Training - am I wasting my time?

There are possibly lots of factors at play, not least racing on a trainer being different to doing an FTP test, no? Things like drafting, hills, downhills can come into play. Sometimes worth getting outside and racing CX as well. Could be under the weather, fatigued etc.. It's always worth training but a race isn't "training" as such is it, it's the culmination of you're training.

They are about 45 mins and my general power is about 8–10% under my FTP.

Been a while since I've done one but the TTT with a well matched group always felt like a really good work out.
Average W/kg was always low (about 80%-85% for me) because you're sitting in quite a bit and recovering but my 1 minute power was always way way over ftp (about 140-150%) and 6 or 7 times per course. Effectively it was an hour of 2 minute anaerobic splits. (30 seconds build, 1 minute pull, 30 seconds to drop back and tuck in.

Very different to crits but they're also very short.

It’s always worth training but a race isn’t “training”

Sort of this I think, lots of races isn't training, or rather it's quite an inefficient way of achieving the same thing (i.e. you'll still get fitter, in the same way as tonnes of easy riding will also gradually increase FTP, but over a much longer time-frame).

Training needs to be quite structured so you can carefully increase the load over time and be sure that you're actually increasing it, e.g. how do you *know* you're pushing just the right amount harder every race?

Saying that, I'm very tempted just to sack off the training and focus on just whatever ride I fancy doing on a given day, my training is inconsistent enough that I suspect I'd get just as fit either way, so if you're enjoying the racing but don't have a specific target event/power in mind, just keep at it I guess!

Saying that, I’m very tempted just to sack off the training and focus on just whatever ride I fancy doing on a given day, my training is inconsistent enough that I suspect I’d get just as fit either way, so if you’re enjoying the racing but don’t have a specific target event/power in mind, just keep at it I guess!

That's me... i can't 'train' to numbers, it's mind-numbingly boring. Sometimes i cruise, sometimes i race, sometimes i go outside.... But 'training' nah, sorry, not playing.

Having some sort of goal would help determine if your training/racing is helping towards that goal.

My goal over last winter was to try and get myself into shape to have a realistic chance of beating my best times up South Downs hills between Owslebury and Hawkley this spring/summer, which would take approx 5-20mins to climb. Rather than doing a structured training period, I did increasing amounts of 5-20min Zwift races between January and late March that were z4/z5. It worked, there were a few outdoor segment times that genuinely surprised me, especially given I struggled to get under 80Kg this year and some of my best times were from 2017 when I was 73Kg.

However, while I improved my time up Road To Hell back in March by ~2.5mins, the average power up the 6.9 mile climb was almost identical to last October... Shock as very focussed racing/training on sub 20min power doesn't improve ~35min+ power! 😆

Goal is always weight loss. So I suppose it's worth it to get the calories out of the door. The good thing a out Zwifting is that it's short enough not to make me mega snacky, and its repeatable multiple Times a week. I don't find this with real riding.

@dangerousbrain what I'm hearing is that I need to do my bit on the front 🙂

I think that's what I should be doing now, but last season I was too strong for the group I was in so had to hold back a lot.

It’s always worth training but a race isn’t “training”

I think Zwift races are because they are far less loss on your body than real races. I "raced" last night, felt fresh as a daisy this morning and I'll probably go running later. I wouldn't do that after a real MTB race.

 I don’t have any specific goal in mind these days for training

I think it's pretty much always better to have a goal in mind when starting on a training plan, isn't it? If weight loss, then eat less ride more is going to work to some degree, it'll need some structure otherwise what's to stop you slacking off if you're not being held accountable? (even if it's just to yourself)

I'm not starting on a training plan. All I'm doing is picking regular workouts for each day. The question is, what effect is 45 minutes of zone 4 likely to have?

I “raced” last night, felt fresh as a daisy this morning

You didn't race hard enough then.
Racing, whether that's bike, Zwift or running should be hard, that's the point of them.
Well, it is for me anyway.

