Is watt/power based training better than distance based training?

[SwissVan]

Yes, Yes and again Yes!

In the old days HR training was the norm; nowadays PM training is the preferred method to improve in a scientific measurable manner.

Reason - HR fluctuates daily according to a number of different criteria such as your overall wellness, external factors like stress (work and pvt life), sleep patterns and so forth.

However PM Watt training values remain the same!

So if you want to train according to a specific plan, establish what your Functional Threshold Power (FTP) is and have your power zones and plan (towards your end goal) set up for those, combined with specific small periodic increments as you improve.

Your HR will just follow whatever your training will be and over time you will see gradual and regular improvement; i.e. increase in achievable FTP and overall lower HR in those PM zones.

My FTP improved over five years from 225 (start) to 319 (current).

I can buy into the power is a better and an easier metric to use for training.....provided you have all the right equipment (that’s another argument in favour of HR based training), however one thing that I’ve always wondered when watching the professionals is why so many of them still wear heart rate straps?

 

If watts is truly the one and only higher grail then surely they would have ditched the HR input?

 

I suspect they are combining the best of both worlds...

 

The problem with watts is if you have multiple bikes then it gets expensive to have the same systems on all your bikes, HR is much more efficient in this case and can be carried over to other sports like swimming and running

[DieselnDust]

Yes, but which one will be faster around my backyard trails...

 

the 26 er

 

[PlemPlem]

I can buy into the power is a better and an easier metric to use for training.....provided you have all the right equipment (that’s another argument in favour of HR based training), however one thing that I’ve always wondered when watching the professionals is why so many of them still wear heart rate straps?

 

If watts is truly the one and only higher grail then surely they would have ditched the HR input?

 

I suspect they are combining the best of both worlds...

 

The problem with watts is if you have multiple bikes then it gets expensive to have the same systems on all your bikes, HR is much more efficient in this case and can be carried over to other sports like swimming and running

 

Depending on your PM, you are correct that for different bikes you will struggle to interchange it between them, especially if it is crank spider based. If your PM is pedal based it is obviously easier to move it around between bikes.But this was not the question; any PM will always be more expensive than a HRM. This becomes an economic discussion whether you want to spend your cash or not.

The one major difference is that your intensity of your required training session according to your training plan will always be the same, if Power based!

In other words, if you are planning to achieve a TSS of 90 in an one hour interval session on your trainer, the TSS 90 for the same workout will be the same today, tomorrow, next week etc.

Your HR will change daily according to way your body feels. So if you are doing a TSS 90 workout, today your ave. HR might be 150, tomorrow 155, next week 145 etc.

So if your workouts are HR based, your intensities for the workouts will also always change, which might be counter productive to what you might be trying to achieve.

To be clear, HR is still very important as it will tell you in what state you currently are; i.e. if your HR is higher than usual, you might be coming down with a bug. If low, you might be getting fitter but also might not have recovered sufficiently from previous sessions.

Ultimately, what you want to see is your Power zones and FTP (workout intensity) go up while your ave. HR either remains the same or, even better, slows down.

[RobertWhitehead]

Have you tried the 4DP from Sufferfest yet? They don't just measure a normal FTP, they take 4 measurements and this is then applied to all future videos. https://thesufferfest.com/pages/4dp

 

Neil is also a legit coach with some achievements under his belt: https://thesufferfest.com/blogs/training-resources/meet-neal-henderson-coach-to-the-pros-scientists-behind-the-suffering

 

After you've completed two 5 sec sprints and a 5 min all out slog you then do a 20 min FTP test with tired legs.Then you cap the 1 hour session with a 1 min sprint. The values are then applied by some or other fancy algorithm.

If you then do a racing or speed video you work mostly on the shorter values and less of the longer 20min values.

The profile then looks like below: 

 

 

I think this is the best advice on here.

 

Those crit races on zwift seen quite legit. Maybe run a program and then smash one of those online crit races once a week?

 

[SwissVan]

Depending on your PM, you are correct that for different bikes you will struggle to interchange it between them, especially if it is crank spider based. If your PM is pedal based it is obviously easier to move it around between bikes.But this was not the question; any PM will always be more expensive than a HRM. This becomes an economic discussion whether you want to spend your cash or not.

The one major difference is that your intensity of your required training session according to your training plan will always be the same, if Power based!

In other words, if you are planning to achieve a TSS of 90 in an one hour interval session on your trainer, the TSS 90 for the same workout will be the same today, tomorrow, next week etc.

Your HR will change daily according to way your body feels. So if you are doing a TSS 90 workout, today your ave. HR might be 150, tomorrow 155, next week 145 etc.

So if your workouts are HR based, your intensities for the workouts will also always change, which might be counter productive to what you might be trying to achieve.

To be clear, HR is still very important as it will tell you in what state you currently are; i.e. if your HR is higher than usual, you might be coming down with a bug. If low, you might be getting fitter but also might not have recovered sufficiently from previous sessions.

