Sorry for the multiples here, but this is less a response to any one person. Here’s a sample of a simple report and a graph I made in WKO5 for tracking long ride performance. This is a master’s athlete, and I kept his long rides reined in a little bit early in his base phase during a SST TTE progression, and then as his endurance came up, gave him a range of times he could ride, and he always opted for the longer duration (which is great!).
As I look at this, I see that his endurance improved significantly riding in that 4-5 hour range, and since he’s good at pacing and keeping things in control, I felt pretty confident letting him go ride as long as he wanted to (the prescription was 4-6 hours). He threw some 6+ hour rides in there, and that really stressed him as the reduced EF at those durations shows even with relatively low decoupling, but then EF started to come up before we moved on (now to his VO2max block).
(That decoupling outlier day was one of the hottest days I’ve ever been on a bike in October. He rode long that day as well).
It might be in this thread that I read about it but can’t find it now, there was some discussion of Z2 efficiency. ie riding in Z2 with a lower heart rate… Wouldn’t that be a sign that your FTP has simply increased, meaning that power is a lower IF for you now? Just trying to wrap my head around what is happening with Z2 efficiency.
This thinking conflates the concepts of endurance and threshold. Yes, if FTP goes up you will be able to ride at a higher absolute power when you’re at (for example) 65% FTP. This is a very common occurrence off the couch/injury or new to the sport (many TR users). Someone riding endurance with a 400W FTP is naturally not working as hard at 210W as I am. It’s analogous to an 11th grader being better at math than a 4th grader. How does a 4th grader get better at math? Easy, he just gets himself to the 11th grade. How do you make endurance easier? Simple: just get a 400W FTP.
But after some time as a cyclist your FTP more or less levels off. Then what? To ask another way: how do amateurs with 410W FTP get beat by world tour pros with 375W threshold? (same weight). Because the WT pro has significantly better endurance.
Moreover, you can experience significant improvements in endurance while threshold remains the same or even goes down (one of the main themes of this thread as well as any “ride slow to ride fast” discussion). Often you can see this with increase in TTE, better trends w/r/t EF and Pw:Hr, and simply how you feel after extending long rides.
Endurance + threshold. Loosely coupled, but not the same.
It is all about where VT1 is as % of FTP.
You can raise Z2 power by increasing FTP or by increasing the %. The latter is called endurance training and is one of the major benefits of these long Z2 rides.
This is true. FTP is not the best measuring stick for a 4-5 hour ride or race. Here is an article that highlights what you were saying:
From the article:
“It gives information about the current performance level for constant intervals and efforts, but it only gives me a number, and nothing more. It doesn’t tell me what happens if the athlete continues for more time at that effort.”
Many world-class male TT specialists have FTPs well in excess of 400 watts; Bradley Wiggins’s Hour Record power was estimated as 440 watts. However, in long-distance road races, it’s not what you can do after 20 minutes, but what you can do after five hours that counts.
“FTP doesn’t capture athletes’ durability or ability to repeat high-intensity bouts during races,” says Seiler. “It tells us something over a short period of time, but over a long period of time, the FTP power deteriorates. What is going on in their body after three or five hours? I want to know how durable your body is at low power, and its ability to repeat high-intensity efforts over time.”
When I read that it came with the disclaimer it was because of coming from a real off-season, you could expect quick fitness gains when coming back to (base) endurance training. And that it wasn’t practical to test every week, and that HR zones are pretty stable and don’t change.
That has proven to be true in my own training, and thats when I use HR zones. Sometimes I’ll use HR caps, for example the first handful or two of times when temperatures jump from warm to very hot.
Otherwise its always training by power or full-gas, and always recording power along with HR.
Because when you distill all the training insights it pretty simple concept. Basically you need 3 workouts in patterns. When you are a coach - there is periodisation, preparation and all that fluff. When you are a storyteller / scientist like Seiler - you have to find a way to tell the same story, known for years, in a different way. And he tells his story very well apparently. There is not much “meat” but a lot of charisma.
No doubt, the long ride is the most important piece of training and a staple that should be in every endurance riders training plan. But the article is saying that in terms of volume, instead of a 2 hour ride, if you only have time for 2 x 1 hour you can get pretty close. At the amateur level I have observed this to be true.
One short TT of 6min22 on zwift .
I had a peak end of november with more intensity in in that period. So my first week at base training i kept it simple. Every week I also increase TIZ in FTP or vo2max zones.
So next week my goal is 14h30 with some more time in Z2+ and also one intenser ride.
@Derailleur you would advice more intensity? 80/20 polarized? My goal is to increase my aerobic performance. Shift LT1 first. But I know I should also include some higher end stuff so not top loose it. But as a century fondo rider I try to become as aerobic as possible.
This is why I am chucking in a Zwift ZRL race to touch “all the systems” once a week.
I’m then tracking peaks and comparing them to my previous season to make sure I’m not loosing too much (arbitrary > 10% difference) across my PDC and then can see if I need to add some more intensity accordingly to keep things balanced.
Thinking is whilst upping volume to increase base but keeping intensity managed and minimising looses I can ultimately build stronger this season than the last.
Why not? I did over summer 1 month just Z2 at ~60% of FTP and quite frequently went into Z1 (recovering from injury). During 2nd month, when started adding Z4 1-2x/week, progressed in 3 weeks to 2x40min 96-98% of FTP, TTE stretched to 50min. Earlier years, when did higher intensity base period (SweetSpot), my TTE was more like 35-40min.
Sure, if you do virtual races, throw intensity in. But if you are focused on creating base for upcoming build phase, do you really need keep intensity before it is necessary?
I wouldn’t necessarily advice one or the other, I’m not a coach. I’m just observing.
It’s just that I would expect to get a bit stale on such a high volume of just Z2 and below. Personally I’d at least try to maintain some high intensity just so not to start from the ground again when the time for intensity comes again.
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