Indoor riding using platforms such as ROUVY is one of the best ways to get specific with your cycle training. Structured workouts, zero distractions and the ability to focus solely on the effort in hand – rather than negotiating traffic, junctions and pot holes – means indoor cycling can often give you the best bang for your buck when it comes to cycling gains.
For many triathletes, improving our FTP is a common off season goal as we seek to boost our overall cycling strength and power so we can hold higher paces for less effort come race season. But where should you start to improve your cycling FTP? We guide you through our pick of the best FTP-boosting workouts on ROUVY for different levels of triathlete/cyclist.
What is FTP in cycling?
First up, what do we actually mean by FTP? FTP stands for Functional Threshold Power. In simple terms, this is the power (force exerted through the pedals) that you’d be able to push for a maximum of 60 minutes. It’s a performance measure, commonly used in cycling as a way of quantifying cycling fitness, and it’s often used as a way to set up your training zones and race paces.
For lower intensity work, where you’re looking to utilise the aerobic system and build endurance you’d aim to ride at a lower percentage of your FTP. Whereas for high intensity sessions utilising the anaerobic system to develop top end power and speed, you’d be working towards the top end of your FTP or above it. Knowing your FTP helps you to ensure you’re riding at the correct intensity to achieve the desired training stimulus from a session. In triathlon, it also helps you to ensure you pace the bike section at a sustainable effort that leaves you with enough energy for the run.
How do I measure my FTP?
While you could go and ride your bike as hard as you can for an hour to get your FTP – that’s going to be a pretty hard session. Most people use a ramp test or a 20 minute FTP test. These shorter, high intensity efforts are used to get an average power value which is then extrapolated to give you the power you’d be able to hold for an hour.
Read more about testing your FTP on ROUVY in our beginner guide to workouts on the platform.
How will I benefit from improving my FTP?
Improving your FTP will essentially mean that you’ve improved your strength and your fitness on the bike. If you have a higher power threshold, you’ll also be able to hold a higher power for a longer duration. Meaning you can ride faster on the flats, or blast up a hill quicker. In the context of a triathlon, this means you’ll be able to go faster during the bike section without emptying the tank and ruining your legs for the run.
How to improve your FTP – best workouts on ROUVY
There’s an extensive library of workouts to pick from on ROUVY, alongside the ability to build your own custom workouts. But if you’re not sure where to start, we’ve compiled a list of our favourite FTP-boosting workouts according to how much time you have available and how intense you want your workout to be. It’s important to have a balance of easy/moderate/high intensity in your overall training programme alongside plenty of time to recover and absorb the training load. So pick your poison carefully, depending on what other workouts and sessions you have planned around your bike session.
Tss EXPLAINED
To help you get a gauge of how hard a workout is, we’ll include the TSS score. This stands for Training Stress Score – a numeric value that takes into account the intensity and duration of a workout to give an overall score of how much ‘stress’ it puts your body through. The higher the score, the harder the workout.
ROUVY workouts under 45 minutes
Squeezing your session into your lunch hour? No sweat. These workouts will get the legs going and the blood pumping, while leaving you enough time to grab a shower and be back at your desk in time for those afternoon meetings.
A taste for higher intensity – start easy
For beginners or those getting back to cycling after time off the ‘taste for higher intensity’ workout is a great (re)introduction to structured workouts. You’ll start with an easy 10 minute warm up to get the legs moving, and then execute two short ramp ups featuring 3 x 1 minute starting at Zone 2 (easy), Zone 3 (medium) and finishing with 1 minute at your FTP (moderate). It might start to feel a little difficult during the last 20s of the 1 minute FTP efforts but pretty much as soon as it starts to feel hard, you get to ease off.
This workout will help you to get a sense of what the different training zones feel like.
Quick FTP Pyramid
The FTP pyramid ROUVY workout is a good stepping stone to try out once you’ve done a couple of other workouts. As you’ll guess from the name, this workout is in a pyramid format – working your way up through progressive intervals and then back down again. This workout will see you working above your FTP for short intervals, with steady/tempo efforts in between rather than full easy recovery. It’s tough, but manageable, and it’ll help to raise your capacity to work at a higher effort for longer.