Ultimately, what you want to see is your Power zones and FTP (workout intensity) go up while your ave. HR either remains the same or, even better, slows down.

 

Ja ja, mostly true as long as your sport is cycling only.

I'd be interested to know if you have lets say 3 bikes, road race bike, tri bike and mtb all with different power meters.... how much fun is that to accurately correlate?

 

Heaven knows how runners, swimmers, canoeists,.... and other non cycling sports manage to train only using HR nowadays....

[Captain Fastbastard Mayhem]

Have you tried the 4DP from Sufferfest yet? They don't just measure a normal FTP, they take 4 measurements and this is then applied to all future videos. https://thesufferfest.com/pages/4dp

 

Neil is also a legit coach with some achievements under his belt: https://thesufferfest.com/blogs/training-resources/meet-neal-henderson-coach-to-the-pros-scientists-behind-the-suffering

 

After you've completed two 5 sec sprints and a 5 min all out slog you then do a 20 min FTP test with tired legs.Then you cap the 1 hour session with a 1 min sprint. The values are then applied by some or other fancy algorithm.

If you then do a racing or speed video you work mostly on the shorter values and less of the longer 20min values.

The profile then looks like below:

I saw this in action on GCN when one of them (Neil?) did it for one of their training vids and compared his Pre and post figures. He was a bit stuffed, afterwards. ????

[RobertWhitehead]

Ya, they're using a lot of the GCN presenters to do stuff, Olie recently tried to beat Eddy Merckx' 1 hour track record. 

GCN also have 6 training videos on the Sufferfest app as well, mostly shorter ones but still some nice training. And then if you're really really hardcore you can try their K.o.S challenge: 

 

https://thesufferfest.com/pages/knights-of-sufferlandria - they even list the knights on their website grouped per country, quite cool

 

I saw this in action on GCN when one of them (Neil?) did it for one of their training vids and compared his Pre and post figures. He was a bit stuffed, afterwards.

Edited March 10, 2020 by RobertWhitehead

[Duane_Bosch]

 

Heaven knows how runners, swimmers, canoeists,.... and other non cycling sports manage to train only using HR nowadays....

 

 Ha. Indeed.

 

It's interesting to me when I compare my HR workouts vs my power based workouts that I tend to blow through more calories in my HR based spinning classes than the power based workouts I do on the trainer at home.

 

It might be the music and that I have a guy barking instructions at me in the spinning studio or it might be that when I'm on the trainer at home I work to the power (i.e. do the minimum)

 

Riding outside ABSOLUTELY TRUMPS BOTH THO.

 

I think it's because on a real bike in the real world you aren't just smashing pedals. There are hundreds of micro adjustments every second. I also find it much easier to get into the red when there's an actual hill that I have to ride up and not just a song with 60 beats a minute.

 

I watch a triathlon guy on youtube called Triathlon Taren and he recommends that you do an outside run and ride at least once a week to keep those control muscles in shape. Interesting.

[SwissVan]

Ha. Indeed.

 

It's interesting to me when I compare my HR workouts vs my power based workouts that I tend to blow through more calories in my HR based spinning classes than the power based workouts I do on the trainer at home.

 

It might be the music and that I have a guy barking instructions at me in the spinning studio or it might be that when I'm on the trainer at home I work to the power (i.e. do the minimum)

 

Riding outside ABSOLUTELY TRUMPS BOTH THO.

 

I think it's because on a real bike in the real world you aren't just smashing pedals. There are hundreds of micro adjustments every second. I also find it much easier to get into the red when there's an actual hill that I have to ride up and not just a song with 60 beats a minute.

 

I watch a triathlon guy on youtube called Triathlon Taren and he recommends that you do an outside run and ride at least once a week to keep those control muscles in shape. Interesting.

I once had a training program from the famous Dr Ferrari, when I asked him if it was better to train on the IDT or outdoors for the hard sessions, he said: “Riding in the lab (indoors) is no substitute for real riding”

[Fat Boab]

 

Is that you the uni-baller?

 

 

I once had a training program from the famous Dr Ferrari, when I asked him if it was better to train on the IDT or outdoors for the hard sessions, he said: “Riding in the lab (indoors) is no substitute for real riding”

[DieselnDust]

Ja ja, mostly true as long as your sport is cycling only.

I'd be interested to know if you have lets say 3 bikes, road race bike, tri bike and mtb all with different power meters.... how much fun is that to accurately correlate?

 

Heaven knows how runners, swimmers, canoeists,.... and other non cycling sports manage to train only using HR nowadays....

 

 

Oh you called. .....err whats it oh correleation between different power meters on different bikes?

Oh jirre this is a bit of a maze to navigate.

