Episode 190: Is Your FTP Maxed Out? And Does Bike Weight Factor Into Power-to-Weight Ratio?

Questions/Topics Covered In This Episode:

• How much difference will it make if I train on a heavy bike and race on a light bike
• Why Total System Weight matters
• Cheapest way to lower total system weight
• How do I know if I've maxed out my Functional Threshold Power?
• Have you maxed out training volume or intensity?
• How to lengthen rides and use mini-camps
• What to do when you can't add more time
• Polarized training to pull FTP up

RESOURCES
- Total System Weight Calculator: https://www.broleur.com/hill-climb-calculator/
- Trainright Membership: https://trainright.com/membership/
- Episode 48 with Dr. Stephen Seiler: https://youtu.be/KfvRy_b1z2k
- Episode 164 on Extensive and Intensive interval training: https://youtu.be/S-95GTC52mA

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Host
Adam Pulford has been a CTS Coach for more than 13 years and holds a B.S. in Exercise Physiology. He's participated in and coached hundreds of athletes for endurance events all around the world.

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Chapters

• 0:07 Optimizing Cycling Performance Through Weight Management
• 10:02 Maximizing FTP Through Volume and Intensity
• 19:38 Effective Cycling Training Methods

Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:07

From the team at CTS. This is the Time Crunch Cyclist podcast, our show dedicated to answering your training questions and providing actionable advice to help you improve your performance even if you're strapped for time. I'm your host, coach Adam Pulford, and I'm one of the over 50 professional coaches who make up the team at CTS. In each episode, I draw on our team's collective knowledge, other coaches and experts in the field to provide you with the practical ways to get the most out of your training and ultimately become the best cyclist that you can be. Now on to our show. Now on to our show. Welcome back, time Crunch fans. I'm your host, coach Adam Pulford.

Speaker 1: 1:00

Today we'll be talking about FTP training, power-to-weight ratios and all that good stuff in cycling, but with a slightly different angle. I'll share some of my own coaching advice on how to tackle these common problems when trying to be fast and fit in. Some of it may be a little unconventional, but we'll get there First. If you're new to the show, welcome. The questions I'll be answering today come from all of you, our audience. Anyone can write in with a training related question and I do my best to answer it on future episodes just like this one, in a short, direct manner, without all the fluff and stuff. So, with that said, let's get right down to it.

Speaker 1: 1:33

Question number one does bike weight really matter? If I'm training by power and heart rate, does it really matter what my bike weighs? Isn't 155 beats per minute or 200 watts the same, no matter what the equipment is used? That being asked, how much difference will it make if I train on a 20 pound bike and race at a with a 14 pound bike? So, michael, that is a very good question. Um, and you know the, the weight weenies out there, they're probably like cringing and they're like, of course. Of course that weight matters and the way to think about this is total system weight, not just body weight, not just bike weight. It's total system weight. That means stuff in your pockets, stuff strapped to your bike and all that kind of stuff pockets, stuff strapped to your bike and all that kind of stuff. So, um, I mean, shortened to the point, yes, um, 200 Watts today is the same 200 Watts tomorrow. Uh, 200 Watts on a 20 pound bike is the same on a 14 pound bike. So the wattage remains the same, always with a an accurate the same, always with an accurate, consistent power meter.

Speaker 1: 2:49

Okay, but why total system weight matters? Is the mass that you're moving, say up a hill or across a distance, and how fast. That relates how fast that acceleration can be relative to the mass given. So think about it like this I think total mass is often overlooked when people you know read power to weight ratios because power to weight is often reported in, uh like kilograms of body weight only. They don't factor in a bike weight and all this kind of stuff. So it can get confusing. All right, but this is because the other parts of the system meaning your bike bottles, clothing, fuel in your pocket, your flat repair type stuff all that stuff is just way too variable for people to put it on the internet and all that kind of stuff, there's just far too many variables. But if your total system is lighter and you do the same 200 Watts uphill you'll go faster.

