"The 33"-Road Bike Racing - Training Status??? (II)

Starting a new one because the old one is laggy.

(Mods can you please lock it, it's slowing everything down).

I feel an elder statesman here should start it but no one has yet, and it takes too long for that thread to load. So sorry in advance.

Let it continue!

Mod Note: for anyone who wants to catch up from the old thread, it is here - http://www.bikeforums.net/showthread.php?t=249271

i just drove 4 hours to miss a race. im gonna go rip the pedals off.

i just drove 4 hours to miss a race. im gonna go rip the pedals off.


this afternoon, while my team and i were getting ready for our race, a guy came up and asked if we had a spare pair of shoes with us. :twitchy: he forgot to pack his.

when we said no, he asked if there was any spare room in the team car, so he could at least watch the race. sadly enough, there wasn't.

poor guy.

Just climbed up to La Turbie, then beyond to the Col de La Madone, and then zoomed down a la Stage 1 2009 Tdf or Stage 7 Paris Nice. Whichever you like.

THAT is a FUN FUN FUN descent.

Training status: still old, fat, and slow. I'm not as fat and not as slow as last time, but I am even older. I can't do much about the last one.

Team training ride today, but I had to cut it short (grumble, grumble). After 32 miles they turned south and I headed home finishing with about 47 miles and 2.5 hours.

It was good to see teammate and Wunderkind Ben Page out on the team rides again. Ben is a perfect example of "it's not about the bike". He went from Cat 4 to Cat 2 in a couple of weekends on a BD Moto. He did have to replace the Chin Haur BB because it sheared off in the middle of a crit, though. He still rides the Moto and gets P/1/2 top 10's on it.

A few efforts this week. But not much until the race weekend.

It's racing quiet time in Texas. Just the weekly crits mostly. So my attention turns to what I call "reward rides" which are just long rides in the country, find new roads, goof with the buddies, no real training structure or intent.

Next weekend is my birthday so I've been mapping a special one.

this afternoon, while my team and i were getting ready for our race, a guy came up and asked if we had a spare pair of shoes with us. :twitchy: he forgot to pack his.

when we said no, he asked if there was any spare room in the team car, so he could at least watch the race. sadly enough, there wasn't.

poor guy.

im not driving far for another race until i get a GPS. im not driving through DC ever again.

After riding 20 miles to the race then 15-ish back (was tired, used bus) the legs were sore today.

So I did an hour of light riding, 164w avg.

Just climbed up to La Turbie, then beyond to the Col de La Madone, and then zoomed down a la Stage 1 2009 Tdf or Stage 7 Paris Nice. Whichever you like.

THAT is a FUN FUN FUN descent.

Heh, fun!

I wish you had started this thread. I feel a little unworthy.

Heading out to ride for an hour and a half today. Frustrating race. Never doing that again.

Did a 3' test and my lungs burn.

Thanks waterrockets.

I think I have a new FTP from the last 20" though. Which makes sense because this last week of riding seems to have higher than normal IF's for what I felt at the end of the ride. Up 10 watts to 260.

If it's true, I am 10 watts and 3 kg. from 4 watts/kg.

went for a ride on my "hilly" route and felt the best I have on the climbs. Unfortunately I came home and pigged out on mexican food.

Tried to do 3 hours of SST. IF was only .757. I faded a little bit as the ride went on.

I'm not sure if 3 hours of SST is even possible? Anyway, it still felt like a good workout. Tomorrow is active recovery, about 30 minute slow spin.

Crit today, uphill sprints tomorrow. Started my second set of build phases last week, if you do the periodization thing.

This thread is about 8000x faster than the old one, by the way. If only the database would automatically make a new instance of a thread and keep it seamless to the user...

still trying to get over a cold that has been hanging on for a bit. 2.5 hours of moderate riding today. First race of the season tomorrow :D

1st ride since my crash today... my leg is still leaking fluids, but it was my first ride on my cyclocross bike, very fun, will repeat. powertap wheel is being rebuilt, then ill be back on my severely scratched up tarmac, hopefully in time for wednesday's crit.

this thread is about 8000x faster than the old one, by the way. If only the database would automatically make a new instance of a thread and keep it seamless to the user...

+1

Just got from the post frustrating crit ride.

I think I left it all out there. Few new bests.

New 5 sec record at 1313 w. Sprint is going towards 20w/kg. Current best is about 19.55w/kg. Just barely at Cat1 turf on the E-wang chart.

New 5 min at 309 w.

Also, 20 and 30 min NP were both at 271 W. LT was tested at 255, and FTP is set to 265 (coach told me so), and I think it may be up slightly.

