Please help me to understand my true limiter!!

Your limiter seems to be thinking that races are like team rides.

You might want to find a local ride where the people hate you and want to hurt/drop you.

---

If the surges cause you problems, you could do high intensity minute or two repeats. Or you could do lower intensity longer repeats and hope to catch up when the pace drops.

I do not think a race is like a team ride. I was using that as an example to show that I believe my sustainable power is much higher than that of most of my teammates. In a race if they make the surge they can sit in the pack at a much lower power than I who have to use my aerobic power to the max of my ability to catch back on. This is why I am starting to believe that sustainable aerobic power might not be the issue.

You haven't given us much to go on. How much L5 work have you done lately? Because if the answer is none then that's at least part of your problem. L5 work is super important for road racing. There's also the fact that the race was pretty hard for you. You did IF=1.1 for 18 mins. I think I can do IF=1.1 for more like 30 mins (and I think that is above the norm). However, clearly you weren't going to last the whole race that way even with more L5 work. One problem might have been your positioning. It sounds like you were yoyo'ing, which is never good.

A couple of thoughts come to mind:

- Maybe it's the driving, not the engine. IOW, it sounds like you're accustomed to gaps opening up and you rely on your FTP and 5 minute power to roll them closed again but your team mates with less sustainable power at their disposal are doing a better job of 'gap management' or that learned ability to see the attacks coming wind up a gear quickly to respond and are following wheels while you might be dieseling your way across no man's land. You can probably get away with that on many group rides where the competitive bursts are shorter lived and less frequent but throw a couple of dozen fit and aggressive riders at similar levels into the mix and each gap that isn't closed immediately is one more match you're burning while others are following wheels.

- In a way, your sustainable power may be leading you into this trap as you generally know you can roll folks down but it doesn't work as well as you face more comparable competition and likely won't work so well if you upgrade.

- From a physiology standpoint you might want to develop your ability to quickly recruit muscle groups on demand with workouts like Bill Black's HOP work that both teaches you to accelerate quickly and forces you to recover at relatively high intensity. You can create many variations on micro-interval work but I recommend folks start with some basic 'Tempo with a twist' where you go out ramp up to mid to high Tempo and do a seated 10 to 15 second burst every two minutes before settling right back into your Tempo pace. The goal on each burst is a dynamic and very rapid acceleration using leg speed, not brute force to whip your cranks up and wind them like crazy in the saddle before settling back to Tempo for recovery. There aren't really power goals for those bursts just focus on immediate acceleration and then go home and see what you actually did hit for the early and late bursts. Sustain the overall efforts just like you might a pure Threshold effort so maybe 2x20 or 2x30 or 1x60. Those bursts will really drive up the NP so these can be quite hard. If they're not hard enough you can do the bursts more frequently or raise the base Tempo intensity a bit. I'd hold off on stretching the 'on' periods as from what you describe rapid acceleration sounds more useful than lactate tolerance right now but that's another very useful flavor of these.

- If you race many crits, especially regular training crits then play with them to work on rapidly responding to surges and getting up to speed immediately out of every corner. Perhaps set a goal of riding the whole crit a gear or two or even more lower than usual and perhaps trying as hard as you can to never jump out of the saddle to respond or finish a corner.

- If you suspect it's more on the driving part, really pay attention to what's happening up front regardless of how deep you're riding in the field and also pay attention to any movement up the sides as early warnings of upcoming surges. Try riding a cog or two lower than usual when the group is rolling moderate speeds and attacks are imminent and only upshift to bigger gearing after whipping your gears up to speed and grabbing a wheel. I love grinding a big gear in a TT or in an L4 training effort or when off the front solo or with a small break but in the field I try to ride a much lighter gear unless we're going flat out and I really need all the gearing or we're going so fast that further attacks are unlikely at those speeds. It's amazing how many folks (and I'm not suggesting you do this) wait till the wheel in front of them starts to accelerate and then jump up in a big gear to grind up to speed instead of looking forward anticipating the surge, riding a bit of calculated but hopefully safe overlap and whipping smaller gears up to speed before the ranks ahead have started to respond. Do it well and it's like the free ride as you just slip in behind those guys as they ramp up to speed. In those cases where they're too slow on the uptake you use that early acceleration to blast right across the gaps they open up. Sometimes that relatively easy in the saddle acceleration takes you right up front at speed just as the leaders decide not to follow through with their surge, when that happens you just roll that easy speed to get a free gap with no huge effort and put your TT and slowtwitch strengths to use without first having to burn a big match to open the initial gap.