Speaker 1: 3:47

Okay, let's. Let's take a look at an example here of a 20 pound bike versus a 14 pound bike, just like you described. Uh, assuming all things being equal, like weather, wind, uh, body weight, clothing bottles you have the same thing on your person, okay, michael, and let's just say your body weight is 75 kilograms and we have you go do the same hill climb, which will be let's just create a hill climb here, and it's going to be 5k in length and 300 meters of climbing, and let's just say you do it in 20 minutes on a 20 pound bike, that's going to make you, or cost you, 239 watts, or roughly 3.2 watts per kilogram. Now if you did it on your 14-pound bike and again, this is the same hill climb and you're going to target the same time up, meaning 20 minutes If you do it on the 14-pound bike, it's going to cost you 232 watts only and roughly three watts per kilo, maybe 3.1, and so each hill climb is done at the same speed, about 15 kilometers per hour, but you produce three percent less power, roughly seven watts, in order to do the effort. Now, that may not sound like a lot, but if that's your threshold, if your threshold is 230 Watts and you're going to be doing something like the triple bypass and something that's just like super hard and hilly all day, altitude or not, a lot of littles add up to a lot. Okay, that's going to cost you a lot of fatigue in the long run. So if you add weight to the total system, you'll either have to push more power to go the same speed or you'll have to go slower to not fatigue yourself as much.

Speaker 1: 5:39

I used a total system calculator. There's a ton of them out there, but I found one that's, I mean, relatively easy, that is easy to use and I'm going to link to it in my show notes. What I'll encourage you to do is play around with that, michael, and kind of run different scenarios to see, especially with hill climb type efforts, to see how changing the total system weight changes the power output or the speed for given scenarios like the hill climbs, long hill climbs, short hill climbs, that kind of stuff. Now, when we're talking about how to change maybe a scenario with total system weight, body weight is the cheapest and most effective way to decrease that total system weight. If you lose weight on your person, you don't have to spend a ton of money in order to get this done and you'll be more metabolically efficient for well everything, really, especially all your bike rides. You'll just have less mass to move around. Now, if losing weight's not an option for you, sure you can upgrade some of your equipment, but I would start first with all the things strapped to your bike or tucked in your pockets. That may be redundant For mountain bikers like this is a classic example mountain bikers carrying around the kitchen sink and their hydration pack.

Speaker 1: 7:01

It's like you know they have the whole backpack scenario. That's a common mistake. I see, now, that's like you know they have the whole backpack scenario. Um, that's a common mistake. I see, now, that's good when you're in the back country, okay, and you're going to be out all day and and who knows what you'll encounter. But this is not as good when you're doing events with um, you know solid support and aid stations and and people looking after you out there. Now, if you've already done all that, if you've, you know, been tentative to uh, you know, knowing how much, you know how many co2s you bring, um, how many tubes you bring, maybe do you need all the extra stuff like in your frame bag and all that kind of stuff. Okay, so let's say, let's just say you've minimized that and you've done that.

Speaker 1: 7:44

My advice is, if you're going to buy anything, maybe you start looking at a nicer set of, because with every acceleration, if you have more weight in that, in the wheels to accelerate on hill climbs or out of corners, that kind of stuff, a lot of littles can add up to a lot there. So if you're going to spend money on something, first take a super good look at everything that you're carrying on your bike. Then, before buying, like a new frame or something like that, the wheels are probably the best bang for the buck in that sort of situation. Finally, do you get a new bike? I don't know. Really depends on your budget and what it costs, right, as you can see in our example, six pounds. Okay, now, six pounds is quite a bit, and that saves you roughly seven watts or 3%. What will that cost you in a new bike? What will six pounds cost you? 3k, 5k, 7k, 10k? I don't know. Again, depends on what you're looking at. I'll leave that up to you, michael, but my main point in answering your question is to get you thinking more about the total system weight versus bike weight alone. I'm guessing that you could probably shave off some weight in the total system and allow your watts to make you go faster without changing a ton. Okay.

Speaker 1: 9:16

So question number two Hi, I'm a 50-year-old cyclist who has been riding and training consistently for 20-odd years now. My question is if you feel like I have maxed out my FTP, which, from experience, I feel in my case, only small gains can be made. What is the best type of training to focus on, bearing in mind that it's not specifically FTP gains I'm concerned about now. It's more how can I get the best out of what I have to work with? Most training plans are FTP gain specific and I will be interested to see what your views are here, and I'm sure there are many cyclists in my position that have trained for years and can't seem to make more gains. Thanks, and I hope to hear your views on this.

