Share your sprint workouts

[beerco]

I tested the IF, NP, TSS stuff about a year and a half ago and it didn't work as well as what I already have access to, so no need to incorporate it because I can do better with out it.

Possibly. Or you didn't quite know what to do with the data.

To go with your chef analogy, do you need a timer to cook eggs or a crepe in the pan?

Anyone who's had a piece of meat come out of the oven too dry, too tough etc. can benefit from using a thermometer to check for doneness. It's not going to pick the right cooking temperature for them though and it's not going to tell you the rest of the recipe.

Likewise, TSS, IF etc. aren't the answer to every question re: training. But, anyone who's had an inexplicable bad day or week or wants more information regarding the weeks and months of training leading up to events can benefit from using a tool like TSS/Training Manager. It all depends on how much you want to up your game.

 

[acoggan]

I tested the IF, NP, TSS stuff about a year and a half ago and it didn't work as well as what I already have access to

No you didn't. In fact, of all the people posting in this thread, only myself, beerco, and rmur17 can be said to have really "tested" TSS the way it was designed to be used.

 

[whoawhoa]

Learning to feel accurately.

What is it exactly you can feel? You know your power output at all times just by "feel."

One of the things that seems to work really well for me (and my coach) is very precise prescriptions for the training sessions, e.g. 3x10' at a certain intensity, 5 x 30" sprints in x gear on a hill, rpm's from y to z, certain amount of rest between each rep and block, etc. The prescription will never be something like, "2-hour tempo ride, 3 sprints in a 53x16.".

This reduces the questions about what was actually done in training and it's easier/more accurate to asses the responses to it. I also have a lot of experience and it seems like my (verbal) feedback is accurate enough for him to prescribe appropriately. I'm sure this approach isn't appropriate for everyone-other methods and tools would work better.

-Warren

This is an apples-to-oranges comparison. What does an interval session have to do with a tempo ride?

 

[WarrenG]

Yes, but my point in bringing up Robert (Eugene) Black's recent success is to illustrate how important talent (genetics) is, regardless of how you choose to train and/or what tools you choose to use.

(For those who don't know him, Mr. Black is a long-time masters/cat. 3 rider who has apparently discovered that he has a talent for pursuiting, winning master nationals in the 45+ age group in both 2004 and 2005, and in the process taking out the previous masters world champion.)

...and I don't think he's ever gone under 55 min in a 40 km TT (I know that I put a couple of minutes into him at the Virginia TT in 2001, despite suffering a stop-and-go penalty myself due to a broken spoke), but he's proven that he can kicks everybody's butt (including your friend Larry Nolan's) over 3 km.



I've never raced any of them at the "main event", which for me would road nationals. As for the "events that matter most", I haven't really cared about how I've placed in races since 2001 (which happens to be the year that I took out the Mid-Atlantic BAR title racing against the likes of Soma et al.).

Don't read too much into that. Bob rode very well in the pursuit. Larry lost that ride from less planning and focus on that particular event. He was more concerned about the points race (won it), Team Sprint (won it with me), team pursuit (2nd), and the criterium (won it). For Worlds he was a bit more focussed and won points, 2nd place to a new world record in the sprints, and lost the pursuit final by .1 seconds the night after the points race.

You say you don't care about placings since 2001... How about performance? Why travel all the way to track nat's 2 years in a row to do just one event (when most of your competition is doing multiple events in a few days) and tolerate the inconvenience of sleeping in an altitude tent for performances that are far below those of guys who train with methods you say are sub-optimal? Do you just want the t-shirt?

-Warren

 

[WarrenG]

On my testing of TSS, IF, NP, etc.

No you didn't. In fact, of all the people posting in this thread, only myself, beerco, and rmur17 can be said to have really "tested" TSS the way it was designed to be used.

Hmmm. I downloaded files into Cycling Peaks. Followed the instructions...Read some stuff you wrote about it...Looked at IF and NP for some races and training I'd done just prior.... knew immediately it wasn't accurately reflecting the stresses and the performances. So if NP and IF weren't as accurate or useful for me as other ways to evaluate performances I don't think TSS would be either.

