Originally Posted by
asgelle
Before you go disagreeing, how about showing us the data? Coyle et al published 17 years ago and as far as I know, no one has produced data contradicting theirs. If you know something the rest of us don't, how about sharing.
The article you posted showed a correlation between elite national races being faster than competitive riders during a 40k TT done indoors because of these reasons:
1. Elite riders were operating at a higher % of VO2 max
2. Elite riders had denser muscle fibers and more type 1 fibers
3. Elite riders were producing more vertical torque during the pedal stroke
The riders in the article were riding a trainer at a given wattage simulating flat terrain, where aerodynamic drag is the biggest force the rider is resisting.
I was talking about climbing a hill, where gravity plays the biggest force the rider is resisting.
Why do you assume that one paper covers all cases? Also, wouldn't reason 3 be due to reason 2?
When you use analytic cycling, it's calculating the steady-state power to go up that hill, but you do not produce power in a steady state manner. Analytic cycling's number is the minimum power to go up a given hill at a given speed.
If you climb a steep hill, standing on the gears and pushing down very hard, your speed vs. time graph would be something like a sin wave, with peaks and valleys. You're constantly accelerating during the power phase of your pedal stroke and slowing down between power phases, then re-accelerating to the same speed. To accelerate a mass takes energy, so you're losing energy both from going up the hill and accelerating yourself.
So, if you reduce the amount you're decelerating due to changes in applied power from your pedal stroke, it takes less energy to go up the hill.
Doesn't sound fuzzy to me.