Am a 60 year old cyclist & have been getting on the Wahoo indoor trainer a lot since start of December. In 5 months my fitness score has moved from 22.5 to 41.5 and last FTP at end of Feb of 202 (so getting close to a 3w/kg aim) when fitness score was 38.
In that 5 months, monthly DTLs have been 1250 increasing to 1400. Last 2 months hovever the fitness score increase has been less steep, sometimes static or going down a bit although monthly DTLs have increased. Now, there have been two weeks with up to 5 days with no cycling due to working away in early March & April, and since the weather has been getting better am doing longer days outside on the bike (200 to 300DTL’s each). Therefore, rather than bobbing about being mainly in the fatigue zone its more recently larger deltas in fatigue and then rested zones.
So, how to I further increase fitness? By being again more constant on the trainer and staying just within the orange fatigue zone and/or increasing total DTL per month?
The most important exercise practice is consistency. Without consistency it is difficult to make progress.
If you have been inactive, and then start exercising with intensity, you will make rapid initial gains. After that period, the gains become harder because your body has already adapted to the exercise stress you have applied.
Remember that you actually improve your fitness during the rest days when your body overcompensates the repair of the “damage” from the exercise stress.
In the future you will have to apply different stimuli to make gains because your body has already adapted to what you have done. Either increase intensity, duration, or make some other change in order to make gains, which will come much more gradually.
Thanks - yes consitency and upping intensity on the trainer may be a way forward.
In 4 weeks time I’m off to Brittany to ride 600miles over 9 days 50/50 road/offroad - so that should give a large blip on the endurance capabilities. Holding on to and building from that fitness after I come home may be more of a challange!
There’s also a 100 miler overnight flash mob ride at midsummer and I’d love to beat last years time / mph on my heavier, but very comfortable, monster gravel bike
A note on Wahoo’s fitness score: it tracks your long term load. That means that at some point your fitness score will stagnate when you reach the maximum effort at which you can train in a week. You will still continue to improve your endurance and power numbers at a constant training load though, up to a certain point. So while the fitness score and DTL are a good metric to see how you are training relative to your current abilities, do not be discouraged when they taper or plateau!
Other than that, as @Heretic said, of course upping the intensity will work given that you rest enough.
