Power Training

Quoted post said:

Originally posted by Brizza
I am still stiff 42 hours following training, how can I improve my recovery time? I will race regardless tomorrow, but doing so usually results in me being more sore the following day.

This Sat is age championships, 66km race instead of 33km.

Look at your nutrition prior to, during and after your event -- this will help your recovery. When racing you need to keep your carbohydrate intake high.

Aside from that, you might need to moderate the intensity at which you ride. Quickly looking, it appears that you just race at the weekend (high intensity) and another high intensity session mid week. You might need to drop two of these sessions and replace them with lower intensity, more endurance based work.

A coach can help you with this.

Cheers
Ric

Race today was Central Division Age Champs, 88km.
I had more power then usual and stayed with the bunch during most surges.
The bunch was split up during the middle of the race with several breakaways. I was in one but after 66km I 'bonked out'. The riders in the bunchwent home early and I finished on my own.
The final 22km absolutly killed me. My energy levels have recovered reasonably but my legs are getting very stiff and I am having trouble riding to the shops.

What is the best action to promote the recovery of my legs? I will eat 2 dinners tonight, and 12 (maybe 18) wheetbix for breakfast should keep me going.

Thanks

Brian

Raced 44km yesterday and a 20km Crit today.
Was happy with both rides.
Sat was a handicap and rode the full race with only 1 other rider. We averaged 36kph on a windy day.
Today was a very tactical crit, we averaged 33kph but the surges and rests where similar to my motorpace training.

Have decided that I need to increase my top speed for sprinting.
Am happy to ride tomorrow, Tues or Wed and skip motorpace this week.

How do other riders improve their top speed?

Quoted post said:

Originally posted by ricstern
...

For TTing, you need to increase the power that you can generate for a long period of time (e.g., ~1-hr). This power correlates well with power at lactate threshold (LT), but is usually ~ 20% higher than LT for most (even vaguely) trained cyclists. To increase TT power you need to train at just below to ~ 100 % of TT power for fairly large chunks of time (e.g., 15 - 30 mins). You'd need to complete 20 - 60 mins of these blocks, once to twice per week.

Usually, the initial effort of breaking away isn't much of a problem for most cyclists -- it's the sustaining of the effort once you have a gap. This relates to the power you can produce at LT and TT power, and also how hard you attack, i.e., if you go 'all-out' to attack anyone would be completely fatigued within ~60-secs. Thus, to attack you need to moderate your effort and then settle into a TT rhythm.

By increasing power at LT and TT power, the actual attack effort will fatigue you less.

The sprinting, will need to be trained by doing specific sprint sessions. Two of the most useful i find are group sprints (which help with tactics and positions) and solo efforts of ~ 10-secs.

Ric

Ric

Have I got this right - what you call "TT power" (which you can generate for around an hour or so) is roughly 20% higher than power at Lactate Threshold? In other words you are well into the anaerobic zone during a 1 hour TT effort?

I'm trying to reconcile this with the often quoted figure of Lactate Threshold Heart Rate (LTHR) being about 90-94% of maximum heart rate. To achieve 20% more power than your output at this level of intensity - and hold that for an hour or more - sounds impossible to me.

I'm sure I've read elsewhere on this forum that 15-20 minute intervals at LTHR are the appropriate way to build increases in sustainable power (eg for improving performance on medium to long climbs). Above, you seem to be saying these intervals should be done at "TT power".

I'm sure I've got the wrong handle of something here, but I'm not sure what. While I know there's no hard and fast rule, perhaps you could indicate (for those of use without power measuring devices) what sort of %age of maximum HR corresponds to what you call "power at LT" and "TT power"?

ricstern,
Hi, I got drawn to this topic by an email "Cycling Forums Community Bulletin"
re : Short interval sessions to improve fitness etc."
link to read full article led me to a blank page. I would like to read. I would like to discuss.

edd

Quoted post said:

Originally posted by edd
ricstern,
Hi, I got drawn to this topic by an email "Cycling Forums Community Bulletin"
re : Short interval sessions to improve fitness etc."
link to read full article led me to a blank page. I would like to read. I would like to discuss.

edd

Edd,

Not sure why the page came up blank for you, thanks for letting us know. I shall contact Steve (owner of the forum to help out). In the meantime the address is
http://cyclecoach.com/articles/?article=Intervals&ext=.htm

Look forward to the discussion.

