alex_cycles
Veteran
- Location
- Oxfordshire
FTP measurement is another area where you see lots of arguments on TrainerRoad and other places. I suppose at the end of the day as long as you us the same test method before and after whatever training you're going to do, it doesn't really matter what anyone else thinks.And yet my outdoor FTP would probably be way lower than my indoor one - I’ve never actually measured it as I don’t have a power meter on my outdoor bike and so have to rely on Strava’s estimated figures (not sure how accurate they are).
Though admittedly most of my Zwift rides are short intense sessions (like races) where I’m aiming for certain power figures, while all my outdoor rides are long endurance ones where I’m not too concerned about how fast I’m going or how much power I’m putting down.
You can't easily do a ramp test outside and no model is going to fit everybody perfectly. On the road I have a specific circuit that gives me a good idea of my best 20 minute power. A flat ten mile TT is ideal. I've no idea if Strava's guesstimates are accurate, but I doubt they're any better than Zwift's VPower.
It's hard to argue with the concept that "your best power over 1 hour is best measured by riding for 1 hour as powerfully as you can". I can't maintain my Zwift ramp test FTP for anything like an hour. But the training program I'm doing is based on that and it's "hard but doable". Good enough for me.
