So far, my workouts with trainerroad had been based on HR. My thinking was that since I'm doing a base building program, I should keep the HR under a certain level to build aerobic capacity - and that thinking was brought over from the running world. However, it appears that cyclists prefer to use power, and train based on that. So to try and reconcile the difference in approach I was using to the one generally preferred by cyclists, I asked the guys over @ trainerroad what their take was on situations where I'm not necessarily trying to build power for a time trial, but instead a longer distance triathlon. That thread can be found here.
I gave it some thought, and decided that I mine as well give it a shot. If they have a base building program, and they've gotten input from cycling trainers, and that base building program calls for prioritizing power over HR - then I had a choice: I could constantly try to figure out the optimal HR ranges for every workout on trainerroad from here on out, or I could give in and go with power. I ended up deciding on the latter - partially because I am not starting out totally from scratch, and partially because I'm going to be working on aerobic base in running, so there should be at least some carryover. Lastly - the base building program calls for three workouts a week, so there'd be time available in the schedule for the long, more traditional base and aerobic building workouts.
So, since I'd be going to using power, I figured I mine as well start over in the program, which meant going back to the 8 minute test. My default profile had an FTP of 200 W, so the targets throughout the workout were based on that - however I remembered from the first time doing this workout that it provides you with an updated FTP at the end - so rather than stick with the target, I wasn't afraid to exceed where I could, as long as I could hold in. In the end, both 8 minute efforts were showing a power of about 250W. The 8 minute efforts seemed to go through four phases for me - the first two minutes was building power to a degree that felt just a little harder than comfortable. The next two minutes was a constant but noticable drain, progressing to comfortably hard. The 3rd set of two minutes got into wind sucking mode where it was easiest to put my head down, close my eyes and pretend it wasn't me putting that effort in. The final two minutes was holding on for dear life, knowing I was going to put out all effort for the last 30 seconds, which made dealing with seconds 31-120 a tad more bearable.
In the end, it gave me an updated FTP number of 220W, which sounds reasonable to me for the setup I have. However, I wouldn't be surprised if its accuracy is artificially high, as I've read various things about the accuracy of the Fluid2 power curve. But based on the work I've done on the trainer so far, I figured my FTP would end up showing somewhere between 200W and 250W. My HR got up into the high 160's, which is about as high as it's gotten on the bike, so I figure it was pretty damn close to a max effort for 8 minutes. Regardless of the accuracy, though - at least now I feel like I have a good metric to use as a baseline for workouts.
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