Even though I have this stuff in Strava and Garmin and a half dozen other apps, I’m going to keep it here so I can summarize it. (Note: I didn’t start this until April 28 but had the back information recorded.)
https://www.strava.com/athletes/113558452
216 FTP / 84.5 kg = 2.55 w/kg
First true FTP test over 20 minutes. It was so painful and hard. It became very clear that there is as much mental training going on as physical to increase FTP. I had just climbed Alpe de Zwift in 83 minutes two days before. I also had the new Garmin Rally power meter pedals instead of depending on the Zwift Hub power approximations, which, given the state of my crappy, cheap drive train probably added at least 3 watts all by itself. I got the Garmin Rally power meter for one reason: to have consistent power readings between Zwift and riding outdoors. Even if it is slightly off, they have to be the same to make any meaningful training decisions.
Zone 2 training is magic for melting fat. It is much harder than the zone 2 based on HR only meaning it burns a lot more total calories but requires a bit of glucose recovery in order to do so. Long and super slow is not the way to lose weight. Neither is starving myself during any training day. Cutting bad calories on the recovery days and eating to fuel all of the activity on training days is the secret. The harder and longer you can go during training the more total calories burned and the low percentage or carbs consumed to fuel that zone 2 effort get burned up in the process so they don’t contribute to fat gain at all. Carbs are like the octane that starts the fire that eventually burns up the other fuel that would never catch fire on its own. You cannot start the fire without carbs.
200 FTP / 88 kg = 2.27 w/kg
I spent pretty much all of February and March on my bike in Zwift and started outdoor rides.
174 FTP / 93.3 kg = 1.86 w/kg
This was the first day I started recording my weight and decided to do something about it. I had been training on and off since December already.