Originally Posted by
SprintzNKiloz
So I messed around with riding straight to the rail versus a corkscrew approach to keep that metabolic burn low (with the corkscrew) and I'm not sure I ever saw a difference in resulting 200m times. Granted, the ride to the rail on the back straight was assisted by a BIG push from my holder. Watching world cup quals, I feel like even on steep tracks the bias is towards going straight to the rail. It's probably easier to pull off a ride to the rail at Major Taylor than say, Rock Hill or LA.
It's MUCH easier to go straight to the rail on a 333M than it is on a 250M. The biggest problem is the first turn that you have to climb into.
This is one area where a power meter can be helpful for sprinters. Evaluating how much torque they are using during the windup before the jump.
I had a buddy tell me that he once followed his coach during a full flying 200M. Both had power meters. The coach had less power spikes during the windup than the student and had a much better flying 200M thus illustrating Brawlo's point. I think they were on a 333M track.
This is sort of how/why I came up with my "Earl Henry Style"* flying 200M. I basically treat it like a rolling standing start for a Man1 effort. Why did I do this? In evaluating my splits from team sprint efforts, I noticed that my final 200M split from a
standing lap was sometimes FASTER than my
flying 200M. That was a clue that I was doing something seriously wrong.
At TTown, I experimented with casually riding around during my windup then performing a "rolling standing start" down the home straight and had a really good time. Like 0.5" faster than a proper flying 200M earlier in the session.
I'm not saying that the "rolling standing start" method is faster. What I am saying is that I was screwing up my proper windup to the tune of +0.5 seconds...or more
*Early Henry is a legend on the US Masters circuit. Old guy from "the islands" (not sure which ones, hahaha). He has several masters world championships. He does his flying 200m windup like at a snail's pace then lays down the hammer hard.