-Warren

 

[acoggan]

Don't read too much into that. Bob rode very well in the pursuit. Larry lost that ride from less planning and focus on that particular event. He was more concerned about the points race (won it), Team Sprint (won it with me), team pursuit (2nd), and the criterium (won it). For Worlds he was a bit more focussed and won points, 2nd place to a new world record in the sprints, and lost the pursuit final by .1 seconds the night after the points race.

Don't forget that Bob also won in 2004, which was the first year he did the pursuit. In any case, however, my point is that while both he and Larry are clearly better in a 3 km TT than I am, neither one could beat me in a 40 km TT. IOW, as the saying goes, horses for courses...and Bob Black is obviously more of a thoroughbred than a stayer.

You say you don't care about placings since 2001... How about performance? Why travel all the way to track nat's 2 years in a row to do just one event (when most of your competition is doing multiple events in a few days) and tolerate the inconvenience of sleeping in an altitude tent for performances that are far below those of guys who train with methods you say are sub-optimal?

In 2004 I raced track nationals instead of road nationals because of a scheduling conflict. I came back in 2005 only because 1) I felt that I didn't perform up to my potential the previous year, and 2) it was only a 4 h drive away, and I could visit family during the same trip. I also found it fun to train for something a little different from my normal cup of tea, just to see how much I could improve. IOW, I was racing in order to train well, rather than training in order to race well. Even so, the pursuit you saw me do in Indy is the essentially best that I can do, and in fact I set a new personal best for power (although not time) when doing it. (I rode a 3:47.3 at T-town in 2001, but that was on a different, more aerodynamic bike.)

 

[acoggan]

knew immediately it wasn't accurately reflecting the stresses and the performances.

Right - just like you "know" that so-called strength endurance training results in very high muscle forces, or that your power is still high at the end of a flying 200 m (I'm still waiting to hear you admit you were wrong on that point).

Face it, Warren, your credibility is essentially nil even on topics that you should know a lot about, and all your appeals to authority by alluding to Testa or the excellent riders you train with doesn't raise it any.

 

[WarrenG]

This is an apples-to-oranges comparison. What does an interval session have to do with a tempo ride?

Hmm. I guess most of my rides are interval sessions since anything harder than recovery pace is specified as so many minutes at a certain intensity for so many repetitions/blocks/sets.

Instead of a "2-hour tempo" ride I'll do something like 3 x10' on the flat @ HR x power z, then 2 x 20' on a climb @ HR x+5... The HR's and power would be values appropriate training for the objective(s). Similar to what some people call "tempo" training. For me, the intensities near 2-3.5 (or so) mmol/l blood lactate.

This format also allows for fairly precise progressions of the training, usually increasing the total time at an intensity, but sometimes the number of repetitions is important too. For example, we might go to 3 x12' on the flat with 2x25' on a climb, or maybe 4x10' on the flat with 3 x15' on a climb. Later, we might add 2' to each rep on the flat and some minutes to each rep on a climb.

-Warren

 

[WarrenG]

Right - just like you "know" that so-called strength endurance training results in very high muscle forces, or that your power is still high at the end of a flying 200 m (I'm still waiting to hear you admit you were wrong on that point).

Face it, Warren, your credibility is essentially nil even on topics that you should know a lot about, and all your appeals to authority by alluding to Testa or the excellent riders you train with doesn't raise it any.

I've said the forces were high tension and that amount of time in tension was important. I would say that the forces I generate during parts of some sprints can be very high, but the forces are definitely lower during SFR intervals.

As for power at the end of 200m sprints, I've seen the PM measurements showing it still over 1300 at the end and I've also seen in races that my jump is weaker than others (working on that now) but my finish is stronger than most of my opponents at the national and world level. This type of performance seems to be a little trend among elite sprinters during their matches, right?

As for credibilty being nil on topics I should know a lot about... This is pretty silly. I mean, if I (and my coach) really did know so little then how come I've gone from a guy who year after year was just trying (and never succeeding) to break the top 5 at Nat's to a guy collecting gold the last two years against really good competition? The difference is not time or energy invested, or change in talent, it's the training methods.