Today wraps up a tough week of training:
12.5 hrs, 209 miles, 800 TSS, and 7237kj.
Bunch of hills in there. I think I'm going to start doing hill repeats more often, I love em in an oh so sick way.

As an aside:
Also a first, I almost hit 40 while sprinting. I hit like 39.5 or so. I think my sprint is strong, but I need to get more aero when I sprint. I can't pull up on the bars as much when I do that, but if it makes me sprint faster, I need to try it. Maybe I need to drop another spacer or two and see how that feels, since that might help a ton. Hopefully working on flexibility pays off.

Tried to do 3 hours of SST. IF was only .757. I faded a little bit as the ride went on.

I'm not sure if 3 hours of SST is even possible? Anyway, it still felt like a good workout. Tomorrow is active recovery, about 30 minute slow spin.

3 hrs of SST seems a bit excessive and not worth it. I think you'll stress your body out too much.

One of the things that I've learned working with a coach is that it's great to go out and do a totally hard ride every so often, but when you're training in blocks your volume is very important. If you go do a really awesome hard ride, but can't train as hard as you need to the next day or two, then it might not have been the best idea.

Volume and intensity go hand in hand to make training efficient and structured.

This thread, like its predecessor, is worthless without saying...

Training is for wussy

3 hrs of SST seems a bit excessive and not worth it. I think you'll stress your body out too much.

One of the things that I've learned working with a coach is that it's great to go out and do a totally hard ride every so often, but when you're training in blocks your volume is very important. If you go do a really awesome hard ride, but can't train as hard as you need to the next day or two, then it might not have been the best idea.

Volume and intensity go hand in hand to make training efficient and structured.

Yeah, I thought it might be a bit much, but today is the end of my week, and tomorrow is a recovery ride. I figured I would go a little harder today since I can rest tomorrow. I guess I'll know Tuesday if it was too hard.

650 TSS for the week, and about 11 hours.

Also a first, I almost hit 40 while sprinting. I hit like 39.5 or so. I think my sprint is strong, but I need to get more aero when I sprint. I can't pull up on the bars as much when I do that, but if it makes me sprint faster, I need to try it. Maybe I need to drop another spacer or two and see how that feels, since that might help a ton. Hopefully working on flexibility pays off.

See, I told you! I know you can do it.

Aero is very important. There is a lot of drag at 40 mph.

team-mate of mine has a son on a pro team who is coaching him. I am trying some of that pro medicine... 1 minute all out intervals OUCH -- kind of like pulling a chase-line for a minute.

Yeah, I thought it might be a bit much, but today is the end of my week, and tomorrow is a recovery ride. I figured I would go a little harder today since I can rest tomorrow. I guess I'll know Tuesday if it was too hard.

650 TSS for the week, and about 11 hours.

Yeah, I overdid my workout on thursday.

I was supposed to do 3 hrs with some tempo and LT, but I ended up doing over an hour of tempo and tons of LT (hill climbs). I rode with a friend and we had a blast 'racing' each other around certain areas. He bet me that I couldn't climb a certain hill in my big ring, and I tried to and promptly blew up about 80 meters from the finish. That was really sad.

Good day for strength training, but even with recover friday and leg openers saturday, I wasn't as rested as I should have been for todays race. I don't really care though. I'll make it up next weekend.

The ride I did after getting home was great for venting frustration though!

Rest day tomorrow, and training crit on tues.

See, I told you! I know you can do it.

Aero is very important. There is a lot of drag at 40 mph.

I lose a bunch of power getting down though, which is why I think dropping spacers for crits might be the way to go. I can get a flat back in the hoods, and breathe okay, but having my hands 1 cm lower will reduce drag a bunch. I suppose speed>power in a scenario like this.

Thanks for the vote of confidence, I'll try it again sometime this week. A friend and I swapped wheelsets today, his is a set of wheels he built. About 1450ish grams and 27mm compared to my 1700 gram 41mm's. I like these a lot more than i thought I would.

First post in training thread for me, figured I can post now.

Picked up The Cyclist's Training Bible a couple weeks ago, working my way through it and learning a lot. I'll be JRA for training, since that is what Friel recommends for your first year (I swam competitively for 9 years, but I'm done now. Getting back on the road to replace that). Will be doing a couple races in September and then doing collegiate races in the spring with schools team.

Just putting in the miles now and working on the little things. Starting to get in the habit of riding at 85-90rpm. Feels great to get back on a bike. Scenery sure beats the bottom of a pool.

Did a 3' test and my lungs burn.

Thanks waterrockets.