Speaker 1: 10:02

Lee in the UK. Yeah, lee, well, thank you for listening and thank you for listening in the UK. This is a good question for sure. I would come at this problem in two ways. First, asking the question have you maxed out your volume? Second question is have you maxed out your intensity? Okay, now, those are good questions to ask yourself. At the same time, it's also a very real scenario that at some point we will hit our physiological maximums, either due to training or age, and that's fine, that's reality, that's human life as an endurance athlete, and at that point, having a plan to maintain our gains or slow the decay is very appropriate, or slow the decay is very appropriate. So while I can't answer you fully about have you maxed out your FTP without knowing more of a full history of training, I can help provide some tips and determine how to move forward accordingly, okay.

Speaker 1: 11:05

So first let's take the higher volume angle on things. If you're a historically time crunch Now I know you've been riding and training for years Okay. But if you're historically time crunched and you've been doing FTP training without seeing FTP increase, I would encourage you to find creative ways to add volume into your training. I use this method to push up FTP in the long run, not by doing FTP efforts itself, but by training the aerobic system with longer hours and lower intensity training, and doing this you know, I guess, the boring work of an endurance athlete. Okay. So how to do this?

Speaker 1: 11:46

Let's let's create some scenarios here. I would say make a goal for the next six weeks to lengthen your long ride by 10 to even 20% each week. So let's just say your long ride is three hours on Saturday. That would mean add 20 or 30 minutes next time. And then add 20 or 30 minutes next time and then you know, maybe err on the side of 10% as the as the long ride you know does increase, because that's going to be a bigger gain. Okay, so you want to make sure that you're hitting a five, a four to five hour ride each month to deepen your aerobic base. So what I'm saying is, for six weeks, lengthen that long ride, get it up to where it is in that four to well, I would say even like five to six hour range, if you can afford that. Okay, I mean, that's a big day. Okay, but if you've been training for 20 plus years, right, you've probably had some of those days. But if you're, say, a time crunched athlete, you're probably not hitting that on a regular basis. So, six weeks dedicated to lengthening that long ride and then, once you have that established for six weeks, make sure that you keep at least one long ride in every month, because that's going to maintain some of those aerobic deepening sort of training sessions that you've been doing. Okay. Now, if that's a big pill to swallow, meaning time is crunched, can't do that.

Speaker 1: 13:13

Here's another one Plan volume camps where you take maybe a long weekend and you do this for the next three to four months. You take one weekend a month and it could be Friday, saturday, sunday, and you just block your calendar. You make little vacations with the family, that kind of thing. Just block your calendar. You make little vacations with the family, that kind of thing and you do something like, um, you know, three hours on Friday, four hours on Saturday, four hours on Sunday, and then the next time you do it, add 10 to 15% of the total volume on those days, if you can, and maybe, like on the Friday, maybe that stays at three hours, but you're adding more to the Saturday and Sunday and you do that once a month and it's it's a mini, little volume camp. This will add more aerobic capacity to your physiology which can increase FTP in the long run. And this addresses some of that popular zone.

Speaker 1: 14:04

Two benefits you're all reading about and basically listening to. You know, reading about in every other article out there, listening to every podcast these days, right, but what you're doing is you're training your metabolism to be more aerobic and handle more capacity later on. Increasing mitochondria, total numbers, total density, capillary density all this like good stuff that you read about, okay, but you need the hours, you need the aerobic depth to do it and then the time crunched athlete can do it. You just have to be organized. You need the aerobic depth to do it and a time crunched athlete can do it. You just have to be organized. You just have to be planned out about how you're going to do it and when. Now, many short on time athletes like this they run into their FTP ceiling because they lack time. If you can add in a little bit more time not forever, but in a dedicated time chunk this will help you increase your fitness, your aerobic capacity and therefore your FTP down the road.

Speaker 1: 15:03

So now, high intensity. High intensity meaning VO2 power, and above is another angle I come at when trying to solve, for have I maxed out my FTP syndrome, if you want to call it a syndrome? I've had some athletes come to me in this scenario, right, and I first look at training history, right, then I look at total volume and then I look at their intensity. I mean a whole slew of things. But this method I use to intensify the training and what we're doing is we're adding glycolytic capacity and increasing VO2 max, or the total amount of air and oxygen that I'm bringing into the system, and therefore I'm pulling up the threshold versus pushing up the threshold with aerobic training, anaerobically or high intensity, and pulling the threshold versus pushing up the threshold with aerobic training, anaerobically or high intensity, and pulling the threshold up. That that's kind of the best uh verbiage I could use, or the analogy to use uh with a high intensity um angle like this. So let's just say, for example, that you're a higher volume athlete.

