Threshold Pulling SemiFinal (Kickr) workout completed last night after a loooonnnggg work day! (Isn’t it awesome how it typically takes a full week to get caught up after taking 2 days off?!? LOL)
I chose to do the Threshold Pulling workout because, while the intervals were at a higher # than the other remaining Kickr workouts, it also incorporated a lot of rest intervals, and I started this workout 72 hours to the minute after falling off my bike in exhaustion post 12 Hour TT, so I knew that my legs would likely “fill up” and want to stop turning over a bit more quickly than usual due to the fact that they weren’t quite 100% recovered yet. At the same time, I know that my legs recover VERY quickly from hard efforts during rest intervals, so I figured I’d have a better shot at hitting/holding the RXd #s in this workout than one of the others that required holding Threshold for a longer period of time between rest intervals.
This workout consisted of a 15 minute warm-up, a 5 minute recovery period, and then into the intervals:
2 x 4 min @ 112% FTP / 4 min Recovery
3 x 3 min @ 112% FTP / 3 min Recovery
4 x 2 min @ 112% FTP / 2 min Recovery
5 x 1 min @ 112% FTP / 1 min Recovery
The intervals were followed by a 10 minute warm-down.
2 x 4 min @ 112% FTP / 4 min Recovery
3 x 3 min @ 112% FTP / 3 min Recovery
4 x 2 min @ 112% FTP / 2 min Recovery
5 x 1 min @ 112% FTP / 1 min Recovery
The intervals were followed by a 10 minute warm-down.
I’ve never done a workout in ERG mode before, but decided to do this one in ERG because I had trouble during the spin-ups in the previous workout, where I had to spin up, and then drop to 76W immediately after. Without ERG on, and with no brakes on the Kickr, it took a good bit of time for the Kickr to spin down to the point that I could pedal at 76W. I wanted to nail the #s in this workout, so I figured I’d give ERG a shot. (Spoiler Alert: Bad Idea!)
A little more info about my Kickr: it’s reading ~14-15W lower than all of my other Power Meters (PT hubs and C1 Crank Meter) – this normally wouldn’t be all that much of a problem, but when using ERG mode, and holding me at 285W, which is 112% of my FTP, it was ACTUALLY holding me at what my body perceived as ~300-305W (~120%), based on the meters that I usually use, and that my FTP was calculated on. . . . couple that with the fact that my legs weren’t fully recovered. . . yeah, I most certainly “got my money’s worth” out of this workout! lol
My legs felt surprisingly good/nimble during the warmup period, and I was feeling very positive about my ability to nail the #s. About 3 seconds before the start of the 1st 4 min interval, I increased my cadence to ~110 to prepare for the resistance to kick in. ERG kicked in, and I continued to spin at 100+ rpm for the duration of the first 4 minute interval, but my legs were screaming at me by the end of it. . and I was 1 interval into 14 – YIKES!
I recovered quickly from the first interval during the 4 min recovery, and then launched into the 2nd 4 minute interval feeling good. Despite my best efforts to keep my cadence 100+ though, it started to drift about half-way through, and 2:20 in, I hit the “breaking point” where ERG mode threw on so much resistance due to my dropping cadence that I began to really struggle to turn the pedals over. I stood up and mashed for the final minute of this interval, and managed to hit my #s, but my cadence had faded over the final minute of the interval from 100+ to ~50RPM. I knew that I’d have to do a better job of keeping it up, because my legs would not be able to continue mashing that big of a gear for all of the remaining intervals.
I faded a bit ~ 2 min into the 1st 3 minute interval when I went to stand and didn’t stand fast enough, so the ERG brought my pedals to a grinding halt and I couldn’t get my cadence back up over 35 RPM for the final 30 seconds. . .can you say OUCH!!? LOL
After that though, I did a good job of hitting all of my #s for the remaining intervals despite a dropping cadence and lots of “mashing” throughout the final 30-60 sec of each of the 3 & 2 minute intervals.
I felt that my legs recovered quickly during each recovery session, even as the recovery period decreased, so that was a relief!
I actually really enjoyed the final 5 x 1 minute intervals! I found that I could easily keep my cadence up over 100RPM for this amount of time, so I never got “bogged down”, and therefore the 1 minute rest periods allowed me plenty of time to recover/prepare for the next one, and I nailed these flawlessly and felt that I could have done more 
Summary: This was a really great workout, and one that I think I would have enjoyed even more, had I taken it on a little more recovered, and out of ERG mode. I earned 7/7 stars, so THAT was a huge relief!
For those of you out there who, like me, don’t have a lot of experience using ERG mode and/or prefer to generate your high power output through spinning at 95+ RPM rather than standing/mashing, I’d recommend turning ERG off during this one 
VO2 Intermittent SemiFinal Workout (Kickr) on deck for tonight after work!