The week started out with a bang!
A full week of training
I finished the FTP bike test and my FTP turned out to be 251 watts. With my current weight of around 75 kg, I am currently at 3.34 W/kg which is dead center in the moderate category.
Based on my previous results when my FTP peaked at around 290 W and my usual race weight of something like 70 kg, I expect to climb into the higher good or lower very good categories. Memo to myself: train better and eat less shit ;)
Want to read more about the power to weight ratio? Check out this nice article!
The run was a whole different beast. I was aiming for something like 4:20 to 4:25 min/km and felt pretty good during the first 10 minutes. Then I realized that I am not really at that level since my run training last year has been sub-optimal so I had to make peace with a 4:31 min/km. I hope to get back to some 4:00 or 3:55 min/km which I was knocking out in 2018 while getting ready for IM Austria.
As for the swim, I got into a little bit of traffic while performing my test intervals but here are the results.
400 meters - 7 min 4 sec (1:46 min/100m)
200 meters - 3 min 19 sec (1:40 min/100m)
100 meters - 1 min 35 sec (1:35 min/100m)*
50 meters - 0 min 45 sec (1:30 min/100m)*
* these two aren’t needed for the CSS test but give you a better look into your swim profile. As you can see in the image below, endurance athletes, like myself, don’t really care about our top speed on short distances but more on the speed we can hold on the longer distances
Because of that, the graph appears flatter than for someone who is good at shorter distances.
My graph is relatively flat (which is good), but not in the range I usually swim (which is bad). I’ll take this as a benchmark for future swims and hope to see the graph climb slowly but steady.
Entering my data into one of the numerous CSS calculators I get a projected speed of 1:53 min/100m which is quite far from the 1:40 min/100m I swam a year and a half ago but if we take into account that I swam 4-5 times since the Covid-19 stuff started I am happy it’s not over 2:00 :D
The rest of the week was spent with some strength training, a long run (1 hour) and a long bike ride (2 hours) all at super low intensity.
As with all those test, we have to keep in mind that these aren’t foolproof systems and we should take them all with a grain of salt. If one or two workouts using the prescribed paces and power outputs seems too easy we can try increasing them a bit or if they feel too hard (which shouldn’t come up that often) we can decrease them a bit but we always have to keep in mind that form is king.
It makes no sense at all to push for higher numbers if your form sucks. That way we can prevent injuries and burn out which is a common problem especially among self trained amateurs like myself who put too much too quickly on themselves and end up worse than expected.
Before I sign off, I’ll just post two small tables which I’ll keep updating with distances covered in each discipline, as well as time spend in each of the plus the strength training I am doing.
You can check it out below.
| Distance | Swim | Bike | Run | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Week | 1.2 km | 110 km | 18.5 km | |||
| Total | 1.2 km | 110 km | 18.5 km |
| Time | Swim | Bike | Run | Strength | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Week | 0:32 | 3:56 | 1:37 | 1:37 | ||||
| Total | 0:32 | 3:56 | 1:37 | 1:37 |
And that’s it. Next week will have more specific training based on all those numbers so I can’t wait to put on my gear and get started.
Until then,
Stay healthy.