53x12 intervals

blkhotrod said:

Any thoughts?

I'd say questions, rather than thoughts, since you haven't given enough information to be helpful to anyone at this point.

Did you ask why he rode like that, or what he felt that he gained from it? Why does he choose that particular gear? What power-level / HR / RPE or any other measure of intensity does he shoot for? What cadence is he usually able to maintain? How often does he do it? Why does he only do it during the off-season? What kind of terrain does he do that workout in? Does he have an 11-tooth cog on his cassette?

Some of our local Pro and NZ Track Team riders use SE training on an erg to work on pedaling technique. With the fan from the erg you get a noticeable variance in noise if not pedaling correctly. They do 20min efforts at 40-50 rpm and work at around 85%-90% of max HR. It really helps build their strength and power for the track and road.

Hamish Ferguson
Cycling Coach

fergie said:

Some of our local Pro and NZ Track Team riders use SE training on an erg to work on pedaling technique. With the fan from the erg you get a noticeable variance in noise if not pedaling correctly. They do 20min efforts at 40-50 rpm and work at around 85%-90% of max HR. It really helps build their strength and power for the track and road.

Hamish Ferguson
Cycling Coach

Maybe I've been brainwashed by Ric and co, but this makes no sense. Can you explain further?

frenchyge said:

I'd say questions, rather than thoughts, since you haven't given enough information to be helpful to anyone at this point.

Did you ask why he rode like that, or what he felt that he gained from it? Why does he choose that particular gear? What power-level / HR / RPE or any other measure of intensity does he shoot for? What cadence is he usually able to maintain? How often does he do it? Why does he only do it during the off-season? What kind of terrain does he do that workout in? Does he have an 11-tooth cog on his cassette?

Sorry Frenchyge, thought you were over in Paris helping out the police.

he felt he gained added strength in quads and on 3-6 pedal force. i think power level was 300-320 with 50-60 cadence. he did this every other week during offseason. said his legs were pretty much wasted next day. terrain is flat to small rollers. no 11 cog on his training bike. I will be interested in your expert comments.

blkhotrod said:

Sorry Frenchyge, thought you were over in Paris helping out the police.

Nope. 🙄
<----------- Kansas City, see?

blkhotrod said:

he felt he gained added strength in quads and on 3-6 pedal force. i think power level was 300-320 with 50-60 cadence. he did this every other week during offseason. said his legs were pretty much wasted next day. terrain is flat to small rollers. no 11 cog on his training bike. I will be interested in your expert comments.

Oh, was there a question to your post? I thought you were just name-dropping about your buddy the Pro.

blkhotrod said:

Sorry Frenchyge, thought you were over in Paris helping out the police.

he felt he gained added strength in quads and on 3-6 pedal force. i think power level was 300-320 with 50-60 cadence. he did this every other week during offseason. said his legs were pretty much wasted next day. terrain is flat to small rollers. no 11 cog on his training bike. I will be interested in your expert comments.

Dang-typed a good reply then somehow got rid of it.

Have you read "gyming to improve power?" Pedal force even in elite road cyclists is fairly low.

300 watts at a cadence of 55 with effective pedaling range of 170 (changed from the ac default of 70) is about 70 pounds per leg of effective pedal force. I doubt this does much for strength. It is probably a good workout since he is working at a high power output for an hour (know what his threshold is?) but would be more effective if done at his preferred cadence.

Low RPM, hard effort, big gears... sounds like specific resistance training on the bike. I like it better than doing squats. If your knees can support it.

whoawhoa said:

300 watts at a cadence of 55 with effective pedaling range of 170 (changed from the ac default of 70) is about 70 pounds per leg of effective pedal force. I doubt this does much for strength. It is probably a good workout since he is working at a high power output for an hour (know what his threshold is?) but would be more effective if done at his preferred cadence.

Sounds like the workout is a concerted effort to train the muscles for maximal downstroke force in lieu of a circular pedalling motion. I know when I'm forced into a slow cadence my stroke gets more choppy and heavily weighted on the downstrokes.

Of course, if that's the case it would support what Ric's been saying all along about elite riders' pedalling motion and downstroke force (and would contradict what Carmichael says on my CTS workout tape), but shhhhhhh...... let Blkhotrod think he figured it out first. 😉

whoawhoa said:

Maybe I've been brainwashed by Ric and co, but this makes no sense. Can you explain further?

When using the BT-ATS erg...

http://www.usauzziesales.com/training_system_details.htm

The fan at the rear makes a constant noise if one has a good pedalling technique. If your pedalling is choppy the fan makes a varied noise. Local NZ Track riders claim doing SE work (40-50rpm) has smoothed out their pedalling greatly.

It also has helped them to ride bigger gears on the track.

The National Track Coach has advised to be careful when doing SE work not to overdo it.

