Training Camp, Tenerife (Part 1).

Training Camp, Tenerife (part 1).

The FTP test (at last)...

We are half way through out training camp in Tenerife, I have used this morning as “active” recovery and this afternoon to get my feet up a little. I had a route in mind but changed my mind to roll up the main climb again. My thoughts on a recovery ride are gentle pressure on the pedals, nothing tough and ideally no steep pitches in the road. Yesterday ride the climb up to Vilaflor seemed very consistent in grade so I changed my play of riding North East up the Island. This was a good idea, the road was incredibly quiet today, strangely more quiet than Sunday. Maybe people out here are work shy like me and chill Mondays.

So the guys were off on a LSD ride, I learnt yesterday what that meant. Learn something new every day they say...! :-) I am much happier on real recovery rides pootling about on my own, if I get tired I can just go my own way, or turn back etc etc... As it was I ended up changing my mind and doing more climbing but a little more time in the saddle. This was alright though, the legs felt reasonable all the time and I got near on 3 hrs of easy tapping before I started the 35k descent!!

Me and Pete enjoying a snack after the monster climb.

Back in my early days I would have just hit another hard session today, the thought back then of doing a “lighter” day while I was away would have made me laugh. Hopefully my new found wisdom (or laziness) will pay me back in the next few days with better high end sessions. Time will tell on that one. I have at least 3 hard more days left. So those and the first 3 hard days should finish me off and get me back to the UK looking forward to a few days easy recovery indoors.

I have done 2 weeks out here before and with the help of Strava I can compare like for like climbs. I have different power meters and a different body shape now (though a bit tubby currently). Being interested in climbing long hills you can see if your power to weight has improved over the course of time. I had decided well before I came out here I would have to do a 60 min TT (FTP test) on the early days. So I told the guys I was doing it on the Friday, and to not let me not do it!! Friday came and I started the warm up and soon was entering Los Christianos where my start line had been the previous 2 camps here. Bleep on my Garmin and off I went...

I had thought before that I would be happy with 310 as my average wattage, below 305 a little disappointed and anything above 310 more than happy. In the usual fashion I looked down at my power after 15 seconds and it was too high, again after 30 seconds and still too high. “sort it out” I said to myself. Which I duly did, then well under, and then over again. After a couple of minutes I found some sort of rhythm and consistency. My average was well over target but I settled with this as all felt decent. The old classic ensued, the feeling good and very easy started to feel a bit sticky in the legs, Heart Rate was creeping up and I was starting to swear about my lively start. I play many many games in my head in these type of tests. All flat out tests are going to hurt, its the nature of pushing yourself. For me its all about keeping the top 3 inches strong and focused (the brain)! If your top 3 inches fails, the body will follow it along all too quickly!

One of Pete's awesome Go-Pro pictures.

When you are starting to feel the fatigue inside 10 mins it is tricky to hold onto positive thoughts, 1/6 of the way,.. nope that won’t do, 50 min to go,... nope that is no help either. I negotiated the time into little chunks. I agreed with myself I would stay seated for x amount of time then could stand for 20-30 seconds where usually I get a few more watts to improve the average. That was my plan for the next 15 minutes of so and it worked well. I broke into the 20 min zone with an average of 322 watts. This was a positive. Pre test I had only revealed to one person my targets, but even one person keeps your mind on it. I worked out I could hold x watts and still get my 305 minimum target numbers. So the longer I could hang onto the current average the better.

Looking back now I cannot really remember much about the middle 20 minutes, only that I was not looking forward to the final 5-10 minutes. Not only due to the fatigue being high there but also form memory the road surface gets a but crappy at that point. Bad for my groin and also bad for watts as I struggle to keep power on when i’m being thrown about the place. I had started to lose the average wattage steadily in the middle 20-30 minutes, but was trying to keep them up on 315. I always get to this final few minutes and think I will put some heroic sprint or steady big burst in the last minute or two, but in the real world I wake up and just manage to hold what I have been trying to hold for the last hour. Just survive! And then out of nowhere I was in the last 10 seconds.... bleep and it was done. Shit that was tough, but the instant feeling that the rest of the camp and probably the next months training wont be that hard was amazing.

People ask why do 60 min instead of the 20min and take 95%, well one I think I do not do so well at the shorter distance. this proved true as I got 302 as my predicted score only 3 weeks ago, and this was at sea level and in cooler temperatures. I also believe it is a great session to just fully empty the tank, and finally, what my old boss used to say to me with many horrible jobs I had, its good character building! :)

Test done I now have a new load of power zones. Slightly higher than 4 days ago... DAM, why did I do this test again...!?!!

Those of you who are coming on the AZUR/GS Henley training camp, I can confirm the temperature is awesome, the Volcano is still very BIG and the views amazing. Still 5 full days left to enjoy it before the cold will hit my bones again..

Thanks for reading.