Hope everyone is doing well & having a great Saturday & also had a great ride today. I know I did, weather was nice enough here in Toronto to escape the rollers in the basement and explore the great outdoors & get some fresh air & vitamin D - sure lifts the spirits!
I purchased my power meter over the winter and until today I’ve been training on my rollers in the basement, had a 3hr SS ride today but there was no way I was going to slog away in the basement so I took it outside - wow is power ever different outdoors and kinda challenging to modulate.
I was to complete a 3hr SS group ride with a TSS of 170. Like most did it solo, but as I mentioned above find it difficult to modulate outside (it was also breezy) - one min way over next under then in zone for a bit then it repeats. In the end I ended up with targeted TSS of 170 in just over 2 hrs, way shy of the forecasted 3hrs - is this good or bad?
Now when I look at the data in TP for the ride my Nominal Pwr was 195 and my Average Pwr was 189, and the IF was 0.91. my SS zone is 178-209.
Is this alright? did I do the right things by winding down once I hit the prescribed TSS not to overdue it as have endurance ride tomorrow. or should I have gone the 3hrs? Plan on doing tomorrow’s endurance that outside as well since it’s looking good, I’ll really have to dial it back, but either way felt fantastic & like I wasn’t even working that hard. Is this the diesel engine I keep hearing about
the nice thing about a TSS ride is that you can ride as hard or as easy as you’d like (easy meaning zone 2) until you achieve the TSS called for. So, it’s okay you ended the ride early since you hit the TSS. You could also continue to ride easy after the fact but as long as the TSS is hit (while outside) you’re good!
Be sure to recalibrate your power-meter (I recalibrate every day) to ensure you’re getting accurate data, too.
Good choice on getting outside. Some people can stick it out for an indoor session for 3 hours but it’s not for everyone. That said, if you do end up riding inside you can stick to 2 hours but ride a bit harder pace, like sweet spot. Don’t worry about being short on the TSS either.
Awesome, thanks for clarifying. Good to know I did the right thing.
With regards to calibrating, I moved the bike in to the garage a few hours before leaving and calibrated so all was good there.
Was too cold & windy Sunday to do my Z2 2.5hr ride outside so I completed it on the trainer, was a easier since I had the prior day outside lol The long term for the weekend here is looking great, keeping fingers crossed!
Like I mentioned I was amazed at the difference in power having not used a power meter outdoors yet, kinda felt like I was cheating. Now I"m really looking forward to the longer 4hr rides coming up in the next several weeks with the nicer weather on the way here.
