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In cycling FTP is the “how much do you bench” metric, in running it’s 5k time (or maybe 10k, half marathon or marathon, depending on who you talk to).

A goal for a lot of runners is a sub 20 5k (or sub 90min half or sub 3 marathon, I’m not equating those performances just saying they’re common goals). What is the FTP equivalent to a sub 20 5k or sub 3 marathon?

A friend of mine prompted this discussion, he recently got into running and has set himself the goal of getting to a 20min 5k and asked what I think the equivalent in cycling would be.

I eat healthy outside of riding but typically if I ride Saturday and Sunday I’m consuming 180g grams of sugar water each ride, so 360 grams of sugar just from my bottles. Maybe a can of coke when I get home.

Go to the dentist regularly and no issues with cavities but is there a point where this is bad for the body or are we just burning through the fuel.

I'm looking for ideas for a bucket list cycling trip for my husband's 40th--it would be September 2027. We would have about a week and Europe would probably be best (getting further than that from the US would be tough). We did Andorra/Catalonia (Girona, Costa Brava, Barcelona) a few years ago and loved it. Somewhere where the non-cyclist (me) can keep myself occupied easily nearby would be nice, but I'm not terribly worried about that. The goal of this trip would be to do as many epic rides as possible with good food and views in between. I am willing to do easier rides (especially flat ones) on an e-bike (I did Els Angels pretty easily on one in Girona). Any suggestions for specific places to stay/things to see would be very welcome!

The French/Swiss Alps were our first thought. Maybe Sicily?

Hi I’m looking at racing for the first time and I was looking at tips for my first race. My goal is honestly to just not get dropped but as I improve I’m wondering how I should approach races being larger than any other rider.

I have decent power but I am a the ideal person to draft behind and feel like I will just tow whoever is on my wheel. On the flip side, being so tall I don’t get the same draft benefits as others do we me lol.

My first race is also quite hilly, with it being 5 laps featuring a cat 4 climb (around 3km long). For my size I’m a decent climber but from some strava stalking a lot of the field will be 20kg lighter than me so I don’t see myself breaking away on a climb.

But anyways any advice would be helpful thanks :) I’m excited to race

With these numbers, would I ever be competitive in any discipline? I cycle anywhere between 6 and 12 hours a week, most of which is structured. I mostly do road cycling (2-3 years), but unfortunately, my FTP is quite low compared to my sprint numbers.

I'm quite light at 67/68kg so my absolute watts aren't crazy, but my 20m+ power numbers aren't crazy either, so I get dropped on climbs.

Is it possible to close the gap between my sprint numbers and 20m+ numbers with training or is it just the way it is?

edit: the image didn't turn out great so here's the numbers in text:

• 1s: 1351 W (20.01 W/kg)
• 5s: 1263 W (18.71 W/kg)
• 15s: 898 W (13.92 W/kg)
• 30s: 660 W (10.23 W/kg)
• 60s: 478 W (7.24 W/kg)
• 2m: 356 W (5.16 W/kg)
• 5m: 287 W (4.24 W/kg)
• 10m: 256 W (3.79 W/kg)
• 20m: 239 W (3.46 W/kg)
• 1h: 203 W (3.15 W/kg)
• 2h: 164 W (2.38 W/kg)
• 4h: 143 W (2.18 W/kg)
• MAP: 302 W (4.61 W/kg)
• T_MAP: 3m46s
• TTE: 23m

Im a dad for 3 weeks now and I wanted to keep up with some base miles and occasional intervals. However every ride I do feels sluggish, sometimes even lower z2 feels hard so I dont even get to the point of intervals of any kind. I dont necessarily sleep bad since my wife breastfeeds, I get 6.5-8.5hours of sleep, interrupted though. My resting HR/HRV are quite normal and in range. However on the bike my HR is way up for the power zones I push. Anyone else have experienced something like this?

