"The 33"-Road Bike Racing - 30 min. CP test accuracy?

For those of you who train with power; do you think the 30 min test is farily accurate for finding your FTP? I havent trained with any signifigant amount of intensity for the last two months +\- (group rides, plenty of sst, some 3x5 here and there, etc)and wanted to see how much wattage ive lost. Earlier in the year Id done a true 60 min test. Mentally the 30 min almost felt like cheating a little, simply because of the shorter duration...

Thoughts?

Friels thoughts on that--Suffering by yourself for half an hour = Suffering in competition (TT style) for an hour. He says it works, because of the added motivation in competition.

Friels thoughts on that--Suffering by yourself for half an hour = Suffering in competition (TT style) for an hour. He says it works, because of the added motivation in competition.

So are you saying:

watts during 30min TT = watts capable during 60min competition TT?

No.

He's saying Watts during 30 min solo TT with no competition is a good enough estimate of FTP, and thus 60 min in competition TT power.

I like cake.

But I just use a 20 minute test for figuring out my FTP because I'm lazy, so I'll have pie. The 20 minute test seems to work good enough for me (i.e. the number I calculate from my 20 minute test jives pretty well with where my body seems to be).

At the end of the day, 20 minutes or 30 minutes doesn't really matter that much because you can just use it as a metric and gauge/track the changes over time. So establish your baseline on the test you think you are willing to repeat on a periodic basis (quarterly?).

Any tests I do seem to end up way over my real FTP. I figure it doesn't matter what my FTP is, as long as I have a test or two that are repeatable to track my fitness. So far, the only repeatable one I've got is MAP.

I believe its suppose to be your 30min avg watts and subtract 5% = ftp...thats what i did, it just seems it would more difficult to sustain those watts for an hour...but maybe not.

^
that's how it works in theory. From what I've seen 30min CP test is a good estimate, but until you do a full 60min TT/40k TT you'll only have a pretty good estimate.

^ i agree, this is the first time id done the 30. Id only done 60 before. Today i decided to do the 30, because i wanted a rough idea where i stood.

http://alex-cycle.blogspot.com/2008/05/seven-deadly-sins.html

30 minute isn't in there unless you use it in correlation with other CP lengths and use the Monod method.

Personally, I've abandoned "testing" completely this year. Even my previous advocacy for MAP testing would be hypocritical. I haven't MAP tested since ... well.. long time ago now. But I did a serious hard group ride tonight (ended up being me and one other guy trading pulls for 40 minutes) at X wattage (normalized). I did a solo SST session for 80 minutes last week at Y wattage. Those two rides alone can tell you what my threshold power is and I don't have to take time out to test.

http://alex-cycle.blogspot.com/2008/05/seven-deadly-sins.html

30 minute isn't in there unless you use it in correlation with other CP lengths and use the Monod method.

Personally, I've abandoned "testing" completely this year. Even my previous advocacy for MAP testing would be hypocritical. I haven't MAP tested since ... well.. long time ago now. But I did a serious hard group ride tonight (ended up being me and one other guy trading pulls for 40 minutes) at X wattage (normalized). I did a solo SST session for 80 minutes last week at Y wattage. Those two rides alone can tell you what my threshold power is and I don't have to take time out to test.

Exc link, thanks.
Interestingly, I did a 'multi-ride analysis' (power agent) from some of my last months group/training, interval rides. My '30min best' and todays 30 min fell into line (similar avgs)...

I believe its suppose to be your 30min avg watts and subtract 5% = ftp...thats what i did, it just seems it would more difficult to sustain those watts for an hour...but maybe not.

Well, there are various ways of estimating. Friel has mentioned just a solo 30' test as being a straight-up FTP estimate since you don't have race legs and adrenaline pushing you, as you would for a real 40k TT.


http://alex-cycle.blogspot.com/2008/05/seven-deadly-sins.html

30 minute isn't in there unless you use it in correlation with other CP lengths and use the Monod method.

Personally, I've abandoned "testing" completely this year. Even my previous advocacy for MAP testing would be hypocritical. I haven't MAP tested since ... well.. long time ago now. But I did a serious hard group ride tonight (ended up being me and one other guy trading pulls for 40 minutes) at X wattage (normalized). I did a solo SST session for 80 minutes last week at Y wattage. Those two rides alone can tell you what my threshold power is and I don't have to take time out to test.

Yeah, I'm in total agreement with you. I don't see much movement on my 5" or 1' power. 5' and FTP seem to track with each other. I can tell where my FTP is just from how it's going in training. I too haven't done a MAP since maybe Jan or Feb? I've done two of those 3' all-out tests, but one of them broke, so that protocol is no good for me.

Here is an alternative to the 30 minute (http://www2.trainingbible.com/joesblog/2008/08/ftp-confirmation-test.html) test. I am going to probably employee this one more.