Seattle Forrest

Nobody gets up off the couch and runs a 4 minute mile. Most runners never run a 4 minute mile. 4:10 isn't a starting point, it takes good genetics and years of training to reach.

Seattle Forrest

​​​​​​Don't try to make it too simple. For example watts are almost meaningless without a duration. And it matters greatly how you train. I improved my 15 second power by over 300 watts by lifting heavy in the gym including squats and deadlifts. That did nothing for my 60 minute power. Without training my strong point is sprinting, so I train endurance timeframes and don't train sprints at all. Due to my genetics, and also to where those training priorities leave me wrt my potential, there's more room to grow my short term power. But I think it's more important to train to improve your weaknesses.

Anyway, it's easy enough to chart progress by watts at X seconds. But which X will take longer (or be more fruitful) varies for the same person by what X, and how you try to get there.

Tony P.

I make mistakes all the time and it's pointed out to me often which is okay. In this case, though, it's unwarranted. You chose to take two separate posts and combine portions of them to make it appear I said something I did not say. Check them out. My "couch potato" and "4 minute mile" comments appeared in different posts. Neither suggested what you describe. Further, your quote of mine doesn't say what you suggest. Apology accepted.

Seattle, a bit of friendly advice to help you. I learned a long time ago that when you criticize someone you should be correct yourself otherwise you run the risk of looking silly. Perhaps you'll learn that lesson someday. Or, maybe not.

My point, though, remains unchanged. I don't believe in a 6-8 year timespan to reach any competitive level. It must depend on your skill level when you start.

Seattle Forrest

Easy, tiger! Nobody is trying to put words in your mouth, we're all here to talk about improving fitness while riding a bike, which involves illustrating concepts, including your 4 minute mile. You seem to be itching for a fight for some reason. If that's the case, go have fun in the political forum and let the rest of us talk about training. I do agree with one of the posts above; at 72 years old you should have more maturity than you're displaying.

Tony P.

I'm not an expert on training and wouldn't know how to be but I do know analytics. In order to estimate an outcome, parameters are needed. Without parameters it is not possible to predict an result. Simply stated, if you don't know where you started and don't know where you ended, it's impossible to predict how long it will take to get there.

In this case, the formula is:

Ending performance - Starting performance = Improvement.

Suggesting, as you and many have, that someone will be predicted to reach an unknown ending level of performance in 6-8 years irrespective of an unknown level of starting performance is not analytically possible. The reason is simple: if starting and ending performance are unknown, so is improvement as the formula suggests. If improvement is unknown it's not possible to know when someone will achieve it.

Improvement can be looked at statistically, but not estimated with any level of confidence. For example, if 100 athletes achieve a result in an average of 6-8 years, that does not mean the 101st athlete will perform the same.

Tony P. aka Tiger

ZHVelo

Look, I started this because in a short amount of time I improved 4 minutes on a particular climb and basically I was just curious if I can improve another 4 minutes. I knew it was a somewhat open question to something that is very much dependent on an individual, but I was just curious. If it isn't possibly to even make an estimated guess, fine, that's ok, I will keep training (in fact, in the other thread someone suggested me two VO2 max workouts that look very interesting and that I will try in June and can compare to my sessions in May and April).

Seattle Forrest

This is the second time you've lashed out at me because you didn't understand a conversation. Once is a mistake, twice is a habit.

Seattle Forrest

What's the average grade of the hill? How long is it? Do you know your average power over the effort or have a good estimate?

If you have any excess weight, losing it will help above and beyond improving fitness. (Of course you can do both together.) Climbing really comes down to watts to kilograms.

Tony P.

Seattle, I had a lot I considered saying here but decided not to. Can we call a truce here? My only comment related to you was:

I'm sorry if you consider that lashing out at you. I didn't mean it to be and, frankly, still don't see it as any more than my offering a contrary opinion. Let me know.

ZHVelo

3km at 8% at 285W average (up from 269W a month prior), though I can time that better, the first two parts were close to 300W and in the last I dropped off hard at the end, just slightly overestimated myself. I reckon I will probably need around 350W (based on how much faster I was going from 269 to 285 and before that I did 257, the seconds/watt increase were similar in both cases, 3.5 and 3.6 so a slightly conservative 3.4sec/W then 350W would get me there by 1 second to spare).

I do not really, I am down to 11.2%, I haven't been this skinny since a decade ago when I was a teenager. Sure more can come off, but it is not something I should actively pursue in my opinion.

Carbonfiberboy 

I'm about as fat as you are. SF is correct, real cyclists are much lighter. Better to go by BMI than by fat percentage. BMI of 20 is good for climbing. You get down there, you don't have much fat. OTOH one of my doctors gave me a strong warning about doing that. Research says that can lead to low bone density. Better to live long and prosper than to achieve your best possible climbing speed - unless that's how you make you living.

