↓ My One Hour Cycling Power Test
↓ Chunking The Effort Into Bits
↓ Time Trial Pacing
↓ The Start Of A Time Trial
↓ The Mental Side Of The Time Trial
↓ How to Pace a Cycling Time Trial
↓ Surges In A Time Trial
↓ Second 10 Minutes Of Time Trial
↓ Halfway Through A One Hour Time Trial
↓ Cycling Hill Climb Training
↓ Hill Climb Physiological Profile
↓ Pacing a Hill Climb In Cycling

Here’s a video on time trial pacing if you’re interested, although I’d still recommend you read the blog below for updates from 2021.

The one hour test is in the building, and one thing that I gave kudos to Dr. Stephen Sieler for highlighting in his podcast on Polarized Training in Cycling. He makes people want to start doing one hour power tests, or FTP Tests. Preach!

People that want to do well in time trial often don’t ride long enough in their intervals, but there are other posts about that, like this one on Sweet Spot Training and this one on Making Gains With Basic Endurance Rides.

My One Hour Cycling Power Test

This post is taking a look at my one hour power test. I had completed some long low threshold intervals the day before, so I wanted to let this one rip and just get a benchmark of where I was at for long, #InTheBreakAllDay, power.

2021 Update: I don’t do many super long intervals anymore, but rather 15-20 minute blocks with short rest between. In 2021, the longest interval set I did was 3 x 18m with 120% overs and 80% unders. More on that later! But the cliff notes: you shouldn’t be riding a time trial as a steady state one hour, so why train with that?
2023 Update: Now that I live in the North Carolina Mountains where I don’t have any roads available for anything like a one hour test makes me somewhat want to try one again! Maybe in Florida this winter!

The first 3 rules of a time trial are:

1. Don’t Start Too Hard

2. Don’t Start Too Hard

3. Don’t Start Too Hard

The biggest reason is that we are going to feel amazing at the start of the time trial, feeling like we suddenly have another 10-15 watts that day. This poor pacing strategy will only leave us riding BELOW Threshold power later on, which is a terrible way to have your fastest time.

I can’t stress enough that we need to learn how to pace ourselves not only by the numbers, but also by feel. Some days, the watts won’t be flowing. Instead of riding at 325W, you need to know that you don’t have it that day, and 310W across the board is going to give you your fastest time trial performance at that event.

An hour at your max is a really long time. You can really screw yourself up on this intense mental test. Most people aren’t doing these very often, so if you’re going to be a slave to the numbers and tell yourself, “I need to hit X”, you might find that within 20 minutes, you can’t hold X.

What do you do then?

You need to feel that out, and this leads us to what the third rule really should be: Finish Strong.

I almost forgot about that going into this test, or benchmarker, and luckily I quickly reminded myself. I found a groove, and whatever that groove was, that’s what I was going to hold on this day.

Chunking The Effort Into Bits

I broke the 60 minute effort into 10 minute segments, just to see how it unfolded. This is not uncommon to how I mentally approach a long effort like this, although I usually think of it in 15 minute segments.

I know the first 15 minutes has to feel easy, the second 15 minutes builds off of that same feeling, since once that is complete, I’m still only halfway through!

The third and fourth are a different beat, but we’ll get to that later.

Overall TT Average: 391W, Normalized Power 392W.

My goal was 380W, but at the end of the day, I know that I just had to do my best, and make sure that I followed Rule #3!!! Finish Strong.

You can see in this image here, that the FTP is probably around 400-410W based on the old ways of doing things. This is actually a really effective way of ballparking someone’s FTP with race data, and it’s described in depth in Training and Racing With A Power Meter.

We’ll get into lap specifics, but here’s the data for those interested.

Time Trial Pacing

Starting the time trial, it usually takes me about 10-12 minutes to get warmed up into the effort. I am just riding by feel. One trick to starting a time trial is make sure you aren’t looking at your power meter in order to hit a number; only use it to make sure you aren’t going TOO HARD.

If your legs aren’t cooperating that day, and you push towards some number that you normally can hold, but can’t on that day, YOU WILL EXPLODE, and have a worse time trial than if you let your body do the pacing.

In this article we are talking about pacing a one hour Time Trial, but if your time trial is only going to be 30 minutes, many of the same rules and adages apply, just chunk them into segments that make sense. The “first 30 minutes” is going to be “the first 15 minutes” for a 30 minute time trial.

The Start Of A Time Trial

A coach told me years ago that when you start the time trial, you want to use the first 30 seconds to let your legs buffer out the lactic acid that has built up. Whether this is physiologically true or not, I’ve always used this reminder as a way to warm up again, once the time trial has started.

What am I talking about, when I say “warm up again”?

