topflightpro

This coaching discussion is getting a bit off topic in this thread - I'm shocked. Shocked! To see a thread get off topic - but some teams have guys with experience who can provide guidance on racing tactics. Others do not.

I've had a bunch of coaches over the years - I'm on No. 6 now. Some have spent more time discussing tactics with me than others. One, who was a teammate, specifically explained what I was to do during a certain race. I followed that plan and won the race. And I've shared that plan with other teammates, and seen them win, or place. In that case, the course dictated the race tactics, and experience riding and racing there is what provided the insight needed to win.

Anyway, I've never met my current coach in person. We do everything online or over the phone. We have discussed tactics, as based on his perspective and my training numbers, I should be performing better. He even asked me to get a GoPro to film my races so he could watch what I was doing and critique things. This season, I am going to try to send him video files. I hope he enjoys watching them, because I don't.

(To be fair, my tactics have been a major problem for me in the past year. Largely, I've been racing stupidly given my known strengths and weaknesses.)

mike868y

has this been posted here? seems relevant Of clothing and community - VeloNews.com

globecanvas

A former riding buddy had two coaches, one for training, and one for race tactics. He got a lot of teasing for that (among other things). He moved out of the country a couple of years ago. I didn't make the connection until after he left that the race tactic training coach was none other than @carpediemracing.

Heathpack 

I actually don't think the coaching comments are too off topic, given that the original post brought up the idea of tactics. People who are learning in the sport are learning from other people- whether that's by just racing and observing, or riding/racing with a team, or being coached or some combo of all of the above.

I am in the coached-by-someone-who-discusses-strategy camp. We are not just building power numbers and manipulating my schedule to get me to a race in good shape for it. There is way more to it than that.

My coach is remote to me and mostly we communicate via text and email, sometimes phone. Although we have met and ridden together. It's incredible to me what he can get out of looking at my power files- sometimes he can even tell me what I was thinking at a given moment in a race. And be spot on. Blows my mind when he does that. I think there's all types out there in the world of coaching and some coaches can manage the remote thing very very well.

Interesting to me to read @tetonrider's comments. My first posts ever in the 33 had to do with trying to assess whether I should stay with my previous coach, who I now realize was terrible. I was way overpaying him at the time and he now charges $700/month for the same type of coaching I was signed up for. Unbelievable to me, given how bad the guy is. I can't imagine anyone signs up for the full package. Maybe after dealing with me, he decided there was no amount of $ that was worth that level of coaching and he really doesn't want to do it any more.

happybday29475

I find it curious that the norm here is to freely admit whether one is coached or not, but at the same time keep the coach anonymous.

Ygduf

NDAs about strategies such as "2x20s" and "vO2"...

(I tease)

Heathpack 

I find it curious that you made a comment about people keeping their coach's name anonymous without identifying your coach by name.

happybday29475

I am a curious fellow!

APEX Coaching

happybday29475

PS - Some of the self-coaches here have some excellent palmares.

PPS - I've never done 2x20's. I would venture a guess that I do more easier stuff, and more harder stuff, than is the norm. But I'm an old crit guy.

carpediemracing 

His training coach was/is a national team coach, for what that's worth.

Some stuff that might help tactical teaching for others.

I raced against the guy but we were slightly different racers, mainly because he was really strong as well as a decent sprinter if he didn't try to do the big solo. Watching him race (meaning I was in the same field) helped me understand his riding fluency etc (it was fine).

I noticed something about his jumps, gave him a small piece of advice. He found 200w peak power on the next ride, and, as he told me on the phone "I didn't even mean to jump hard, I was just doing what you told me to do!". That was nice.

Per my request he recorded some races on video, he'd upload them so I could watch them. I saw his power files. He described where the wind was (I asked for specific sections). His power site (where I logged in) had a map so I could see where he was making efforts, etc. Based on this I could see what he was trying to do, his errors, and make recommendations. It's always easier as a Monday morning quarterback, right? He went back to the same course (it's a regular series) and got pretty close to winning shortly thereafter.

He also gave me info on courses and I'd try to make recommendations based on that. It's hard to make calls but at least he had stuff he'd look for. His big race, his national RR, was a disappointment, but based on what I saw of his power and his description of the race, I don't think that was the year for him.

