Lithuania

i hate that the search is down!

where can i find a solid sprint interval training guide for a newb? I want to have a little training in this before my first cat 5 crit

DrPete 

I dropped you a PM with a couple workouts from my TrainingPeaks program. Enjoy.

Remember that these are more specific workouts from the "Peak/Race" period of the training schedule. But it's stuff that you can do for the rest of this season. Base miles, weights, all that stuff will have to wait for the off-season.

Lithuania

Thanks Pete thats exactly the type of info I need. Up to this point I have done a little of the old school telephone pole intervals but thats about it.

I need to get a little practice in before next wednesday.

timmhaan

make sure you can shift from your sprint position (i.e. out of the saddle and in the drops). a lot of people either overgear or spin out of their current gear. some people shift a couple of times during a sprint.

also, be careful during those sprints. if you're mid pack just go with the flow and cross the line. no need to sprint like crazy for 12th place. it can get fairly accident prone toward the end.

Lithuania

good advice. I am able to shift from the drops but I have never really tried it under pressure.

craigery

Dr Pete,
Can I get that PM as well. Thanks!

CTAF

not too be a moocher but i'd be interested in that PM also...

DrPete 

I guess since all this stuff is in Friel's book anyway I'll throw it on up--Again, I sent these to give a couple ideas of what to be doing in the next couple weeks before a race. This doesn't take the place of base miles, strength training, etc.

----

I have a paid subscription to trainingpeaks.com. It's all adapted from Joe Friel's book, and it has helped me immensely. Here are a couple workouts that might help, straight from my program. I'll list them as hard and easy.

The heart rate zones in Friel's programs are all based on your LTHR, which for me was right about 90% of my max. If you go to Trainingpeaks.com, click on "Training," then "HR and Power Zones" and it'll calculate them for you. If you don't have an HRM, it breaks down like this:

Zone 5a, 5b, 5c--all above LT. Max effort or damn near. 90+% of max hr for me.
Zone 4-- 10bpm below LT. For me this is 85-90% of max HR.
Zone 3-- moderate to hard aerobic effort. roughly 80-85% of max HR.
Zone 2-- moderate aerobic effort. 74-80% of max hr.
Zone 1-- active recovery. <= 74% of max HR.

Hard:

Bike 0:52 A1c
BT:Sprintervals. After warm-up do 3 x 15-20 seconds all out (1-minute recovery) followed immediately by 5 minutes to heart rate 5b zone. Take 8 minutes of recovery and then repeat this 2 more times. 95-110 rpm. Aero position.

BT: Cruise intvls. 3-4 x 6-8 minutes in heart rate 4-5a zones (2-minute recoveries). Shift between a hard gear for 30 seconds & a 'normal' gear for 60 seconds. Maintain the same cadence regardless of gearing. This should be closer to the low end of your 'comfort range' (about 85 rpm).

Easy:

Bike 1:03 M5b
After warm-up do 4 x 90 seconds in the heart rate 4-5a zones (3-minute recoveries). Finish with a very easy cool down and stretch.

Bike 0:50 A5c
After warming-up do 4 x 90 seconds at race effort (3.5-minute recoveries). Cool down very easily and stretch.

Bike 1:03 S3b
Warm-up well. Then on a curbed course, sprint in and out of corners several times. Work on body and bike positions for different scenarios--dry (lean bike, not body) and wet (lean body, not bike). If possible, also do some off-camber and 180 degree turns. Each cornering sprint should last no longer than about 8 seconds. Long recoveries between corners--3-5 minutes.

I would do no more than 2 hard days per week, no more than 1 in a race week. Lots of easy riding/active recovery in between. Whatever fitness you have right now, you have. You won't get better faster if you train yourself into the ground the next 2 weeks. Save it for the races.

I hope that wasn't too much info, and I hope these workouts help. Sprintervals suck the most, but they'll definitely do the trick.

