What is the best approach for increasing FTP for zone 2, endurance, non-race rider?

Great, just coming into your peak stamina / endurance years. Trust me closer to 50 than 40 is a chore. :slight_smile:

So I see no reason why your goals arenā€™t achievable.

Do you have a TR subscription? I assume so. Can you post any of your training history, the training stress chart?

Either way get on a sweet-spot plan.

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@CJKeig, donā€™t get down. Stay the course!

Over the past few weeks you lowered your training stress substantially. Thatā€™s OK! We all need to take some recovery now and then. You had a peak TSS week of 357, then a week at 325, then a recovery week at 117ā€¦where you tested at a local maxima FTP of 220. So that concluded a block of training where your 6wk avg TSS was trending up & your FTP followed.

You took another low TSS week. Now youā€™re embarking on a TSS ramp thatā€™s going to take you to a level of TSS you have not previously achieved.

STICK WITH THAT PLAN! Your FTP will start to trend up as your 6wk avg Training Stress reaches an inflection point and starts to trend back up.

You are doing ok! Good, consistent work. Keep it up. Keep it fun. You will see improvement.

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Hereā€™s your training history for the last little while with some annotationsā€¦

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IMO, stop playing around with your plan - pick something, stick with it, and wait a month or two to reassess how things went. Youā€™re doing yourself a disservice by changing everything. Then of course when it doesnā€™t work, you get frustrated, take time off, go backwards, which just reinforces the notion that something needs to change.

If sweet spot base has been daunting (and it ABSOLUTELY can beā€¦itā€™s tough), try doing traditional base, even if just low volume. You can have significant gains with it, and it is much more gentle. It follows a very gradual increase in intensity over 12 weeks, that eases you into a bit of sweet spot work.

And donā€™t ramp test every week. Youā€™re hampering, needlessly, your ability to complete workouts. If you get too strong for the workouts, and everything seems comically easy, manually bump up intensity a couple percent. But no moreā€¦wait for the next schedule ramp test, and bask in the glory of having a 50 watt bump if it happens.

Just my 2 cents.

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Exactly. No more than once a month.

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Youā€™ve got some solid advice previously. I just want to add yet another aspect; if youā€™re doing all your training fasted SSB maybe isnā€™t your best option. It takes a lot of carbohydrates to fuel those workouts. Maybe a traditional plan would be more suitable.

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Good call. I usually do them fasted so I can do them first thing in the morning to help keep my blood sugars down but just because it is usually a lot cooler. I can do some threshold workouts without fasted first thing & Iā€™m fine. However, threshold always seems easier than sweet spot but I never worked out why. I wonder if it is because the threshold workouts usually have shorter intervals.

Iā€™ve been on TrainerRoad for a year & a half. I did try the SSB plans but I found the workouts incredibly hard to complete. I have no idea why, threshold feels easier on my legs that SS.

The vast majority of my training on TrainerRoad has been putting together my own short term plans using loads of zone 2 workouts with a little threshold & anaerobic workouts.

Cheers Brennus. So, looking at the chart, itā€™s normal or expected then to see the improvements followed by temporary drop offs & then a new cycle going up?

Thanks mate. I typically do my own plans of primarily zone 2 & try to stick to it. Itā€™s when I get to perhaps 4-6 weeks in that I see big declines with the gains being wiped out. I think I just need to get a better balance of being type 1 & doing the Training.

I did the ramp tests weekly so that as I improved I adjusted my wattage so my zones stayed accurate. I also though that doing them more regularly would help me get used to the toughness of the efforts. I see what everyone is saying though.

I agree, shorter intervals are probably easier than longer sweet spot. You might even get away with some vo2max work fasted.

Have you ever done Matterhorn? Itā€™s only 30 minutes but a real killer, I love it.

I would separate your blood sugar control from your training.

For blood sugar control you could keep your bike on your trainer all day and then jump on it for 15 minute bouts of Z2 to control blood sugar after meals. Or swing a kettle bell and do some squats 5 or 10 times a day.

For cycling training, I would agree to stick with a plan and follow it. Itā€™s possible that fasted morning rides are not helping you get stronger. Fasted rides are usually used for weight loss and fat metabolism training. The usual recommendation for that is once or twice per week.

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I have a friend who is Type 1 diabetic and weā€™re both cyclists of a distinguished age.
He like you finds that the exercise helps manage his condition.

About a year ago a cyclist from Novo Nordisk came to give a talk in a local city. Iā€™d been following Team Novo Nordisk for a while so I was keen to hear what he said as the team ONLY employ diabetics (I presume T1 only). He gave loads f really good tips for both diabetics and non-diabetics.

He left with an open offer to help. My mate has asked a few questions via Facebook; Iā€™m sure the offer stands as the entire point of the team is to support diabetics getting into cycling (and parallel endurance sports).

Hope they come up trumps as the guy was really friendly and open.

Good luck.

Solid advice already above.

Just a separate interpretation. I donā€™t think the way you use the ramp test shows an accurate estimate of increases in terms of FTP( looking at the figure above, within every week).

What youā€™re actually doing is you train to test better. Of course, by gathering more experience and the feeling for holding high power during the test, you then test better next time.

But your physiology underlying FTP, unfortunately, hasnā€™t changed much. These adaptations take significantly longer.

You crash (ā€œloose all FTP gainsā€) once youā€™ve build so much fatigue that you donā€™t do well anymore in the ramp test.
True physiological adaptations that translate to FTP gains donā€™t dissolve in a week.

As noted above, rest week doesnā€™t mean you need to be off the bike/doing no sports so thatā€™s got your T1D covered.

Iā€™m hearing 2 goals: 1) manage blood sugar and 2) raise ftp. I suspect you believe doing 2 will help you manage 1 faster/better, but Iā€™m not so sure. Intense workouts will increase gluconeogenisis (glucose production in he liver; pretty sure t1ā€™s are no exception in this regard). That is backwards progress re: goal 1.

@CJKeig as you accumulate more hours/week in the saddle you need more taper days to super compensate. You seem to be able to make ample progress on ~6 hours/week. At that work load you really donā€™t need more than a few days taper to supercompensateā€¦then fitness starts to decay. Two weeks is probably too much recovery/taper for you at this point in your training.

So from that perspective, Iā€™m not surprised to see a little drop off in performance after two low-volume weeks.

BUT GOOD NEWS! Now you are fresh and ready to attack your training calendar again.

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Thanks for the help mate. I do feel like I can usually improve a lot on relatively low hours, 6-8 typically. This morning I actually do feel super fresh so looking forward to getting back on to it.

Iā€™ve never looked at them separately but I see where youā€™re coming from.

Iā€™d say the bulk of my rides are fasted, usually, typically 5 rides a week fasted. My logic was: 1) better sugar control as mentioned 2) if I eat then ride I risk going hypo & not finishing the workout 3) if I leave the workout for later on in the day, this time of year, I can typically only do zone 2 rides rather than anything harder due to the heat generation.

Does the amount of fasted rides Iā€™m doing, even if only short zone 2 rides, have a detrimental effect long term on fitness if done too often?

Cheers Jules. Iā€™ll go over their site for what blogs & videos they might have.

Iā€™m glad your T1 friend is going good with cycling. Iā€™ve gotten my blood sugars levels to non-diabetic levels through heavy zone 2 & some threshold training previously. My doctor said if I went into the hospital & they didnā€™t know my background & ran my bloods they wouldnā€™t spot it. I only got into cycling because of vegan YouTuber called DurianRider, I never knew it would be such a good sport for diabetics. TrainerRoad took it to the next level for me & improved them even more, very thankful for the team for doing what they do.

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