No matter how perfectly you time your warm up, there is almost always some down time before the gun actually goes off. I would recommend that you not try to perfectly time your approach to the start line, because too many racers have missed their start time doing this.

Also, there is supposedly some data that shows that the effects of warming up stick around for about 15-30 minutes. Said differently, if you’re warmed up, you’re good to go for up to 30 minutes. This is a HUGE mental pearl for those time trials and criteriums when you need to stage early. Don’t freak out; you’re going to be fine.

On the time trials when you start feeling like Superman, you need to start out yelling to yourself: “DON’T START TOO HARD!” The watts are going to be FLOWING. Don’t be your own kryptonite and blow it. Settle in and remember that you are going to pour it on at the end; you’re going to FEEL LIKE YOU’RE ACCELERATING for the last 15% of the race.

On the time trials where you feel like dog poop, you need to make sure you don’t psych yourself out of the race in the first 5 minutes. SETTLE IN. Ignore the number on the power meter. Don’t let your expectations allow you to go too hard. If you are trying to pin 330W and 300W feels hard, RIDE AT 280! Yes, that sucks, you’re 50W off what you could be flowing at on another day, but it’s either NOT TODAY, or it’ll come around in a few minutes. SETTLE IN.

See Also: Crit Racing Strategy

The Mental Side Of The Time Trial

Half of this sport is mental and brain training should be part of your race prep. The only reason we’ve been so successful on the amateur circuit is because we have a really locked up mental game that starts days before the race. There will be another post on that for sure!

Believe in yourself. Most of us don’t. Go to the start line, especially when you’re going up against the girls or guys that are, on paper, stronger than you, convincing yourself that you can win. Believe that you are going to have a rockstar day, and use this mental attitude and fortitude not only on race day, but on test days.

That being said, don’t look at it as a test! Who likes tests? I don’t. I don’t want a pop quiz. It’s a BENCHMARK.

If you have a crap day, go home smiling, KNOWING that the next time you go out and attempt this, you’re going to crush it. That’s a WIN! Don’t get yourself psyched out.

How to Pace a Cycling Time Trial

So, back to the first 30 seconds on the TT: get out of the gate, but don’t go over 90-94% FTP. Settle in for 60 seconds, get going fast, but not smashing. Feel the flow of the bike.

Then I literally mumble to myself: “Here We Go.”

It’s the cue. This is gametime. This is 100% focus. This is what I came here for.

While you’re in the first 10 minutes of a 60 minute effort, these numbers cannot feel hard. You cannot be gasping for breath.

If the first 10 minutes feel hard and you’re below your number, just realize that this is not your day to CRUSH IT. You might come around later, but don’t start thinking about setting a lifetime PR. You’ll know the day when that’s going to happen. That is when you are pulling back the reins because you feel so damn amazing.

Surges In A Time Trial

Avoid these at all costs when they aren’t increasing your speed at critical points! Use them to keep your average speed high, and this video describes how to utilize VO2Max Surges to have your best time trial.

If you hit a slight hill, roll over it with some gusto, but I really wouldn’t hammer over anything just yet, especially in the first half of the time trial. The exception to this is a hill or climb where you will lose time going too slow. You really need to have a sense of where to surge, and where not to, before the time trial begins.

While average speed is obviously the only thing that matters for this type of race, if you surge extremely hard over the early rollers and hills, you will surely have a harder time pouring it on in the end, where you’ll want to be attacking every hill, corner, and piece of tarmac that you can find.

The surges, like everything, is a balance. This blog post cannot tell you exactly when to utilize a surge to save time on each course; you need to study the course, your watts, and figure that out.

Second 10 Minutes Of Time Trial

Remember, this is an hour long. You can’t be feeling pain yet. After 20 minutes, you still have 40 minutes to go!

I feel like I’m repeating myself, but I can’t stress these major points enough; they are easy to forget when you are in the pain cave riding 94-105% FTP.

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Halfway Through A One Hour Time Trial

By now, you’re 30 minutes in and you know what’s going on. What hurts, what doesn’t hurt; you might be shifting around more and more. That’s all fine, just stay aero and utilize the small shifts in your saddle to your benefit.

Minute 30-40

I started cranking a slightly harder gear, 82RPM. The watts were up, but my HR is up also. That’s normal.

The Final 20 Minutes

The last 20 minutes is still crucial to pacing, due to the third rule. Even when there’s only 15 minutes left, there’s still 15 minutes left! You cannot get too antsy and ruin all of your hard work. You’re almost there, Remember The New Rule #3! FINISH STRONG!

Breaking Down The Last Ten Minutes

I chunk the last 10 minutes into two 5 minute efforts. The first one being slightly towards the 100-105% range, and if it feels good, I just keep it there with the goal of really ramping it up in the last five minutes.

