Power Mentor Group with Shane & Marc - Closed. (Page 5)

Here's the link - if I recall correctly it pulls everything from Garmin Connect, it doesn't allow you to just pull the ride files (assuming you have ride and run files in there as well).  

http://www.sideburn.org/garmin/

Hey Marc, not shy but I'll update.  I'm about to try my first GC ride. Got home last night so finally had access to my laptop.  I loaded everything after a long day spent in airports so there may be user error.  I"m also a new MAC user but that seemed to be ok. I entered the FTP that TR gave me after my last 20 min test a couple weeks ago. For any slower/newer/lighter riders in the group...I'll put my not so impressive number out there so you don't feel alone - 149. So when you power monsters are posting watts in the 200-300's I look at those numbers like a foreign language. 

Speaking of which...Marc the youtube's were great and really helped. Have to say though, I really thought French was your first language and was expecting an accent.  

Happy holidays all. 

My guess is that while your fitness is likely seeing a small bump, the difference between your workouts likely has more to do with your ability to pace your workouts well, and also chase after a "tangible" carrot...being a power number. 

And that's the beauty of power.  It gives us a true "carrot" to chase after in our workouts.

Quiet one in the "have not started yet" category checking in.....

But I did download GC so there's that. I'm not very good with gadgets and computers, but my husband is a computer geek so I'm not too worried. Before we start he will help me and make sure everything is working as it should. I will watch the videos posted too, just been too busy with work and Christmas.

I was glad to read that we can do these workouts outside. I'm not sure if I will, but options are always nice.

I know we will get into it more later, but what is the difference between power and normalized power?

And does it make sense to have a different FTP indoors vs. outdoors? I ask because a lot of my outdoor rides have an average power # that is higher than my FTP. Maybe I have a calibration issue? Or I tested wrong & my FTP should be higher.

Power is simply the amount of watts you are generating at the moment.  Average power is simply an average of that over time.  Normalized power is a little tricky.  It's basically an average power that estimates what you could have held if your power was even throughout.  It accounts for the surges or spikes in your power to give you a better idea of how hard your workout was.

This is an example Marc gave in another thread...(AP is average power and NP is normalized power)

Here are two extremes

You cycle at an even 200w for 1 hour. You AP will be 200w, your NP will be 200w
Now pretend you are going up and down a mountain. You go up 10min at 400w and you come down 10min at 0w. Your AP will be 200w.

Which one do you think is harder on your body ? The gong up, coming down, going up, coming down. The NP on this ride will probably be 270w..I am guessing, I could calculate it but too lazy

NP is more the physiolical cost on your body. While you only average 200w, the true cost on your body was 270w. In theory your body is "as tired" as if it had cycled 270w constantly.

This is an extreme. Cycling 270w on flat would in fact be harder, but NP is pretty close to what your body feels, esepcially when riding on a course a little less extreme like rolling hills.

Yes, it does make sense for some people to have indoor and outdoor FTPs.  Some people are able to have them close together, but I'm like you in that my outdoor riding usually generates more power. 

Thanks Jason - that all makes sense. Good info!

So the ride that stands out and makes me question my FTP was over an hour, pretty hard effort for an hour, mostly uphill then flat to rolling, but was out & back so I had the long downhill too. Indoor FTP test resulted in about 187, and the outdoor ride was over 200. I tend to think I'm closer to the 200, but maybe not.

Should the settings include zeros or not? I think I have mine set to not include, thinking it would skew the # too low.

I know that was absolutely true for me.  The first time I attempted a 20 minute test, I went out WAY too hard, held it for a couple minutes, and then dropped down something like 40W.  The resulting FTP was so low that none of the workouts I did after that were challenging at all, so I kept bumping my FTP up until the workouts felt like what I thought they should.  Once I had a decent baseline for my FTP, the 20 minute tests became easier to pace.  That said, I think I've done something like 5-6 tests and have only been pleased with the pacing on the last two.  It really is a learning curve.

However, in regards to indoors vs outdoors, I actually think my indoor FTP is higher.  I'm not sure if it actually is or not, but I'm willing to push myself a lot harder inside than outside.

Marc -- question for you about Golden Cheetah: is there a way to overlay your max 5/20/60/90/120 minute power output on the PMC, or is that something you can only do in Training Peaks?  I'd really like to have that feature, but I haven't been able to figure out if you can do it or not.

That's a bummer. I recently tripped while running (pretty common for me) and took a good chunk out of the palm of my hand. Didn't get stitches but that took forever to heal, and like you, no swimming. I was going to swim but my husband convinced me it might not be the smartest move.

When it gets partially healed try New Skin liquid bandage, that stuff rocks!