Experior's Group, Take Two -- CLOSED (Page 26)

bartimaeus - 2010-06-23 11:03 PM



I'm not sure about the top/bottom thing Sylvain, but I read something here on BT that discussed practicing making a full circle with your feet.  It said to think about one foot at a time, say 100 revolutions of the left, and visualize yourself making a perfect circle and keeping the power transfer even around it.  Then switch to the right, then both.  But Moogle (Michael) can probably give a better answer.

bartimaeus - 2010-06-23 3:59 PM Mark, where did you get the swim socks?

OneFastMule - 2010-06-24 10:04 AM

Mike,

I bought a pair of Blue Seventy socks from our local Tri sponsor (just before the first race of the season in 60 degree water - Yes, they did a brisk business that night... :-), but you should be able to find them online at a number of stores:

http://www.blueseventy.com/products/detail/swim_socks

- Mark

StlPhil - 2010-06-24 7:51 PM Ok guys, I need some input here. I seriously thinking about signing up for a tri on July 11th. It's a pretty big event around here with a lot of "elite" triathletes participating. BTW as you all know, I'm not elite, but it looks like it would be a lot of fun.

The distances in the bike and run are no problem. The swim is a .62 mile OWS. I'm not the strongest swimmer. However, it is a wetsuit race. I think the buoyancy of a sleeveless wetsuit would help with my swim deficiencies. What do you think? Do you think I can get through the distance without drowning? I can do a mile in the pool, but OWS?

Phil

Experior - 2010-06-24 2:42 PM Alright, let's talk about pedaling.

First, we should dispel a myth:  while there is such a thing as good and bad technique, producing higher and lower efficiency, you will not see huge gains on the bike by improving efficiency.  This is not to say that you shouldn't do it!  Just don't expect to magically become a lot faster by fixing any small problems in technique.  And yes, if you have problems (any of us), they are small.  Being a machine, the bike basically forces the rider to have at least passably decent technique.  (Compare that with swimming, where poor technique can mean massive wasting of energy -- I could post a video of me swimming to illustrate that point!)

OK, so how should we pedal, and how should we learn to pedal that way?

There was a famous study by Coyle et al. a while back.  You can get a copy from his web site, here.  I happen to like science and numbers and stuff like that, so I read the whole thing, but the only thing you really need to look at is Figure 5, which looks like this:



This figure shows the average torque generated by two different groups of cyclists.  The solid line is the average of elite national-level cyclists ("group 1") and the dotted line is the average of what they called "good state class" cyclists ("group 2").  0 degrees is 12 o'clock if the crank is a hand on a clock; 180 degrees is 6 o'clock, and so on.

There are several important things to notice here.

(1) The group 2 cyclists have a slightly smoother stroke.  Notice, for example, that just after the bottom of the stroke (just after 180 degrees in the figure) they are putting zero pressure on the pedals.  In other words, they are wasting zero energy pushing down on the pedal at this point.  And on the upstroke (around 270 degrees) they are doing a better job of unweighting the pedal, and in fact they manage to generate somewhat of a pull up on the pedal (which is why the torque goes negative).

(2) Despite the slightly better efficiency of the group 2 cyclists, the group 1 cyclists perform better overall, and they accomplish this by putting much more power into the pedals during the power phase of the stroke.

(3) Along similar lines, the power phase of the stroke is by far the most important part of the stroke.  The rest of the phase is just about irrelevant.

So what do we learn from this?  Well, it is definitely useful to do the 'scraping the mud' thing at the bottom of the stroke and the 'rolling the barrel' thing at the top of the stroke, but these actions are not really for the purpose of producing power.  You do them so that the leg that is not (at the moment) producing power does not act against the leg that is producing power.  You want the leg that is producing power to be sending all of that power (well, as much as possible) to the rear wheel.  You don't want some of that power to be eaten up pushing your lazy other leg up the back half of the stroke.

So think of it like this: "I'm producing power from around 2 o'clock to 5 o'clock, and the rest of the time I'm making sure that my leg takes responsibility for getting itself around the rest of the stroke, so that my other leg doesn't have to do that work."

If you think about what muscles are involved here, it makes perfect sense to relegate everything except around 2 o'clock to 5 o'clock to 'just getting around'.  Your quads and glutes and to some extent calves are involved from around 2 o'clock to 5 o'clock, and the rest of the time, other muscles (mostly the hip flexor on the upstroke) take over.  Those other muscles are much much weaker than your glutes and quads and calves.  They just cannot contribute much.

OK, so how do we learn this technique?  First, as I said before, a large part of it is just forced on us by the bike itself and our anatomy.  The bike forces us to pedal in circles.  That's the only way the crank moves!  And you can try to generate loads of power on the upstroke with your hip flexor, but good luck doing that for more than a few minutes.

But even within these parameters, there is still better and worse.  It is entirely possible that you (and that's the generic 'you' here -- I'm not referring to anyone in particular) have 'dead' spots in your stroke where the opposite leg is having to do extra work to push the lazy leg around.

I think that the best two drills you can do here are one-legged pedaling and spin-ups.  (You have to be clipped in, or have the toe cage wrenched down pretty tight, to do these properly.)

One-legged pedaling:  Just unclip one foot and keep it out of the way, while you pedal with the other foot for 30-60 seconds at first.  These are hard, and you will get tired quickly!  That's because this drill forces you to produce power during the weak phases of the stroke, and as I said, the muscles that do that are weak.  (Do this in a safe place, or on the trainer!)  Don't try to go fast.  This drill is to develop muscle memory, not fitness.

