Occasionally I write blog posts that highlight the beautiful places I ride, filled with sunny photos and interesting commentary. This is not one of them.
I did my first FTP test in 10 months today and, surprisingly after my ‘recovery year’, my power numbers were higher than in March. I’ll include a link to my Garmin Connect stats below, but here’s the main damage:
- 20 minute all-out effort: 263 Watts
- 95% of this is 250, which is now my Functional Threshold Power for the next couple of months.
This 250 W number is now in my Garmin 510 and will determine my Power Zones (think Heart Rate Zones for the analog among you) and I will see these zones as I ride my workouts, ensuring that I’m ‘in the zone’. You might think that this sort of thing reduces riding your bike to just numbers, but unless you’re Chris Froome, it’s still possible to enjoy the view.
Anyway, I’m glad it’s over, but I’m happy I did it. Numbers, in this case, don’t really lie, so knowing where I’m at will help me get to where I want to be…which I don’t know yet, so I better get on it! Here is the test protocol that I used today. The last 20 min interval is the all-out effort.
Pretty pictures coming back in the near future.
The Vicious Cycle 