Stewart Cook, who used to own Gran Prix Cyles in Caulfield Sth, and was a strong time-trialer, often told me about his very long training rides which only averaged about 28kmh. Coming from a gym background, to me, this made about as much sense as doing 10,000 reps to improve your max bench weight. It just never sunk in, and he basically ended up telling me I was a d1ckhead. My 'lack of understanding' problem was augmented by hanging out with "scientists" (physiology lecturers who never rode bikes), who laughed at the suggestion of training 600 or 700km a week for 45km criterium.

Like I've said before, when training for the criteriums and track stuff, I used to absolutely KILL myself for less than 200km a week.

Do track riders still do heaps of kms?