I think I have a new FTP from the last 20" though. Which makes sense because this last week of riding seems to have higher than normal IF's for what I felt at the end of the ride. Up 10 watts to 260.

If it's true, I am 10 watts and 3 kg. from 4 watts/kg.

Good job on the test and the progress. No graph?

Raced today (Long Beach Crit Cat4) and had two firsts:

1) Crashed in a pileup of about 1/4 field, hopped back in and

2) Spontaneously decided to spend my last lap leading out a good friend (non-teammate) when I found him on my wheel starting the last lap.




Came back to Santa Barbara afterwards and JRA for the first time with a new friend for 3 hrs. Z2. Gorgeous day.

Good job on the test and the progress. No graph?

The more I look at it the more it confuses me. Depending on what you include, you can get anywhere from 260 to 275, and 275 is way too high. I should just send you the WKO file.

Either way. You can pretty much tell if the test was good just from the shape of the graph. If it's pretty clearly decreasing until 2:30 or so, then really flattens out, no spike at the end, then it's probably good. I would go with the lower number. Start your selection at the end, and extend it backwards until the average starts to go up. Even if that's only 10 or 15 seconds, that will probably be ther right span.

Had bronchitis for the past ~3 weeks. Raced this weekend (likely the last races around here of the season).
Did horrible as expected.
Training has been super limited. ~6 total hrs. last week. Got 2nd to last in the TT [went w/o aero gear since I knew it was gonna be a tough go and I was too lazy to put on aero bars], DNS'd the crit and DNF'd the RR [after I got lapped by the field on a 7 mile circuit-- I did 6/7 laps and pulled out when it started to thunderstorm]. :twitchy:

^^ These were the races everyone around here trains/peaks for. Got obliterated.

how many 30 on/ 30 off intervals do you guys do in a session?

quick VO2 interval question.

is there any difference in training effect between doing VO2 max intervals as a set (e.g. 6 sets of 5 on / 5 off) or doing 6 of the same 5 min intervals but spread out over a longer 3 hour ride?

thanks

Shouldn't matter how they're spread out as long as you can get to your planned power zone for each interval (don't go so hard between them that you screw up the intervals).

quick VO2 interval question.

is there any difference in training effect between doing VO2 max intervals as a set (e.g. 6 sets of 5 on / 5 off) or doing 6 of the same 5 min intervals but spread out over a longer 3 hour ride?

thanks

With Vo2max work, keep the intervals close together to get the maximum benefit. I'm a big fan of 3 sets of 3x3's w/3' recovery and 5-8 minutes between each set. You'll want to puke, or lay down and die, by the time you see # 9, that's how you know you did them right.

Start out with just doing two sets for a few weeks to get used to that stomach churning gut wrenching feeling.

oh yeah, i know the feeling of doing these. i usually do 2 sets of 3 x 5 min efforts (for 30 min total at VO2 max), but i'm kind of sick of the workout and wanted to see if i could work it into more of a fun ride.

6x2mins @ 115%. Rest 20 mins. Then another set of 6x2mins @ 115%. Rest for 15 mins. Then a 20 min SST. Then a 15 min cool down.

oh yeah, i know the feeling of doing these. i usually do 2 sets of 3 x 5 min efforts (for 30 min total at VO2 max), but i'm kind of sick of the workout and wanted to see if i could work it into more of a fun ride.

Go race.

Or find your local tuesday night worlds and attack the crap out of it.

:D

Rest week. Blah.

I'll do a field test Friday and see where I am after this block. Yay, what fun.

According to the tanita, I've dropped a point of body fat in the last month. I'm still too fat for this sport.

Active recovery today.

Entire workout (71 watts):
Duration: 35:47 (38:00)
Work: 152 kJ
TSS: 10.4 (intensity factor 0.418)
Norm Power: 92
VI: 1.3
Pw:HR: n/a
Pa:HR: n/a
Distance: 5.618 mi
Min Max Avg
Power: 0 269 71 watts
Cadence: 29 244 62 rpm
Speed: 2.2 28.2 9.5 mph


It was pretty tough keeping my pace low, self control was hard. It also hurt my wrists. Riding a race bike at 50W, not so comfortable.

went for a ride on my "hilly" route and felt the best I have on the climbs. Unfortunately I came home and pigged out on mexican food.

Unfortunately?? Mexican and Tex-Mex are awesome :) (Kind of like the old Southwest Airlines ads) You are free to eat as much as you like...




It's racing quiet time in Texas. Just the weekly crits mostly. So my attention turns to what I call "reward rides" which are just long rides in the country, find new roads, goof with the buddies, no real training structure or intent.