Ric

Originally posted by Unregistered
Ric

Have I got this right - what you call "TT power" (which you can generate for around an hour or so) is roughly 20% higher than power at Lactate Threshold? In other words you are well into the anaerobic zone during a 1 hour TT effort?

Quoted message said:

Time trials are ridden above LT closer to an intensity described by Maximal Lactate Steady State allowing you to ride at a power output about 20% higher than LT. At TT effort you are not using much energy derived from the anaerobic system otherwise you would fatigue quickly. Instead you are riding at the maximum intensity you can before lactate begins accumulating significantly and you have to slow down. This is your maximal lactate steady state (mlss), you might want to do an internet search on it.

I'm trying to reconcile this with the often quoted figure of Lactate Threshold Heart Rate (LTHR) being about 90-94% of maximum heart rate. To achieve 20% more power than your output at this level of intensity - and hold that for an hour or more - sounds impossible to me.

Quoted message said:

LTHR varies between inderviduals and training status, it may fall within 75 to 95 % of max heart rate (there will be individuals outside either end of this range!). A 20 % increase in power doesn't represent a 20% increase in HR and the fact that you can hold time trial pace for 1 hour shows that this intensity can be maintained (your LT being 20% below your 1 hour pace).

I'm sure I've read elsewhere on this forum that 15-20 minute intervals at LTHR are the appropriate way to build increases in sustainable power (eg for improving performance on medium to long climbs). Above, you seem to be saying these intervals should be done at "TT power".

Quoted message said:

These are great sessions and will increase your sustainable power in every situation.

I'm sure I've got the wrong handle of something here, but I'm not sure what. While I know there's no hard and fast rule, perhaps you could indicate (for those of use without power measuring devices) what sort of %age of maximum HR corresponds to what you call "power at LT" and "TT power"?

Quoted message said:

The HR will change for every individual and training status, sorry. You could get a LTHR in a physiology lab, or simply do the same field test that Ric advises for TT power but measuring HR.

Unregistered(!) wrote, i replied with >>

Ric

Have I got this right - what you call "TT power" (which you can generate for around an hour or so) is roughly 20% higher than power at Lactate Threshold?

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

Yes, for most trained (and i don't mean elite) riders power output at TT power is ~ 20% hiher than the power that elicits LT

In other words you are well into the anaerobic zone during a 1 hour TT effort?

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

No. The general definition of LT is the exercise intensity that increases lactate 1mmol above baseline levels (see Coyle et al., 1988 off the top of my head). Thus, LT is actually quite a low intensity and is the effort that trained cyclists can maintain for ~ several hours. I'm not sure where you are (and thus what training zones you use), but as a rough guide LT is approximately equal to low level 2 (UK's old four level system) or zone 2.

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However, on top of this, the power that can be maintained for ~ 1-hr even if you could ride outdoors at a constant load (which can't be done), would cause an increase in lactate throughout the duration, i.e., a 1-hr TT is not a 'steady state' event. In some lab TTs that i took part in, we found that at a constant load (e.g., TT power) lactate (which was measured at 5-min intervals), rose from a low level (2 mmol) to an almost maximal level at 55 mins (~ 7 mmol).

I'm trying to reconcile this with the often quoted figure of Lactate Threshold Heart Rate (LTHR) being about 90-94% of maximum heart rate.

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

This is mistake on the part of the author. Firstly, there's no such thing as LTHR, and some coach's state that LT or LTHR is TT pace. This is incorrect, and shows a lack of understanding in the primary literature regarding physiology.

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As an aside, HR response differs from person to person, and is affected by external influences such as caffeine, food, environmental conditions, anxiety, members of the opposite or same sex, etc.