I've given advice at the spring series I promoted, usually racers in races other than mine. There were a number of riders who had their first win right after I spoke with them. To be honest they were strong, they just rode not-so-smart, and I gave them some advice which they followed. I'd try to keep up with them after, offer some follow up stuff.

My mom used to teach violin. She wasn't very skilled herself, just book 4 in Suzuki, but she could teach and her students loved the violin. When the students got to book 4 she'd hand off the students to one of two teachers, my teacher (he was pretty advanced) or another one (less so, but that teacher took more students). I feel like my mom. I can teach Cat 5-4-3 tactics but in the 2s it starts getting more fitness based, like drilling it and cracking the other riders. I don't know that very well, and I have to hand off to someone else. Like how to approach a hill in a RR? How to approach a stage race? I dunno.

I remember overhearing Jonas Carney coaching his Kelly Benefits riders via radio. It was pretty interesting, he was saying the same kind of stuff I might say but his riders were so strong he could take massive liberties with distances or efforts. One stage in particular had a winding approach to the sprint - he said to his guy to go super early, I think it was 1 k out, because everyone would blow. I was like, wait, why didn't his rider blow? Because Carney knew he wouldn't. His rider won the stage clear of the field. I would have been like "You want to be 3rd wheel at such and such corner and then punch it here just before the line." Carney was like, "Yeah, you have to go at this turn (which was way early), there'll be gaps everywhere after." He was right.

globecanvas

What was the advice ?!??!!


(he just "retired" from racing btw)

Hermes

Inquiring minds want to know. Push harder on the pedals???? Big gear spin fast????

carpediemracing 

Retired... that's a bummer. I can see that though, he wanted to do well, not just enjoy racing. When thinking of results and you're racing in fields with ProTour riders, it's got to be demoralizing at some core level. (Me, I'd be psyched that I was on some guy's wheel for a mile and that he won some minor classics - and won Paris Roubaix later - etc.)

I noticed he was only pushing down on the pedals. I told him to pull up and over the top of the pedal stroke. I showed him pictures of me on the bike, my foot vertical at the top of the pedal stroke. I flick my foot forward at the top of the pedal stroke. Told him to do the motion slowly first, with no resistance (rolling 53x21), to get an idea of how it feels, and then do it with more resistance (rolling, 53x15) but still at lower rpms. Then do it with more speed.

Just before the flick forward. Keep in mind that what I say I feel and what people see can be two different things. The idea is to get the right sensation you feel as you make the movement, not the exact movement itself. It's not like ballet where you need to do x y and z, with pedaling you're trying to get something done without looking at what you're doing.


Sprint on the drops. Enough said.

I also described to him how to throw the bike side to side. I did it in person, it's hard to describe in text, but I pointed out that when I get going super fast I'm not pulling/pushing very hard, I'm just letting the bike move back and forth. A little nudge each time the bike changes lean direction. For many years my fingers didn't necessarily curl around the bars, they were loose when I pushed out (like the "cup of tea?" kind of gesture, where you hold a tea cup with your thumb and index finger and the other fingers splay out). i haven't been able to sprint satisfactorily in decades, but when younger I was doing 125-130 rpm in sprints and going 10-20% faster, doing just that. Now I'm just mashing pedals and it's horribly depresssing. Our protege is young so he can do this stuff.

I told him to think "spin faster" not "pedal harder". When people "pedal harder" they push down more. When people "spin faster" they pedal faster, in better circles. They automatically think about pulling up and over.

Related to that I told him to forget about the scraping mud off your foot thing. That's for slower, power stuff. It's not for sprinting as much - if you pull up and over you automatically get that other stuff down almost automatically.

Finally I told him that your foot should be sort of flinging around while you're pedaling, meaning ankling. Ankle area shouldn't be stable (I think someone told him that?).

Sounds like a lot but that was a few minutes of conversation and we talked for a couple hours that night. Also this is all stuff that happens to work for me, definitely not "by the book".

Doge

Photo by Vickie Batchelder McNulty

cmh

Puppy Doge is yawning. Clearly this sport is far too easy for him, it puts him to sleep .

congrats to him on the GC win!