I don't think you can be "training" without a plan. The two are if not synonyms then at least complimentary.

Goal is always weight loss. So I suppose it’s worth it to get the calories out of the door.

In general any decent training load would make keeping weight on an issue.

Training explicitly for weight loss is counter productive as weight loss will almost always mean you get less "fit" in every other metric (loss of muscle mass, loss of FTP, loss of strength, etc) unless starting from a very low base.

I’m not starting on a training plan. All I’m doing is picking regular workouts for each day. The question is, what effect is 45 minutes of zone 4 likely to have?

In isolation, almost nothing? Especially considering how slowly FTP changes.

It's like going to the gym. If you squat 25 reps of 100kg, what effect does that have. Pretty much nothing, it burns very few claories, you won't measurably grow muscle, you won't burn off measurable ammounts of fat.

But if you repeat it again 2 days later with 105kg, and again with 110, 115, 120, etc. Then you're seeing a benefit and getting stronger.

So unless you:
A) Track something
B) Have a plan that progressively overloads that something,
C) Do some other complimentary exercises for it (less critical)

Then the effect won't be much. Other than if you do it sufficiently then you'll be fitter in some unquantifiable way in some unknown point in the future (doesn't sound very motivating when put like that TBH).

@dangerousbrain what I’m hearing is that I need to do my bit on the front 🙂

I think that’s what I should be doing now, but last season I was too strong for the group I was in so had to hold back a lot

Even if you're massively out gunning the rest of the group you should still be able to pull at ftp or above just for much longer periods of time, the rest of the group just works 2nd to 8th mostly and rotates through there.

IIRC second wheel is about 80%, third 70% and so on to about 50% from 5th on (its a while since I looked at the numbers.) it works out pretty much as a strong B at 3.9w/kg can be held by a barely a B at 3.1w/kg so, as long as folks are rotating onto and off of your wheel you need to be a lot lot stronger to drop them, if your technique is good. As soon as you kick a little hard, pull too much on an incline etc etc you'll spit them. In theory though if you do an hour at ftp*, and the folks behind you rotate properly, they should have an easy race of it even if their ftp is a good w/kg behind yours. Having spent an hour at ftp you will certainly not feel like you didn't put in the effort!

think that’s what I should be doing now, but last season I was too strong for the group I was in so had to hold back a lot.

Unless you were a couple of cats higher then you're just riding the wrong tactics. If you're a stronger rider you should go longer at "lower" output so you don't rip the group apart. By riding to a set Watts on the front but varying duration for individual riders we got everyone in a mixed D-B team at average 90-95% of FTP for a TTT. But that was based on 130-140% pulls on the front in a team of 8.

And doing nearly an hour at 90% FTP on an over/under basis certainly made a huge difference to my fitness even on it's own. Throw in the odd crit race and some longer rides and it was massive.

Most here will remember I was in the same frame of mind a few weeks ago. To decide whether I ditch my coach and move to Trainer road, I did two things:

a) Full committed to an 8 week XCO training plan to my next race to see if full commitment would yield results / be something I want to continue with
b) I bought a 150mm trail bike with absolutely no intention of doing intervals or lightening it in a way way. It’s brief was to allow me to enjoy rides with “landscape” leading to beer/tea

B) has been an utter success. I’ve enjoyed lower effort rides with the bike flattering my skills and having no “first to the top pretentions”

A) also a success. Remembering that I’ve trained for four years for 6-12hr endurance, last night with a prior FTP of 282w, I completed a rolling Zwift race with 38 mins at 275w average. I’d be confident then I’ve increased my ftp over 20 mins. Now, I came 43rd of 71 which I was moaning about this morning. I was also moaning that my average watts could have been higher had I not had to have breaks from 4+wkg turns pulling the group along, but as above realise that “tactics” played against me with my group refusing to help chase the gap and me accidentally breaking the draft at the top of a climb closing to within 3s but not going eyeballs out to get in the group. You can see on Zwiftpower that my 3.6wkg race was pretty much the same wkg of everyone in front of me. So it wasn’t power being the issue it was tactics.

