I am preparing for a recreational gran fondo on hilly terrain.
I have been following AI’s suggested training rides for several weeks now. I feel that fitness is improving. What worries me: my FTP does not change anything! Is this normal? What am I doing wrong (in the settings?)?
What does your Forecast Chart look like on the Training page?
What are your Event settings under Program?
The XFAI Setup Guide serves as a wizard to fill out the Program dialog box entries.
Setup Guide – 
Program dialog box – 
In your case Event Readiness (3 - Fair) and Max Weekly Hours (10) on the Setup Guide have capped TL and predicted increases in signature values.
There are a couple ways you can handle this situation but it will require increasing your hours (assuming that is feasible) and recasting your plan. This also means the Start date of the new plan will be today.
Option A: Go to the Setup Guide and bump up your Max Hours a bit until you see Readiness change to 2 - Good. If the increase is feasible, recast the plan with Run Forecast AI button. For example, increase from 10 to 11 or possibly 12 hours if you think that is a realistic number for you. If no lowering the Readiness value, proceed to Option B.
Option B: Go to Program dialog box and change Target Type from Event to Goal. You should see Mixed GC Specialist listed and below that a box to enter a Target Focus Power. Enter a value a few watts higher than your current GC Specialist watts. As you do that watch what happens to the Current vs Target TL on the right. That’s equivalent to raising your weekly hours. If the increase seems realistic to you, recast the plan with Run Forecast AI button.
The above options assume you haven’t configured Availability to cap your weekly hours at 10.
If so, edit Availability keeping in mind the increase required could be as simple as riding long one day a week. Anything that will raise TL between now and your event.
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Perhaps the more basic reason is just signature decay and lack of breakthroughs… the new decay approach should limit decay after some time, so soon it should start going up with your training load as you would expect…
Or, if you feel fresh, go for a breakthrough to see where you are really at 
Many thanks for taking a closer look at my settings!
I brought the training hours to 10.5hrs and the ‘Event duration’ to 5.15hrs (which is more realistic).
Event readiness= 2
Totam XSS is now:289.
Now my FTP indeed goes from 194 to 198.
Thanks again.
As a side comment - most often the day-to-day changes in Threshold are going to be very minimal… often less than 1 W increase, even if you’re training every day.
However - assuming your Training Load is going up over time - you should start to see the accumulation of those minuscule day-to-day increases when looking over larger blocks of consistent training. 1% better per day might not seem like much, but 100 days of 1% better every day is! Kinda like the concept of marginal gains 
The event I was training for several months (Recreational gran fondo on a hilly terrain) is over. Trainings generated by AI Forecast were quite accurate.
In the group of + 70 year olds, I finished last. My time over the 120km with 1900 altimeters (average speed 22.4km/h): 5h27’ (the best from the group of +70 year olds took 2h less time!)…
Not that I expected to be the best (far from it …) But a difference in time of 2hrs. How can this be explained?
I followed the suggested workouts pretty minutely. The intensive workouts were difficult and felt that way. . Were my settings wrong? Other reasons? I am trying to find an explanation for this inferior performance. Disillusioned.
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Hey Luc.
One of the biggest things about cycling is that it’s a fairly simple sport - it’s not like some sports which are skill based as well as around based. (for example downhill skiing or downhill MTB or Chess) (for anyone else reading this please accept that in the spirit intended, I know there are tactics for the leading edge athletes and so on …)
With cycling - we are all born with a capacity for aerobic activity, running I guess is what that was for millennia ago.
We can then all train that capability up, and help that aerobic capacity work by working in strength, but we can only train against our own baseline. And that’s in some ways the joy of it. It doesn’t matter what anyone else is doing.
But it does matter that we are making our own efforts to be better in whatever way we choose. And even being in a training platform is miles ahead of the 20 billion people sitting on a sofa !!
You took on this event and you did it. That’s something to be proud of right from the start. How many people take in events …. and that’s not an age thing that’s just a fact … to get as far as going for an event takes some doing.
Depending on whether you’re a lifetime cyclist/runner, or someone who started later on in life (that’s me) … you may still have plenty time to improve (against yourself).
Here’s a real world example.
I ride most of the time with one person.
He is in the same age bracket as me. He doesn’t train - at all !!! whereas I’ve been trying to get to the best I can be for 5-6 years.
Like many who use training platforms (and it doesn’t matter which one you use - seriously it doesn’t) I saw a huge improvement in the first year - like 10% on what I thought was useful benchmark at the start (ftp from a standard test).
That was just me moving from someone who did shit loads of exercise but wasn’t a cyclist, to the cycling ‘thing’ and my aerobic capability increased and muscles adapted.
In the next few years I got maybe a few more percent. Since then I have to work hard to hold back the decline as long as possible because I’m at an aerobic ceiling (probably declining) (though I still hope to balance that through work on my overall strength).
On the other hand - person I ride with can compete in all-age MTB XC, and is still winning stuff.
On the road - if he is trying, I can’t even use the draft to stay with him. His baseline is so much higher than on a road event that was timed over say 8 hours, he’d easily be 2 hours ahead of me.
I can cite a huge number of examples like this.
In short - we are who we are.
We can improve ourselves. And while it’s in our nature to compare with others I guess, personally - it’s simpler to compare oneself with oneself and find a measuring mechanism that you can use that suits you.
Lastly. Top job on finishing your event. That’s some amount of climbing AND distance
All the best for whatever your next event is 
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Thanks for those motivating words!
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Your event was a UCI Gran Fondo Series qualifier for the World Championship. That means many were there to ride as fast as they could.
Your goal was for a recreational pace finish with a readiness level of 2 (increasing fatigue during event; tired afterwards).
How did you feel during and after the event?
How well did you fuel and hydrate?
More importantly – did you enjoy the event? 
What are your comparative strengths and weaknesses when you view your spider chart on the Ranking page for Male 70-79? I.e. the highest percentile and lowest percentile at which focus durations.
Also check the left side Personal chart. How close are you to 100%? (Best metric in the past)
It’s great to see year-over-year improvement but a decline due to aging is inevitable.
The goal is how long we can retain a level of fitness and keep further decline at bay.
As a Strava user you can gauge past performance with your segment times and PR history and compare with age-group results. For example, I’m slower on flats and descents but typically reach a top three position on climbs when I aim for a PR. But I’m no match for any national level septuagenarians or tri-geek diesels in my region. I can’t keep up with them. If my occasional group rides end up mostly solo, I’m fine with that. I still enjoy the ride.
Solo at my own pace is also the only way to Z2.
As @scoobmw2 mentions genetics is in play no matter what you do. That includes on the way up (20-55) and on the way down (55-70+).
Those gifted are likely to remain gifted on the way down unless disease or genetic disposition kicks in when it’s their time. Your family tree will be an indicator.
At our age we really only compete against ourselves. That in itself is enough.
Consider 70+ represents less than half a percent of riders still at it.
I used intervals.icu to determine that. 70+ males = 397/83196 total males = .47 %
In your event there were 1603 male riders, 16 of which were 70+, six of whom were DNF.
16/1603 = .99%
We belong to the less-than-one-percent club. Showing up and finishing is a win.
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Thanks mates for these encouraging words. An aging athlete: it remains painful.