Yeah, I'm making tons of assumptions here and maybe you already do all these things really well but that's what came to mind after reading your post.

Good luck,
-Dave

Thanks Dave. At the begining of last year I used to think it was the driving part but as I did more and more races I could handle these surges better. This race by the way was a field of 75 with centerline rule in effect so it wasn't the easiest to move around in. But I really noticed some things today that led me to really believe it might not just be the driving. For example, as the the pack would enter a corner and exit it would string out a bit. I could pass 3 or 4 in the corner alone because I could lay off the brakes because of better handling. Right after the apex I would be giving it all I had just to hold the wheel in front of me why the guys I just passed plus a few more would pass me and take position as the field bunched up again. This is not on the back of the pack by the way. I would have to look for the tiniest of diagonal spaces to move through to get position back. One guy [censored], but hey, he wasn't on the wheel in front of him and my bars were first sooo, you lose.
If you noticed I was asking Dr. Coggan some questions on his power scheme and IF over on wattage. One thing I noticed is most of my rides I try to ride as iso power as possible, even on the rolling terrain in which I live. L2, l3, SST, L4. I thought I should be doing this to have the greatest stimulation to raising FTP. I kept one group ride a week on average to keep some power variability in the plan. But your comment about my sustainable power and the team ride got me thinking that maybe you are right there. My sustainable power on these particular rides is actually keeping me from having to dig deep enough to get any kind of adaption out of the variability because I can just ride back on. Get me in a race with more equal riders surging in a repeatable fashion and it puts me up against my MMP curve and eventually I'm toast.
I'm gonna take your reccomendation to add some bursts to tempo or SST work. If you don't mind me asking since most of my riding has been iso power what about just riding the terrain more farlek style, jumping out of corners, hammering hills like Andy has said he does tempo work? Maybe doing the same with some L4 as long as average power is in level and IF is where it should be to describe the effort. Or do you think the structured micro interval and burst every few minutes in a longer interval is the way to go?

Thanks again for your insightful post.

Absolutely, nothing wrong with using the terrain and your own imagination to introduce variability. If it's group riding with the right group then the fartlek approach can be great assuming it is appropriate for your fitness (e.g. not too easy during the sitting in sections) but if you do the fartlek work solo then you'll want to be really diligent about pushing not only when it's fun to do so but also on partial recovery and at times when you've got to dig deep to make the efforts. That's one big advantage to structured HOP work, the timer rolls around for the next burst and if you want to stay on the plan you've got to go regardless of how well you are or aren't recovered at that moment. Group rides can be like that as well if it's a good group for you but doing that stuff solo can be tough if you have too much flexibility about when to dig deep or whether you'll just roll another mile or so before you jump again.

But yeah you can definitely be creative about this and just opening up to the possibility of some more variable riding, even if it's not the focused HOP stuff can be real useful. Seems like a classic case of 'train your weaknesses' as your strength seems to be sustained isopower efforts.

