Tomek’s Crunched Power plan was a 16 week plan by CJ. I have completed ALL the segments, even the long LONG indoor rides. All the VO2 and HIT and some Z2/3 were done at 10% of increased intensity, because what was prescribed by CJ seemed too easy. However I made sure that the recovery Z1/2 were done VERY easy. That seemed to work for me VERY well.
Now riding outdoors with club etc, magically everything seems easier and faster not too mention I feel much better during and AFTER the rides.
This Friday is the last day of my plan and I will take the 20min FTP test to see what actually did happen during the 16 weeks.
Onto the question, now what? #1. Pause for now and enjoy the benefits of my hard training over winter for summer riding. #2. Get another plan setup, based on the new FTP number, and try to do the work as much as I can?
You would be amazed at the results of seemingly ‘too easy’ workouts if you can persuade yourself to stick to it
Don’t judge performance on FTP alone. Like you said, ‘everything seems easier’ is the result of a good training plan. You not only increase pure wattage numbers, you also increase repeatability and capacity. Those will not show in FTP tests. If someone has 10W higher FTP but he can only do the effort once, all you need to do is attack twice with your 10W less ;-).
By now, you should have a pretty good idea what works for you. Keep doing the things that clearly do, experiment a bit with the rest. But always make recovery a high priority. Otherwise you will burn out.
You took that “what was prescribed by CJ seemed too easy” out of context. I simply knew I could push more during those workouts, and I did. However I always did Z2 to Z2 and Z3 to Z3 etc. VO2 max and HIT are a different kind of hurt and I made sure they hurt but I was able to recover no problem.
My question was more of what to do next? Run through the CJ plan builder again to see what comes up? Use a specific plan etc.
What are your next goals? What kind of event do you have in mind and when will it take place?
The answers to those questions will greatly impact what you should prioritise the next couple of weeks/months.
As MedTech pointed out, we have a different philosophy to training then the standard do as much as you can recover from, especially because we are never 100% sure that we did recover 100%. It’s ok, meaning I believe fun, is very important and if more intensity is more fun for you that is great. But our belief is you can start easy and end hard and get the same or better results then starting a plan moderate to hard and ending moderate to hard. If you start easy and end hard, by the time you get to hard you are totally hungry for hard and the hard can be harder, or at the minimum equally as hard. But it’s also true that people are different and can adapt a bit differently. For short term gains pushing harder will get you there a bit faster, it’s just you caused more stress, took more risk and in most cased no more benefit.
Overall it seems the number of hours people ride a week has more of an impact on performance then what they do during the sessions. Obviously there are more extreme cases that make this not true. But in the end have fun If you let us know your goals we can help and @robert.wlr is a great cycling coach and can provide some suggestions as well.
thanx all. I dont have any goals, no race goals or any major events.
My only real goes is to, well, get faster and increase my FTP. When I started I was at 256 at 75kg 188cm. I will test on friday and see where this last 16 weeks got me with that.
So obviously we want our FTP to go up because seeing progress is inspirational Although there are some problems with chasing short term FTP goals.
Ramp tests in general have a component of anaerobic contribution, so doing say 6 weeks of hard anaerobic will make a ramp test show higher FTP readings when in general your actual 60 minute threshold may not have gone up that much. Also short term hard work in general will make your FTP or at least your ramp test go up. So having FTP as a goal is a bit of a slippery slope and is not always the best indicator of progress, yes year over year you ideally want your FTP to go up.
It also feels good if it goes up in short term but as part of a good strategy it’s not ideal to focus too much on this. It’s easy to game the system and only do stuff that shows FTP gains but long term that won’t maximize your potential. Year over year growth seems to come best from doing very traditional training. Be consistent, increase your hours of training. Do base, build, peak periods and at the end of peak ideally your FTP is up from the previous year.
Not getting sick, injured or burned out as well as feeling amazing is the obviously optimum goal. If you are doing all the right steps, rest, recovery, diet, sleep and good training plan, then just trust that you have a good plan.
Thanx Alex, but you still are not answering my question. Where do I go from here? Simply ask CJ to create another plan for me based on the new FTP number?
