Hi there,
I am 43 years old and have a little ftp of 158 now.
After à winter of training on TrainerRoad intervals for 3h/week.
Which plan should I choose now for Getting up for the First time in the Ventoux in juli/aug or would It be impossible?
Zwift/VenTop or the real thing? How much do you weigh?
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Get on the bike 3x/week. Any plan. You can use plan builder, I would put in 4h grand fondo as goal event.
Maybe make the weekend ride a long ride every other week before the event.
Have fun!
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Thnx,
Currently I do 3h/week on smart trainer with TR.
Good Tip of the fondo.
The real thing.
Currently 79kg
Its not going to be impossible - if you had the right motivation you could get on your bike and ride it now. It might just take a while. The old saying “it never gets easier, you just get faster” applies here.
So 3hrs/week is not very much and is going to limit your progress. You dont say how much time you have available per week to train, and if you can ride outdoors or a mix of indoors and out etc, but I’d suggest you use the TR Plan Builder and as said above, enter a date you want to ride Ventoux and add it as a 4hr Gran Fondo - or similar, depending on where you plan to start your ride etc. Go through the process with PB and follow the plan.
Just remember the things that will have the biggest impact on your fitness development will be:
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volume of riding eg hours per week before your ride?
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consistency - making sure you ride those hours and don’t skip days or weeks on the way
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going up is all about w/kg, so make sure you ‘win in the kitchen’ as well and improve your body composition to supplement your growing fitness. Don’t diet on your bike but do the obvious stuff to trim excess body fat where you can
If 3hrs per week is your absolute max then you’re going to end up on LV plans - SSB1 and 2 - Sustained Power Build - Gran Fondo - are the obvious path if there is time to get them all done before your ride? Otherwise PB will cut some weeks and come up with a plan.
Ideally you want to get as many additional endurance miles as possible done and, if you can, then practice on some longer climbs. Then, if you intend to ride down as well then you’ll want to get some time practising descending - lots of hairpins and in July/Aug there will be a lot of traffic, so its not really the time or place to learn to ride hairpins and how to descend mountain roads! Its windy on the upper slopes as well so you’ll ideally want to get used to bike handling with crosswinds etc - all the sorts of things that come from as many outdoor miles as possible before you get there.
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As suggested you could probably “do it” today, but it might be a long and unpleasant adventure. You’re a little heavier than I was when I did it, somewhat spur of the moment, on a vacation. I was training for an IM then, but just a mid/back of pack athlete. You have some good advice already on the training plan, so I’ll just add that you want to bring enough gears to get you up there. With the potential wind and the relentless pitch once you pass the ski resort it can be a tough ask without real climbing gears. Don’t forget to stay on top of your eating/drinking in the early going as well. Most importantly, have fun!
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Mostly you need the right gears on your bike.
If you want to be appreciably faster by August, you need to ride more hours as previously said. Do the TR LV plan during the week and then find 1-2 hours on Saturday and 2-3 hours on Sunday for an endurance ride.
If you are truly time crunched, think of some creative strategies. I think something as simple of rolling out of bed and riding the trainer every morning for 20 minutes can yield good results. That will give you more frequency. I mean that you do this on top of your regular 3 hours per week.
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