-Warren

 

[acoggan]

I've said the forces were high tension and that amount of time in tension was important.

Yes, you have - and you're wrong.

As for power at the end of 200m sprints, I've seen the PM measurements showing it still over 1300 at the end

And we've been over this before: your powermeter is lying to you if it says that you're still maintaining 1300 W at the end of a flying 200 m (either that, or you don't know how to do one correctly). Even a world champion such as Sean Eadie will be producing <1000 W when they cross the line.

As for credibilty being nil on topics I should know a lot about... This is pretty silly. I mean, if I (and my coach) really did know so little then how come I've gone from a guy who year after year was just trying (and never succeeding) to break the top 5 at Nat's to a guy collecting gold the last two years against really good competition? The difference is not time or energy invested, or change in talent, it's the training methods.

I have never really called into question your own personal training methods, just pointed out the fallacies upon which they often seemed to based. That said, though, I would never hire you as a coach, because I think you have a very poor understanding of the actual physical (as in physics) and physiological demands of racing, and thus are ill-equipped to do anything except parrot the training programs to which you've been exposed.

 

[WarrenG]

Yes, you have - and you're wrong.

You say so. Coaches with far more success in training racers disagree.

And we've been over this before: your powermeter is lying to you if it says that you're still maintaining 1300 W at the end of a flying 200 m (either that, or you don't know how to do one correctly). Even a world champion such as Sean Eadie will be producing <1000 W when they cross the line.

Maybe it's lying to me. For 200m TT the efforts will be mainly at the beginning to get up to speed. I'm not especially good at this. For the actual sprints the power profile can look more like what I've described, high power at the end to come around people or hold them off when they have accelerated within my large draft.

I have never really called into question your own personal training methods, just pointed out the fallacies upon which they often seemed to based.

But the methods work and experts in the field agree. You believe they are based on fallacies but there's no denying they work. How can this be? With all modesty (I know this will sound bad), if I used your idea of perfect training how much better could I be than I am now? World Champion instead of just National Champion? I've already beaten the 2004 World Champion-his only loss in all of 2004. I don't have a particularly high amount of talent but I've gotten some really good results from my current training. I just don't see how there can be so many problems with my training (according to you) and still be doing pretty well at the game.

That said, though, I would never hire you as a coach, because I think you have a very poor understanding of the actual physical (as in physics) and physiological demands of racing, and thus are ill-equipped to do anything except parrot the training programs to which you've been exposed.

I don't take that as much of a comment because I doubt that you would ever hire anybody as your coach. I think part of the reason for your limited success in the sport is because you won't listen enough to good coaches because you believe you already know the answers.

As for my coaching abilities, there's 6-7 of us here in NorCal who are all friends with something in common. We all have gold medals from Nat's and some have them from Worlds. We discuss training methods from time to time and I think we've all helped each other figure out how to perform better.

One thing we don't do is tell someone who's been successful that their ideas are based on fallacies or that they would be a bad coach, or whatever nasty things _you_ would like to say to someone who's obviously figured out some things that you haven't.

-Warren

 

[acoggan]

You say so. Coaches with far more success in training racers disagree.

I don't say that the forces generated during SE training are relatively low (compared to what our muscles can generate), I know that they are because I've actually measured them. So, if any coach disagrees, they are not only flat-out wrong, but they're foolish as well.

Maybe it's lying to me.

Maybe you're Polar powermeter is lying to you when it says you are still generating ~1300 W at the end of a flying 200 m TT? No maybe about it: it is, and all you have to do is look at powermeter files from world class sprinters doing the same event but using more reliable devices (i.e., an SRM) to realize it.

I don't take that as much of a comment because I doubt that you would ever hire anybody as your coach.

What, like the coaches/coaching manuals available when I first started out, which were full of bogus advice like "keep a pebble in your mouth so that you don't have to drink as much", "eat horsemeat to make yourself strong", etc.?

The fact of the matter is that while I could undoubtly learn a lot from a good coach about the actual practice of coaching (vs. designing training programs, which is only one of a coach's jobs), I have no desire to be a coach, so there's really no reason for me to hire one.

