Three reps of 10km practice TT's. Goal Pavg 310 watts, with 10 minute rest between. Hopefully all efforts to be within about 20 seconds time for the same distance.
TT #, NPavg, Pavg
Neaves Road tonight for 2x20 SST workout. Did it on the TT bike to get some more iBike testing in.
Easy ride, rain until late, then had limited time. So just a climb up Westwood and some intervals in Heritage, all at L2 or easy L3.
Briskly out, a little slower back. Timed arrival at home just as it got to dark to ride...
Nice day, better than the forecast. Just an lazy L2 ride to warmup for tomorrow.
Wednesday night at the track, endurance, L3, kept it down to a dull roar, so to speak...
Heritage Intervals today (just under 2k loop, 700m at 8%, 60m clavation gain, then 500m flatish, then 500k steep descent..)
Each climb started with a short 20-60 second sprint at any where from 500-800 watts depending on length etc..
Average loop time about 5 minutes. Average TSS points about 10... which made this an NP Buster (more than 105 TSS points in 60 minutes...)
This also meant that my FTP was set to low (this is another test for FTP, it shouldn't be that easy to do an NP Buster...) so I'm ratcheting up FTP to 305 as of last weekend.
Started out by doing my Barnet 10K TT route. Not terribly bad time, 17:30, for this time of year with tired legs from yesterday and no aero (PB is 15:00, all aero, neutral TSB etc..).
Then climbed up SFU and did two laps of last years Kermesse course... (short and with some nasty climbining.)
Then over to Westwood for another 300m climb and home. 200+ TSS points making it 400+ for weekend total. Which gives me a current ATL just a shade under my all time high of 113.
Although that was with a higher FTP... so PE (perceived exertion) wise this is the same, but I actually had to do more work for the other (although with higher FTP that meant I *could* do more work...)
Entire workout (176 watts):
Duration: 2:59:01 (4:13:01)
Work: 1887 kJ
TSS: 205.8 (intensity factor 0.83)
Norm Power: 245
VI: 1.39
Pw:HR: 29.87%
Pa:HR: 38.5%
Distance: 64.34 km
Elevation Gain: 1538 m
Elevation Loss: 1470 m
Grade: 0.1 % (68 m)
Min Max Avg
Power: 0 879 176 watts
Heart Rate: 0 169 113 bpm
Cadence: 26 137 60 rpm
Speed: 1.9 54.3 21.6 kph
Pace 1:06 31:35 2:47 min/km
Altitude: 0 425 236 m
Crank Torque: 0 98 28.8 N-m
Temperature: 11 20 14.3 Celsius
Cervelo out for minor repairs, so was out on the P2C today. Rode out to Pitt Meadows (Ford Road route) and then did a 12k TT on Neaves Road.
Verified, once again, that as soon as I hit the aero-bars my wattage goes up by about 20 watts (assuming I'm in VO2Max range...).
Neaves Road 14kTT:
Duration: 20:30Not a great time or NPavg, but good for this time of year. And other than TT bike no aero gear (helmet, wheels, clothing etc.)
Work: 381 kJ
TSS: 39.1 (intensity factor 1.069)
Norm Power: 315
VI: 1.02
Pw:HR: n/a
Pa:HR: n/a
Distance: 13.975 km
Elevation Gain: 16 m
Elevation Loss: 19 m
Grade: -0.0 % (-3 m)
Min Max Avg
Power: 0 493 310 watts
Cadence: 34 98 81 rpm
Speed: 10.1 50.4 40.9 kph
Pace 1:11 5:56 1:28 min/km
Altitude: 78 83 80 m
Crank Torque: 0 58.1 36.4 N-m
Temperature: 13 15 13.5 Celsius
Couldn't resist the continued nice weather. Quick L3 effort out Barnet Highway to Hastings and back. This is my Barnet 10K TT route, but not, today, done as TT..
Forgot the Ergomo... so had to count laps...
First session 100 laps in 30 minutes. Or pretty much bang on 40kph average. That will (from past experience) be SST and should be about 40TSS points.
Second session 100 laps in 35 minutes. Little slower, about 38kph. Call it L3 and 35 TSS points.
Shoulder felt fine. I purposely did these late tonight so that the track would be mostly empty. Only two or three other riders. Didn't want to have to deal with the rush around 6:00. There can be 20+ people on the track then, all doing different workouts..
Anmore Tour - SST, ran out of daylight, had to cut out the final climb.
CTL continues to move up...
Lovely weather today, went out and did a pre-ride on four of the Escape Velocity Spring Series races courses...
I've done three of them before, but they have added a new one, the "Snake", which I hadn't. It's very similar to to the Armstrong Road course, and in fact uses half of it. But where the Armstrong courses 7 reps on the hill, and the hill climb is broken into three one minute segments (total about 90m of climbing...) The Snake does the hill as one single two and a half minute climb of the same height. And as the overall length is more (10km vs 6km) we only do it 5 times.
Even though the snake climb is one single climb it actually still has three sections. The bottom part is short but almost hits 12%, then a short section a little less, maybe about 8%, then the final long steep climb at 13-15%...
