CoachingDIAGNOSIS

FTP STUCK AT 250 WATTS? WHAT YOU'RE PROBABLY DOING WRONG

Your FTP has been stuck at 250 watts for six months, maybe twelve. You're a 70kg rider, so that's the 3.5 W/kg shelf — exactly where most committed amateurs stall out. You train 8-10 hours a week, you do intervals, you've tried sweet spot blocks, but the number won't budge. The problem isn't effort. It's almost always one of five structural blockers in the system around the work.

THE SHORT ANSWER

Most often, this is because you're stuck in the grey zone — most rides are 'medium' instead of properly easy or properly hard. The fix: fix the intensity distribution — run polarised — roughly 80% genuinely easy, 20% genuinely hard. cut sweet spot until the base is thicker..

WHY THIS HAPPENS

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You're stuck in the grey zone — most rides are 'medium' instead of properly easy or properly hard

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Your aerobic base is too shallow to support more threshold work — you've maxed the gain from intensity without enough zone 2 underneath

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You're under-recovering — same load, but recovery hasn't caught up, so adaptation can't happen

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You're under-fuelling long rides — sub-60g of carbs an hour caps the quality of every interval that week

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Your programme has gone stale — same intervals, same routes, same intensities for over a year

WHAT TO DO ABOUT IT

1

Fix the intensity distribution

Run polarised — roughly 80% genuinely easy, 20% genuinely hard. Cut sweet spot until the base is thicker.

2

Diagnose the specific blocker

The Plateau Diagnostic asks four minutes of questions and tells you which of the five patterns is yours.

3

Add low-cadence torque work

The 2024 Habis study showed 40-60 RPM intervals on a climb produced near-double the VO2max gains of self-selected cadence.

4

Audit your fuelling on long rides

Most stuck-at-250 riders are eating 30-40g/hr. Targets for amateurs in build phase are 70-90g/hr.

5

Talk to a coach

If the system is the issue, an outside read on six months of data finds the leak faster than another six months of guessing.

FREE DIAGNOSTIC

Take the plateau diagnostic

Or apply for coaching →