DrPete 

Riskus:

I didn't know how to attach a file to a PM, but I wanted to pass this on to you--it's my HRM profile from the Greenbelt race tonight. I finished 6th out of 33 riders. Average speed was 23.3 mph by my HRM. As you can see it's really an interval workout with short recoveries. The course goes like this:

Uphill at the start for a few meters, then a descent.
Slight uphill before the one 90 degree right turn--the little spike you see on each lap in the HR curve is the sprint out of that corner. Then it's flat and fast up to a 1/2 mile or so climb that's doable in the big ring, but that's where the moves are made (and my HR goes up).

I'm still working on getting savvy with my new HRM, so the warmup and cool-down are included in these images. It's easy to tell, though, where the race starts and ends (look for the highest HR--that's the finish )

Red is HR, blue is speed, green is cadence. I hope this is semi-useful info for you.

WCroadie

What model HRM are you using?

DrPete 

It's a Polar S725X. The image is actually from TrainingPeaks, where I upload the files to log them--Don't know how to export an image from the Polar software yet. I took the altitude curve off for ease of viewing.

Lithuania

pete what is the green line? Cadence? Do I see you are getting almost to 40mph? Man I am going to get killed. 6 out of 33 is great. I know who I am going to follow now. I cant wait.

GuitarWizard

Ya do any intervals today?

DrPete 

Yes, green is cadence.

Don't worry--the speed peaks are on a downhill, and there's a short uphill to scrub speed off before the 90-degree turn. For reference, though, the uphill sprint at the finish was about 27-28 mph by my speedo. I took the altitude plot off because it's very jagged and I can't figure out how to change the scale to make it not look like I'm racing in the Himalayas.

DrPete 

Kinda makes you wonder why hard intervals with short recoveries work for training, eh?

Lithuania

i wish. I cant really ride on my work days. I work 6am to 6pm and I have an hour commute each way. Got home at 7 and then had to go right out to the groccery store.
Its been driving me crazy thinking about doing them though. I got two rides tomorrow with the second one being a fast group ride so I think I am going to sprintervals on friday.

Lithuania

if i am reading the chart correctly it looks like you are only getting about 3 minutes of recovery time before the next spike. that looks intense.

DrPete 

That's about right. It's about 3min per lap and my HR was basically peaking at the top of the hill.

Yeah, the descent does get you a little break relative to other crits I've done. A typical downtown crit is more like a series of sprints into/out of corners with less recovery (15 sec-1 min depending on the course). It's fun stuff...

GuitarWizard

I used to do the whole 12 hour shift thing, 4 days on/4 days off when I worked in a Data Center. While it was nice having 4 days off.....the 4 days on pretty much sucked - all I did for the most part was eat, sleep, and work. Riding on a regular basis is very difficult with that schedule.....

Good luck, man.

DrPete 

The resident schedule is even more fun--80+hrs/week, overnight calls, late nights, bad diet--I'm doing a year of research right now so the way I see it, I have till next July to get some decent race results in the books and get into the best possible shape before I start deconditioning again.

Lithuania

i work in a data center right now. you are exactly right about the pros and cons. I used to work 6pm to 6am and I think that was even worse. I will eventually have the choice to move back to a 7am - 4pm schedule but its a hard decision to make because 2 day weekends are brutal after having 3 and 4 day ones. But I wouldnt miss out on stuff like the good DRs training race last night. I dread making the decision at this point.

GuitarWizard

Well....I did 3 years of nightshift, from 6:45 p.m. to 7 a.m.....and then about a year of dayshift from 6:45 a.m. to 7 p.m.....and then went to a standard 7 a.m. to 3 p.m. Mon-Friday job. I thought I'd hate it as well since I did the 4 on/4 off thing for so long, but it turned out I liked it quite a bit, since I could actually do stuff during the workweek.....but with the new job, came on-call duties. It's a tradeoff.....

I'd say go for the shorter hours.

Lithuania

so I did the first sprint interval the good dr posted for me today during lunch and holy suck did it ever hurt.