I understand that one aspect of progression is to spend more time on the bike and not increase the intensity, but we only have so many hours in the week. For me doing that last segment of the plan was a challenge, time wise where I was doing 14h/week.
Should I not revisit the FTP every now and then in order to adjust the value in the TD settings? I know TR software does this automatically.
Oh my 14 hours a week!!! Yeah, that’s enough And yes, it’s good to do an FTP test.
Sorry, I was trying to provide the ideas behind what to do next, without any clear goals it’s hard to say what to do next but generally you should do base, build and peak and after peak you are at your seasonal peak.
I would do 8 works at a fairly high intensity level so the first week feels hard and each additional week feels harder. Big climbs is one of my favorite peak blocks. Probably starting at an intensity level of 6 to 8 but try the first week and see how it feels. If you can take it to a higher level go ahead.
What do you want to get faster at? Sprint, short criteriums with lots of surges, mountain rides, time-trial, ultra-distance,…?
You can get ‘faster’ in general by repeating the same plan with an updated FTP. But during your journey, you must have sensed things that you were better at (or at par) then your friends, just like things that you were less good at. Where do you want to go now? Getting even better at the things you’re already good at? Or do you want to address the things that didn’t go that well? The answer to those questions probably depends on what kind of rides you like more or less. But it could also be that the rides you like most, are those where you’re at your best…
My goal here is to make you think about the actual situation and where you want to go. Then you can make more specific choices for the harder workouts. More aerobic, threshold or anaerobic oriented. Probably also technique/agility/bike handling…
There is no ‘one-fit-all’ solution. But Base is the foundation for all of them.
I’m sitting in my tent at the base of the Mont Ventoux in France, so sorry that I’m joining the discussion so late.
My advice is to take a couple of restdays before you start a new program. During these rest days (minimum of five) you can either leave the bike entirely or, if the thought of not cycling at all freaks you out, you can do some recovery rides. If you don’t cycle at all, make sure you do other things like walking or swimming. All at a very easy pace.
I understand that you want to start a new program, but both Alex and MedTechCD gave you some very good advice.
There is no point, doing a FTP Test every time you finish a program. The FTP test has its limitations. However it does take away some valuable time. You have to rest two days before testing and at least one day after testing. So every test takes away 4 days of valuable training time.
Take a look at your heartrate- and powerzones first. Are you still in the right heart rate compared to the powerzone? If so there is no need for a ftp test. Sometimes your heartrate is higher indoors than it would be outdoors, especially with hard and hot indoor rides. But you’ll see what I mean.
To make your training more interesting MedTechCD’s advice to take a look at what you’re good at and get even better in that is a great tip.
When I compare your weight to your height, you seem like a good climber. So Alex’s advice to go for the bog climbs plan is great advice, too.
To spice it up I would do a field test. You can do this on Rouvvy, Bkool, Zwift or whatever platform you’re on. Pick a mountain. Take a longer climb that is not too steep. Set a time on that mountain. Do the big climbs plan, take two days of rest and ride the same mountain again.
To sum it all up:
Five days of rest
Pick a climb and set a time
12-16 week Big climbs plan
Do the same time again.
Well then, this morning I did the FTP test. Not sure what to think of it to be honest. I was expecting this to be much more, by the way I feel on the bike. From 253W to no 268W. So I went from 3.4W/kg to now 3.6W/kg OR an increase of a measly 6% increase. This is 16 weeks of consistent CJ training. Not sure if I should be happy with this or VERY disappointed, and I am leaning towards the latter at the moment.
However, will this number in mind and in the app, i will follow a plan that Alex and other seem to recommend, and again, re-visit this before winter.
I am hoping to crack 300W for ftp. Not sure how I am going to do this, but I want to
I don’t know your age and your cycling experience/history but 6% increase is something that you can only achieve in the earlier stage. The better you get, the more difficult it will be to further improve FTP. Something that will ‘easier’ increase is the ability to recover from it and do it again. That’s a capacity increase and is just as important for performance.
