Cycling Fitness / Training Advice

I'd be riding outside right away once it's somewhat healed. You'll be fine I bet. Or just go running.
Surely you don't need a sling for long? Reminds me of when I fractured my elbow and was riding around outside with a sling for a week or two.

I sat on the bike just now, static and it felt fine. My primary concern is in the event of an off, kids and job are important too, so I'm being unusually conservative. But whilst I've got a week off both I think I'll do longer turbo z1/Z2. Then take it from there.

It really was the dumbest thing I've done, table saw, back edge of blade, luckily the left hand and no bone (just)!

I seem to remember your convalescence paid dividends! I have such rosey memories of that Lanark summer!

I do have visions of me raising my HR and it starting to be like something out of a b-movie.

Top tip for turbo-ing with a sling is you can just hook your injured arm in your bib strap so you don't end up cooking in the heavy density foam.

Good call. Every little bit helps!

Yeah obviously that's smart.

Next question is minimum workout time for Z2?

I've done injury rehab on the turbo riding like this. Should be good for the thumb bleeding as its up. I managed 2-3 hours at a time of Z2 like this and 30 min Z3 blocks were fine

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Sums up the inevitable boredom!

It was more to do with the intensity I could maintain whilst still being comfortable rather than boredom although it is boring. I just found I grip the bars alot harder for more intense efforts. Nowhere near as bad as yours but I couldn't grip the bars for 3 weeks after this one

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Ouch! Yeah a combination of increased HR and the grip isn't appealing rn. Flexibility work and aerobic will be the path I think.

Anything really. Better than nothing. But Z2 on the turbo is hard... So don't over do it.

I'm sure I read somewhere that indoor endurance rides were the equivalent of 20-25% longer on the road physically due to the lack of accumulated micro recoveries you'll get riding outdoors

Interesting, I don't have a benchmark FTP as I typically just ride, don't "train" as such. So will be going on HR and time available, so no pressure on numbers. Just doing anything will be better than doing nothing. Just as the trails dried out too....!

FWIW, this is a one hour TR workout averaging 60% FTP. My heart rate was 62% max, average for the hour.

60 to 79% FTP is zone 2 so I’d be aiming for 60 to 70% max HR for your workouts.

Ah, thanks, I'd got to same on HR and I know my rough max, so will just hang out at the low end.

Because of a recent heart diagnosis, I've been training almost exclusively by HR for the last 6 months and I typically define Z2 as 80-90% of Threshold HR. For me this works out as approximately 75-85% max HR. 70-80% LTHR (65-75% HRMax) is closer to zone 1. I believe it is also important to stick WITHIN Z2 and resist the temptation to ride at the top end, so I typically aim to keep my HR as close to 85% LTHR as possible and use 90% as a hard upper limit.

I've also seen people say that HR is not great for defining Z2, especially among relatively untrained athletes. I believe this is (a) because of variability between subjects in terms of their HR curve, (b) because HR is slow to respond to changes in effort and (c) because of drift. For this reason I also use the talk test to verify Z2 effort by reciting Burns poetry to myself 🙄.

All this correlates well to my power zones and has worked well for me .

I've never actually done an FTP test, so I've now done that and can have some structure for the next few weeks. I'm very unfit!

Hatred of turbo is confirmed.

Did an hour of HR based Z2 on a hotel exercise bike today, thinking of you 😘

Ah, that's sweet. Did they at least have MTV on big screen?

They had a blank wall in a small room with no air con. Every ten minutes or so someone would come in looking for the breakfast room.

Sounds bouji.

I've started back on the turbo with a broken hand after surgery/2 weeks off the bike. Classic Z2 is 55-75% FTP but even the bottom end at 210-215w is pretty tiring, I can't manage much more than 90 minutes.

Not sure whether to scale back my threshold in terms of setting zone boundaries and commit to some structure or not....may just ride indoors on RPE for the next few months till cleared to ride outside.

...may just ride indoors on RPE for the next few months till cleared to ride outside.

I think that sounds smart. Unless you're some pro racer then why smash intervals. Just chill and let it heal and keep yourself sane.