-Dave

Dave,
Wanted to follow up with a big thanks and share what I found this morning. If it wasn't your keen obervation about using "the diesel engine" on the gourp riding I might have missed this.
This morning I delved into the power file in more detail. Isolating the section when I was in the field there were 8 efforts of 20 to 40 seconds between 150 to 180% of FTP where I was burning a major match to keep with the field after it would surge out of a corner or over a roller. I would lose the wheel with the initial snap and just hold on and ride back up. This was for around 18 minutes till I was dropped. If it wasn't for my somewhat decent FTP and aerobic system fueling these efforts I wouldn't have made it as far as I did.
So I brought up some of my iso power tempo, SST, and L4 work and looked at the QA. Of course, Lots of dots around threshold in all 4 quadrants. Then when I brought up various group rides...it was the same thing. A few more outliers but you could see the diesel in full fledge. What really shocked me is what I found with the QA plot of when I was in the field. There was of course some outliers in quadrant 1 but mostly a big huge blob around threshold showing how I favor the diesel. When I looked at races at the end of last year when I was doing better it wasn't such a big blob and more quadrant 1.
This tells me that as I do more races and I am forced more and more high pedal speed, high force efforts and get the quadrant 1 work I need. So, it seems obvious to me that I need to start this sooner every year and spend some time on this weakness. So I'm off to do a mix of long tempo with some hill sprints and jumping out of corners. I built up to around 5x20 or a 1 hour 40 min straight at 90% FTP so I'm going to introduce some bursting into those every few minutes. Probably also will hit some structured micro interval work to be able to change leg speeds back and forth quickly.

Thanks again, Robert

Actually, after reading everything else you've written I think it's now really obvious that you're missing L5 work. I.e. 4-5 minute intervals. You don't even seem to be thinking about it, and it's key. A few weeks of L5 intervals and those accelerations will feel much much easier.

Lanierb,
It's not that I'm not thinking about the L5 work. I do agree it's key. I have done some just not enough to peak aerobic power because my main events are not till July. You said also in your post the race was obviously hard for me and the L5 work wouldn't have kept me in the whole race. I *think* that if I did more L5 I would have probably lasted longer but still in the same boat later on. If I could grab that wheel quicker it wouldn't stress my metabolic fitness so much. I did a race last year that had a 3-4 minute climb in it and I dropped the whole field. But in a rolling race when the smack is going down and everyone is fighting for wheels, they get on a recover much quicker while I am doing a little more work and over time it puts me up against my metabolic fitness limit. That is the only reason I have been leaning towards increasing how fast I can accelerate over making them *feel* easier. If I could get my FTP up to 350 watts in a month I would just ride away from the whole field and be done with it but that is just not gonna happen. [IMG]/img/vbsmilies/smilies/smile.gif[/IMG]
Also, it's not like I was the only one hurting. Everyone was in the pain cave. 20 or so were dropped in half a lap. I made it further then they did!!!
If you can hold a IF of 1.1 for 30 mintues I'd be curious as to what your power profile looks like. As I mentioned I have a high 5m and FTP column and a almost non existent 5s and 1m. I am so aerobic and slow twitch that my 3m to 8m power drop off is less than 10% and my 20m to 60m is only 2%. Can you say flat MMP curve??? I can ride hard all day....I just suck at hard real quick. [IMG]/img/vbsmilies/smilies/smile.gif[/IMG]

I'd love to have an FTP of 350 too! Actually, if you work on your L5 I think you'll be able to ride more efficiently, staying in good position etc and in the end you will actually work less because you won't always be fighting for position. You haven't said how much you weigh, so this could be a w/kg issue, but I have a hard time believing you're racing against a lot of people who have an FTP of 350w. It's just not that common. Those guys shouldn't be passing you on the corner exits. You should be holding the wheels in front of you. I strongly suggest you just try an L5 block. It makes a huge difference in a short time for me (couple weeks). As far as my IF=1.1 issue is concerned, standing up and cranking at high power is very easy for me, surprisingly almost restful (it seems to use different muscles that are rested), so I regularly end up with an IF=1.1 or even higher in Crits (every race actually). No way I could hold that power in a time trial though.