Speaker 1: 16:08

Maybe not, you know, definitely not the pro athlete, but you've been riding for 20 years so I'm guessing you've had some good high, high volume weeks. Let's say you've been averaging 10 to 15 hours per week. Or, like lee said, you know train for years and you're not making gains. Sometimes I find these athletes they're just doing too much ftTP work too often, which then makes them never really go super hard but also never really super easy, and it's not enough to raise the ceiling right, to pull that ceiling up of their anaerobic threshold. This is where a polarized method of training is super valuable. For more on this, by the way, check out the episode I did with Dr Steven Seiler, the father of polarized training. Forget the actual number itself, but if you search for Time Crunch Cyclist you'll you'll get more on that. Also, all the episodes I've done with Tim Cusick, we touch on polarized uh method of training and that's going to be super helpful.

Speaker 1: 17:18

But the highlights of of polarized uh methodology here are we keep the hard days hard and focused. The aerobic days are aerobic in zone two, but they're not harder Okay, and that contrast is key because that contrast is going to allow for the rest, or the non-intensiveness, to happen in your body to adapt and make the changes that we want to see. Okay, that glycolytic capacity that we're talking about, an increased VO2 max. That's where the contrast comes in with the typical master's athletes hitting group rides and just kind of going like medium hard all the time, a lot of FTP work. You're not going to get that Okay, it's fun, you stay super fit and there's also benefits that happen with um tactics and pacing and and um it kind of the race deployment of group ride type stuff. But if that's what you always do, I see people running into the FTP ceiling.

Speaker 1: 18:15

Now, kind of back to polarized uh training. Here. What we're really talking about is 20% of your training sessions are hard and 80% of the training sessions are aerobic, okay, or easier. Now, this may mean that you only might have one day of a week that you're going full send super hard, okay, and the others are zone two training. Now, that's if you train five days a week or doing about six to eight hours per week, but that one day could be enough. Again, remember, this isn't forever. Okay, we may do two cycles of three to four weeks with recovery periods in between I'll talk about that here in a second Um but that one day a week of high contrast might be enough to start moving the needle, to intensify your training and start to make the gains anaerobically that you need. Typically, though, if I'm, if I'm working with my athletes and let's just go back to the 10 to 15 hour athlete example I would likely do two sessions of this per week and probably six sessions total. So two days full send, six days that are aerobic and easier, and typically I'm going to stay out of the group ride when I'm working something like this, because that group ride is like mixed intensities, something like this. Because that group rise like mixed intensities, okay, it's neither full FTP or full VO2. And it certainly is not zone two.

Speaker 1: 19:38

Now, a typical progression like this. Okay, and this is what I was talking about, I'll get into this here. Now, typical progression for this is I would start first with a block of intensive VO2 max training. I do that for about three weeks, take a recovery week, then go back to a block of extensive anaerobic capacity training, do that for two to three weeks, then take a recovery week and then I would either do a field test, an FTP test, or go racing. That's how I would approach it with you, lee, and that's about an eight-ish week. Eight to 10 weeks, um, sort of cycle. That may be enough, it may not. When I was, when I was working up the outline for this, if you have good recovery habits and you're like, and you have, you know the history of training, I might even cycle back to one more intensive VO2 max training. So that would be like three week, one week. Three week, one week. So now we're talking like a 12 week sort of program. Right there, okay, but I do think that the a round of each would be enough to start moving the needle.

Speaker 1: 20:47

Typical workouts in this intensive VO2 phase this is your, your, your classic. I've gone over these workouts on on the podcast before. But eight by two minute power interval at a nine to ten out of ten rpe, or roughly 110 to 130 percent of ftp. But the rpe is actually the, the better guide here. You're going almost full send on every single one, okay. So eight by two minutes hard with two to three minute recovery in between. Okay, do that in a you know 75 minute workout with a warmup, a couple openers, proper cool down. That's a great go-to intensive VO2 max uh training session. Okay, you could even repeat that twice a week, right, eight by two, and then scale it up. You would then add a couple of intervals to that. Do 10 by two, maybe even 12 by two for your hardest week, and keep the second session as eight by two for this, for the second one in that week. Do that for three weeks recovery week and then get onto extensive anaerobic capacity training.

