Why do models use 105% instead of 100% of FTP for the top of zone 4?
Because training in your FTP zone is training at 95 - 105% of your FTP. Longer intervals at 95, shorter ones at 105 all target your FTP zone.
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Your physiology isn’t tied to a single (fixed) value, and can have variation every day. Adaptations for the threshold power zone can happen across the wide range that is 91-105%. In addition to what @MedTechCD mentioned, doing a workout at 95% of FTP is less fatiguing than 105% yet the benefits are almost the same. It’s about toggling the switches called intensity (how hard), duration (how long) and frequency (how often).
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Strava members can utilize heart rate data every workout but it must be with select compatible devices, however my watch collects bpm every recorded workout but does not transfer data:( Those strava members receive a pie graph at the end of every workout broken down into zones of heart rates and time spent in each zone. That’s wonderfully efficient! I thoroughly enjoy the strava community; just won’t pay;).
This past year was my first complete year of training and i went all in on every workout well almost 95% effort and more trying to improve And so i now know my muscles can endure more stress easily for longer periods of time. This is no unique revelation; just my self proclamation and heartfelt accomplishment. However, this year I will look to tone down effort and still go for longer distances🍵. Yep, it will be like dropping coffee for tea.
I still believe my bodies physiology will be at top performance without excessive max level exercising
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Thank you for you input.The reason for my question is that it seems to work well with the polarized metrices built into intervals to place the top at 100%. It just makes that calucation cleaner and didn’t know if I was missing something. If you place it at 105% you are putting your intervals done at 100%-105% FTP in zone 4 therfore being calculated as seiler zone 2 instead of seiler zone 3 where I belive they belong.
Matthew, well done for your first year of training. Wondering if this post was meant for this thread?
Note that he uses HR (% of HRmax) at VT1 and VT2 to differentiate the zones, not traditional power levels on their own. Also note that he said you have to measure it (annually), and not just estimate it.
Agreed and those intervals in the 100-105%FTP range end up for my athletes in the >90% MAX HR putting it in seiler zone 3. But that is not the issue, it is that intervals.icu calculates polarized as zone 1,2 then 3,4 then zones 5 plus. That is why I adjust to 100% of FTP for the top end of zone 4. I just wanted to make sure I wasn’t being naive by doing so since the rest of the world seems to use 105%. I get the physiology of the work done and it doesn’t change no matter what zone we call it. In fact those intervals I prescribe don’t go by zone anyhow so zone 4 for me is only a retrospective look. The zone metric as I’m looking at it is to quickly and easily see if the polarized prescription is being followed. And setting zone 4 at 105% makes that a bit harder to read. Am I missing anything?
It aligns with “each person is individual”. David mentions adjusting to 100% in this post.
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Oh well there you go. Thank you so much for that helpful info. I missed that post by David.
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