In much the same way as yesterday I really didn’t want to get out of bed this morning. Being rudely awoken three times in the night by my kids, I was in no mood to get up “early” and get my backside on the bike.
Part of the reasoning for not wanting to jump on Zwift was because of what I had in mind for my next ride. I expected it to be New York today (I rarely check the course schedule) so had it in my mind that I’d be doing a time trial (against myself) on Fuego Flats.
Now, I quite like Fuego Flats, but I’ve just ridden it twice in a row.
What I wanted was a fairly flat circuit to put in a “max effort” over a twenty minute period. And for this ride I’d swap from my usual Specialized Allez on to the Zwift Time Trial (TT) bike.
Actually I thought the Tour of Watopia final drop was a skin for the TT bike. It’s not. That skin is for another bike. Sad panda.
Seeing London as the guest course for the day bucked me a up a touch. I’d switch to ride the Greater London Flat circuit with its ~50m of total climb per circuit. This would be a really good comparison as this was the one circuit I spent most of my original time trying to beat my 10km in 20 minutes or under challenge back when I first started riding on Zwift.
It would be really interesting (and somewhat fun) to see how much I have improved.
With my usual lack of time in a morning, and being grumpy and tired, somewhat foolishly I jumped pretty much straight into a full on effort.
My plan was to ride as hard as I could for 20 minutes, and see whether or not I could sustain a 200w+ average.
I set off a bit too hard, and whilst confident I could complete the twenty minute effort, I realised quite early on that there was no way I could maintain 200w or greater all the way around. I figured that it would be fine, I’d average out even if I took a few recovery minutes.
On previous rides where I have attempted to give it my all, I have found that going hard for two minutes (or more) followed by a recovery minute to work for me. Knowing that I have to push as hard as I can and then I will be “rewarded” with a brief respite helps me mentally cope with the effort involved in keeping those pedals turning.
Also, having those rest minutes means there is plenty of scope for future improvement, say by cutting them down to 55 seconds, then 50 seconds, then 45, and so on.
When it’s my turn to put in an effort, I try my best to give it my all. As I got further into the twenty minutes, the figures I was able to put out were definitely dropping off.
One of my biggest achievements from this ride was in covering 10km in under 17 minutes. It’s not too long ago that 10km in twenty minutes was a major achievement for me.
In my head I had it down that I needed to keep riding at my maximum until 23 minutes had elapsed on the clock. I somehow got confused that I’d had a luxurious three minute warm up. As above, that was simply not the case.
I remember feeling knee pain, particularly in my left knee towards the end of the ride.
Last night I adjusted my saddle (yet again), this time playing with the lay back – or moving it forwards and backwards, in layman’s terms. I pushed it back a touch yesterday, and it feels slightly better now. Maybe pushing hard on a new setup without any prior testing was a bad idea.
Hitting the Mall, I couldn’t help give it a sprint. I was really surprised to find my time was my new personal best.
A few weeks ago I had a number of sprint attempts on London on fairly fresh legs, so to beat these times (not by much, but still) felt really encouraging. And no doubt it bumped my twenty minute average up a notch, if not fully eliminating all my minute recoveries.
Spurred on by the fact that I thought I had to get to 23 minutes elapsed time before I could ease off (for good), I forced myself to keep up as much effort as I could.
This wasn’t much, and it was hard as hell, but I did my best. I was wheezing, dripping with sweat, and generally absolutely shattered by the end of this.
Whilst not a true FTP test, I feel this effort was probably as good a representation of my current physical fitness as I’m going to get.
I wanted to set a new benchmark for myself over twenty minutes for a good few days now. I’ve been wondering where I’m at. I’ve been considered a ramp test, but I think the 45 minute – or the longer variant – of the FTP test would be a better fit for me. This was my non-official-FTP test FTP test, if you will.
Did I give it my all? Well, I felt like I had, but the recovery minutes suggest not.
I knew I’d given it as best I could within the time I had, and how I’ve been feeling lately. I was honestly hoping for an FTP bump at the end of this one.
Seeing a 203w average over 20 minutes put a big smile on my face. Hard work has paid off.
Thanks, as ever, to all for the ride ons. They are very much appreciated.
The reason I want to get my true FTP down is so I can do structured workouts with greater results. There’s no point doing a workout that’s too easy. At the end of the workout it feels like the time would have been better spent on a free ride, so what’s the point?
I need to suck it up and put in a real FTP test. Or a ramp test. But as above, probably the full blown FTP test would be a better fit for me. I don’t expect to do much better than I’ve just done, in truth.
In order to do a proper FTP test, the theory goes that you should have some easier rides before attempting the FTP test. I struggle with this. When I get on the bike, I don’t get long. I need to make every session count. That means I don’t feel I’ll ever be fresh enough to give the best account of myself. So that then becomes my excuse for not doing the test.
Eye brow raised? Yeah, me too.
Was really happy to see 190w weight average power. Been trying to get to 190w or greater for a while now. Now I know how much effort is involved in reaching that figure.
Booosh.
Job done.
Really nice to see that screen again. First time in a good few weeks.