rubiksoval

I think that's pretty common in crits (and even road races if you're out of position and have to get there quickly).

Definitely a specific element to working on two jumps with an effort in between.

I've tried 30 second efforts with 5-6 sec jump, 20 secs hard, and then a 5-6 sec jump again at the end as I feel it mimics a lot of races.

Our Wed night crit usually has 3 separate jumps over the last minute. Making sure you cover the first two and can then squeeze off enough of a sprint for the final jump out of the last turn is important.

globecanvas

Definitely true, and definitely learnable. But I also think it's true that one can compensate for weaknesses in such a way as to mask the fact that they are weaknesses. This connects to a conversation I was having yesterday with a friend who is a coach.

Him: "I looked at some of your numbers. I think the area you'd benefit from working on most is 5-60 second power."

Me: "nah I'm OK there, it's FTP I need to work on. when I do well it's usually a bunch finish, I need to work on success in a break."

Him: "you won the field sprint at Branchbrook on 5 seconds @ 890 watts. just because you did well doesn't mean you're strong."

gsteinb

It's a skill to hide your weaknesses. A delusion not to recognize them.

furiousferret

The best way for me to hide my weaknesses is to put my bikes on eBay....

Ygduf

it's a dilution to mix your weaknesses with water

carpediemracing 

Just saw this (been away from browsing for a bit)...

My peaks don't move very much. 1250-1350w in a race (if I'm fit enough to get to the end without being completely exhausted), about 1450-1550w in training (and very fresh when making the efforts). However my best overall sprints (in terms of power-seconds) have been sustained 1100-1150w efforts, going on 18-19 seconds long.

In races where I do 1000w for 10-14 seconds I can do very well in most sprints.

So for me sprinting better is sustaining higher power for a longer period of time. When I'm not fit I struggle to maintain 800-900w for 8 seconds. When I'm reasonably fit I can do about 900-1000w for maybe 12 seconds. When I'm really fit I can do 1100w for a solid 17-19 seconds. I have not captured a great sprint on any clip, my 1450-1550w sprints happened before I regularly wore a camera.

One thing that I've discovered possible is to get multiple peak efforts in a sprint. I discovered that my peak power band is in a pretty narrow rpm range. I need to be going about a certain cadence, with a certain amount of acceleration. Then my power drops off rapidly. By shifting into higher gears I can keep my cadence at a close-to-ideal speed, allowing me to make multiple max wattage peaks. I haven't done it in a race but in training I've done sprints with three 1200w peaks in maybe 4 or 5 seconds. This led to a pretty high avg wattage in the sprint, even though my power dropped hard after that third peak. Through experimentation I found that my best sprint power is just around 105-110 rpm, using 175mm cranks (I have extremely short legs).

In races I struggle to optimize rpms/etc because I pay more attention to what's going on around me. I tried using a heads up display for a bit (Sportsiiis) and will try again as I now have an Ant+ powermeter (SRM wireless). The Sportsiiiis can be programmed to display certain color LEDs depending on whatever you want, cadence, HR, power, speed. I set mine to show green in a very narrow rpm range (105-110 rpm) so that I knew I was in the right zone when I jumped. With a heads up display I don't have to look down/around to see if I'm in the right cadence range, the I just get into the green zone and then I know I'm optimized to jump.

(btw my power pales in comparison to "true" sprinters that might put down over 2000w peak, 1800w for 10 seconds, and 1000w for a minute... one former National Team sprinter put down such numbers apparently, a local rider that was untouchable in sprints as a Junior / Cat 3).

therhodeo

Don't have great peak power but I got 5th in a road race mass sprint because cat 5's are dummies and tried to sprint from half a mile out into a headwind. I rode a guys wheel till maybe 200 meters to go and overhauled a pile of guys who were burned up. So there's my useless post.

Ygduf

real-world actual experience and good advice as well. hardly useless and better than most of the posts in here