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Body Mass to Generate Power?

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Body Mass to Generate Power?

Old 09-18-20, 07:24 PM
  #1  
davidwm88
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Body Mass to Generate Power?

Hello,

I have been researching some topics on this forum regarding body mass and power generation, but have not found the answer to my question, so please excuse this thread as I am sure the general topic has been beat to death.

Back story:

32 year old male. I currently weigh 210 Lbs (~95 Kg). 6'0 tall. I will say this off the bat, I am wide frame, and the lowest weight I could get to, and have gotten to is high 180s or low 190s. Even though I am not trying to get into any amateur or professional clubs, I take my riding very serious and its really changed my life since I started doing it 9 months ago.

Now for the stats

FTP when I started 9 months ago- 170 Watts
FTP as of two weeks ago- 315 Watts
Max average 5 min power- >440 Watts
Weight has stayed the same. Endurance has gone up dramatically (from be able to ride 10 miles before calling it a day to just finishing a 60 mile ride last week with energy still left in tank)

I have two main questions going off of these stats and improvement:

Generally speaking, can a rider produce more absolute power with more body weight? I know it depends on body make up, a 220 pound bodybuilder is different than a 220 pound 25% Body fat individual, but if you take the average male with 15-25% body fat at 210-220 pounds, would it be reasonable to expect them to push out 400 watts? I believe the key is the endurance here, more bodyweight might produce more power but they certainly would not be able to hold that power for 20 minutes, correct? In other words, is my 315 watts FTP at 210 lbs with 18-20% body fat a good number? Or at that weight, the body just has more muscle mass to produce more power so most riders at that weight with a little bit of training could hit those numbers?

Second question, in the back of my head is the thought to drop my weight to 190, but I know if my ftp and power goes down it will discourage me (even if my average speed goes up), so in the forums experience, does power drop when losing that much weight as a percentage of my overall weight? Do I just to need to make sure my W/Kg increases and not worry about absolute numbers? And is that even possible.

Thanks for the insight.
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Old 09-18-20, 08:05 PM
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surak
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It depends on what you want to do. W/kg is a good measuring stick for climbing and fitness, but on flatter ground raw power is better because your frontal area isn't linearly proportional to weight.
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Old 09-18-20, 09:26 PM
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unterhausen
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watts/kg is very important for cycling performance. If you just want to emphasize watts, then you will probably have more muscle mass and more watts. The holy grail is losing weight without losing muscle mass, which is extremely difficult. Pure sprinters weigh more, but they don't do that well on the road.
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