Quoted post said:

Originally Posted by rbarker76 [IMG]/img/forum/go_quote.gif[/IMG]

Thanks Dave. At the begining of last year I used to think it was the driving part but as I did more and more races I could handle these surges better. This race by the way was a field of 75 with centerline rule in effect so it wasn't the easiest to move around in. But I really noticed some things today that led me to really believe it might not just be the driving. For example, as the the pack would enter a corner and exit it would string out a bit. I could pass 3 or 4 in the corner alone because I could lay off the brakes because of better handling. Right after the apex I would be giving it all I had just to hold the wheel in front of me why the guys I just passed plus a few more would pass me and take position as the field bunched up again. This is not on the back of the pack by the way. I would have to look for the tiniest of diagonal spaces to move through to get position back. One guy [censored], but hey, he wasn't on the wheel in front of him and my bars were first sooo, you lose.
If you noticed I was asking Dr. Coggan some questions on his power scheme and IF over on wattage. One thing I noticed is most of my rides I try to ride as iso power as possible, even on the rolling terrain in which I live. L2, l3, SST, L4. I thought I should be doing this to have the greatest stimulation to raising FTP. I kept one group ride a week on average to keep some power variability in the plan. But your comment about my sustainable power and the team ride got me thinking that maybe you are right there. My sustainable power on these particular rides is actually keeping me from having to dig deep enough to get any kind of adaption out of the variability because I can just ride back on. Get me in a race with more equal riders surging in a repeatable fashion and it puts me up against my MMP curve and eventually I'm toast.
I'm gonna take your reccomendation to add some bursts to tempo or SST work. If you don't mind me asking since most of my riding has been iso power what about just riding the terrain more farlek style, jumping out of corners, hammering hills like Andy has said he does tempo work? Maybe doing the same with some L4 as long as average power is in level and IF is where it should be to describe the effort. Or do you think the structured micro interval and burst every few minutes in a longer interval is the way to go?

Thanks again for your insightful post.

Quoted post said:

Originally Posted by rbarker76 [IMG]/img/forum/go_quote.gif[/IMG]

Lanierb,
It's not that I'm not thinking about the L5 work. I do agree it's key. I have done some just not enough to peak aerobic power because my main events are not till July. You said also in your post the race was obviously hard for me and the L5 work wouldn't have kept me in the whole race. I *think* that if I did more L5 I would have probably lasted longer but still in the same boat later on. If I could grab that wheel quicker it wouldn't stress my metabolic fitness so much. I did a race last year that had a 3-4 minute climb in it and I dropped the whole field. But in a rolling race when the smack is going down and everyone is fighting for wheels, they get on a recover much quicker while I am doing a little more work and over time it puts me up against my metabolic fitness limit. That is the only reason I have been leaning towards increasing how fast I can accelerate over making them *feel* easier. If I could get my FTP up to 350 watts in a month I would just ride away from the whole field and be done with it but that is just not gonna happen. [IMG]/img/vbsmilies/smilies/smile.gif[/IMG]
Also, it's not like I was the only one hurting. Everyone was in the pain cave. 20 or so were dropped in half a lap. I made it further then they did!!!
If you can hold a IF of 1.1 for 30 mintues I'd be curious as to what your power profile looks like. As I mentioned I have a high 5m and FTP column and a almost non existent 5s and 1m. I am so aerobic and slow twitch that my 3m to 8m power drop off is less than 10% and my 20m to 60m is only 2%. Can you say flat MMP curve??? I can ride hard all day....I just suck at hard real quick. [IMG]/img/vbsmilies/smilies/smile.gif[/IMG]

If you have an IF of 1.1 then maybe an adjustment of your FTP could be in order.