Hamish Ferguson
Cycling Coach

This type of strength training would be much better for you're cycling compared to gym work as it is only using cycling specific muscles. A bit of extra power and muscle never hurt anyone and as long as you are spinning youre legs out at say 150 rpm as a recovery afterwards i would think this training would be very beneficial. I heard many australian riders do similar work at 50-60 rpm up hills like buffalo, hotham etc. I think if you incorporated spinning in the workout you could get the best of both worlds?

fergie said:

When using the BT-ATS erg...

usauzziesales.comtraining system details.htmOpen ↗

The fan at the rear makes a constant noise if one has a good pedalling technique. If your pedalling is choppy the fan makes a varied noise. Local NZ Track riders claim doing SE work (40-50rpm) has smoothed out their pedalling greatly.

It also has helped them to ride bigger gears on the track.

The National Track Coach has advised to be careful when doing SE work not to overdo it.

Hamish Ferguson
Cycling Coach

Interesting thread. I can't speak about many details of the BT-ATS, but did have the opportunity to sit in on a presentation about it and then participate in some testing on it. I can definitely see how it would allow riders to use bigger gears on the track, and have experienced that fan noise that changes based on pedaling technique. One of the other cyclists who used it with me actually got to do a 53-12 type of workout, but not for 2 hours...still, it was a pretty great workout, and I can see how a workout like that may be useful.

frenchyge said:

Nope. 🙄
<----------- Kansas City, see?

Oh, was there a question to your post? I thought you were just name-dropping about your buddy the Pro.

As usual you have no expert advice or expertise, in fact you probably spend more time nit picking this forum then you do on a bike is my guess. And everyone can see your from KC, the joke flew 38,000 ft over your head i'm afraid.

whoawhoa said:

300 watts at a cadence of 55 with effective pedaling range of 170 (changed from the ac default of 70) is about 70 pounds per leg of effective pedal force. I doubt this does much for strength. It is probably a good workout since he is working at a high power output for an hour (know what his threshold is?) but would be more effective if done at his preferred cadence.

Thanks for shedding some light on this workout. I think he said he could get up to about 375-380 watts when racing. He was doing this for 2 hours. I got the impression that he couldn't do this for 2 hours at normal cadence of 90-95. Thank you again, I apologize for asking these elementary questions but I don't have the background and calculational tools you guys have.

blkhotrod said:

As usual you have no expert advice or expertise <snip>

If it's expert advice you seek, then you might start by not alienating the moderators and other coaches and physiologists that frequent this forum.

SolarEnergy said:

Low RPM, hard effort, big gears... sounds like specific resistance training on the bike. I like it better than doing squats. If your knees can support it.

Like doing squats for 2 hours? I would imagine the force to be rather low to accomodate that gear. My guess is that if specific resistance training is desired, do all out "big gear" efforts from a standing start for 5-10 seconds.

blkhotrod said:

Thanks for shedding some light on this workout. I think he said he could get up to about 375-380 watts when racing. He was doing this for 2 hours. I got the impression that he couldn't do this for 2 hours at normal cadence of 90-95. Thank you again, I apologize for asking these elementary questions but I don't have the background and calculational tools you guys have.

It all comes from analyticcycling.com

blkhotrod said:

Thanks for shedding some light on this workout. I think he said he could get up to about 375-380 watts when racing. He was doing this for 2 hours. I got the impression that he couldn't do this for 2 hours at normal cadence of 90-95. Thank you again, I apologize for asking these elementary questions but I don't have the background and calculational tools you guys have.

It's all on analyticcycling.com

As for my "background" I'm a sophomore in high school, so you probably shouldn't listen to anything I say. 😉

dkrenik said:

My guess is that if specific resistance training is desired, do all out "big gear" efforts from a standing start for 5-10 seconds.

This seems to be closer to the CTS approach. Four CTS exercises come to mind:
(1) "Stomps": "designed to improve muscular strength & power while in the saddle", "gearing should be large, 53x12", "4 to 12 efforts of 15-20 seconds each...the effort should begin at moderate speed (typically 15 to 20 mph)" [note: my coach has me start around 10 mph, I've got 8 of these on the schedule as soon as I stop posting on the internet!]
(2) "Power Starts" : very similar to stomps, except do these out of the saddle, and start speed around 5 mph.
(3) "Muscle Tension" : "...to convert strength gains from the weight room into power on the bicycle", "2-4 efforts of 5-12 minutes each", "gearing...53x12-15", "uphill 5-8% grade", "50-55 rpm" [I've been doing 3x9 minutes, while controlling these by finding a gear which keeps me at the right cadence, the after-training file download shows power just a little under "field test" levels.]
(4) "Tempo" : "better power at moderate intensities", "20-120 minutes continuous riding", "pedal cadence 70-75 rpm" [ so these aren't quite as extreme as 2 hours in 53x12 at 50 rpm, but big enough gearing to bring one's cadence down from the usual 90-100 range to 70-75 rpm.]

The rider I spoke with raced for Discovery and has won World Champs medals on the track. He does 3 X 20min efforts at 40-50 cadence as part of a three hour ride on the road or on the erg if weather is bad. He says it kills the legs but was a key factor in making the transition from National level to Elite track and Cat 1 Team Pro racing.

Hamish Ferguson
Cycling Coach