Thanks for the additional insight! I’ll keep those things in mind as I’m experimenting.
Very good point–I’ll definitely test it out in training prior to a race!
Maybe you need to work on muscular endurance? How good are you at sweet spot work? I’d work through Antelope, Geiger, Tallac, Wright Peak (in that order). Also check out the + versions of those. If you’re really serious about them try to do 2 hour rides at each of those progression levels.
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Carb loading is the secret to a good race.
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Sweetspot is not that bad, 8min + threshold and over under is hard! Since race season is over I started the first 4 weeks of sustained build as of this week before starting my sweetspot base.
I’ve been doing more long sweetspot lately and my FTP just shot up since it’s been all anaerobic and vo2 work for the past 4-5 months.
I think im just cursed like Coach Chad and my muscle loves to cramp… 
Even after a long ride sometimes I can yawn and get a jaw cramp!!!
When i do sweetspot on the weekend outdoor on a close loop park. 2x20 session. How bad is it if Avg power is at 90 % but actual time in sweetspot might be 14min and the rest is tempo - vo2?
I think it would be better to stay in the zone, you really want that constant stress on your muscles.
Just to beat the cramps I’d try going out to Wright Peak which is 3x30 sweet spot. If you can do that then you’ve convinced me that it’s not a muscular endurance issue :).
Overall power: for me that means climbing 30-90 minute hills faster. Sustained build is the name of the game, I suppose…
Could your issue be hydration, then? While you can probably go higher than 60g of carbs per hour, a- you say you have this issue in Olympic distance triathlons too; b- you say that you run out of hydration too early; c- even if it’s not the max, 60g is a lot compared to what a lot of triathletes (who don’t end up walking in an Olympic distance race) do, so it’s probably not your weakest link.
Hitting sprint power at 1000+ watts! Completely unrelated to my steady-state, triathlon background, but in swimming, huge power sets help endurance, same goes for run and bike too!
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Hydration could certainly be a piece of it! I need to figure out a better way to ration/monitor my hydration during the ride (in races). I primarily use between the arms aero bottle on tri bike. For half irons, I may refill half way through bike leg, but then finish all hydration with 5-10 miles left in bike leg. I should probably just bring more hydration for backup. That extra hydration would likely go behind seat, so I’ll need to practice grabbing those bottles while riding. I’d always looked at my bike hydration in calories/hour vs carbs/hour and thought that 250 cals/hour was relatively normal for my height and weight. I’ll do some experimentation there and see if my stomach can handle more cals/carbs per hour. I’ll also plan to bring extra hydration/calories to ensure I have a backup if I go through my main bottles. Thanks.
A good rule of thumb I’ve seen, and that has helped me, is aiming for about 1 liter / 32oz of fluid per hour on the bike. I don’t know how fast you are, but for me that means I’m aiming for about 96oz of liquid (with sodium appropriate to your body). Both sweat volume in liters per hour and sodium content, in mg per liter, can combine to tell you how much sodium per hour you should be taking in.
I also don’t know how big your BTA bottle is, but mine is 28oz, and I refill it from two 24oz bottles, so I still need a 20oz bottle on course to top me up (I guess if I expected to finish the bike leg in 2.5 hours I wouldn’t need a handup). For now my bottles go inside the triangle, aero or not, but in the future they’ll go behind my saddle. The hand up will probably go straight into my BTA and then get tossed aside.
Here’s another point: even if you aren’t sweating out 1L/hr, you might want to drink at that rate (or whatever the highest rate you can sustain is). Why? Because you started the bike at a deficit (can’t really hydrate on the swim) and you will probably run at a deficit. So, you have a little catching up to do and you want to start the run as fully hydrated as possible. If you can be a tiny bit overhydrated without feeling too sloshy, that probably sets you up the best.
The literature I’ve read has generally described the limits of digestion here in ways that are fairly unrelated to size / weight. The different chemical pathways, the length of the intestine, osmolality, all of that. What I recall is that people can generally do 60g of glucose, and “up to” 40g of fructose. But different people tolerate fructose differently, and going past that tolerance leads to GI distress. Table sugar and high fructose corn syrup are 50/50 glucose and fructose, so 60g of table sugar is nearing the high end of what most people can tolerate… of fructose. Going with different options that are weighted more heavily toward glucose (maltodextrin is 100% glucose for example), and then supplementing a little fructose from various sources, can help you maximize calories without going past your personal tolerance for fructose.
But again, 60g/hr is well beyond what most people actually execute in a triathlon, so your limiter right now is probably not nutrition. From what you’ve said hydration is the low hanging fruit, and then you can probably tweak your nutrition a little higher in the future.
This has been my first year using any structured training of any sort. I chose TR because of the focus on making me a faster cyclist. It has most certainly worked! While my ftp has changed very little since the beginning of the year I have become faster. Endurance has always been my struggle.
Can’t wait to finish my race season and start planning on building my endurance for next season!
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I always feel like my FTP should be higher, but I chose other because the biggest thing for me is having the confidence during the race to hammer through climbs or various sections, trust that I can recover and then do it again. I know I can do it based on TR workouts but when I get to a race it’s hard for me to not worry about blowing up if I misjudge. So I guess from a training perspective I need to do more of these workouts to still improve my feel for what is simply too much for my current fitness.
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I voted other: Should really work on my off the bike nutrition and work on more consistently hitting the power targets during intervals (buying a smart trainer will likely fix this). By improving in these areas I hope I can rise above of my FTP plateau of the past couple months.
I’d like to improve my sleep! Like most people, life gets in the way of good interrupted sleep and I’m lucky if I get 5.5 hours most nights.
I feel that years of endurance training mean that my short power/speed is lacking (both cycling and running), but endurance is pretty well ingrained.
I love digging deep! Assuming there’s an event on the horizon I’ve always been up for a bit of suffering!
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+1 for sleep! 
@Nate_Pearson — Do you prefer Spanish Needle over Clouds Rest? Seems like the longer the interval the better, right? And I am always torn if I should do a micro burst type workout vs 10min to 20min at 95-100% FTP. Torn over which one would yield the better results.
I’ve recently switch to an XLAB torpedo BTA system (for my last 70.3). It holds 26oz—my goal was to go through that by the half way point of bike leg and then refill from 25oz Camelbak bottle (from inside the triangle), which is what I did----so only 51oz total for the bike leg (2:45)—but probably ran out of hydration by 2:25-2:30. Based on your recommendation, I didn’t even have enough liquid for 2 hours of the ride from a hydration standpoint (which could be very true). I’m going to have to practice a lot to grab bottles from behind the saddle! I’d almost prefer to fit a second bottle in the triangle for the time being, but don’t believe that’s feasible on my bike (Cannondale Slice).
Great points about trying to drink at 1L/hr due to starting bike at deficit and likely running at a deficit.
I do sweat a decent amount and have never done any sort of sweat test to identify how much sodium I need per hour. I know they’ve talked about it on the podcast—any recommendations you have on your favorite sweat test, etc. would be great! Any good cheap options?
Thanks so much for your help–it’s a huge help for me!
As a point of reference, I’m roughly the same size as you and consume 100g/hour/20oz bottle on the bike. And yes I do drink it at that rate for most of my long rides, and greater than .85 IF TR rides. Then take very little nutrition on the run. In a HIM might need more, but for oly distance shouldn’t need anything.
I think they both of their place. Spanish Needle is more anaerobic and Cloud’s Rest is more aerobic.
Thanks so much for the information! If you don’t mind me asking, what’s your go-to liquid nutrition on the bike? Are you consuming about 400 cals/hr on the bike with those 100g of carbs/hr?