Test Results

Was done on a Velotron. Start at 150W. Increase 25W every minute...
W/HR/ml per min/ml per kg per min/VeVO2
150/122/2149/28.4/21.14
175/135/2625/34.6/22.18
200/144/2838/37.4/23.29
225/151/3289/43.4/24.22
250/157/3726/49.2/25.23
275/162/3809/50.3/26.89
300/167/4381/57.8/28.15
peak ml/min occurred 7:15 at the 300w at 4528ml/min
325/173/4326/57.1/29.62

acoggan said:

Did you do the VO2max test on this Computrainer, or on a different device? If the latter, the fact that your heart rate is quite comparable would lend confidence that the power data from the original test are correct (as it seems unlikely that both your Computrainer and whatever you used originally would be equally wrong). That raises another possibility, which is that the VO2 measurement might be off...can you describe the test protocol, and the final power that you achieved (and for how long)? At your weight and with your VO2max, you should have been made it to at least 350-375 W, perhaps even higher if you have a high anaerobic capacity and/or the rate of power increase were very rapid.

larrynipon said:

Was done on a Velotron. Start at 150W. Increase 25W every minute...
W/HR/ml per min/ml per kg per min/VeVO2
150/122/2149/28.4/21.14
175/135/2625/34.6/22.18
200/144/2838/37.4/23.29
225/151/3289/43.4/24.22
250/157/3726/49.2/25.23
275/162/3809/50.3/26.89
300/167/4381/57.8/28.15
peak ml/min occurred 7:15 at the 300w at 4528ml/min
325/173/4326/57.1/29.62

Hmm. Either you're very inefficient (which is possible, considering the high cadence that you chose), or the metabolic cart that was used overestimates VO2. I say this because the average slope of your VO2-power relationship between 150 and 275 W (i.e., during submaximal exercise) is 13.8, i.e., for every 1 W increase in power your VO2 rose by 13.8 mL/min. That's markedly higher than the 10.5-12 mL/min/W relationship normally found. Unfortunately, while your data fall outside the normal range, they aren't so far outside it that it's impossible to say for certain whether anything is truly amiss or not.

acoggan said:

Where was my track SRM up until a week or so ago? (Answer: in Bobby Leah's hands in Tasmania.) Who else have I loaned that same crank to in return for data? (Answer: among others, Shaun Wallace, Becky Conzelman, and Brad Huff.)

You lent the Crank to an Aussie and a Pom. Andy how could you??? 😠

Hamish Ferguson
Cycling Coach

fergie said:

You lent the Crank to an Aussie and a Pom. Andy how could you??? 😠

Hamish Ferguson
Cycling Coach

Well he couldn't lend it to Kiwi's. You only have sheep down there right 😄 Such a small country...so many sheep:p

fergie said:

You lent the Crank to an Aussie and a Pom. Andy how could you??? 😠

What Aussie? Becky Conzelman, Brad Huff, and Bobby Leah are all from the US.

My event focus is the Mt. Greylock Century in early August. It's exactly 100 miles with 10,000 feet of climbing, one of which is a 9 mile climb. It brutalized me last year. Seizure-like leg cramps from mile 55 until the end. It was over an 8 hour day. My goal is to complete it in under 6.5 hours this year. I can hang with the pack on the 3 hour rides, but want to get to a much higher level. Not going to be racing, just want to see how high is high. Any suggestions?

WarrenG said:

I'm not sure that those cadence differences are really the issue. If your slow fibers aren't good then you'll be using lots of fast fibers to produce your power at relatively low power levels and you will tend to produce more lactate. I used to be that way much more than now. In my case, and maybe in yours too, my body tried to adapt to the generally high level of lactate by handling it fairly well. In the end though, it's pretty much impossible to get to your full potential in that way.

If you can develop your ability much better (that what you appear to have now) below the intensities that illicit 4mmol/l, and then train what appears to be your good potential above that intensity you could end up being a pretty good bike racer in many events, if you care about that. You'd also get much better at 2-3 hour rides with your buddies if that interests you more.