I dragged the Garmin Edge 305 along, so I'll try and do some Google Earth KML files this week for all of these courses.
My ATL is now close to my traditional high point (90..) Most likely now is the time to start switching to more intensity and wait for CTL to "catch up". So that by the start of Spring Series (two weeks) ATL and CTL can be about the same (mid to high 70..) and TSB close to zero or slightly positive.
Even though ATL/CTL are moving up, this is with a lower FTP... at some point I'll have to look at moving FTP up. Currently the indications are that 295 is still a good (probably slightly high) estimate. E.g. the power distribution curve for the last 28 days shows that the biggest drop is 240-260 watts if 20 watt interval is used.
If a 5 five watt interval is used it is less persuasive, but still pretty similiar.
My shoulder feels comfortable on the bike. So I probably can look at doing one day a week training at the track. Just no racing. Don't want to risk falling on it until it has at least (so I'm told) 3 months... That may mean I can do the May 3-day race.
Started out to do Anmore Tour, flatted about 30 minutes in... Couldn't get tire pumped up properly, so soft pedaled home.
Pumped it up and given limited time did some VO2Max and Anerobic (L6) intervals in Heritage Mountain.
Managed to get about six inches and fell over!! Still in big ring and little cog from doing the Ergomo offset adjustment. Clipped in, stood on it, fell over. What a klutz! Luckily went down on my left side so nothing bruised or battered other than my ego...
Still, even though not hot, and not entirely dry, it was a pleasant enough day at about 6-8 C. Did a quick tour around the local neighborhood. I.e. hill climbs..
With a few VO2Max intervals. The numbers, as always for outside, where a bit higher. It really is easier to keep up the power outside.
On a year-2-year comparison, I'm now about 15-20 TSS points higher on ATL and CTL. Or about 5-6 weeks earlier in building up (i.e. I'm pretty much where I got to in early April last year.)
So things look on target, form/fitness wise, for Spring Series in 3 weeks. Hopefully FTP will increase and overall power curve be back to something suitable by then.
More rain, so computrainer.
4x1m high cadence, then 6x2mTT, then 1x6mTT and cool down.
Hard to get power out today, probably too much turkey yesterday.
No rain today, and the Sun was actually visible at times... although the roads where still wet enough to need fenders to keep dry.
Anmore tour, not in record time.. about 2:13 (although that included an extra little climb at the end, about 5 minutes..) Still 25 minutes slower than mid-summer times.
It does compare reasonably well with last winter (Feb 2007) times: 2:22 and 2:08 (without the extra small climb.)
Entire workout (183 watts):
Duration: 2:13:28 (2:45:57)
Work: 1466 kJ
TSS: 162.4 (intensity factor 0.854)
Norm Power: 252
VI: 1.38
Distance: 41.684 km
Elevation Gain: 1250 m
Elevation Loss: 1270 m
Grade: -0.0 % (-20 m)
Min Max Avg
Power: 0 684 183 watts
Heart rate: 0 0 0 bpm
Cadence: 24 101 56 rpm
Speed: 1.7 59.1 18.7 kph
Pace 1:01 35:18 3:12 min/km
Altitude: 1 310 127 m
Crank Torque: 0 106.3 32.8 N-m
Temperature: 4 20 5.6 Celsius
Straight forward workout today.
Six sets of 6on/6off using 51x15 (~89"). then four more sets using 51x14 (~95") gearing. The target for the "on" was 43-44kph, or L5.
I noticed while doing the first sets on the 51x15 that I my breathing was labored by the end of the set. So after doing the first four I stopped and put on my HRM. Then did two more on that gearing.
Then switched up to 51x15 and did four more sets.
There was a definite difference. The overall Pavg for the first six sets was 322 watts, and for the last four, 329 watts. Subjectively the first six where also "harder" with my breathing more labored and (I think) heart rate higher.
The difference in cadence is not huge, about 95 for the bigger gearing and 101 for the smaller.
In theory, assuming I could maintain the same force, the higher cadence should have meant higher wattage. Since wattage went down, it means that I loose a fair amount of force as cadence moves up from 95 to 100.
This may also explain to some extent the difference in wattage between the TT bike and on the track. On the TT bike I maintain a cadence around 88. If there is a similar drop (in force) from 88 to 95 that starts to explain why I find it hard to maintain the same power output on the track.
I'm hoping that I can get my leg speed up, with appropriate force, and without pushing the heart rate up, as of course that would make my track results better. As it is I can do well in the local B group as I have just enough jump, speed and endurance in the 51x14 to be competitive.
But I would get crushed by the A group. To get up their speeds would require jumping up another notch (say to 97"), but that would leave me in the dust... But on 95" I would be spinning out (due to leg speed) when they lead out 58-60kph.
Track was open today, so was able to workout there instead of outdoors (cold, wet, cold, dark, cold) or on the computrainer...
Started with a good high pace warmup (dodging the guys doing motorpaced madison training...)
Did three sets of 3 laps on (> 400Pavg, L6) and 3-4 laps off. First set was on 91x14, did the reset on 91x15 (effectively 95" moving down to 89".) Trying to see if I can get leg speed up a bit (a weakness.)
Then 20 minutes L3, and cooldown.