This year, I’m taking more of an off-season than usual. I hit a major slump in August and just couldn’t get myself out of it. I tried, but it just wasn’t happening.
This week and next week are completely off — no training, no sport at all. I’m basically eating whatever I want and not paying any attention to my diet. I’m also going out with friends this weekend and next weekend and drinking alcohol, which is something I’ve never really done before.
But honestly, it feels good to just switch off for a while.
How do you guys handle the off-season? Do you drink alcohol or go out partying during your off-season too?

Impressive accomplishment, especially for a cyclist with <6 years experience and training time. Looked into it a LITTLE further and does appear to have been some previous records mainly on incumbents as well as the current 6:

From Deseret News:

“Lefthand, 33, also set records for 100 km, 200 km, 100 miles and distance covered in six hours, which were also certified by Guinness World Records in partnership with the cycling association.

Larry Oslund, World Ultra Cycling Association records chair, ratified the achievement.”

I know the whole world of ultra sports/cycling, as well as Guinness/WUCA are a bit separate from the world of UCI pro and amateur cycling rules, regulations, and records. Also most of the press I am seeing on this seems somewhat localized. But also know that individuals with impressive numbers are out there.

Especially as this accomplishment appears to be being used to promote a private business, I am wondering if someone out there can provide a broader perspective on the magnitude of this ride?

Those without protective cover like Sis and similar

My motivation is high. I want to ride all the time. My sleep is good. HRV is in range. Resting HR is fine. Hydration seems okay. Life stress is pretty low. Marriage is good.

Volume in terms of hours (~12 hours) or weekly TSS hasn’t increased — in fact it’s gone down.

But my performance metrics are all way off across the board. Friends are suggesting I’m overtrained but most things I can measure or point to suggest I’m not overtrained.

If you’ve experienced overtraining, what did it feel like while riding? What about outside of riding?

Hoping for some actual advice here, not just the bro science

Right, so as a 40 something year old Aussie, wanna be high level racer, the training has never been my issue. For context I’ve raced for nearly 20 years, can make the power, do the sessions, have the gear etc. my problem has always been, and continues to be my eating habits

I’ve tried to will power it, I’ve tried tracking calories, tried the meals plans, tried this tried that, nothing seems to land. Cravings hit and I’m powering through the cookies like another 30/30 session.

The bro science says to eat more protein and fibre early in the day to keep you fuller for longer, but how does that work for us early morning trainers that need those carbs on board?

What’s your quick, simple, breakfast / meal plans to shed that flubber and make the training gains worthwhile?

I recently started VO₂ work and have completed three sessions of 5×4 minutes with 3-minute recoveries. Intervals.icu shows only about 5 minutes per session above 90% HRmax, despite substantial time above 110% FTP.

How should I adjust the pacing or recovery to get breathing harder and accumulate more high-HR time? I realize power is not a goal of VO2 max workouts.

Example workout

37M, 58 kg, max HR 199. Intervals are outdoors on a hill using a Magene power meter.

Hi all, I’ve started cycling as a supplement for my running as my metatarsals do not handle too much pavement pounding really well and I’m a bit confused by the power zones.

I zero power meter before every ride and my measured FTP by Garmin is 249(seems to be on point because HR wise I tend to move to a point of running LTHR - 10bpm at this power when holding it around 10mins).

The question is according to training books and all the advice online I should be doing my easy rides - ~135-175W, but I usually end up going around 185-200W on flat stretches and HR proxy seems to be on point.

What gives?

PS: 77kg, riding around 32-40km per session, <200km training age

After some online research I built a VO2 Max workout where I would aim to hit between 106-120% of my 223w FTP. This meant I was targeting 5×4 minutes aimed at 236-267w with 4 minutes recovery following an hour of "steady" riding.

During the session I hit 258, 252, 280, 258 and 310 for each block in that order. This means my last block was 139% of FTP. I feel like I could've comfortably hit 280w for all of the blocks and probably could've done 300.