ZHVelo

I agree, I am even considering allowing myself to treat myself more now. That's the good thing so far though, my watts have gone up while my weight has gone down.

rubiksoval

This is a massive mistake. Skill level has nothing to do with the amount of time and training required to reach your full aerobic potential.

I'm not sure why you're so confused with this, but what you're saying directly contradicts basically all sports science, so... yeah.

rubiksoval

More mistakes. No one is giving a value to the improvement. Merely, the assertion is that said maximum improvement (whatever that is, because it's highly variable) IS dependent on volume and duration of training.

You're created a massive fallacy that no one is interested in discussing. That you're doing it while simultaneously asserting ignorance of training is ironic, but unfortunately common in this forum.

Tony P.

FYI, at least one person is interested, me. If you don't appreciate my posts, you're free to disregard them as I have yours.

Tony P.

Your post shows me there's a disconnect. Skill level at the start has everything to do with how long it will take to reach full aerobic potential. How can it be that someone who has been training for four years will reach full aerobic potential at the same time as someone just starting to train. That's just common sense.

rubiksoval

You're the only one interested because you're the only one regurgitating this fallacy.

That's the whole point, see?

rubiksoval

6-8 years to reach max potential.

0 years training = 6-8 years to reach max potential.
4 years training = 2-4 more years to reach max potential.

Those numbers are not the same.

It's like you're replying to what's in your head rather than what's written on the page. Stop doing that. Pay closer attention.

And stop using the word "skill". You either don't know it's meaning or don't understand how it has nothing to do with what's being discussed.

Tony P.

Congratulations, you wore me out. I'm no longer interested in it either it, either.

Seattle Forrest

Seattle Forrest

How much time did it take you to get up the hill?

3.5 w:kg is good for a recreational rider. You won't come near cat 1 with that, but most won't. To go much beyond that is going to take time and effort. You said your background is lifting, I'm assuming you don't have years of miles behind you.

At 11% body fat I wouldn't be looking to lose any weight either.

ZHVelo

13:03 is my PR on that hill (goal is 09:22) and yes, I have already cycled more this year than all of last year together and more than twice as much as in all of 2018 for example. No, if I get to above 300W FTP I will be very happy, I would say that is my goal, it is a nice number and something that looks achievable. Beyond that, depends where I am really at at the end of this year, the first with proper training. Living in the alps, I want start climbing mountain passes.

Oh but I am not massive. I picked up lifting because I did not want to be skinny any more, not because I wanted to look ripped, and the last year lifted for strength, not hypertrophy. Cycling I have been doing for years, but never with proper training nor consistency (e.g. half a year over winter and some months before/after I did almost no cycling at all).

rubiksoval

Can you post the segment? Or post the weight/power of a time that's close to the 9:22?

I'm finding it hard to believe that you could lop off that much time just increasing from 285 to 350 watts. Obviously climbs aren't the same, but I've done a 3k climb averaging 7% in just under 9 minutes and that took over 400 watts and I only weighed 74 kg at the time, and you're quite a bit heavier.

In any case, whether it be 350w or 400w, that's a massive increase from 285w for that duration. Unless you have some serious untapped talent, that type of improvement is probably going to take years of training with lots of focused work, if you can do it at all (most can't).

ZHVelo

I am 70kg (74 at the beginning of the year, I can lose and gain weight fairly easily, more easily the gain part ). The 350W estimate comes from checking how much faster my times were, going from 257 to 269 to 285 (which turns out to have been 3.5 and 3.6 seconds/watt, the 12W increase average was 42 seconds faster I think and the 16W increase 58 seconds). Maybe when I wrote 3.5 you thought that that was my watts/kg? That would have been 4.04 over those 13 minutes (I dropped another 0.5kg recently). And I have already improved 4 minutes this year (don't know the wattage since I only got a powermeter halfway through April), hence why I made the thread to see if I can do another 03:40 or if really the improvements right at the beginning are that much larger than anything else coming after.

rubiksoval

Oh, yes, I thought it was 3.5 w/kg and you were 81kg.

I still think you'd be very hard pressed to do an 9 minute, 8% climb at 350 watts and 70 kg. That's a grind.

259-267-285 isn't a huge improvement over that time period, and certainly wouldn't indicate that you could then go 285 -> 350 any time soon. The speed relative to those wattages will definitely not be linear as a number of factors could have affected those; wind, riding position, passing cars, etc. 12w/16w just doesn't equate to 42/58 seconds over 13 minutes, so there were definitely some other significant factor(s) happening.

But it's a long-term game, so keep chipping away at it and who knows. Optimize your bike, your fit, and your clothing a bit more and you could probably get some free speed, too.