Quadrant Analysis Paralysis

[82zman]

Ok I have been through the "Beyond Average Power" chapter in "Training And Racing With A Power Meter" a few times. It seems to me that this "Quadrant Analysis" tool is nothing more than a fancy way of restating "specificity of training" in a very technical manner. I did a quadrant analysis on two ride files. One on a 20 minute threshold test and then a another on very hilly TT. The scatter plots were fairly predictable. The results clearly show that for nearly the same normalized power, the power was produced quite differently. This makes it clear that performing steady state threshold intervals on a trainer is a less than suitable training environment for a hilly TT. I do not mean to be sarcastic but duh, that’s pretty obvious. The specificity of training rule states that the most ideal way to train for an event is to match the demands of that event as closely as possible in training. What am I missing here? Even in the book there is a statement used to support the quadrant analysis tool that seems rather obvious, "Don’t expect to be a successful criterium racer if you spend a majority of your time in quadrant III riding back and forth to the coffee shop"

To be fair this book is one of the best resources I have ever read on training. It brings very technical information to the average Joe in such a way that self coaching becomes a reality. Coggan and Allen are some fairly sharp guys so I must conclude I am missing something and thus over simplifying this concept. So then… what am I missing here?

 

[acoggan]

Ok I have been through the "Beyond Average Power" chapter in "Training And Racing With A Power Meter" a few times. It seems to me that this "Quadrant Analysis" tool is nothing more than a fancy way of restating "specificity of training" in a very technical manner. I did a quadrant analysis on two ride files. One on a 20 minute threshold test and then a another on very hilly TT. The scatter plots were fairly predictable. The results clearly show that for nearly the same normalized power, the power was produced quite differently. This makes it clear that performing steady state threshold intervals on a trainer is a less than suitable training environment for a hilly TT. I do not mean to be sarcastic but duh, that’s pretty obvious. The specificity of training rule states that the most ideal way to train for an event is to match the demands of that event as closely as possible in training. What am I missing here?

Not a lot, really. For some individuals, the relationship between pedal force and pedal speed is intuitively obvious, such that they just shrug when the information is presented as a scatter plot. For others, though, it can a pretty useful tool, at least until they begin to think in such terms.

BTW, have you checked out all the examples, etc., presented here?:

http://home.earthlink.net/~acoggan/quadrantanalysis

If not, you might find some additional "nuggets" of info that can be gleaned from analyzing powermeter data this way...

 

[frenchyge]

So then… what am I missing here?

Well, you've heard the answer from the horse's mouth, but here's another way to look at it. Specificity of training would lead us to believe that the best way to train for a hilly TT is to ride hilly TTs in training, but what if you don't live in a hilly area or don't have access to roads suitable for hilly TT training? A person in that situation might use the QA tool to help modify their indoor intervals to more closely match the force-velocity demands of a hilly TT without actually doing hilly TTs, say in the winter or on rides where they wouldn't have access to hills. The same could be true for criterium-specific training during the winter or as part of normal road rides.

The QA tools can help make one's training more specific when it may not be possible to be entirely specific. This may be an important realization for some people, and a <shrug> for others depending upon their situation.