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Depending on many factors, the HR that you can sustain for a given workload, will also vary depending on acute and chronic training, i.e., HR will generally decrease at a given power as your fitness increases, but can vary dramatically day to day depending on your state of freshness. For example, whilst riding at my TT power my avg HR can vary ~ 20 b/min (~ 10%) depending on what i've just done.

To achieve 20% more power than your output at this level of intensity - and hold that for an hour or more - sounds impossible to me.

I'm sure I've read elsewhere on this forum that 15-20 minute intervals at LTHR are the appropriate way to build increases in sustainable power (eg for improving performance on medium to long climbs). Above, you seem to be saying these intervals should be done at "TT power".

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

yes, i suggest doing intervals for 15 - 30 mins at just below TT power. However, as previously mentioned this isn't LTHR

I'm sure I've got the wrong handle of something here, but I'm not sure what. While I know there's no hard and fast rule, perhaps you could indicate (for those of use without power measuring devices) what sort of %age of maximum HR corresponds to what you call "power at LT" and "TT power"?

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

In general, TT HR (not LTHR) is likely to be somewhere around 75 - 95% of HRmax, but can and will vary under different conditions and a variety of factors.

Ric

2Lap and Ric

Thanks both for taking the time to reply in such detail. Your answers seem fairly consistent to me, and certainly clear up my misunderstanding of the term "Lactate Threshold". I'm sure though - having done a quick bit of surfing since writing the original post - that there are plenty of coaches (at least one writing on cyclingnews.com's Fitness Q&A) and others out there who use "lactate threshold" or just "threshold" to describe something more like what 2Lap calls "mlss" - certainly a higher intensity than is sustainable for 1 hour. It's a pity for us neophytes that's there so much variation in the terminology out there. It's like anyone writing anything on the subject almost needs to attach their own personal glossary!

Finally, there seems be general agreement that training sessions at around TT power (15-30 min intervals) is valuable. What about training at around LT - is this the best zone to build endurance? Would training at this lower intensity have any spinoff benefit for more intense efforts?

Unregistered,

Glad to help. If you have anymore queries then we (other people as well) will be glad to help. This is a good forum.

Our answers are likely to be similar as we have similar backgrounds. We're both doing PhD's in exercise physiology (mine is about endurance cycling performance physiology) so tend to interpret work in a similar way.

Indeed, the term is horribly abused and missused. i usually mention the 20% bit about power primarily to distinguish it from any other definition.

Unfortunately, there are other similar thresholds, which can be confusing. That's why i tend to use TTpower so that people can understand what i'm talking about.

If you've surfed for these terms, almost certainly, you'll come up with others such OBLA, IAT, VT, critical power concept and others.

Training at LT (i.e., 1 mmol increase) is an excellent training zone. I tend to term this as "core endurance training". regular sessions at this intensity of say 1 to 4 hrs (depending on fitness level) are very demanding and excellent training. An idea of what might be trained can be found here: http://www.cyclingnews.com/fitness/?id=powerstern
(Benefits of each zone. Look at zone 2)

Ric

Quoted post said:

Originally posted by Unregistered
2Lap and Ric

Thanks both for taking the time to reply in such detail. Your answers seem fairly consistent to me, and certainly clear up my misunderstanding of the term "Lactate Threshold". I'm sure though - having done a quick bit of surfing since writing the original post - that there are plenty of coaches (at least one writing on cyclingnews.com's Fitness Q&A) and others out there who use "lactate threshold" or just "threshold" to describe something more like what 2Lap calls "mlss" - certainly a higher intensity than is sustainable for 1 hour. It's a pity for us neophytes that's there so much variation in the terminology out there. It's like anyone writing anything on the subject almost needs to attach their own personal glossary!

Finally, there seems be general agreement that training sessions at around TT power (15-30 min intervals) is valuable. What about training at around LT - is this the best zone to build endurance? Would training at this lower intensity have any spinoff benefit for more intense efforts?

Briz,

I made your last post into a new thread as it was a good question and just off topic...

http://www.cyclingforums.com/t41036.html

Thankyou.

While it might seem that most people are in heavy training I would imagine that there is a large number of weekend warriors.

Should I consider gym work if I can't train on the road or track?

Brian