Summary of Facts...

Here it is... I have not blogged in a while. The following is a summary of facts/items of interest that have presented themselves since I last blogged...

1. My FTP is 265 Watts. I did a 30 minute test and that is what I came up with. My pacing was bad again, so I think this number would be OK for an hour effort. Once you get used to these efforts (I did one a week through the winter), it is pretty easy to tell what it will end up at for a full hour.


2. Number one really sucks. That is 50 Watts or more less than my FTP prior to my injury and I have gained weight and lost muscle since then. Long road to recovery (see picture to the right)...


3. I bailed out of the Tour of Atlanta... the reasons follow...

• I have found that my TT position is not powerful due to the tightness in my hip... I can't push over the top of the stroke the way I used to


• My sprint is down over 200 Watts for a 15 second effort


• My fitness seems to only allow around an hour at a high level of effort... I die after an hour and cant put pressure on the pedals. Prior to the injury, I was at around three hours...


• My doc says that I don't need to take a hit on my hip right now. It is not fully fused so it would be very bad to fall on it.

So, the first item above takes me out of time trials... the second takes me out of the sprint stage and any chance for a field sprint... the third kills the RR... and the forth kills the crits...

No reason to race at the back of the pack where the risk of a wreck goes up and there is no chance of winning... so I bailed out of the Tour. It breaks my heart... I trained all winter with that race in mind and it was the race of the year for me and our team. If I go out and kill it on Tuesday Night Worlds next week, I will of course rethink the whole thing, but with the FTP I put out today, I am pretty certain that the outcome will be the same.

I have planned to train my FTP for the next four weeks... like I described before... a FTP workout on Tuesday and 5 min VO2 max workouts on Thursday. I now know where I am and lets see how quick I can bring it upward. The amazing thing is that a 210 Watt NP effort is no a L3 workout for me. That was a sleep on the bike type workout for me pre injury... now it is sweet spot training... or close to it. I will, of course, be pushing the upper end of L3 for all workouts between my FTP, 5 min, and long ride workouts. I will be growing my weakassed CTL of 59 by 4-8 CTL points per week to a more respectable number while growing my FTP.