For tonight’s ride I opted for something a little different, and if I’m being completely honest, something a little daunting: Sweet Spot Training.
Here’s the schedule:
For my FTP (198w), I had:
- 5 minutes at 190w
- 5 minutes at 175w
Rinse and repeat four times.
I’d picked this out during the morning, so was aware of what lay ahead.
I remember checking back to WhatsOnZwift several times to make sure I was fully aware of what lay ahead.
And I have to say I felt nervous on the drive home, and not just because driving through heavy rain in rush hour motorway traffic is a life and death scenario.
Knowing what needed to be done, I was dressed and on the bike before I really had chance to think about it too much further.
And fortunately, it wasn’t as bad as I expected.
Even though I’d checked and double checked this workout, for some reason I was under the impression it was over / unders. As in, 5 minutes above FTP, 5 minutes below.
Thankfully, not so.
I chose this workout for the reason that it looked harder than usual.
If anything I’m a little underwhelmed with the FTP Builder program. It doesn’t feel as though I am building up to increase my FTP at the next attempt of the FTP test.
Maybe I have misunderstood the intent of that program. But for now I have shifted that to be my recovery ride / workout. Sounds a bit odd, but there we go.
And for regular workouts I’m going to do things that look more challenging.
Today’s Sweet Spot Training ride started well enough.
I got a 5 minute warm up, with a few on screen prompts (nowhere near as many as the Zwift Academy, or even Emily’s Short Mix) which was a nice addition.
Immediately after the warm up we were into the ride proper.
5 minutes at 190w wasn’t as hard as I had imagined. I kept a nice high cadence, and whilst I had a sweat on, I wasn’t dead by the end of the first block.
Recovering at 175w took a little getting used too. Essentially no cadence drop, but the resistance decreased.
This was a shock to the system in so much as the FTP Builder rides so frequently give me a block of medium intensity work, then a 10 minute @ 100w block… fine for clocking up kilometers, but not really helping my fitness in any great way.
Dropping into the second “on” block, I found I kept up a fairly steady rhythm, though was definitely happy to hit the “off” block at the end of it.
It was in the third block that things got a little dicey.
Avid readers may recall my horrendous cramp during the Zwift Academy workout #2.
This was a highly uncomfortable pain that felt like a cricket ball was impersonating the “chest buster” scene from the Alien movie, but in the back of my calf.
Well, in the third interval I felt it again.
I’ve not felt this for a good long while. And that in itself tells me I probably haven’t been pushing myself as hard as I ought to have been.
Fortunately, it didn’t persist. I did my best to straighten out my leg, and drop the cadence a little (down to ~85rpm) which seemed to help. And as quickly as it came, it subsided.
But the fourth block was the hardest by far.
I managed OK-ish during the “on” block, but really struggled on the last five minute “off” block.
At 37 minutes in I remember just wanting it over with, and the minutes were ticking down oh-so-slowly.
Still, I got there in the end.
I definitely felt proud of myself for completing this workout.
It was one of the harder things I’ve done on Zwift in recent memory. I’d put it alongside The Wringer.
That said, I definitely prefer these harder workouts. More effort, more reward.
I certainly need more rides like this. Though perhaps tomorrow’s ride needs to be an easier ride (think: FTP Builder ride) ahead of Sunday which is likely to be a climb. I have one in mind.
I’d definitely do this ride again. I see a lot of value here. I feel like I put in a shift, and I feel like this is the sort of practice I need for racing.
The only gripe I have is I didn’t cover a huge amount of distance on this one. I still have ~37km to go on the 100km weekly riding goal. However, including the RGT Cycling ride from Tuesday, I’m at 87.5km on the week so far.
A target for the future would be to see this session through without the drop in cadence.
I think doing so would help in working through this muscle cramping issue. I apparently need to improve my muscle strength in my calves(?).
So yeah, tomorrow will likely be longer but low intensity stuff. I need to check out the ride stats for the two climb choices I have available.
It’s been a while since I’ve done a solid climb… if anything I perhaps should be more nervous of that than this!