I think part of the reason for your limited success in the sport is because you won't listen enough to good coaches because you believe you already know the answers.

My limited success* in cycling is due to 1) my limited ability (I'm genetically more gifted than many, but not nearly as gifted as some), and 2) the fact that I realized early on that I could never be as good as I wanted to be, and even if I was, it would be hard to make a living in the sport. I therefore stopped making cycling my #1 priority when I was just out of the Espoirs (which of course didn't exist back then) and have really just treated it as a hobby ever since. (By the latter I mean that I haven't made career moves based on cycling, choose not to train more than 1 h or so per day, generally only do races that are within an hour's drive, etc.)

*I was a cat. 1 back in the Lemond era and I've won district championships in five or six states, but unlike, e.g., my wife, never won a national championship, never made a national team, never had a legitimate shot of going to the Olympics or Worlds, etc. Perhaps more to the point, I never went to/medaled at Worlds or the Olympics or rode in the Tour de France, like, say, Carl Sundquist, Kent Bostick, and Thurlow Rogers, who happens to be the fellows who won the TT at master nationals the years I competed.

One thing we don't do is tell someone who's been successful that their ideas are based on fallacies or that they would be a bad coach

Hey, I'm just calling them like I see 'em...if you can't stand the heat, stay out of the kitchen.

 

[WarrenG]

I don't say that the forces generated during SE training are relatively low (compared to what our muscles can generate), I know that they are because I've actually measured them. So, if any coach disagrees, they are not only flat-out wrong, but they're foolish as well.

When I ride up the hill in about as big a gear as I can manage at a cadence of 45 or so, the forces are useful, the time in tension is useful, the focus on even pedalling motion are useful, and I feel the strain on muscles in my legs, back and glutes. I notice the improvement every few weeks or so and I feel the difference within certain periods of races. This training has been used for many years by coaches and trainers who are interested in top performances and have the ability to do regular testing of its effectiveness.

I'm not told to do this or any other type of training more than a few times before I provide feedback about it. Then we decide whether it's worth continuing. I started with it in the winter of 2004 and last winter I asked for more of this training. This year, with some input from another good coach we've found a way to make the training probably still more effective for a rider with my abilities and objectives.

I see that there was previous discussion about this type of training in the December thread called "53x12" where some experts indicate that it can be useful for them, or their athletes. No surprise to me.

There's no real need for the "heat" simply because you disagree with me or someone else. I know for a fact that you have burned bridges with knowledgeable people because of your "heat" and a general unwillingness to learn from experts you don't respect. Your "heat" also contributes to a decrease in the number of people who would otherwise make useful contributions in several online cycling forums. In the end, you decrease the free exchange of useful ideas. Some have called it "Church of Andy", presided over by a demagogue. I doubt that is your real intent, but that is the real effect.

-Warren

 

[acoggan]

When I ride up the hill in about as big a gear as I can manage at a cadence of 45 or so, the forces are useful, the time in tension is useful, the focus on even pedalling motion are useful, and I feel the strain on muscles in my legs, back and glutes.

I felt the strain on my lower back and especially my ankles as well, but even so I don't see how you can consider such strain to be "useful" unless you're planning or expecting to have to ride like that for extended periods other than when training this.

There's no real need for the "heat" simply because you disagree with me or someone else. I know for a fact that you have burned bridges with knowledgeable people because of your "heat" and a general unwillingness to learn from experts you don't respect. Your "heat" also contributes to a decrease in the number of people who would otherwise make useful contributions in several online cycling forums. In the end, you decrease the free exchange of useful ideas. Some have called it "Church of Andy", presided over by a demagogue. I doubt that is your real intent, but that is the real effect.

If you find the relatively mild flak I give you so hard on your feelings, perhaps you'd be happier if you simply didn't get online in the first place. As for "burning bridges with knowledgable people", I think you're just making this up. If somebody really wants to contribute their knowledge then smartass remarks from me or anybody else isn't going to stop them...I know that it doesn't stop me, and who am I really but just another guy with a keyboard and an internet connection? (I mean the latter quite seriously: in the free marketplace of ideas someone's words/arguments either carry weight on their own, or they don't.)

