Since we are still relatively buried under snow, which tuned to ice overnight, school was closed again today. It also meant staying indoors for some wonderful 10-minute FTP intervals. I took a full rest day yesterday, instead of the usual short active recovery ride, mostly because the YMCA was closed so I didn’t have to teach my class. I generally tend to feel “clogged up” when I ride the day after a full rest day, so I was a wondering what today would hold. Having upped my FTP 10 watts after last week’s test, I switched the cassette on my trainer wheel so that I had a 16-tooth ring, which would allow me to hold a more comfortable cadence at 300-310W.

Mentally, I struggled more than I usually do, but I think being indoors had a lot to do with it – well, that and the fact that these intervals were 10W harder than previous FTP workouts. I found myself thinking, “How does one ever string all of these intervals together with no rest?” To help cope during the middle intervals, I decided to recall the pain I was in after a crash last July, which gave me instant perspective, and I started encouraging myself out loud the way I do to my students in spin class – positive self-talk always help, even if it just distracts you from how slowly time is passing. I even pushed a bit harder during the 4th interval, just to build my mental toughness.

The meat of the workout was 5 x 10min at 300-310W, with 5 min rest between each interval. APs for each interval were 303W, 303W, 302W, 309W, and 304W. Interestingly, the consistency of the efforts shows my body was up to the task, even if my brain wasn’t wholly convinced.

Got in a good 20-min FTP test today. It was, to be sure, the hardest effort I have put in on the TT bike since I began my TT-specific training in January. I managed 319 watts for the test, which confirms my observations based on other workouts leading up to the “official” test that my FTP is up 10 watts to 300, about a 3% increase in the 6-weeks of training and 95% of my road bike FTP.

I may have started out a bit too hard in the beginning, averaging 323 W for the first five minutes, and then only 317 for the final 5, but my effort didn’t fall off as much as I thought it had – the middle 10 minutes was a solid 318 watts. I also switched to a new TT-specific saddle yesterday, the kind with the nose cut off. While I would never switch to new equipment the day before a race, I didn’t really think about the fact that it was the day before a performance test. It’s impossible to quantify how that may have affected the test, if at all.

So the good news is, things are headed in the right direction. Considering that I was just hitting 300W at the end of last season, the possibility of adding 10-20W more this year is exciting, and could mean an extra 45-90 seconds off my times this season.

I haven’t stopped cycling, or fallen off the earth, or taken up ballroom dancing. It’s a recovery week, so I’ve not been posting any workout info. It would be pretty boring… 5 days in a row of, “Oh today I did an hour of endurance”. I will definitely report my test results from Saturday or Sunday (depending upon what my wife wants me to do this weekend). Heh.