FTP on the move 3
This workout takes you through a short warm up before you dive into 2 sets four intervals, alternating between 90s and 2 minutes at your current FTP. You’ll ride at your easy endurance pace in between the efforts, helping you to practice recovering quickly for short blasts of power. Because the efforts are short and there’s plenty of steady riding in between, this workout should be suitable for most riders – as long as your FTP is accurate. If you’re new to workouts, the efforts might feel hard – don’t be afraid of just doing the first set of four and then cooling down if you need to.
60 minute workouts
Get an hour of quality work ticked off in the saddle with these 60(ish) minute workouts on ROUVY. Long enough to deliver strong training benefits, but short enough to still easily fit in around your other priorities. These workouts will help to raise your power threshold and get more efficient on the bike.
Threshold Stacks
For beginners and improvers, this hour long workout is a great choice to start building up your time on the bike. The intervals stay just below your FTP, and reduce slightly in duration with each rep, so this workout should feel nicely manageable. After a warm up you’ll complete 5 intervals at 95% of your FTP, starting with 2.5 minutes and reducing down to 1 minute by the end. You’ll have 6 minutes of aerobic riding in between each repeat, making this a great workout to practice putting out short blasts of efforts (like you would on a rolling course in the real world) and recovering efficiently in between.
Six Thresholds Lite | Increase your FTP with Lidl-Trek
ROUVY Threshold
For riders who’ve got a good base of fitness and experience of completing hard workouts, this overs-unders threshold set will get the legs burning. This workout features 6 x 6 minutes where you’re working at, just above, or just under your FTP. That totals 36 minutes of effort around your threshold pace. This workout will boost your capacity to spend time riding at or near your threshold power. And with short aerobic rests in between each repeat it’ll help your body to get efficient at clearing lactate and recovering between efforts.
ROUVY workouts over 1hr
If you’ve got a bit more time to burn, these 60 minute plus workouts will help you to build strength and endurance on the bike. Get your go-to playlist locked and loaded and get ready to put in some effort – these workouts are tough but you’ll feel great once they’re done!
Sweet Spot Symphony | Ellen Van Dijk’s Favourite
Designed by Lidl-Trek cyclist Ellen Van Dijk, this sweet spot workout will help you to boost your aerobic capacity and improve your resistance fatigue – key for improving your FTP.
Sweet spot training involves working at 88-90% of your threshold power. It’s an intensity that’s challenging enough to stimulate fitness gains, but not so intense that you can only do small amounts of it. Making it an ideal training methodology for endurance athletes.
This workout will guide you through a warm up before you tick of 2 x 15 minutes at sweet spot with recovery in between. The Sweet Spot Symphony will help you to build your endurance, strength and pacing skills.
Fight the fatigue 3 | Puncheur’s plan
This workout has a mix of everything. Ramp ups and a few spicy sprints keep things interesting in the warm up. Then you’ll tick off two lots of 4 minutes at your FTP before taking some recovery ready for the final kickers: two rounds of 40-20s at 140% of your FTP.
The Fight the Fatigue workout – as you might have guessed by the title – is designed to improve your fatigue resistance. Add this workout into your schedule, and you’ll soon notice both strength and cardiovascular endurance gains. Those newer to interval training on the bike might find the second half of this workout fairly tough, as you’ll already be feeling a bit of burn from the FTP efforts. So don’t get disheartened if you don’t make it all the way to the end the first time!
45/15 | Increase your FTP with Lidl-Trek
The 45/15 workout is particularly useful for those racing shorter triathlon distances, where the bike might be draft legal or you might need to be able to respond to race dynamics and put in surges of power. Designed to boost both your FTP and your VO2 max (aerobic capacity) this workout features 3 sets of short, sharp intervals with very short rests. You’ll start with 15 x 45 seconds at 110% of your FTP with 15s rest between each one. Then you’ll tick of 2 x (15 x 45s) at your FTP. Blocks of riding at an easy effort in between make this a great midweek medium-length ride, giving you bang for your buck when it comes to build strength, power and endurance.
Head to our ROUVY section for more tips and advice to help you get the most out of training on the virtual reality cycling platform.
