Joe Friel has an interesting article about optimization of aerodynamics for time trialists. He has been doing some testing with differents setups of head position (aero helmet, head position etc.) and saved 77seconds. I can strongly recommend time trialists to have a closer look at that article and notice Joe Friel’s final comments: “I’m afraid many helmets on the market that are marketed as “aerodynamic” are actually less aerodynamic than a standard road helmet. And even wearing a decent helmet with the front down close to the eyebrows, while it may look good, is actually slower than with the helmet’s leading edge worn closer to the hairline in front.”

I found this link via PowerTap Geek that publishes a lot of interesting articles for PowerTap freaks.

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Marc Moeller has a season goal of moving to cycling race Category 2. Moving up one category per season seems fair for serious cyclists like Marc, but doing it with only 8 hours per week is a bit of a challenge. Nevertheless, he has worked hard for the last 6 weeks to improve his already good fitness. And with great success! Here are the results from the critical power tests Marc has performed with his PowerTap:

Critical Power Tests	5sec	1min	5min	20min	Body Weight
Week 1 (Watt)	1110W	600W	395W	337W	82.6kg/182lbs
Week 1 (Watt/kg)	13.4W/kg	7.3W/kg	4.8W/kg	4.1W/kg
Week 6 (Watt)	1184W	649W	417W	351W	80.4kg/177.2lbs
Week 6 (Watt/kg)	14.7W/kg	8.1W/kg	5.2W/kg	4.4W/kg

Week 7 to 12
I know that Marc is getting close to a plateau where additional improvement requires a bigger training amount. But by giving his high intensity training program some periodization, there is a chance that he can continue his progress. I am really satisfied with the results I have seen from him so far, and predict that he will deliver even more watts next time. It is though pretty clear that he will have to work very hard for every single watt from now on. But as I told Marc in an email: “Every single watt counts at your level”.

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I have often been asked the question ‘What does 3 x (3+3) minutes VO2 max mean?´ so I thought it would be a good idea to spent a short post on it. 3x(3×3)min VO2 max means 3 times 3 minutes maximal effort with recovery periods of 3 minutes between each interval. (3min hard work, 3min recovery, 3min hard work etc.) VO2 max refers to the intensity you shall try to maintain through the intervals. It’s clear that you don’t know what your actual VO2 is, but when you have tried these intervals a couple of times you will know how to pace yourself. The important thing to remember is that you are supposed to ride as fast as you can for a period of 3 minutes (but not faster than you can repeat it a couple of times). It is not possible to use a heart rate monitor for pacing because of the delay of the heart rate but can be a good indicator of your performance afterwards. A power meter like SRM or PowerTap is very useful for such pacing. Yeah, they are expensive, but strongly recommended if you are a serious cyclist. In the recovery periods it is a good idea to do some light pedalling to remove metabolites. That will make it easier for you to make the following interval at the right intensity.

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Gonzalo Vilaseca has done the first six weeks of the power meter project, thus he has now entered the final six weeks of the project. This part of the training is considered as race preparation.

Competing in a cycling race is one of the best ways to prepare you for your main goal. The reason is that you train exactly what you are going to compete in. I have previously discussed races as preparation for cycling races in an earlier post here. Gonzalo will use Sundays for races where the race itself doesn’t have high priority, but the training he gets from it has a high priority since it is one of the three weekly intensive training sessions.

Evaluation of Gonzalo’s critical power tests performed in week 6

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Four riders have completed the first 6 weeks of wattage controlled cycling training. In week 1 they performed four critical power tests to evaluate their sprint power, anaerobic endurance, VO2 max and threshold power. After the initial testing week they have performed four weeks of wattage controlled training based on their test results and personal goals. In week 6 they performed another test week with four new critical power tests performed under the same conditions as in the first. The four riders have achieved some great results as you can see on the graphs below. I will make my comments on their critical power tests and talk about their future training programs based on these test results later in this week.

If you are interested in having a closer look on their results in the critical power tests, you can find their numbers here:

Marc Moeller
Paul Skiba
Dave Simonson
Gonzalo Vilaseca

Ps. Thomas Davis has had some troubles with his knee, so he has only just begun on the training program.

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A couple of months ago I posted three quality programs for indoor cycle training. These programs are not only easy to understand they are also a very efficient way to train if you don’t have much time for training. Another advantage is that it is not necessary to use a heart rate monitor or power meter for pacing even though it certainly will be a good help for an optimal training session. I will now introduce you to two more indoor cycling programs that really rocks:

Indoor Cycling Programs

Aerobic power 3
10min warm-up
3min (semi-high intensity)
2min low intensity
8 x (3min high intensity + 2min low intensity)
5min cool down

This program gives you 24minutes at very high aerobic oxygen consumption. Your aerobic engine will love this program and you will be glad that these tough intervals are separated into short 3minutes bursts. It is though important to maintain some intensity in the recovery periods since that will help you to recover faster.

Aerobic power 4
10min warm-up
3min (semi-high intensity)
2min low intensity
4 x (6min high intensity + 4min low intensity)
5min cool down

This program also gives you 24minutes at very high aerobic oxygen consumption, but it will be tougher for you to maintain the same power outputs as in ‘Aerobic Power 3’ since the intervals are twice as long. If you compete in time trial events this program is good for pacing control training.

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