Totally new user here, encouraged to join after listening to the excellent Podcasts!
I did the ramp test after a couple of months of little to no riding and it was a good bit lower than the last test I did on Zwift. Not surprised, after no riding, so ran with the suggested FTP.
I have done 2 weeks of Low Volume, basic training with 3 sessions per week. 2 x 1 hour and 1 x 1.5 hour.
Really enjoying it and am using a cadence of 90 - 100, when I was grinding out around 70 - 80 last year, with great results.
Anyway, I am at a bit of a loss presently, as the on screen text suggests my firm should be dropping during sessions when it actually isn’t and so am therefore wondering whether my FTP is set too low?
Or is this normal when focussing on higher cadence and getting the form right in comparison to my previous approach when doing the initial Ramp Test?
Ramp test is just a test, not a hard rule, and if you haven’t been driving a lot it might be imprecise. So if your training sessions are too easy, if you’re finishing them and feel like you could keep going easily, then just raise your FTP manually a bit and see how it goes. Your personal feedback will always be more precise than some short test and a formula.
Depends on the aim of the session - if it is endurance or SS then you should be able to keep going at the end - it is cumulative fatigue over a training block which drives improvement. If it is threshold you should be pretty close to what you can manage and VO2 max work I’m usually on the limit at the end. Rule for intervals I learnt many years ago when running but still applies - you should have another one in you if you were forced to do another but you should be very glad that you don’t have to!
Not too much to go off of from your profile workout history, but you haven’t ran into the pretty demanding over/under type of workouts yet. Personally, I’d be very wary about bumping up FTP so early into a plan. Things can feel a bit different around that 4th week when you’ve accumulated a lot of fatigue. If you do one of those 1.5 hr over/under workouts like Carpathean Peaks or similar and you feel ready for more by the end, certainly give yourself a little bump (~3W). Until then just trust in the plan. It’s supposed to start you out relatively easy and then get more challenging by virtue of TSS creep.
BTW, one trick with the Ramp test that I found works for me is to do it by cadence–if I physically just can’t hold 80 RPM, I know I’m done.