Spin-ups:  Slowly increase cadence (in a very easy gear!) until you start to bounce in the saddle and cannot keep it smooth any more.  Then back off a bit to smooth things out and hold your cadence there for 30-60 seconds.  Again, don't try to go fast.  This drill is to develop muscle memory, not fitness.

What Friel is advocating (and I think it is a good idea, though clearly you should listen to him, not me!) is, when you are doing these drills (or just trying to be conscious of your stroke for a while while riding), you should focus on one phase of the stroke at a time.  There are four phases, roughly:  2-5 o'clock (power); 5-8 o'clock (scraping mud); 8-11 (upstroke); 11-2 o'clock (rolling the barrel).  Of course, the ultimate goal is to put it all together into a nice smooth pedaling action.

Whew!  That took longer to say than it does to do it.  Don't spend undo amounts of time on this stuff.  You will see some gains from it, but in general our limiter on the bike is not technique but fitness.

StlPhil - 2010-06-24 7:51 PM Ok guys, I need some input here. I seriously thinking about signing up for a tri on July 11th. It's a pretty big event around here with a lot of "elite" triathletes participating. BTW as you all know, I'm not elite, but it looks like it would be a lot of fun.

The distances in the bike and run are no problem. The swim is a .62 mile OWS. I'm not the strongest swimmer. However, it is a wetsuit race. I think the buoyancy of a sleeveless wetsuit would help with my swim deficiencies. What do you think? Do you think I can get through the distance without drowning? I can do a mile in the pool, but OWS?

Phil

StlPhil - 2010-06-24 7:51 PM

Ok guys, I need some input here. I seriously thinking about signing up for a tri on July 11th. It's a pretty big event around here with a lot of "elite" triathletes participating. BTW as you all know, I'm not elite, but it looks like it would be a lot of fun.

The distances in the bike and run are no problem. The swim is a .62 mile OWS. I'm not the strongest swimmer. However, it is a wetsuit race. I think the buoyancy of a sleeveless wetsuit would help with my swim deficiencies. What do you think? Do you think I can get through the distance without drowning? I can do a mile in the pool, but OWS?

Phil

Experior - 2010-06-24 6:30 PM

Yep.  Do it.  You can't sink in a wetsuit.  Worst case scenario (OK, barring lake sharks and whatever) is that you have to sit there and float for a while.

It'll be a great experience.  I say do it.

TriGuyBri - 2010-06-25 12:37 AM Had a teribble run this evening.  I went out way to fast and began doing some 30 sec. bursts as per my workout.  Got through with about 5 and had eight to do.  I was pretty tired, must have been from my Bike TT yesterday.  I ended up walking about three times for about a minute each.  Still managed under 9:00 mile, but it wasn't pretty.  Finished strong though.

I have an open water swim tomorrow evening at the local reservior; looking forward to this.

I am thinking about cutting my workouts to about two disciplines a week instead of three.  I just can't get them all in right now.  So instead of fighting it and feeling bad about it I'll reduce some for these next two sprints.  I may still run three each week, but the bike and swim not so much.  The added distance to my swimming has begun to give me some pain in my left shoulder so I am going to back off some and keep it 1800 or 2000.  I think I have a pretty good base right now for my next two sprints;

Beginning of July and then vacation for two weeks; (no biking but I'll be able to swim and run).  (Going to South Dakota - may try to get a Mt. Bike Ride in  the Black Hills with a friend, his kids and my son).  

When I get back my next Sprint isn't until the beginning of Sept., but I may do one other the following weekend to see if I can get ranked Regionally in the Sprint Distance or Olympic Distance.  I then have a couple of weeks to prep for my final Oly race in Sept. 

Not sure why I am telling you all this, but I am.  Kind of unloading all this stuff in my head.  Sorry.

slornow - 2010-06-27 8:15 AM

Michael-another great result.  Is scotch a "performance enhancing drug"? Not my favorite but I'm willing to try. Cant imagine racing after a night of drinking now-takes me back to college when I played tennis.  I never let an upcoming match get in the way of a night out drinking.  Sounds like you are on your way to fully recovering from the injury.

I did a brick yesterday with 36 mile bike and 2 mile run.  Did 3 "hill loops" totaling 21.5 miles after warmup. Averaged about 20.5 mph with norm. power at 215 and avg power at 194.  Speed was little slower than expected but given intersections and stop signs I feel that I can average close to 21mph in Chattanooga.  2 mile run was not "too" bad.  Averaged right at 8 min miles which was better than expected.  No way I will be able to do full 10k at 8min/mile pace.

I am trying to figure out how to pace the bike for Chattanooga Olympic.  There are some long inclines with, of course, some long downhills.  Living on the Gulf Coast it is hard to do alot of hill training.  Hard to avoid the spikes in effort/power on the uphills.  Want to push it on the bike but dont want to die on the run-although that may happen anyway.

Any suggestions?  Headed out for 8 mile easy run before we hit the 110 heat index predicted.

Randy  

slornow - 2010-06-29 5:38 PM

Its kind of quiet here with our speedy leader being on vacation.  How's everyone doing?  Anyone racing this weekend? Heidi how's your recovery coming? Hope everyone is doing well and getting in lots of good training.

I need a new profile picture-it was about 25 degrees when my current picture was taken-that was about 75 degrees ago!!!  

Randy