Everyone is in the pain cave because it's a race and if you find a way to up that FTP by 75 watts then let me know 🙂

It sounds like to need some very hard, shortish intervals with minimal recovery time. That'll redefine what the pain cave is and may introduce you to Ralph. Top tip - don't try to inhale when your stomach is 'exhaling' - it burns. So do carrots and stomach acid up the nose... 😉

I'm still not convinced by anything in the thread that's it's a physiological problem. However you're riding if it's "chilled" in between the 20-40second bursts, then you've plenty of time to move up, which means in the next burst you shouldn't be dropped and needing to close big gaps, you should just be surfing the pack without needing to jump at all - then using your aerobic power to move up again during the lulls. You said "this wasn't at the back of the pack" - but you have to be at the back of the pack to get dropped, you can't be dropped from the front (you can be the wrong side of a split, but should be plenty of people to help get the group back together)

I'm very slowtwitch and aerobic too, and have atrocious 1 minute power relatively (my 20 to 60 minute fall off is even less and my 3 to 8 is similarly low), but I don't experience the same racing problems on getting dropped (mind you my FTP is closer to 350watts, but I've still never scored a point since becoming a 3rd cat.)

Another thing as Dave mentioned, but wasn't followed up on - Have you looked at cadence, if you are a low cadence diesel, youi'll be taking a longer time to react simply because of the time lag in winding up the gear.

Yes, I was dropped from the back of the pack. What I meant was that I started around 10th position. With each surge over a roller or out of a corner I would lose some places because of my inability to accelerate fast enough to hold my position. If there was room to move I would use my aerobic power to move back up. I tried my best. Did you see where I said it was a field of 75 with centerline rule? Sometimes it was at least 4 wide and you could not move up. Some people did cross the yellow line and take position and when they did the race official pulled them to the back of the pack. A few guys did it twice and were DQ'ed.
Back to what I said when I looked at the QA analysis. There were hardly any outliers in quadrant 1. I just don't seem to either want to, or can't because of lack of training, for whatever reason wind a gear up to high cadence, high power. I would accelerate a bit and then sit down at 95 rpm putting out over 400 watts to catch back on. If I could accelerate a gear up to and over around 600 watts at a high rpm I probably would never lose the wheel in the first place. The surge would be so short it wouldn't tax me on a metabolic scale. But because I have to lay out high power efforts over 30 seconds in length it *is* taxing my metabolic system.
Yesterday I went out and did and IF of .92 for 1hr45m. I have done that steady iso power before and it's hard but pretty doable for me. Yesterday I did it mixing in 15 second surges trying to hit 550 watts. I divided it into 20 minute segments where 2 were random accelerations, 2 were a surge every two minutes but back down to steady sub threshold power, and the last was 15 second on, 15 second off microbursts. I think I discovered that I do have some type II fibers and they pretty much suck!!! It was kind of funny. When I would do the accelerations at the 5-10second mark my right hand would start twitching to shift to a higher gear. I actually had to fight the urge and just keep winding up to 110 rpm. Towards the end of the workout I did notice, even with the fatigue, that I was hitting that 550 mark earlier in the surge.
There is a thread over on wattage called TSS vs TSS2. In the thread everyone is trying to guess what TSS2 is. Towards the end there is a few posts back and forth between Andy and Bill Black. Bill is talking about how his HOP with surges feels so much harder than a steady effort of the same length with the same average or NP. Bill is wondering if TSS2 will reflect the difference in how he feels. Andy replies that because the surges are less than 30 seconds that there is no metabolic difference between the two workouts with the same average and NP. The reason it feels harder is reflected in the QA. If the surges were longer than 30 seconds it would push NP up over the average power and the surges would start taxing the metabolic systems.
Nonetheless, I am finding it quite interesting to see the different opinions on this. I'm going to try working on the accelaration side of the equation first because it's still early in the season for me. The neouromuscular adaption should come quicker than the adaptions from more FTP, L5, or L6 work. Also because it's just something I have never concentrated on before. If the next races get better for me than I will know I am on the right track. If they do not and the races after I start more of the higher end work get better than I know I was on the wrong track and all of you arguing for more high end metabolic work were right.
Any more opinions Dave from some of the replies from others and my other posts? I'd be interested to hear if you were willing to take the time.

Thanks everyone for chiming in.