My event focus is the Mt. Greylock Century in early August. It's exactly 100 miles with 10,000 feet of climbing, one of which is a 9 mile climb. It brutalized me last year. Seizure-like leg cramps from mile 55 until the end. It was over an 8 hour day. My goal is to complete it in under 6.5 hours this year. I can hang with the pack on the 3 hour rides, but want to get to a much higher level. Not going to be racing, just want to see how high is high. Any suggestions?

WarrenG said:

I'm not sure that those cadence differences are really the issue. If your slow fibers aren't good then you'll be using lots of fast fibers to produce your power at relatively low power levels and you will tend to produce more lactate. I used to be that way much more than now. In my case, and maybe in yours too, my body tried to adapt to the generally high level of lactate by handling it fairly well. In the end though, it's pretty much impossible to get to your full potential in that way.

If you can develop your ability much better (that what you appear to have now) below the intensities that illicit 4mmol/l, and then train what appears to be your good potential above that intensity you could end up being a pretty good bike racer in many events, if you care about that. You'd also get much better at 2-3 hour rides with your buddies if that interests you more.

larrynipon said:

My event focus is the Mt. Greylock Century in early August. It's exactly 100 miles with 10,000 feet of climbing, one of which is a 9 mile climb. It brutalized me last year. Seizure-like leg cramps from mile 55 until the end. It was over an 8 hour day. My goal is to complete it in under 6.5 hours this year. I can hang with the pack on the 3 hour rides, but want to get to a much higher level. Not going to be racing, just want to see how high is high. Any suggestions?

Sounds like your ride went pretty much the way I'd expect a person like me, I mean you, to handle a long ride with periods of harder efforts. It took 55 miles to exhaust your type 2 fibers mainly because you don't have enough ability within your type 1's to allow your 2's to be saved for extra hard efforts. Your 2's get used for efforts that would have been better-served with 1's. So like I said after your test results, improve the ability of your 1's. This will reduce the amount of lactate you'll be producing at efforts below 200 watts (in your case) and will also save your 2's for harder efforts.

I know this is oversimplified but by breaking it down this way I think it will help you form your training objectives. At this point you could do maintenance training for your 2's and put the major focus on your 1's.

Oh, and make sure you're getting enough fuel for those long rides-could be part of the problem too. Perhaps your high lactate levels at relatively low power are being exacerbated by too much carb right before the testing and maybe your rides. As your 1's improve, so too will your ability to rely more on fats for fuel and less on carbs.

1's being fast oxidative fibers, 2's being more inclined towards fast glycolytic fibers

larrynipon said:

My event focus is the Mt. Greylock Century in early August. It's exactly 100 miles with 10,000 feet of climbing, one of which is a 9 mile climb. It brutalized me last year. Seizure-like leg cramps from mile 55 until the end. It was over an 8 hour day. My goal is to complete it in under 6.5 hours this year. I can hang with the pack on the 3 hour rides, but want to get to a much higher level. Not going to be racing, just want to see how high is high. Any suggestions?

Sounds like your ride went pretty much the way I'd expect a person like me, I mean you, to handle a long ride with periods of harder efforts. It took 55 miles to exhaust your type 2 fibers mainly because you don't have enough ability within your type 1's to allow your 2's to be saved for extra hard efforts. Your 2's get used for efforts that would have been better-served with 1's. So like I said after your test results, improve the ability of your 1's. This will reduce the amount of lactate you'll be producing at efforts below 200 watts (in your case) and will also save your 2's for harder efforts.

I know this is oversimplified but by breaking it down this way I think it will help you form your training objectives. At this point you could do maintenance training for your 2's and put the major focus on your 1's.

Oh, and make sure you're getting enough fuel for those long rides-could be part of the problem too. Perhaps your high lactate levels at relatively low power are being exacerbated by too much carb right before the testing and maybe your rides. As your 1's improve, so too will your ability to rely more on fats for fuel and less on carbs.

1's being fast oxidative fibers, 2's being more inclined towards fast glycolytic fibers

WarrenG said:

Sounds like your ride went pretty much the way I'd expect a person like me, I mean you, to handle a long ride with periods of harder efforts. It took 55 miles to exhaust your type 2 fibers mainly because you don't have enough ability within your type 1's to allow your 2's to be saved for extra hard efforts. Your 2's get used for efforts that would have been better-served with 1's. So like I said after your test results, improve the ability of your 1's. This will reduce the amount of lactate you'll be producing at efforts below 200 watts (in your case) and will also save your 2's for harder efforts.

