout intensity as the reason. I would think this should be enough to not adjust your progression levels based on the workout, but it did in my case.
Other than my PL being way off, this doesn’t seem to be an issue as I was never given adaptation suggestions based on the threshold 10 PL. (Or maybe I just quickly ignored those and forgot about it in my stupor following that workout…)
Even with saying that I stopped due to workout intensity, AT moved me to a PL 10 for threshold. Working with support to get that fixed.
) I had to bail after about half an hour. It looks like AT thinks I nailed it because it moved my VO2 Max to 10 as well. 