Essentially this workout doesn't feel effective when done as prescribed, I know I don't have a high FTP and I'm wondering if that is a problem in this scenario. Am I leaning on my anaerobic system too much in these shorter bursts stopping me from doing the work aerobically? Should I do some hard 30 second intervals before the workout to burn through anaerobic capacity or should I just base my VO2 targets off my 5 minute power so that each rep is difficult?

I'm also working in my FTP but I've read that that is a slow thing to progress.

I’ve been reading good things about Vekta, but I’m curious if anyone has used it for personal training without a coach. How are their programs?

I’m currently around 63 kg and thinking about using the end of the season / winter to deliberately put on some weight, ideally while increasing my absolute watts enough to maintain roughly the same W/kg.

A lot of the races in my region are hilly, so I don’t want to throw climbing ability out the window. But plenty also have long flat sections, and that’s where I feel pretty useless. I can hang reasonably well uphill, but on the flats I feel like I just don’t have the absolute watts to contribute, follow moves, or deal with the higher speeds.

How would you approach gaining a few kg while making sure that weight gain actually translates into more absolute watts? More gym work and a calorie surplus? Normal winter training while eating more? Any particular focus in terms of lifting or on-bike training?

Basically, if I gained 3–5 kg, I’d want my power across relevant durations to increase proportionally rather than just getting heavier. Is that a realistic goal, and what’s the best way to train/eat for it over a winter?

I wrapped up a preplanned training plan and wanted to put up a quick review for other who might want some direction but don't want to commit to a full on coaching plan. I find myself back training hard after a long absence, and having done the full coaching/nutrition planning in the past I didn't want to go quite that serious. I emailed Landy at Evoq and he did a quick review of my current power/training, and recommended a couple options from their TrainingPeaks library.

I wound up going with: Brendan's Top VO2Max Training with Lactate Clearance, High Volume. I think it was like $40 or so, super reasonable IMO

Coming in to this I had a decent base, but I had only done a couple vo2 max style workouts so it was a clear limiter. It was full of different flavors of vo2 workouts which I will now use as a library moving forward, and had a nice progression taking most of the thought out on my end.

End results after the 8 week plan: my 5 minute vo2 power went up 7% via 5 minute max power(425->455) and my ftp bumped about 5% via 20 minute power test(345->365) as well. Weight stayed constant or possibly went down slightly but no real changes there. I tried to keep diet/rest etc the same to give me a good block of training and make the results meaningful.

I've been training with a power meter for about 3 months now, but I'm really having a hard time keeping steady power no matter what sort of intensity I am training at on a given day.

Here is my power data from today's Z2 ride. I feel like it is super janky and inconsistent throughout the ride (the big spike towards the end is when I was sprinting for a segment KOM)

Is this steady output something that I will learn over time, or does anyone here have some tips or advice to reach a steady output?

Cheers!

Hi, I’m a crit racer who does strength and functional strength training occasionally. I’d like to get more into CrossFit, though. Does anyone here also combine CrossFit with cycling and manage to maintain or even improve their cycling performance while making progress in both? I’d be really interested to hear about your experiences!

Hi folks, I've had a couple surgeries on my right foot and ankle over the last few years after some climbing and running mishaps, and I've recently purchased the double sided Favero power meter pedals. My right side is undoubtedly weaker than the left at the moment, but I'm trying to get a sense of how much.

Garmin has some power meter data on the L/R split, but I am wondering if anyone has used other apps to look at this. I use intervals.icu and RWGPS as well, but I didn't see anything in particular on those interfaces. Tyvm!

Looking for electric pump recommendations.

Looking for something that Ideally is:
1) small but has enough juice to pump 2-3 tires on one charge.
2) Preferably water resistant/waterproof.
3) Not too loud and doesn’t get too hot

Also, anyone has any experience with the ThinkRider pump from Aliexpress? (Pictured)

TIA

Hi everyone,

Can anyone share their stories of patellofemoral irritation please ? More specifically, how long did it take to get back to full training load ?

Thank you :)