Next weekend is my birthday so I've been mapping a special one.

May you have many more creaky years...




This thread is about 8000x faster than the old one, by the way. If only the database would automatically make a new instance of a thread and keep it seamless to the user...

Indeed!!




First post in training thread for me, figured I can post now.

Picked up The Cyclist's Training Bible a couple weeks ago, working my way through it and learning a lot. I'll be JRA for training, since that is what Friel recommends for your first year (I swam competitively for 9 years, but I'm done now. Getting back on the road to replace that). Will be doing a couple races in September and then doing collegiate races in the spring with schools team.

Just putting in the miles now and working on the little things. Starting to get in the habit of riding at 85-90rpm. Feels great to get back on a bike. Scenery sure beats the bottom of a pool.

I wouldn't worry about training by year...after you finish Genesis, you'll be ready for the next phase of riding and racing...




Either way. You can pretty much tell if the test was good just from the shape of the graph. If it's pretty clearly decreasing until 2:30 or so, then really flattens out, no spike at the end, then it's probably good. I would go with the lower number. Start your selection at the end, and extend it backwards until the average starts to go up. Even if that's only 10 or 15 seconds, that will probably be ther right span.

QUESTION: Does the terrain matter when doing this, or, does it only matter that one find any stretch where one can go uninterrupted and all out for 3 minutes?



Off the bike today to rest the tender "near-hamstring" muscle (after yesterday's race, I thought I pulled a hamstring, but, it was some other muscle off-center but nearby the hamstring) and to set the new Thomson Elite seatpost...sorry USE Alien Carbon, ya burn me once in a situation that didn't call for it and that could have led to some serious injury and it's buh-bye for you and economy stimulation for the bike shop...

Active recovery today.

Entire workout (71 watts):
Duration: 35:47 (38:00)
Work: 152 kJ
TSS: 10.4 (intensity factor 0.418)
Norm Power: 92
VI: 1.3
Pw:HR: n/a
Pa:HR: n/a
Distance: 5.618 mi
Min Max Avg
Power: 0 269 71 watts
Cadence: 29 244 62 rpm
Speed: 2.2 28.2 9.5 mph


It was pretty tough keeping my pace low, self control was hard. It also hurt my wrists. Riding a race bike at 50W, not so comfortable.

Good man...sometimes it feels like these types of workouts take more discipline...but, the benefits keep you coming back for more...

QUESTION: Does the terrain matter when doing this, or, does it only matter that one find any stretch where one can go uninterrupted and all out for 3 minutes?

It sort of does. Mostly because it's very difficult to keep the hammer down on downhills, almost impossible. That's what messed up my test the other week, the downhill parts of the rollers.

I would try to find a section that's uninterrupted, good pavement, low traffic, and either flat or slightly uphill, no downhill at all.

quotes, etc...

That's gotta be one of the most quotes in a single post I've seen in a while. :D
My ADHD kicked in and I didn't make it to the end. :p

You are about 1,251 calories over your recommended daily caloric intake for today.

Ouch. Luckily, I was about 1250 (almost exactly) under yesterday, so I guess it works out. Do you guys who diet and count calories pay attention to calories by the week more than by the day? On days I don't ride, I have an impossible time trying to stay under my limit (like today). But yesterday, since I rode a few hours, I wasn't really that hungry (especially since I rode towards the evening).

That's gotta be one of the most quotes in a single post I've seen in a while. :D
My ADHD kicked in and I didn't make it to the end. :p

I'm honored with your blessing :) My typical approach is to treat each post independently, but, every now and then I've sensed that some folks aren't keen on several posts in a row from the same person...1-3 seems ok, but, beyond that seems to bug people, so :bday:

Either way. You can pretty much tell if the test was good just from the shape of the graph. If it's pretty clearly decreasing until 2:30 or so, then really flattens out, no spike at the end, then it's probably good. I would go with the lower number. Start your selection at the end, and extend it backwards until the average starts to go up. Even if that's only 10 or 15 seconds, that will probably be ther right span.

It flattens out pretty well, there's a small spike at the end of 275, just enough to throw the average off. If I ignore that I get anywhere from 258 to 265 depending on the sample. I think 260 makes sense, I'll do some LT intervals later in the week and see how they go.

I'm honored with your blessing :) My typical approach is to treat each post independently, but, every now and then I've sensed that some folks aren't keen on several posts in a row from the same person...1-3 seems ok, but, beyond that seems to bug people, so :bday:

You're a little early but that's ok. :p
I expect a present or at least a slice of cake come September though. :thumb: