One comment in this episode really cut right through me. During the VO2 discussion one of the guys dismissed a score of 60-something as ‘low’ (or words to that effect). My Garmin estimates my VO2 as 44…that comment felt like a real kick in the teeth. I wouldn’t normally grumble and I know it wasn’t intentional but it felt really demotivating to me.
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Garmin has me around 44 too. In the lab I was 62. 62 makes it hard to join the pro peloton but some people still do it.
No one has ever won the TDF in the 60s to my knowledge but I’d bet $1,000 that people have won masters national championships in the 60s and 50s.
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Interesting to see really no ‘progression’ in TSS, kinda seems all over the place.
Good stuff, @kitenski! Thanks for steering us toward some useful resources. 
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Very cool! Thanks for sharing this, @dprimm.
My Garmin and Golden Cheetah both have me at like 57 (although Garmin estimated 60 once recently but that seemed to have disappeared), so no clue what it’s like in reality, but it sounds about right!
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Jonathan has some low hanging fruit 
. 
Would be really interesting to hear from other people who have both a Garmin estimate and a proper test to see how they compare. Garmin normally has me around 55-58, don’t really pay much attention to it as it seems to be more temperature dependent than anything else (I get lower numbers in the summer despite normally being leaner and stronger at that time of year). Also consistently gave me a higher number for running than it did for cycling, when my cycling has always been quite a bit stronger than my running.
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So (listening to this a bit at a time)… I have two related questions, both basically about duration at certain intensities.
When you’re trying to add low-intensity volume, is there evidence that adding on 15 minutes of cool down 4 times a week has the same effect as adding 1 hour once? It somehow feels like doing the hour all at once would do more good.
Secondly, how much of benefit from vo2 work comes from the muscles working at that intensity, and how much comes from accumulating time at high percentages of vo2 max?
I can do a Seiler-style 4x8min session and set records for time above 90% HRmax, but never go above 105% FTP. Or I can do 40/20s and accumulate loads of time at 120% FTP, but not push my HR so far.
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I’d love to know the VO2 question answer as well. Is it more about getting the heart used to the work or the legs? I feel like heart rate often is my biggest limiter there.
FYI, Golden Cheetah estimates VO2max from your maximum 5-minute power: VO2max = 7 + 10.8 * 5-min-power. (Power in W/kg.)
I think Garmin uses FirstBeat, which uses multiple submaximal measurements to estimate your MAP and figures VO2max from that. But don’t quote me on that.
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Does anyone have a link to the device @Jonathan mentioned using to plug and inflate tyres? (cant listen back right now and didnt take down the name while listening in work earlier).
I haven’t seen any evidence, but my intuition on the matter is the opposite. The 15 minutes at the end of the ride are when your aerobic system is the most fatigued. If you take a bit of time then to do more work, you get a nice training stimulus out of it. If you instead do an hour of easy riding during the week sometime, that just sounds like a recovery ride. Which by design, has a low training impact. Also, if you’re already riding 5-6 days a week, you may not want to add another day of riding. But if you can add more time to your existing rides, it seems a good way to increase volume a little.
And anecdotally, I felt like I responded positively to the extra volume, when I was doing a good job of doing this regularly.
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It’s the Dynaplug Air.
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Cheers! I was wondering if that would work with tubulars as I’ve just gotten a set on a bike I bought and it would make them a lot less worry inducing to use 
but I dont see any references to that working online.
I doubt that the dynaplug would work with tubulars. They are a plug for fixing tubeless tires. They seal up the hole in the tire itself. With a tubular you’d also need to seal the hole in the tube.
Agree. Answers to both these would be interesting.
Regarding the question on 3 Watts/Kg limit, is there an age component to this? I am 53 and at 2.3 W/Kg. Would love to get up to 3 and just wanted to know if Chad’s comments would apply to my age. Just to add I am new to cycling (2nd year) and have one winter of TR where is did Low Volume Base 1 & 2 twice. Now just riding outdoors in a group.
This post has W/kg in age buckets to give a good perspective of TR users at least.
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I came across this article while researching about the accuracy of Garmin’s Vo2Max estimate
It seems to indicate minor differences in the numbers when using chest straps.