Beer Drinker Appreciation Society - Open For Business (Page 151)

Out here on the west coast there are plenty of running events, especially half-marathons, to keep me moving throughout the off-season. I have one scheduled for the end of December and plan on one in February to start the year. Trying to stay focused on my swim and bike are a little tougher, I do admit.

There are two types of 'professional' bike fitting, those based on experience and those based on science/technology

Experienced based are usually done by people who have been doing it for years and years and typically will eyeball your position with some minor help from basic measurements

Pros:

Often times experience is just as good as the tech and much cheaper

Cons:

Its hard to know if the person is experienced enough or even good at it until you've started riding

Technology based using computers/camera/infrared all sort of gadgets to analyze your fit. 

Pros:

Theoretically it should fit you perfectly.

Cons:

'Fit' is based on a model that has been predetermined to be the best riding position. The computer might 'fit' you to the ideal fit but the question then is what is the ideal fit? How is that determined? Does it assume you have optimal pedal stroke? Does it assume you have perfect posture on the bike at all times? Does it account for injury or flexibility issues? 

The technology might be sound but the does the person using the software (or whatever) know how to use it effectively? 

Cost - Super expensive. 

It's also really hard to judge if a bike fit is good or not. If you had your bike set up wrong for years you've probably become used to it. If you change it to a 'proper' fit, you might find it incredibly uncomfortable and you might find your power output decreases. Our musculature tends to adapt to be powerful in whatever position we ride, changing it to a position that could potentially produce more power might initially cause you to see a reduction in power until you adapt to it (can take 6 weeks or more). 

I prefer to have someone with experience and a reputation for fitting riders do my fit. That being said, there are some people I know who are excellent bike fitters but they've only ever done rec riders. I don't go to them. They don't know how to fit someone who races. Find someone who has lots of experience fitting people for the type of riding you do. If you ride a Tri bike, get a Tri person to fit you. Don't let a roadie or even TT person fit you (TT and Tri are very different setups), unless of course they have experience in both or multiple.  

It's too difficult to continue sport specific training throughout the entire year for triathlon (i.e. training swim, bike, run all at the same time). In the off season pick a weakness you have and try to develop that. Focus on a 60,20,20 approach to training. 60% of your weekly time should be working on your primary weakness, 20% should be devoted to maintaining the other two disciplines. 

Even though I don't focus on Tri anymore, I still try to do maintenance for both run and swim during my off season. I do a block of run training (which is where I am currently). Then I switch to strength and swim for 6 weeks. Then I start my focused bike training. You an do a variation of this over a 12 week period. Do 4 weeks of training where 60% of your training is on the bike. Do the next 4 weeks with 60% focused on running, and do a final 4 weeks with 60% focused on the swim. 

Make sure you set goals though. And not just frequency or volume goals (e.g. run 3 times per week). If your weakness is the bike, for example, and you typically do Sprints or Olys, set a goal to try and ride 30km in a certain time and build a training plan that will help you build speed up to that. Having a goal and making a plan to get there is what will motivate you to keep going.