Cycling Fitness / Training Advice

$71.40 (approx £53.19) for 12 months. I'm tempted to have another look at it.

They were supposed to kill off WKO3 activations a while back so I think I'm on borrowed time with it. Not sure that WKO4 does anything useful but TP would be handy for checking stuff when I'm not at home. Le hmmm

WKo4 was very clunky when I used it. TP is simple but does all I need. It annoyes me i have to pay annuall, but they have to make money I guess, and it's £4 a month.

GC is just clunky and no app. But then it's free and devd by one guy.

I've used GC for aero testing but I've not used it for training periodisation since I've owned WKO3 for over 10 years now. @scherrit has 'upgraded' to WKO4 but it doesn't sound particularly great so I've been avoiding it. I'm already paying RWGPS, Trainerroad and I have a TP account already, just the free one. I don't particularly like subscription models but if they're putting their time into TP rather than WKO then maybe it makes sense to head that way.

Just the automatic syncing makes it worth it for me!

Whats going on here? Is it normal to have a big HR spike after going a bit hard on a rep?

A bit of context: I was planning on doing 8x 4min @105% FTP with 1:30 recoveries on the turbo (a session I've done plenty of times) but it was too nice not to ride outdoors so I rode out to a quietish little climb to do the session there. I rode out easy and rather than watching my power meter on the first climb I rode to feel and probably set off a bit quickly. At the top I was pretty pooped, but not too bad - but as soon as I turned around to ride back down my heart felt like it was going to jump out of my chest. Normally my HR-Max is 170-175... 180absolute tops in races (TT/CX/running) so ~220 is mega high. I don't know if the HR reading in the spike is accurate, but I could really feel it thumping. Once it calmed down I felt completely normal for the remainder of the session.

http://tpks.ws/MUGRCIOKWAXDXUIPD3FCAOCTGE

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Go and see a doctor. Do dont ask online.

Definitely go see a doctor, it’s not easy for them to find anything of any issue, especially if it only happens during hard exercise.

I had this happen a couple of times, settling down by itself after a few minutes back to normal, for it to not happen again in the ride. Ruled out faulty HR monitor.

Took Prints of the workouts and HR to the GP who was impressed with the information and referred me for further tests.

Had a 72h ecg test, and it showed no issues, even with multiple hard rides during that time, and told to come back if it happened again.

As it happens, my neighbour is a cardiac specialist and advised that it’s probably SVT (supraventricular tachycardia), and I’ve likely had it for ages, just more visible with HR monitor wearing.
Potentially fixed by catheter ablation, but if it’s not causing me to feel ill, light headed, fainting etc, probably best to leave alone.

It only appears when I’m feeling run down, fighting a bug, or about to come down with a sickness. Happened a couple of weeks ago on a ride with a sharp climb, stopped at the top for 5 minutes for it to settle down and then didn’t show up for the rest of the ride. Day after was struck down with a horrible cold for 2 weeks.

Obviously different for everyone, but has it happened before to your knowledge?
Definitely go see a doctor.

As example:

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Mrs OWK would like advice on an indoor cycling solution that isn’t expensive or loud, preferably 2nd hand under £200. (Wooden floors, neighbours below) aim is to help get fit again post baby so she only wants to own it for a year or so

Exercise bike? Turbo? Rollers? She doesn’t own a geared bike. Pls advise, forum

Humph, I’m just getting back into things after a horrid cold a few weeks ago. This morning I feel a VERY slightly tight chest in a way that I normally associate with an oncoming cold. My HRV and my resting HR seems slightly up so that might also indicate a nascent infection.

I’m pretty sure it has happened before, but so rarely I don’t remember any details; the “thumping sensation” was definitely familiar though. I’ve been using an hrm for sports for 15+ years and have probably got 6years data on TP so there is a good chance I may have recorded other instances without thinking about it. Is there any way to filter TP workouts by hrmax (e.g. find workouts where hrmax >190) so that I can go through and see if any other workouts look like genuine spikes?

As per everyone else, see specialist. Sudden cardiac deaths in athletes can be due to magnesium deficiency. A close friend who was exceptionally fit, working as a messenger and started having scares with his heart was referred to a specialist who had experience with this, a few days into magnesium supplementation, he was good, no further problems. Don't assume its that, get proper diagnosis, but it may be worth supplementing in high dosage in meantime.

Do you have the raw data file? I used to get spikes all the time and I'm not dead yet.

I’m not sure if you can use a single speed/fixed bike with a turbo trainer?

Rollers would be best for single/fixed. I found them to be a bit boring after awhile as you can’t adjust the resistance while riding. It’s best to set them up in a doorway or next to a wall until you gain confidence.

I think an exercise bike would be the best option. If you don’t want to purchase a geared bike and turbo trainer.

You can, with track nut turbo adapter bolts. My missus does this.

can you please link me to some products that you use/recommend? @hippy @farewell

https://tacx.com/product/axle-nuts/

These are the rollers I use:

https://tacx.com/product/antares/

If I had the cash I would go for a smart turbo trainer and use it with Zwift.

Bit late to the conversation, but as someone who has been in and out of hospital trying to diagnose the cause of my SVT (it runs in my family) then if you're worried, go to the docs. They can usually tell from a quick ECG if you have anything potentially fatal.

My experiences are that mine gets set off by sudden increases in intensity, or if I'm tired, but I'm fine if I gradually let my heartrate increase. No biggie, and as they couldn't pinpoint what was causing mine, we opted for no ablation, no drug management, just "deal with it"

When mine used to go out of rhythm badly, my HRM and ECG readings would look like an ink-covered spider having a fit on the printouts. One paramedic said he'd never seen anything like it, thought the printer was broken!

I've had a pretty depressing past two years of health problems, which I think I'm finally nearly through, so back to training again.

I'm not in the least bit surprised to see my FTP has dropped nearly 40%, but hey, can only go up from there, right?!

Cheers, and thanks to everyone else too. I’m booked in to see my gp but currently carrying on as normal and ftp efforts and 50mi tt have both been completely normal. This evening will be my first over ftp efforts since the spike so I’ll keep an eye on things.

Is it reasonable to base my FTP on a hour long race effort? if so, should I be using actual or normalised?

Perhaps somewhere between the two, it depends.

And it depends if you were flat out for the hour.

If you had to lie down for half an hour afterwards because you were completely cooked, averaging close to 95% of your max HR for the race, then the normalised figure might not be too far off.

My race watts are always quite a lot lower than my FTP, as I try and avoid getting anywhere close if possible, so I have the watts needed when in counts (I don’t really do breakaways)

I’d probably use the classic 90% of 8m best effort or 95% of best 20m effort, which might have been from your race.

It'd be from a cross race, so very spikey.

324w actual, 335w normalised, Coggan weighted at 363w (definetly not happening). I've been using 321w for training for the past month, so I suppose I should push it up 5w at least.

I should probably just do a proper test, but, 🤮.