Tuesday, August 17, 2010

Week-to-Week Comparison

Today's ride is based on a ride I did last week. Last week I attempted three sets of 2min long intervals, maximal effort. I rode them without looking at the PowerTap. After the ride, I noted the efforts. Andrew Coggin recommends looking at the average of the third interval. Which makes sense. The first one is a gimmie. You're fresh. By fifth or sixth you're tired.

Sure enough, there was a big decline in rep one to rep two. But third and after were remarkably close until reached the point where I couldn't complete a full 2min interval. I didn't complete the final set last week.

This week I repeated the same workout. Just for giggles I knocked 20watts off the target for the intervals to see if I could complete all the sets. I pushed things through, and did indeed finish all sets at this slightly lower power level. Could I have finished at the same power level? Donno. These felt way easier. But today's temperature was a significantly lower. 102°F vs. 96°F. The magic number being 98°F (body temperature). Too many variables to control, but things seem to be working OK for now...

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