So my answer, if you want to train with a racing goal find yourself an alternative option to have a break from the monotony, and find the right way to measure a result. Placing in a Zwift race is unlikely to be it. My issue was 8 months of constant training grinding me down.

So unless you:
A) Track something

15 sec w/kg
1 min w/kg
5 min w/kg
20 min w/kg

It’s always worth training

Yeah....no
Zwift, Smart trainers, power meters etc kill the joy. Ride your bike, have fun. I go out on group rides most weeks where lots of the riders have power meters that likely cost more than my bike. I doubt they are having more fun, infarct a lot seem to be having much less fun. For us average nodders if you want to get faster, ride more and do some fast rides, if you want to lose weight, ride more, try to eat less off the bike, if you want to ride further, ride more. If you want to win a Zwift race, pretend you have lost 10kg......

If you actually want to race and be competitive by all means train, otherwise stop over analysing and enjoy the pedalling.

With the exception of some very specific forms, or for (relatively) untrained athletes, racing isn't great training. Great practice. Good for skills development and education. Not for making you gaster. Neither, really, is a group smashfest ride.

Training requires you to progressively increase the stimulus to a given energy system, then give it fuel and rest to strengthen.

You might come back from your Wednesday night drop ride knackered with a large TSS burden, but you should think of this like going into the gym and repeatedly throwing random weights around the room in-between sets of burpees vice going in and doing 5x5 of strict deadlifts.

The caveat to that principle is that "relatively untrained" is a pretty high bar and most of us sit under that.

Goal is always weight loss.

Then ride how you want and put all your mental effort into eating better....

Then ride how you want and put all your mental effort into eating better….

Isn’t Molly the one who adamant that eating less and moving more doesn’t help him lose weight???

that eating less and moving more doesn’t help him lose weight

i need to know about this immediately.

Zwift, Smart trainers, power meters etc kill the joy. Ride your bike, have fun.

Speak for yourself.

I shouldn't have started this thread. I was asking about the physical effects of a specific workout. I didn't want lifestyle advice. I've been at the cycling thing a while now...

Isn’t Molly the one who adamant that eating less and moving more doesn’t help him lose weight???

Yes, he is. Riding how I want makes me either very hungry and tired, or not hungry and fitter. It doesn't make me much lighter.

With the exception of some very specific forms

Like Zwift racing, you mean? The Zwift crits are one of the best training workouts I've ever done for increasing FTP numbers and form on the outside bike. The TTTs less so, hence the question. There may be better workouts out there, but the stuff I've been given in the past by coaches has not worked this well, for whatever reason.

It’s an interested point. As you know I train - for specific and long endurance events. I know my ftp went up, and I’ve kind of hit a ceiling at 3.8-4wkg, I’m aerobically a lot fitter and I’m much better at climbing hills.

Yet and albeit some of our stronger riders - some of our club have been riding Zwift events commenting and club rides with the former the only addition to there normal practice of many years and have pushed their power to be regularly finishing events with ftp’s from 4.5 to 5.2wkg. One of those is in his 50’s, the other 63.

Maybe they’ve just become very good at Zwift events, but this doesn’t feel like they’ve not gained from just racing in Zwift. In fact, my Tuesday night workout was deliberately replaced by my coach with the WTRL series to allow competitiveness to push me harder than I might with intervals alone, on that basis I’d suggest Molgrips is right.

I’m guessing where the argument is that to consolidate and continue with gains longer term it does need a properly focused plan including rest and low effort days.

The question is, what effect is 45 minutes of zone 4 likely to have?