Speaker 1: 21:51

A typical workout for this would be 10 by one minute power interval Again, full send on each one minute effort, perceived effort of basically 10 out of 10. And you take three minutes recovery in between. Three to four minutes okay, I mean, these are super hard, you're going all out. I want some repeatability behind this as well. So it may not be full, full recovery, which would be more like a six to eight minute kind of recovery window. So three to four minute is enough recovery where I can hit good enough power and keep it going and that good enough power. What is it? I I don't know For my athletes it really depends.

Speaker 1: 22:34

And this is where the individualized aspect of coaching and training really comes into play. Because I'll give you 115% to 150% of FTP is probably going to cover the right genre or the right range for most people listening here. But the more sprinty you are, you're going to choose a higher percentage. If you're more of a climber or a time trialer, you want to err on the side of lower. Okay, but either way, perceived effort is super high. You're going full.

Speaker 1: 23:07

Send 10 by one minute with a three, four minute recovery in between, and um, that'll be in a great extensive anaerobic capacity workout. You can simply repeat that workout on the next hard day during the week. Or maybe do eight by one, assuming that you have a little fatigue in the system. Okay, scale it up. Look to add in a couple of intervals each time. Go 12 by one the next week and then maybe 14 or 15 by one minute. It's going to be super hard to do. That's going to max out your time, but it's also going to keep you on track to develop the upper end of what we're talking about and raise the ceiling. The main focus is keep the hard days hard and the aerobic days aerobic, okay. This will allow for that contrast to happen and, more importantly, the adaptation to occur.

Speaker 1: 23:59

Often, with my master's level athletes like yourself, lee, again I, I and I fall into the trap too. The group ride is super awesome, but it's mainly FTP. You just keep doing the same thing and you get the same result. So I would encourage you to take a look at those two questions. Have you maxed out your volume? Have you maxed out your intensity? Are those intensities? Are you truly going full send or are you just kind of like poking at it, scraping at the like the low end of VO2? Okay, that's the other thing.

Speaker 1: 24:29

When you're a self-coached athlete doing this intensive VO2 work or anaerobic capacity work, it is, it is not fun, and you almost need a very unbiased person looking upon you and telling you what to do, because it hurts so bad that you're normally not going to impose that much hurt upon yourself. I mean, that's me and that's a lot of my athletes, right, which is why a coach can look at the numbers and be like here's what you need to do. I separate myself from the emotion of the pain that's going to occur during that main set, while fully knowing the pain that's going to happen, and therefore I plan recovery in contrast days accordingly the pain that's going to happen, and therefore I plan recovery in contrast days accordingly. So to to bring this thing home. Um, two great questions and uh, thank you everyone for writing in. But uh, you know, total system weight it's a thing, and when you want to go fast, think of how easily and cheaply you can reduce some of that total system weight between your bike, your equipment, your clothing, the stuff that you're putting in your pockets, without having to spend thousands of dollars to save a pound or six. Most people can usually save money and reduce total system weight and therefore go faster without changing a ton of stuff in their current setup.

Speaker 1: 25:48

Now, also, in order to see a difference in training, you have to change your training habits. That could be by adding more volume and being creative about that, because not everybody has a ton of time or adding more intensity. Perhaps it's reshaping the contrast or the rhythm to each week so that you get that contrast and your body can respond the way you want it to and you can get the adaptation you're looking for. This is where the individuality of training and coaching becomes super important, and having a coach or a very well-read, self-actualized, self-coached athlete is super important.

Speaker 1: 26:26

I've provided some resources on our show notes and our landing page to help further guide you along, and I hope each and every one of our listeners here today took away something from this episode. That's it, that's our show. If you liked what you heard awesome Please share it with a friend and definitely tell your training partners about it. That's the best way to grow the show and make sure that we keep pumping out great advice to all of you. Like I said, if you have a training question for me, head over to train rightcom backslash podcast and click on ask a training question. There's also a ton of resources there, especially within our train right membership for our self-coached athletes, so you can learn more about training and make sure that you're doing it right.

Speaker 1: 27:10

Be sure to come back next week to the Time Crunch Cyclist podcast, where you'll get more content and more answers to all the questions that you're asking. Thanks again, and keep training right. Thanks for joining us on the Time Crunch Cyclist podcast. We hope you enjoyed the show. If you want even more actionable training advice, head over to train rightcom backslash newsletter and subscribe to our free weekly publication. Each week you'll get in depth training content that goes beyond what we cover here on the podcast. That'll help you take your training to the next level. That's all for now. Until next time, train hard, train smart, train right.