Hermes

Unlike aerobic junkies that burn up their glycogen, I did a sprint workout at the track and popped by ATP-PC system. Okay, I did have to burn some glycogen to get up to speed but not much.

San Diego Velodrome warmup and jumps and then 6x100 meter flying efforts two gear changes with full recovery between efforts. My coach wanted 8 efforts.

I was the only one at the velodrome and, as a former track supervisor, keenly aware of the perils of riding the track alone if something goes wrong. As I generate a lot of fatigue, I can start to lose form. So I decided that I was tired on sprint six but two more would have put me into that highly fatigued state where I can make mistakes. At sprint speed, alone at the track, a mistake is not good (it is never good). So I called it early.

furiousferret

Now that I'm relatively close (5 lbs?) to my weight goal, I'm a bit nervous about maintenance. All I've ever done was lose weight or gain weight, I've never really been able to maintain. Most of that has to do with taking 1 to 2 breaks a year due to injury or burnout and going crazy with my diet; just being around normal people and eating with them makes it hard. Dieting I have to be a recluse and I am really tired of running a 500 calorie deficit.

My times up hills are getting really good now, not as good as the Juniors around here, but for my AG its not out of the realm that I could be on the top podium a few of the races coming up. For the flat stuff nothing will change, I'll still be below average.

TMonk

This morning I stayed on the gas for a few hours, ended up with 58 mi, 2:54 moving and 2,333 elevation. My speed was 19.9 MPH which should anger the Strava gods. Wish I could say I coasted down at the end of my ride and did it on purpose but the truth is I wasn't paying attention and just wanted to keep the pace up.

Power was good - 215 w average for the duration, which is the top of my zone 2 and ~3.3 w/kg on my ~145 lb body. I feel like that should have been faster, but I was on a training bike with training tires, and the air is thick and wet in the marine layer along the San Diego coast.

burnthesheep

Dude, what tires and kit you have for that ride?!

Gators and a parachute?

Around here I’ve done 20.2mph solo for a 60mi loop on only 205NP and a tad more elevation. And I weigh 10 pounds more too.

That was with a generic decent kit and 4000’s with latex.

TMonk

I actually have GP4000s on right now + buytl. Turbo cottons and latex on the race wheels. Reasonably fair fitting kit too. Maybe my PM was reading high? IDK. The morning air can be thick and soupy out here. There are also lots of stoplights in the beginning and end of my route.

burnthesheep

Maybe so. I'm still having to remind myself all the time to take things with a grain of salt.

I think my ride though probably had the most ideal conditions possible for that speed at that power. Outbound and inbound cross wind, and at the top long part of the "triangle" shaped route was with the wind. And the parts of the ride against the wind had more hill stuff and trees.

So, probably a super ideal situation. Was also early on a Sunday, so there was zero stopping for traffic or other nuisances and could carry speed around and up stuff.

Hermes

The fastest conditions are high temperature, high humidity and low pressure - riding in a hot humid day during a thunderstorm. Gains due to humidity get offset by lower temperature. For golfers, drives go farther on foggy mornings.

Hermes

Back at the gym yesterday for general strength training. I am finding that 3 to 4 sets but with lower reps, increasing weight per set and less reps with each set seems to feel pretty good. My last set is just two reps. This is in contrast to 3 sets of 10 to 15 reps at lower weight with less rest between sets and between exercises. I am also taking more rest between sets. The goal is to get closer to my max one rep lift on the last set.

My goal is more strength with less mass and less fatigue due to gym work.

cmh

I'm interested in hearing if this does help lower the fatigue from gym work for you.

I started lifting last fall/winter for the first time in years, doing 5x5s of squats and sometimes leg press, along with upper body. I found the fatigue just from the squats with no other leg work to be pretty hard. 2x per week really cut into the riding I could do. For that reason, I'm not doing any lifting right now while I race 2 weeknights per week, but I'm probably losing anything I may have gained over the winter. I'd like to figure out how to keep some lifting up all year without much fatigue.

cmh

What are the physics of gains due to humidity? I'm not doubting your knowledge, it just isn't intuitive to me (whereas the heat and pressure gains make sense).

cmh

Answer to my own question using the googles:

burnthesheep

I notice the same for gym stuff. I tend to go 8, 6, 3 for reps. 8 is kinda to remind me of the form and get going. 6 to introduce some challenge. And 3 to make sure we're really not leaving anything on the table.

Anywho, did a little GCN show workout at lunch and tossed a few 350w short efforts on the end of it. The aerobic work will pay off later. Once I swap back over, it'll just be a different kind of chewing your bar tape to cope with pain. 3min or 2min at a time instead of 8 to 20min.

It was one of those "random hiit" ones that's like 50min. With the new host.

