# Theoretical Interval question



## Doc_D (Mar 16, 2006)

Do you think doing 1 minute intervals does anything to improve your FT power? And the opposite question, do you think doing FT work improves your 1 minute power? 

My personal gut feeling after looking at my first year of serious training with a power meter last year is that a shorter interval (i.e. 1 minute) contributes to your performance in longer intervals (i.e. 20 minute) more than work at a longer interval (i.e. 20 minutes) contributes to performance in shorter interval (i.e. 1 minutes). To REALLY break it down, I'm starting to think that FT work does nothing to improve my sprint but sprint work does have the side effect of improving my FTP somewhat.

I was just curious of the pros had any thoughts.


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## Alex_Simmons/RST (Jan 12, 2008)

Doc_D said:


> Do you think doing 1 minute intervals does anything to improve your FT power? And the opposite question, do you think doing FT work improves your 1 minute power?
> 
> My personal gut feeling after looking at my first year of serious training with a power meter last year is that a shorter interval (i.e. 1 minute) contributes to your performance in longer intervals (i.e. 20 minute) more than work at a longer interval (i.e. 20 minutes) contributes to performance in shorter interval (i.e. 1 minutes). To REALLY break it down, I'm starting to think that FT work does nothing to improve my sprint but sprint work does have the side effect of improving my FTP somewhat.
> 
> I was just curious of the pros had any thoughts.


Well it somewhat depends on what you mean by 1-minute intervals.

But think of it this way:

Sustainable aerobic power is a function of your aerobic abilities alone, and doing long aerobic interval work is specifically designed to target that energy system.

1-minute power is a function of your aerobic capacity, anaerobic work capacity and neuromuscular power, and as such one can see an improvement in 1-min power due to changes in one or all of those elements. It is however difficult to improve both aerobic and anaerobic abilities at the same time.

And what energy system(s) you are primarily targeting with 1-min intervals will vary depending on how you are doing them. It's entirely possible that they way you are doing 1-min intervals is ultimately more of an aerobic workout, and hence providing more of an aerobic training stimulus, than an anaerobic one. Hence why you might be perceiving a benefit to FTP.

It's a common mistake for people to skew training interval sessions such that they end up training something other than what's desired.

1-min power is quite a complex beast, and it matters a lot to understand the context of what you intend to need/use it for.


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