If you do it often enough, you'll become faster doing 45 min efforts in Z4

Thursday lunches on Zwift are great for VO2 Max smashes, with a short recovery, then go again... Like a mini "The Gorby" https://whatsonzwift.com/workouts/less-than-60-minutes-to-burn/the-gorby

Today's menu...
1200: https://zwiftpower.com/events.php?zid=3170953
1215: https://zwiftpower.com/events.php?zid=3170957 (not usually the same route as Micro above)
1230: https://zwiftpower.com/events.php?zid=3170964

~8mins / 8mins / 4.5mins @ 4W/Kg

Zwift Insider have been running Tiny Races on Saturdays for a few weeks now, they are getting huge fields (often 100+ per category) and are absolutely brutal smashfests! Four races, often custom length, starting at every 15mins at 0900 and 1500.

I shouldn’t have started this thread. I was asking about the physical effects of a specific workout. I didn’t want lifestyle advice

Yet you still started it! 😉 On this forum of all places.

I've not read every response, but I always use the rule that you need to ride twice a week to maintain and 3 rides a week to improve. So, if this ZTRL TTT gets you over that number its only good.

The flipside is over training may negatively impact your fitness and introduce fatigue...

Yeah….no
{stuff}

Counter to this, training can have some great effects if it is structured with a goal in mind.

I train so that when I am on the bike either on group rides or out in the hills I can have more fun. Couple of half hour interval sessions and a couple bodyweight circuits each week counts as training and putting that effort in at home has made my bike time so much more fun. I can absolutely guarantee that spending that time 'just riding my bike' would absolutely not improve my capabilities in the way that the same time training has - but what I can guarantee is that as a result of training when I do go to trail centres or out on big rides I can go for longer or be fresher for the descents after gruelling climbs. End result is more fun for me and it only costs me 2-3 hours a week in short sessions.

It is always worth training if that training will add value to ones usual riding.

The Zwift crits are one of the best training workouts I’ve ever done for increasing FTP numbers and form on the outside bike.

FWIW, personal experience doesn't tally with that. Once I got beyond shaking off "I'm fat and lazy*" the crits (and other short sharp efforts) mainly just improved my ability to suffer, it wasn't that I actually got fitter doing them.
Much longer efforts at relatively high numbers on the other hand did work for me.

A lot of it is horses for courses.

*I've never really shaken off the lazy bit.

I love the Crits... but i'd be inclined to agree that it doesn't really make you any better at anything other than racing the Crits....

It won't stop me racing them though 😀 😀

Yes, but all Molgrips wants to do is lose weight, and presumably stay fittish. In that context a diet of 45 minute , quite hard efforts will be effectivish for the latter (as you won't improve much IF you're already fit). After a while you'll start to drop fitness - they're not long enough to replace long rides, or hard enough to replace really hard efforts. You need to do something else as well. OR are you still improving at them?

Re. weight loss - I doubt they're optimal, but they're a lot better than nothing, and hopefully afterwards you're not so broken you need to eat everything-

'If you do it often enough, you’ll become faster doing 45 min efforts in Z4' - best answer on this thread. There are always exceptions to training rules tho' - I used to go running with someone who used to do nothing bar one hour burnups at 5.30 mile pace and a Sunday morning 20 at <6 minute pace. Intervals about once a month, and he ran a 2.10 marathon of that (yes those numbers are correct), of what would now be termed junk miles

To Kryton - when I read you were doing Z races as you pushed harder I reacted a little, but that might be that you are mentally fried and thus to mentally tires to get intervals done correctly

Ther

i can’t ‘train’ to numbers, it’s mind-numbingly boring. Sometimes i cruise, sometimes i race, sometimes i go outside…. But ‘training’ nah, sorry, not playing.

This is also me. I've always ridden for fun, with moderate fitness as a side benefit.

However, I had covid in june which has impacted my athletic performance to the point I can't sustain riding with my regular group.