Andy's writings state that 1-hr TT intensity (functional threshold, in his schema) also seems to represent a threshold between chiefly type 1 and chiefly type 2 fiber recruitment. If that's the case, then your explanation above can be modified to say "Larry spent too much of his time working above FT power, and thus gave out after 55 miles. Training to improve FT power will allow more of his ride to be done below FT and will enable him to save his reserves for use only during the extra-hard climbs, thus allowing him to go longer."

Not disagreeing with what you said, just pointing out for Larry that FT training methodologies will help with the type 1 / type 2 situation.

WarrenG said:

Sounds like your ride went pretty much the way I'd expect a person like me, I mean you, to handle a long ride with periods of harder efforts. It took 55 miles to exhaust your type 2 fibers mainly because you don't have enough ability within your type 1's to allow your 2's to be saved for extra hard efforts. Your 2's get used for efforts that would have been better-served with 1's. So like I said after your test results, improve the ability of your 1's. This will reduce the amount of lactate you'll be producing at efforts below 200 watts (in your case) and will also save your 2's for harder efforts.

Andy's writings state that 1-hr TT intensity (functional threshold, in his schema) also seems to represent a threshold between chiefly type 1 and chiefly type 2 fiber recruitment. If that's the case, then your explanation above can be modified to say "Larry spent too much of his time working above FT power, and thus gave out after 55 miles. Training to improve FT power will allow more of his ride to be done below FT and will enable him to save his reserves for use only during the extra-hard climbs, thus allowing him to go longer."

Not disagreeing with what you said, just pointing out for Larry that FT training methodologies will help with the type 1 / type 2 situation.

frenchyge said:

Andy's writings state that 1-hr TT intensity (functional threshold, in his schema) also seems to represent a threshold between chiefly type 1 and chiefly type 2 fiber recruitment. If that's the case, then your explanation above can be modified to say "Larry spent too much of his time working above FT power, and thus gave out after 55 miles. Training to improve FT power will allow more of his ride to be done below FT and will enable him to save his reserves for use only during the extra-hard climbs, thus allowing him to go longer."

Not disagreeing with what you said, just pointing out for Larry that FT training methodologies will help with the type 1 / type 2 situation.

Yes, "FT training" will help with 1, 2 situation. During the 55 miles (3 hours) I doubt much of that was above his one-hour TT ability, just too close to it. Training to improve his FT is too broad and needs to be broken down into the components of what can best improve his FT power. I think we know that his type 2 fibers are significantly stronger than his 1's, relatively speaking, so rather than performing say, 3-5 hours a week of tempo training (which provides somewhat equal training for his 1's and 2's) I would suggest significant training for his 1's instead, with maybe just 2 hours a week of tempo to maintain his current 2's ability. So, 1.5hours to 4-hour rides, mostly around 20-25bpm below his 4mmol/l pace, and maybe 2 hours (broken into segments of 6-12 minutes long) a week about 10-15bpm below 4mmol/l pace.

I'd still prefer to see the shape of Larry's lactate/power curve because that can indicate approximately how much of the work below his 4mmol/l power was being done by 1's vs 2's.

frenchyge said:

Andy's writings state that 1-hr TT intensity (functional threshold, in his schema) also seems to represent a threshold between chiefly type 1 and chiefly type 2 fiber recruitment. If that's the case, then your explanation above can be modified to say "Larry spent too much of his time working above FT power, and thus gave out after 55 miles. Training to improve FT power will allow more of his ride to be done below FT and will enable him to save his reserves for use only during the extra-hard climbs, thus allowing him to go longer."

Not disagreeing with what you said, just pointing out for Larry that FT training methodologies will help with the type 1 / type 2 situation.

Yes, "FT training" will help with 1, 2 situation. During the 55 miles (3 hours) I doubt much of that was above his one-hour TT ability, just too close to it. Training to improve his FT is too broad and needs to be broken down into the components of what can best improve his FT power. I think we know that his type 2 fibers are significantly stronger than his 1's, relatively speaking, so rather than performing say, 3-5 hours a week of tempo training (which provides somewhat equal training for his 1's and 2's) I would suggest significant training for his 1's instead, with maybe just 2 hours a week of tempo to maintain his current 2's ability. So, 1.5hours to 4-hour rides, mostly around 20-25bpm below his 4mmol/l pace, and maybe 2 hours (broken into segments of 6-12 minutes long) a week about 10-15bpm below 4mmol/l pace.