Robert

Quoted post said:

Originally Posted by rbarker76 [IMG]/img/forum/go_quote.gif[/IMG]

.... Any more opinions Dave from some of the replies from others and my other posts? ....

Since ya asked....

I think everyone's got really good advice on this, and as Jibber points out there's a definite association between the driving part in terms of gear selection and the resulting physiology part which you've observed in QA. Your comment about the right hand twitching to upshift is a good example of this and one I'm real familiar with during solo training when I want to work on a bit more leg speed. Funny in races I don't have that same temptation unless I'm chasing solo or taking long pulls in a small group, when I'm in the mix I've taught myself to ride a cog or two lower than what I'd do alone and it's often a cog or two lower than folks around me in anticipation of surges and the need for quick accelerations to cover gaps or go with moves.

I do think we all tend to see this based on our personal strengths and weaknesses and what has or hasn't worked for us. IOW, I don't have a lot of trouble quickly closing gaps or staying on a wheel, I might have trouble if the surge continues for a while and I might have trouble if the attacks keep coming and I spend too many matches or exceed my NP or AP MMP for extended sections but the initial gap closing comes pretty easy. I don't know if that's just the cards I was dealt or because I raced track for a number of years and got used to that kind of riding but I don't see that as my limiter. So naturally on these boards and elsewhere I push L3/L4 and some L5 work because those are the things that made the biggest difference in my racing and moved me forward. Until I got a PM and got my head around the value of sustained SST/Threshold work my only chance in a race was to follow wheels, close those gaps and hope against hope that others would get me close enough to the line to do something. Increasing my FTP and 5 minute power have opened up a lot of options for me and racing is a lot more fun as a result.

Based on your posts above I guess you're leaning towards the other end of the spectrum and have lots of staying power and sounds like decent VO2 Max power for shorter climbs and mid duration surges, crosswind sections, etc. If that's true then I'd bet you'd see the best results by adding the sort of dynamics you brought into your recent training ride and working on retraining your instincts in group ride scenarios and races to ride a bit lighter gear while in the field and to learn to anticipate the surges and jumps and wind up your gears immediately with leg speed before upshifting into your high end gearing to go with the flow. So that's part driving skills and part physiology but they're pretty tightly linked. Part of this is reducing the 'think time' so that you can react more quickly to gaps opening up, sort of reprogramming to link the eyes and ears to the legs so you waste no time when you see folks launching something or even when you hear the telltale sounds of attacks from behind.

Anyway, you asked for opinions and mine is that you sound like you're on the right track with some micro-interval work and introducing some intentional dynamics to your riding. The other piece is to take that into group riding and racing situations and make conscious decisions to ride lighter gears more often and to work on responding immediately to attacks. If you have a local group hammerfest ride those can be great places to work on these skills by challenging yourself to ride outside your comfort zone in terms of gearing and time to respond. I don't disagree with any of the advice above, it's all good and everything mentioned should help in different ways but from what you described I'd focus on quickness and dynamic riding as you're doing.

Good luck,
-Dave

One thing I used to notice was that my performance during rapidly repeated intervals and my ability is most "lumpy" road races or crits was somewhat tied. The intervals were usually something like this and were done "as best you could for the duration":

5 x 2mins - 1 minute rest between

2 mins rest

8 x 1 minutes - 1 min rest in between

2 mins rest

10 x 30 seconds - 30 seconds rest in between

If the power remained similar all the way through, especially during the 30 second efforts then I typically did better during crits (despite hating then with a passion). Sadly the Kingcycle setup we had didn't record data (or not that I knew of) - it was just all on screen and as you know, what you think you see during an eyeballs out effort isn't always what's presented on the screen after it's been downloaded.

There was other stuff before the 2 minute intervals but the session was aimed at trying to force you to become better at dealing with repeated very intense efforts and it certainly did that. Whether or not there's a more graceful, less painful and stomach churning way remains to be seen... but 6+ weeks of the above and you'd be covering moves faster than a hungry cheetah legging it after antelope.