 

[Eldrack]

I have too say that I find Dr Coggans input very useful and his ideas are backed up by a lot of other scientific literature and studies I have read.

 

[WarrenG]

I felt the strain on my lower back and especially my ankles as well, but even so I don't see how you can consider such strain to be "useful" unless you're planning or expecting to have to ride like that for extended periods other than when training this.



If you find the relatively mild flak I give you so hard on your feelings, perhaps you'd be happier if you simply didn't get online in the first place. As for "burning bridges with knowledgable people", I think you're just making this up. If somebody really wants to contribute their knowledge then smartass remarks from me or anybody else isn't going to stop them...I know that it doesn't stop me, and who am I really but just another guy with a keyboard and an internet connection? (I mean the latter quite seriously: in the free marketplace of ideas someone's words/arguments either carry weight on their own, or they don't.)

You can go about keeping your head in the sand about this if you wish. What I shared was a feeling expressed by far more than a few knowledgeable people-both people you disagree with, and those who don't disagree with you all that much but still find your discussion (and debate) style abrasive and one they'd just as soon avoid. Ever wonder why there are so few experts in the field posting in forums that you frequent? Some come in for a while and then leave, mainly because of you. Others have lurked, have seen the environment you foster, and leave without ever posting. It doesn't have to be that way. And yes, you have burned bridges with some knowledgeable, experienced people. That you think I made this up just emphasizes my point about where your head is.

Be helpful, and nice. At some point we've all been newbies.

-Warren

 

[acoggan]

What I shared was a feeling expressed by far more than a few knowledgeable people-both people you disagree with, and those who don't disagree with you all that much but still find your discussion (and debate) style abrasive and one they'd just as soon avoid. Ever wonder why there are so few experts in the field posting in forums that you frequent? Some come in for a while and then leave, mainly because of you. Others have lurked, have seen the environment you foster, and leave without ever posting.

I've been hanging out on the 'net for over 10 y now, and in that time I've never run across anybody that either you or I would consider an expert who has posted on a regular basis. This is undoubtly because they feel they have better things to do with their time (and probably rightfully so), not because of any environment that I "foster". Indeed, when you consider the size of most discussion boards and the nature of cyberspace communications, I don't know you could possibly believe that I - or any single other person, for that matter - have/has a significant impact on such things. IOW, just because you feel that your toes getted stepped on all the time isn't my fault, and I could stop posting completely and it would make no difference in the big scheme of things. (Just look at rec.bicycles.racing.)

 

[WarrenG]

I've been hanging out on the 'net for over 10 y now, and in that time I've never run across anybody that either you or I would consider an expert who has posted on a regular basis. This is undoubtly because they feel they have better things to do with their time (and probably rightfully so), not because of any environment that I "foster". Indeed, when you consider the size of most discussion boards and the nature of cyberspace communications, I don't know you could possibly believe that I - or any single other person, for that matter - have/has a significant impact on such things. IOW, just because you feel that your toes getted stepped on all the time isn't my fault, and I could stop posting completely and it would make no difference in the big scheme of things. (Just look at rec.bicycles.racing.)

...Not just what I think, but what others have said and written. Many others. It's a small world. Your reputation...

 

[acoggan]

...Not just what I think, but what others have said and written. Many others. It's a small world. Your reputation...

Oooooo, people are talking about me behind my back...do you really think I care?

 

[velomanct]

And we've been over this before: your powermeter is lying to you if it says that you're still maintaining 1300 W at the end of a flying 200 m (either that, or you don't know how to do one correctly). Even a world champion such as Sean Eadie will be producing <1000 W when they cross the line.
QUOTE]



I have been looking for this for quite some time! Finally! Yes!

I would of thought the top match sprinters would be in the 1300 range at the end of a 200m sprint. but <1000w you say? that makes me feel better! I usually see 850-900 at the line. Those guys must be decelerating quite a bit if they are under 1000 at the end.