I'd still prefer to see the shape of Larry's lactate/power curve because that can indicate approximately how much of the work below his 4mmol/l power was being done by 1's vs 2's.

WarrenG said:

I'd still prefer to see the shape of Larry's lactate/power curve because that can indicate approximately how much of the work below his 4mmol/l power was being done by 1's vs 2's.

We've been over this territory before: anybody who thinks that they can say anything about fiber type recruitment patterns based on blood lactate levels is just fooling themselves.

WarrenG said:

I'd still prefer to see the shape of Larry's lactate/power curve because that can indicate approximately how much of the work below his 4mmol/l power was being done by 1's vs 2's.

We've been over this territory before: anybody who thinks that they can say anything about fiber type recruitment patterns based on blood lactate levels is just fooling themselves.

acoggan said:

We've been over this territory before: anybody who thinks that they can say anything about fiber type recruitment patterns based on blood lactate levels is just fooling themselves.

Not a 1 vs. a 2 precisely, but the fibers' characteristics and how they respond to the testing loads. I haven't seen lots of tests, just advised about them by someone who has far more experience with testing cyclists with blood lactate tests than you. (For those who don't know, my advisor/coach was with Mapei for 5 years, Asics before that, Motorola before that, and 7-11 before that.) I've been able to see things on my sequences of tests and see the changes in the curve shapes as a result of certain types of training, and also some tests of some other people and correctly predict their past training habits (before they told me).

acoggan said:

We've been over this territory before: anybody who thinks that they can say anything about fiber type recruitment patterns based on blood lactate levels is just fooling themselves.

Not a 1 vs. a 2 precisely, but the fibers' characteristics and how they respond to the testing loads. I haven't seen lots of tests, just advised about them by someone who has far more experience with testing cyclists with blood lactate tests than you. (For those who don't know, my advisor/coach was with Mapei for 5 years, Asics before that, Motorola before that, and 7-11 before that.) I've been able to see things on my sequences of tests and see the changes in the curve shapes as a result of certain types of training, and also some tests of some other people and correctly predict their past training habits (before they told me).

WarrenG said:

Not a 1 vs. a 2 precisely, but the fibers' characteristics and how they respond to the testing loads. I haven't seen lots of tests, just advised about them by someone who has far more experience with testing cyclists with blood lactate tests than you. (For those who don't know, my advisor/coach was with Mapei for 5 years, Asics before that, Motorola before that, and 7-11 before that.) I've been able to see things on my sequences of tests and see the changes in the curve shapes as a result of certain types of training, and also some tests of some other people and correctly predict their past training habits (before they told me).

For those that might be interested, here's a web page I did awhile back with my own blood lactate tests. http://www.usvh.com/LTtests.html

You can see non-linear changes in power below 4mmol/l because of certain training focus, and the changes in the shape of the curve from when I first started to later on due to certain emphasis in training.

WarrenG said:

Not a 1 vs. a 2 precisely, but the fibers' characteristics and how they respond to the testing loads. I haven't seen lots of tests, just advised about them by someone who has far more experience with testing cyclists with blood lactate tests than you. (For those who don't know, my advisor/coach was with Mapei for 5 years, Asics before that, Motorola before that, and 7-11 before that.) I've been able to see things on my sequences of tests and see the changes in the curve shapes as a result of certain types of training, and also some tests of some other people and correctly predict their past training habits (before they told me).

For those that might be interested, here's a web page I did awhile back with my own blood lactate tests. http://www.usvh.com/LTtests.html

You can see non-linear changes in power below 4mmol/l because of certain training focus, and the changes in the shape of the curve from when I first started to later on due to certain emphasis in training.

WarrenG said:

During the 55 miles (3 hours) I doubt much of that was above his one-hour TT ability, just too close to it.

For such a hilly ride, and with him trying to keep pace with his 2 stronger buddies, it wouldn't surprise me at all.