Just out of curiosity what is your FTP and best 5min and 1min power?

While follow all the attacks is a common strategy for beginners (up to cat1), it might not be the best. And if it is not the best then there are better ways to ride a race with different demands and different training techniques.

It may be a naive question to the OP, but

If the head of the race separates from you coming out of the turn, and the then guys who were behind you pass you when the heat turns off, why not just let the other guys take you back to the pack? rather than you leading them back to the pack. IOW let someone else close the gaps so you can save some precious matches for later. If no one else steps up...the it's up to you.
If I saw you grinding, I'd just sit on then pass you as the pace settles back down.

You can call me stupid, if you like. I'm not a racer.

Quoted post said:

Originally Posted by cram1960 [IMG]/img/forum/go_quote.gif[/IMG]

You pose an interesting question. I think the answer is that most bicycle racers don't have the ability to come up with a plan during a race. Considering that a lot of racing is done at the physical edge, that is to be expected. For the most part if the pre-race plan comes apart, the race is over.

If you look at less intense efforts, typical of longer road races, you will find racers coming up with plans during the race and having the physical ability to execute those plans.

Quoted post said:

Originally Posted by cram1960 [IMG]/img/forum/go_quote.gif[/IMG]

It may be a naive question to the OP, but

If the head of the race separates from you coming out of the turn, and the then guys who were behind you pass you when the heat turns off, why not just let the other guys take you back to the pack? rather than you leading them back to the pack. ..

The trouble is you don't know what's going to happen next. IOW, the surge goes, gaps open and if you sit back and wait for others to tow you up your race can easily be over at that moment. The leaders may not slow until the gap is too big to bridge if you wait. But Old Guys point is really valid as well. Especially in the lower categories it's common to get so fixated on your chase that you forget there's half a dozen guys on your wheel that could be helping to close the gap. With more race experience you typically learn that the best bet is not to let the gap open at all by paying close attention to what's happening up front and keeping an eye out for folks taking flyers up the side that will lead to a surge in the pace and likely open gaps.

Responding immediately so you grab a wheel before any sizeable gap opens is the best plan when a major selection begins to go. It's often not the best plan when one or two riders go and again that's where Old_Guy's comment on pre-race plans really matters. If you chase everything you'll likely be too spent when the real move goes but if you chase nothing you'll never go with the selections. A plan to chase everything with certain strong riders or to chase any move with 3 or more or 5 or more riders can be a better bet than to chase every move.

If the gap does open and you perceive a real threat then there's the question you pose of chase solo or hope to ride the train up. Again it depends a lot on how many riders and exactly who is still with you. If a few local strong guys are back with you and don't have team mates up the road with the selection you'd be foolish to just tow them up close enough to attack your chase and drop you after doing too much work. But if the folks behind you are struggling to simply hold your wheel you'd be foolish to sit up and hope they'll do the work for you, same if the folks behind you have the strength but are protecting team mates up the road. Good luck getting them to tow you up.

But in the end it's always a gamble. Strong looking breaks fail for lots of reasons so burying yourself to chase one that doesn't last is just burning precious matches. Sitting back and hoping the break fails can work but sometimes the break succeeds just because no one took it seriously and the got too far up the road before folks realized the threat. Once a gap opens you can sit back and get burned as no one around you wants to work and every second you wait trying to be cagey is another second the leaders have to stretch their advantage. Doing all the chasing only to get burned by folks on your wheel isn't smart either but generally doing some work and trying to get others to pitch in is a better bet but also a gamble if your chase group doesn't work well together. Sitting back then bursting free for a solo bridge can work but it costs you the big match you burn to get free of others around you which is costly when you know you're going to be out there working hard in no mans land for several minutes or more.

There aren't any easy answers if you're riding against well matched competition. It's always a crapshoot but that's bike racing and part of the reason the strongest riders don't always win.

-Dave