Hermes

@cmh The air density stuff is counterintuitive. But you found the reason.

I am sure that the fatigue is less. The reason is that I am resting more and let my ATP-PC system have more recharge time. The warmup set and mid range rep sets seem pretty easy. It is the last heavy set that feels hard but not fatiguing. I walk out of the gym feeling pretty good. Now, is it doing any good? Time will tell.

I have posted this before article before by the Aussi track strength coach. It has some tidbits of info that can be applied to a gym workout. IMO, the hot sauce of the gym workout for cycling is one leg jumps and to have a strong back. Although, he points out that for endurance road, the only useful part of gym work is to be able to take a crash and muscle imbalances. All the rest is gained on the bike. https://forums.t-nation.com/t/traini...-cyclist/56012

furiousferret

A solid gym workout usually kills 2-3 days of good riding for me, so I'd like to find a middle ground. Everything I've researched say 3 to 4 sets for 3 just may be that. Low reps don't cause hypertrophy, so less mass but what you do have is stronger. What you're posting confirms that. The problem comes handling those reps, because they're going to end up at some point being big numbers and its easy to get hurt if you're not careful.


Being a strong rider will never be a strength, but I'd like to optimize what little anaerobic power I have in tank. At my short height its glaringly obvious I don't have the natural leg strength of others. I'm just not sure when I'll start up. Part of me says now, but in the past weight lifting has been disrupting to training so the winter is a safer bet.

Hermes

I am keenly aware of injury as the weight increases. I started consistent strength training in 1974 and did some in high school for football and track and field. I have belonged to a gym ever since and have stuck with it. I have not done power lifting. In fact, I cannot get my arms into a power clean position for the catch - flexibility.

An interesting exercise that I started doing is the farmers carry. As part of the warmup, I take a couple of dumb bells or kettlebells and walk around the gym with perfect posture with the weights. I find this does wonders for posture. Cycling, we roll our shoulders forward and keep them in that position for long periods of time. This posture plus weight puts the shoulder back in its correct place and aligns the spine.

Hermes

Fiesta Forever...


Back on Fiesta Island for some 2' all out 3' spinning 1' all out rest do it again. Who thinks of this stuff?

wktmeow

It's the stoplights. Assuming you went up and down the coast @TMonk? 200w on Fiesta is an easy 20+ mph avg. But you add constant stops in and it drops a lot for me.

burnthesheep

After looking at the data from the cute little GCN show workout yesterday, I decided to go for some 3min hits.

Just one at first, just to see. I made it. Decided to give the workout a try.

Managed 5 of them in the 3x3min set formula with cracking during the sixth one. 18min total of 350w work at 3min a pop. I didn't think I'd be able to hit that workout till maybe October this year.

The plan of spending some weeks boosting the basic engine was worth it. Gosh these hurt. There literally is zero hiding from 3 min intervals. Zero.

At the end threw in a 5min bit of SS. Just because the internet says to do that after hard intervals since you "mobilized fat into your blood" or something like that.

270w NP for pretty much an hour.

I wanted to let out a Ric Flair "wooo!" once I was done.

I'm really considering taking on a "carbon repair needed" cheap crit bike build.

TMonk

yep!

Hermes

Same for me. There is a lot going on along the coast. Generally, I am happy with an endurance ride at whatever speed / power I get. Sometimes, I get a long stretch of no stops and average speed goes up per kJ expended. And there is the wind. Sometimes we have what seems to be a headwind in both directions. This can happen as the wind shifts from SSW to WNW as the day progresses. Fiesta is generally fast until it isn’t. I was out last week and it seemed like 80% of the course was headwind.

aaronmcd

Been a while. I was starting to train for a while there, but really wasn't enjoying it. Been having fun working on body composition lately, added 15 lbs January through april, lost 15 lbs of fat over the past 9 weeks so, down to ~10% now. I'm done cutting this weekend and finally get to eat like normal again. Maybe I'll have some energy for the bike, but I am trying to start up a one man business here so prob won't have the time for it. I still feel hella guilty about cutting the racing and most of the riding.

TMonk

love that song haha. it's fun!

TMonk

Kicked down 101 miles today with moderate climbing. Started with the SDBC "A" ride (hammered the front), then broke off and did my own thing. I really wanted 99 miles (@mattm style) to anger the Strava goons out of spite, but it just didn't happen. Next time...

...which might not be until October, honestly. Not gonna force it until then when I'll begin preparing for the 2020 racing season.

Hermes

I rode the coast yesterday and I saw the most group rides / team rides and cyclists on PCH since moving back to SD. Beautiful day.

Ttoc6

Week of work travel and awful dieting comes to an end today. Flying back to Utah and my bike. Scared to step on the scale tomorrow. I got a run in every day and lifted twice but the massive amounts of food will not be offset.