I've since reluctantly dropped to a low rate training plan to avoid stringing myself out too thin, and its actually reaping dividends in excess of my expectations. I'm still bored pottering about in Z2 and Z3, but the edge is taken off by the progress I'm making. That and the fact that Im not good for much else so have to just suck it up.

To Kryton – when I read you were doing Z races as you pushed harder I reacted a little, but that might be that you are mentally fried and thus to mentally tires to get intervals done correctly

No, it’s because for me at least the adrenaline and competitive nature of a race allows me to punch out higher and longer efforts. It’s also more specific to my forthcoming IRL XC race than intervals would be - albeit not replacing Saturday morning Smashfest on my MTB on singletrack as the other option.

I’m not having issue with interval completion at all - yesterday 5x5 at Threshold the day after the Zwift race evidencing that.

With apologies to the OP as the thread's been derailed.

It might just be me but if I simply "ride round for fun" then all my rides just gravitate to a general tempo/zone 3 ride of 3-4hrs. Are people really just going out "for fun" but properly smashing it for an hour one day and then slowly bimbling along for 5 hours another day? And if so, isn't that basically just training anyway. Perhaps the difference is if you care to look at the numbers afterwards or not.

I find that Zwift races make excellent substitutes for V02 max sessions for me. Those sessions on Traineroad are a slightly horrifying chore whereas as if I just do a Zwift race I can hit higher numbers anyway almost without thinking about it. I'm still crap though.

over/under my FTP

FWIW on effects - I don't have a power meter or any expertise in this area but if I do a period of turbo sessions they're mainly over/under threshold (LTHR) intervals which I think is very similar to over/under FTP. Output as high as I can hold at or over threshold for a period then drop to low-mid Z4 for the same period, then back to at or over threshold. I add a minute to the 'over' intervals once I get into the plan, then add an over-under set as I feel fitness increasing.
Over a 12 week period of 1 session a week it's effective for hill climbing power and my ability to recover and repeat an effort, also it raises my base pace noticeably ie Z2 rides where I get further up easy hills before getting to upper Z2 limit (as I understand it the sessions raise max output and thf my power at all levels goes up proportionately).

You mention 45 mins in Z4, If you mean trad Z4 80-90% Max HR I'm not sure what effect that would have but sweetspot training seems to recommend around 80-85% of max HR?

FWIW, personal experience doesn’t tally with that. Once I got beyond shaking off “I’m fat and lazy*” the crits (and other short sharp efforts) mainly just improved my ability to suffer, it wasn’t that I actually got fitter doing them.
Much longer efforts at relatively high numbers on the other hand did work for me.

A lot of it is horses for courses.

Yeah I think it varies by person. Physically, I'm a sprinter (this isn't a brag, it's just to do with type I/II muscle ratios) so I think I respond to those crits much more quickly.

they’re not long enough to replace long rides

I am still doing those, I'm not ONLY doing TTTs.

@molgrips

No, that's not the specific use case I meant. A specific use case might be racing a TT on a specific period for improving tting, or a hill climb champs at improving your 5min power.

If you aren't interested in a viewpoint from the scientific literature and just want to feel better about doing the TTs, then that's totally cool. Do the TTs. You probably are untrained enough that they will contribute to your fitness a bit.

If you aren’t interested in a viewpoint from the scientific literature

I was asking for a scientific point of view.

Training requires you to progressively increase the stimulus to a given energy system, then give it fuel and rest to strengthen.

That's still possible with Zwift I think, to a degree. For example, you can spend gradually longer in the front group of a race. Whatever the stimulus ends up being, my performance does improve week on week (in terms of feel at particular power, relative to the pack, relative to the people in the group I ride with, and my estimated FTP whatever that's worth) when I do the regular races. It could be that by chance they hit whatever spot I need to hit to improve whatever makes me feel fast.

However, they seem to be largely aerobic. Ideally I'd combine that with some strength workouts, I think, but I struggle to do those at the same time as actual biking.