You’ll end with a killer finish, and as obvious as this is, the last five minutes is 8.3% of your total ride time. You want to CRUSH THIS last 8% because many will just be hanging on for the last 20%. You can make up serious ground here.

Do not get overly excited with only ten minutes to go, and go too hard from minute 50 - 55. You have to finish strong. You want to be pouring it on, crossing the finish line knowing that you bossed the hell out of that thing!

Every time trial where you finish, just holding on for dear life, hoping that you had a good time, was not your best effort. Guaranteed.

Below you can see that I had really poured it on. The top peak of the histogram was 410-420W. My best segment of the entire time trial. At this point, you can go for broke, and with practice, you’ll really learn how to nail the finish.

This bumped by mFTP to 392 and Time To Exhaustion to 1:04:52.

Most people aren’t doing these hour long efforts, so kudos to you if you are. (Edit from 2021: But honestly, not even sure if this is still needed today. I think it’s a great exercise in knowing yourself in case you find yourself in a 2 man break off the front for 30-50 minutes, but to set FTP? Questionable.)

Cycling Hill Climb Training

This sounds obvious, but the goal of a hill climb is to ride above threshold as much as possible without accumulating fatiguing metabolites that will force you to ride below threshold. While this will produce lactate, which is created through glycolysis, it can also be used as fuel if your aerobic system is well trained, so that development is a big goal.

Hill Climb Physiological Profile

We need a large anaerobic capacity, as well as a large aerobic capacity. We will be utilizing both, it just becomes a matter of which one is more predominant.

4 biggest physiological determinants of your success:

1. Your aerobic capacity, or VO2max. This creates the most energy with fewer fatiguing metabolites, and uses lactate and other metabolites to create energy. If two riders are putting out the same exact watts and weigh the same, but one has a larger % of power being created aerobically, they will last longer than the more anaerobically powered athlete who will fatigue sooner.

2. Your ability to produce enough energy anaerobically. Both the maximal wattages (anaerobic maximal power) and the duration (anaerobic stamina) with which you can hold that power will both be critical to a great performance.

How do I know if i have enough anaerobic power? One good guide is looking at your 5 and 20 minute power. They should be very different numbers!

3. Muscular strength: you really have to have the ability to push big watts and maintain them for more than just 30 seconds. This is why I like 5x5’s by power and not just HR, because it trains us to push a lot of power, stress the muscle fibers, clear lactate that is building up, and really challenge the respiratory system.

4. High threshold power or FTP. With lactate threshold being such a big determinant in energy production and how we produce power, the higher your lactate threshold, the better chance you have of pushing big watts throughout the hill climb event. Of course, if your lactate clearance capabilities or VO2Max are not well trained, a large FTP will only take you so far.

There are some nuances to this. A very short prologue of 2-3 minutes will favor more Anaerobic Capacity. An 8 minute effort will require VO2Max and Anaerobic Stamina. Longer efforts at 10-25 minutes will favor VO2Max and FTP.

Pacing a Hill Climb In Cycling

What is the fastest way to climb a hill on a bike?

Many of the same rules apply here, but a Hill Climb is going to be raced much above FTP! Hill Climbs might only be a race in the 5-15 minute range.

Duration and Watts

Clearly you want to try and figure out what a great time would be. Then, you can figure out how many watts you’ve produced on your best day. That said, you might not have you best day come the hill climb, so don’t overcook it early on and fall apart.

Wind

Wind can be a huge factor, so check out mywindsock, and see what data you can draw from there.

Course Profile

Will this be best to be paced evenly throughout, or will there be portions where you will be able to recover? To note, a 10 second downhill will not give you much recovery, so do not overcook it early thinking that you will magically recover in 10 seconds! This sounds obvious, but can create havoc for the rider during the hill climb.

Speed is what you want to maximize on this ride, so if the course is undulating, make sure you know where you can surge, where you can recover a bit (while keeping speed up!), and hitting it again.

There is no point in going out too hard, only to use up all of your FRC or W’ early, which by definition, will have you riding BELOW THRESHOLD for nearly the remainder of time. This is not good.

Remember the pacing! If you look down and you are doing 50-100W more than your target, but “feeling good”, alarm bells should be ringing! You did not magically bring 100 more watts today; you will explode.

Use the inital burst to get out of the block and up to speed, but then be patient! You do not want to be drowning in lactic acid in the first 1/3. It would be much better to be pouring it on during the last 1/3, with massive wattage. Finishing strong, through the finish line, will give you the fastest time. Most athletes will be dying at that time, and you’re making up time.

Thank you to everyone for your comments and questions, let’s continue to foster a constructive conversation about cycling; let’s #EVOQYourBest Together.

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Time Trial & Hill Climbing Cycling Training Plan