I have a PM on my MTB, and two bikes. (Like I said I bought into the super cool aid)

 

So yes a PM will give you a TSS value. Well it kinda has too since the TSS value was developed by Andrew Coggan(?) and is a training peaks licensed trademark. It will give you a HR TSS as well by the way. It just might not be the same number as the PM will give you for the the SAME RPE.

 

Now back to the different PM's on different bikes maze. Which one is right? If i used my IDT (direct drive and often considered to the the benchmark for accuracy), each of my PM's either under reads or over reads when compared to the IDT.

On a different day they play merry go round and the a different one will under rear or over read.

 

So after thinking about it, I said *&(% it, it means sweet fannyall because the normalised data still shows the trend to be upwards. and the longer the period over which I average the PM readings the closer the spread of data points i.e. they don't drift that far apart.

 

Now when I take three different HR straps and three different Head units the spread is much much tighter. Why? because HR is HR. there is no warmed up strain gauge, votage differences due to temperature of the battery and all that.

and when I train with HR I don't look at the HR tren I look at the Average speed across segments trend.

Power is also variable because I don't weigh the same every day and this influences the amount  fop force I can put into the drivetrain. So yes I can go and look at my power out ut but what I'm interested in is whether I am faster or not.

My power out put is only of interest  when i sit in the coffee shop with my legs wide open and the cigar hanging from my lips and answer "Well, there's a 3 in it.....!" puff

 

Power is good if you are interested in identifying your weaknesses scientifically and developing your training to fix or optimise those weaknesses so they are less influential and developing your strengths to be more influential to the race outcome.

 

If you just want to get fitter then HR and a speedometer are fine. A PM like a dynamo-meter is a tuning tool, not a design tool.

 

So how I handle using different tools? I look at how much faster or slower I am over certain segments

Edited March 10, 2020 by DieselnDust

[Duane_Bosch]

Yissis It's annoying reading your posts and agreeing with them.

 

* only kidding. 

Edited March 10, 2020 by Duane_Bosch

[Captain Fastbastard Mayhem]

Yissis It's annoying reading your posts and agreeing with them.

Same here.

 

Not kidding. Always good to learn more about things I know little about. 

Edited March 10, 2020 by Captain Fastbastard Mayhem

[Captain Fastbastard Mayhem]

Oh you called. .....err whats it oh correleation between different power meters on different bikes?

Oh jirre this is a bit of a maze to navigate.

I have a PM on my MTB, and two bikes. (Like I said I bought into the super cool aid)

 

So yes a PM will give you a TSS value. Well it kinda has too since the TSS value was developed by Andrew Coggan(?) and is a training peaks licensed trademark. It will give you a HR TSS as well by the way. It just might not be the same number as the PM will give you for the the SAME RPE.

 

Now back to the different PM's on different bikes maze. Which one is right? If i used my IDT (direct drive and often considered to the the benchmark for accuracy), each of my PM's either under reads or over reads when compared to the IDT.

On a different day they play merry go round and the a different one will under rear or over read.

 

So after thinking about it, I said *&(% it, it means sweet fannyall because the normalised data still shows the trend to be upwards. and the longer the period over which I average the PM readings the closer the spread of data points i.e. they don't drift that far apart.

 

Now when I take three different HR straps and three different Head units the spread is much much tighter. Why? because HR is HR. there is no warmed up strain gauge, votage differences due to temperature of the battery and all that.

and when I train with HR I don't look at the HR tren I look at the Average speed across segments trend.

Power is also variable because I don't weigh the same every day and this influences the amount fop force I can put into the drivetrain. So yes I can go and look at my power out ut but what I'm interested in is whether I am faster or not.

My power out put is only of interest when i sit in the coffee shop with my legs wide open and the cigar hanging from my lips and answer "Well, there's a 3 in it.....!" puff

 

Power is good if you are interested in identifying your weaknesses scientifically and developing your training to fix or optimise those weaknesses so they are less influential and developing your strengths to be more influential to the race outcome.

 

If you just want to get fitter then HR and a speedometer are fine. A PM like a dynamo-meter is a tuning tool, not a design tool.

 

So how I handle using different tools? I look at how much faster or slower I am over certain segments

This is great info. Tx for the insight

[Fat Boab]

And further to what you said, you can determine a HR TSS from your time in HR training zones from your pulse meter.

 

I really must look at this and give it a try!

 

 

A PM will give you a TSS value. Well it kinda has too since the TSS value was developed by Andrew Coggan(?) and is a training peaks licensed trademark. It will give you a HR TSS as well by the way.

 

 

[SwissVan]

Ja ja, mostly true as long as your sport is cycling only.

I'd be interested to know if you have lets say 3 bikes, road race bike, tri bike and mtb all with different power meters.... how much fun is that to accurately correlate?

 

Heaven knows how runners, swimmers, canoeists,.... and other non cycling sports manage to train only using HR nowadays....

 

 

Actually my bladdy polar super duper Vantage V watch gives me power readings when i run

Not that i pay much attention to them

At least they are a bit higher than my cycling power avg