My post was in a discussion on FTP estimation, and isnât relevant to you if you are happy with whatever estimation protocol youâre using.
Fair enough. But Iâm really responding to the general tendancy of this forum to tell people that their FTP is wrong even when they feel it works for their training routine or what have you. I know that there are people on here that would say my FTP is set too high because Iâve marked sweetspot workouts as hard (even though thatâs middle of the survey!) without even asking about the circumstances of the rating.
Also, I was curious in case Coggan had any thoughts on judging accuracy of FTP based on how over unders feel.
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We are on the same page here 
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the above definition from coggan is tempo. you can give it a different name, but anything from border between level 2/3 up to just under FTP is Level 3. the special name implies that it is somehow different.
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the above definition (of tempo) notwithstanding, numerous coaches, industry services, etc. have very much promoted the notion that it is different/better/special/something else
As such, why further sub-divide it? It has really just served to create a bunch of FUD among a competitive-minded community (bike racers) who are already prone to being overly precise and pedantic about one watt here, two watts there. It will not end anytime soon.
Also, Iâm not arguing about FTP as a concept (as others are doing)âŚitâs a thing, I get it. Itâs useful. Thank you. Sincerely. Years ago I had questions about what to do once it more or less settled (given a certain weekly load), but Iâm good now. Iâve seen less conflict over jazz harmony, and that is a significantly more complex topic to dumb down that FTP. Baffles me.
I have experienced first hand how riding lots of tempo can benefit my fitness. I have yet to see (and have personally experienced the pitfalls) of further sub-dividing it up into a âmagicalâ subset at the upper end of what is already a fairly generous and productive range of effort.
After all these years, Iâm still trying to understand Sweet Spot. I AM NOT trying to understand tempo. Itâs clear enough, and has been for a long time.
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When I see a rare sweet spot workout on my calendar, I know its a benchmarking effort at 92% ftp. Not because its a magic intensity, its a benchmarking effort over time and I can easily pull up previous ones and compare. It is not magic, it is benchmarking and looking for improvements. Thats the way my coach rolls.
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Seems that this is dependent on which training âphilosophyâ you adhere toâŚI donât think there has ever been consensus on how many training levels exist.
Ok, I can see that. But to me that is a benefit or a use of FTP. Your coach is basically saying: âletâs get you just under threshold see how it goes / benchmark itâ. Makes sense.
I donât follow what he means by that, but itâs fine. I think itâs just âitâs all the same irregardlesslyâ idea (with regard to sub-threshold physiology), but no doubt there is more nuance.
Agree, so let me add: within the context of the current thread. If weâre discussing sweet spot and moreover doing so in the presence of the coggan bot, might as well use the de facto standard zones.
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OK, I think I see where you are coming fromâŚusing a Coggan 6 Level training regimen, SS falls in between Level 3 and 4, but not residing squarely in either one.
Am I understanding your point correctly?
Exactly, and without (or at least with less) snark, how does that help me? Or how should it have? Because ultimately I just got tired and mad LOL. Iâm certainly less frustrated by it now, but in 2018 it drove me nuts. I imagine there might be others who have the same experience.
I can still recall debating âsweetspotâ with Hunter as we were leaving a restaurant in Boston after a USA Cycling coaching webinar. He was advocating for a discrete, narrower âzoneâ, whereas my counterargument was that there was nothing about the classic 7 levels to stop him from prescribing training at that (or any other) particular intensity if he wished to.
That said, one difference between the âsweetspotâ concept and any olâ training intensity is the notion of cost vs. benefit, something that isnât true (or goes unspoken) for levels 1-7.
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This isnât true. Itâs the power at a metabolic quasi steady state. Most people can hold it for about an hour. But âaboutâ can typically range from like 45m to 75m. The âyour FTP is your one hour powerâ was an over simplification.
This of course is where it gets interesting. Is there a use for Sweet Spot? Sure, for some coaches. If you give it a reasonable range then its under threshold, advanced aerobic work, many can hit some reasonable numbers outside without getting freaked out they arenât riding at some exact %. And then a Tempo workout would sit below that, again advanced aerobic, but a little lower stress yet more load than doing just endurance. Its playing the game of aerobic loading while balancing stress/recovery across 3 intensities (endurance, low tempo, upper tempo/low threshold).
But you could easily just divide tempo in half (or thirds) and not get OCD by strict zone borders. Upper tempo outside, with excursions into low threshold (90-94% ftp), as long as you donât freak out about âborder crossingsâ - well thats basically sweet spot. A little more load, a little more recovery, and depending on the athlete, more or less benefit.
So Iâm with you now, Iâve dropped sweet spot from my vocabulary.
Over time Iâve come to view my training as follows. Spend a lot of time working on limiters. For myself that means lots of endurance rides around the z2/z3 border, and then whenever possible adding some âjunk milesâ (lol) to the end of rides to increase volume. Moving up the intensity spectrum⌠Tempo work. For myself its often low tempo to add a little extra load without ANY perceived recovery cost. Every once in awhile Iâll go out and do upper tempo (SS) 1x30 or 2x30, or if Iâm feeling good just pop out a 1x60 upper tempo, or hit a climb and do 1x90. But with upper tempo there is a higher recovery cost, I might need to swap some workouts around and do endurance on Monday instead of intervals. I know the recovery cost appears to go down if I do extensive work here, but Iâm not targeting events that need much of this and I can get plenty of muscular endurance at lower recovery cost. Regardless, personally I donât seem to benefit much from investing time doing a lot of tempo. My limiter is anaerobic repeatability and my compressed top-end (relatively low vo2max, high fractional utilization), and we work on that by doing as much volume as I can manage, with some HIIT work.
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Unpopular Opinion:
Since most everyoneâs FTP is a vanity number inflated by poor testing methods and ramp tests, what you think is sweet spot is really threshold anyways. 
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so for me, sweet spot is about being able to ride hard but steady for a long time. Iâd say I can do 2hrs at 90%, although the most Iâve done this year is 90mins. And I donât think this is otherworldly by any means, in fact I think, with a properly assessed ftp this should be quite doable during a build up block. I think people have disagreed with me on this, but if someone canât do 3x20 sweet spot, they may want to revisit their FTP setting.
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Totally agree. I was doing this my first year of cycling but didnât have a fancy name for it. I can still go out and pop out 90 minutes of âsweet spotâ without any special training or special recovery.
Sweetspot is just a label for the concept. Not technically needed, but Iâm sure it helped communicate the concept because it gave it a special name that could be referenced.
If the term wasnât coined, someone else would have come up with another term later for this intrazone, such as âuptempoâ or something.
There are actually 7 levels. Yes, level 7 isnât referenced to FTP, but saying 6 levels suggests that youâre talking about a different system entirely.
As for sweetspot, to repeat what I have said before, it is primarily a concept. When pressed, though, I say that it extends from about the level 2/3 border up to FTP. So, itâs not really between levels, but spanning over them (i.e., all of level 3 and most of 4).
Others may define sweetspot differently, but since they didnât come up with the concept, I donât listen to them, and maybe you shouldnât either. 
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We can mince word choice, but I donât see a substantive difference hereâŚ.spanning or between, the idea that it doesnât for into your defined levels seems to be correct.
As for the number of levels, I got 6 from TPâŚsee attached screenshot. Maybe you can discuss it with them. Pretty sure you know a couple of people there.
I donât think that it is âmincing wordsâ to differentiate between âbetweenâ (narrower) and âspanningâ (broader).
As for TP, thatâs far from the 1st thing that they have f*cked up. I would suggest not fully trusting anything on their website, even if they have attributed it to me.
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