I m looking to improve my time trial ability for 60-100km. What plan should i go for? I just finished my 12 weeks Sufferfest All Purpose Road Intermediate.
Rider profile shifted from Pursuiter to Sprinter.
There’s a specific time trial plan, but it’s designed for events up to 40km.
Do you have your 4DP profiles pre and post the APR-I program? I’m really curious to see how they changed.
I do see there’s a 6 week power builder profile, but it doesn’t say what the focus is. If it’s an SST/FTP focused plan that could be helpful here. Looking through the plans, you could also plan things out using building blocks.
If I was doing things using building blocks in your position, I’d likely do the FTP one and then retest FTP at the end of the month using the half monty ramp test. It’s less taxing so you should be able to do it as a check in at the end of every block without really messing with the rest of your training for the week.
I’d call those test results about equivalent (within powermeter error %) other than the sprint, but that can be pretty variable sometimes. How were the workouts? Did you finish all or most of them? Any rides outside the confines of the app?
Curious what the coaches have to say about this and what the data suggest re changes in 4DP after the APR-I plan.
I think that we’d need a lot more information to say whether a training block was successful or not ie where were you in terms of training prior to starting, how well you stuck to the plan, extra rides, illness, other life factors, nutrition, recover etc. What made you choose the general road plan last time?
I’d say the TT plans could be a good idea. They’re basically FTP focussed plans, which is still very relevant for longer TTs. You’d need good base fitness too for those long events and to prepare your body to be on the bike in an aero position for a long time. Do you, or did you used to, so long hours on the bike? If so the intermediate plan may have left you short of those long hours which is where you’ve found not much change to FTP.
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I criss cross between pursuits and sprinter. The people who can hold high power in the peloton for mile after mile are amazing. I am going through the building blocks now.Base, I found hard, tempo easier, and ftp easiest.MAP is doable ,but having me hanging on , suffering from big map hike in last FF. After this I am looking to try the TT plan
The idea of the easier plans was to build up a base of using oxygen for energy, having sustained as my weakness, I found the base block harder than I expected and seemed to be riding much nearer tempo effort .This may have been psychological because I was switched on to easy rides. The tempo was an easier block .I found the FTP block easier still, there seemed more built in recovery during the workouts and not so much riding at FTP as I expected. .After a while without doing any MAP work, the MAP block has me hanging on but doing the workouts OK. You can only spend so much time at MAP so there are plenty of easy rides in the block as well. I actually feel less fatigued than I was doing the base block. . hard at the time, then 5 mins later you wonder what the fuss was about .,AC block next followed by the TT plan which should resemble something closer to what I will be riding in the spring, hopefully
i did weekend ride outdoor and mark done in the plan… week 10-11 i skipped a few…
Finding base difficult is really hard to comprehend. Boring and mentally taxing because of the nothingness and monotony… Maybe!
Jeez, how hard were you going during base? Other life/work stress?
I would say there are a couple of options here of where to go next, but firstly, I recommend having a recovery week between plans allowing your body some recharge time.
As the focus is time trial I would say this is a good one to aim for and as you have completed intermediate, depending on your time available to train go for advanced?
Another option to consider, as you are wanting to increase the distance is to use the metric century plan (intermediate or advanced depending how you felt coming out of the all purpose intermediate) to increase the distance and then lead into the advanced time trial after that.
We always recommend some strength, yoga and mental toughness on the side too 
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I agree. It’s hard in that you have to pay some attention and keep some pressure on the pedals, so mentally it’s dull but you can’t quite switch off like on a recovery ride either. It shouldn’t be hard to complete physically though, certainly not for 45-60 mins. Longer endurance rides in zone 2 can take some time to build up though.
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It just asks me to do the very thing I find hardest. I often struggle to pedal at 80 watts after hard effort, no amount of dialling down a workout helps.It usually follows a standing stint or something, but within seconds my legs go, and there is no recovery at any level. At one time, before Suff, I had one to one coaching. I was scheduled an easy week and I got really tired during it, so I was scheduled an even easier week. I felt worse so I was given a week with lots of days off, and finally no riding at all. I was accidentally sent a weeks training meant for an elite cyclist. I noticed the name was different on the email, but I acted dumb and did it, the harder week revitalised me.
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I could see why your coach was worried, it sounds like you could have been massively over-trained?
He said his plan was to build me from the bottom up over a couple of years, and so the sessions were mainly HR Z2 , with a 3-5 hour club ride on Sun which seemed mostly HRZ4 The one hardish session was to ride up this slope in progressively harder gears until I could no longer match the cadence he set .There was a cartoon in my office of a man overworked, and a man with nothing to do at the next desk.The man with nothing to do would not change his calendar. That is me, the less you give me to do, the harder it is to motivate me, and the less good I feel about myself for feeling so lazy and lethargic.I grind to a halt and have trouble getting going again