To give you some insight in what this number of 3.6 w/kg means, here’s an article comparing and classifying performance: https://www.cyclinganalytics.com/blog/2018/06/how-does-your-cycling-power-output-compare
This isn’t taking age in account, but if you only started structured training 16 weeks ago, I would consider this a pretty good result. You might be able to replicate this performance gain once again but then you will see a diminishing return. Don’t forget that elites have a decade or more of dedicated training behind them before becoming an elite. You can’t expect to get similar results in a couple of months. The cardiovascular system is slowly adapting from correct progressive overload and can’t be pushed over its limit. It takes time…
Also this was not a peak block. As I mentioned the biggest gains come during the peak block. And feeling really good is what you want before a peak block and as MedTechCD mentioned 6% is great for many. So I would ay you are not seeing this clearly And now do some hard training and all will be good. Secondly you did a ramp test which seeing big gains comes with anaerobic improvements too (which is not actually an FTP (aerobic) gain but looks good on a ramp test). So all in all be happy. And really I am not saying this so that you love CJ plans, I am saying this because you are prepared for a great outdoor season. CJ plans are not the key to life… There are many paths to the summit. They are just good plans.
For reference, I am 46 years old make, 75kg at, 188cm tall. Been riding for now 10 years clocking in 10-15K km yearly. This is the very first year I did an FTP test and decided to sign up to a training plan.
I know we should NOT compare ourselves with others, but when I real how someone can go in their FTP number a LOT in a year of training etc, make all the hard work I did very very discouraging. Thats all.
Peak Block. So how come the CJ plan created for me did not include this? I had specified a 16 week training block, maxes out all the levels, the last month nearly broke me, and this is still not a peak block?
If I follow your advice above regarding the new plan, will this be considered a peak block?
Should I just skip all this for now and just enjoy the riding season and re-visit come fall / winter?
A maxed out build block is not the same as a peak block, but it’s similar in some ways but has less anaerobic training. Also other than a peak block we don’t really recommend such hard training, especially for 16 weeks as it makes you too tired.
If you decide to follow another CJ plan you can set an event date then it will give you a peak block as well. Ideally for more like 24 weeks. The reason CJ did not suggestion one is we assume if you are not training for an event then it is more general training. Overall the default recommendations from CJ are way less intensity but can still provide great results and feel a lot more fresh afterwards.
I will repeat the same as MedTechCD, 6% in 16 weeks that is good depending on where you are in your “cycling career and/or season” but I also see if you killed yourself so hard you could be hoping for more. If a pro got a 6% increase from one season to the next it would be incredible.
And to answer your question. YES. YES. YES If you did such hard work, then now it’s time to just enjoy your season.
With this kind of cycling history, a 6% increase in FTP is HUGE.
Reaching 80% of your potential is quite fast and not very difficult. We’re talking about 6 months to a year of consistent training here. Motivated and dedicated beginners will see huge gains during the first 6-12months. Unfortunately, you can’t expect to keep growing at that pace.
Reaching 90% of your potential becomes much more difficult. Structured and balanced training/recovery/periodisation are required on top of the consistency.
Anything above 90% of your potential, demands specific training routines and you will almost certainly need a coach or a lot of knowledge and self assessment awareness to keep improving.
The fact that you were able to increase your FTP by 6% after all those years with high mileage, simply means that the chosen plan did a very good job.
And for the record, the link with comparative FTP in my former post is valid for people up to age of 40 years. After 40, performance in well trained athletes is decreasing or stagnates at best. You need to adapt your goal settings to something more realistic. If you never before trained in a structured way, there may still be room for improvement. But the fact that you already have a solid base means that you are close to that 90%.
Oh I missed this part. I agree 100% with @MedTechCD 6% is HUGE in your case. The problem is you worked so hard and could likely have worked a lot less hard and gotten a similar level of gain. So I understand it’s all about expectations. Really structured training is the icing on the cake. Consistency and volume are the cake itself. Since you had the basics down, optimum workouts will give small incremental gains. You should be happy and now enjoy your season. If you want ideas for next season just post questions here, and I would say don’t kill yourself next year… smarter not harder. Killing yourself can work, as it did in your case. Hopefully you will not be burned out and it sounds like you did not get sick or injured so I call that a success as well.
@ MedTechCD So what you are saying is that I pretty much got as strong as I ever will??? Well that kind of sucks lol I guess I need to lower or check back my expectations.
but I was able to recover no problem.
