Training4cyclists

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climbing

How to Plan Your Peak Climbing Performance

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How to Become a Better Climber ”“ Lesson 4

This post is the fourth in my series about how to become a better climber. After the first three lessons you should be in a position to describe the physical challenges to fast climbing: the hill’s steepness and length, your body and bike weight. You know what you are up against and can begin to plan your training. Always keep in mind what you are preparing for.

I am often asked by a broad range of riders how to plan for peak performance. The single best advice I can give you is to start at the end. Write down how you should train the day before the race.

Afterwards, write down how you should train two days before the race etc. This little trick keeps your focus on the event you are training for and makes sure that your tapering protocol is on target.

So, whether you have 14 days or 14 weeks to train, is not that relevant. It is clear that you could prepare better if you had 14 weeks, but sometimes that is not possible.

Even when I work with elite riders, their race schedules and priorities might change throughout the season. Suddenly an athlete has the chance to represent the national team and then that race gets the highest priority and a short deadline.

In such situations, I think it works best to simply begin at the end. Instead of trying to do the impossible, you should stick to sensible training planning techniques.

Sometimes it is important to accept the fact that it is not possible to make miracles happen in such a short space of time. 

Instead, focus on the small changes that will have a positive influence on your performance (optimum tapering, optimization of bike etc).

Your task today:
Describe how long time you would like to spend on your climbing project.

Need to Reduce Your Bike’s Weight?

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How to Become a Better Climber ”“ Lesson 3

This is the third post in my series about how to become a better climber. This lesson will not focus on you, but on your bike. In the first two lessons you were supposed to describe in details what hill you would like to climb faster and your optimal body weight / body composition. Since you will have to carry your bike up the hill, it’s obvious that bike weight is also essential for your performance.

What is the optimal bike weight for a road bike?

If you race under UCI rules the answer is pretty exact: 6800g. If your bike weight is more than that you will get a ‘weight penalty’ to your opponents. If your bike weight is less than 6800g you might be disqualified. I have never heard of any rider having trouble with this rule, but maybe this is because of extremely rare testing.

Rules are rules and should always be followed. As a rider under the UCI rules you should aim for a bike weight of exactly 6800g.

If you ride just for fun and want to achieve the best possible performance uphill, you might benefit from an even lighter bike. Today it is not that difficult to build a bike weighing less than 6kg. It will cost you, but it is definitely possible.

What is the optimal bike weight for a mountain bike?

There is no limit to how light a mountain bike can be. If you can make your mountain bike lighter, there is room for improvement of your climbing performance.

Reducing bike weight is challenging and does not have to cost a lot of money. Every single gram saved is an advantage on the climbs. Naturally it must not negatively effect the riding performance.

It is clear that weight savings can be really, really expensive, but for road cyclists, you are probably not far away from optimal bike weight regarding UCI’s 6800g rule. It is a little more tricky and expensive for mountain bikers since they must estimate how many grams or kilograms they are from the best mountain bikes in their competitions.
Your task today:
How light weight is your bike and how light weight would you like it to be?

How to Become a Better Climber – Lesson 1

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Ever wanted to climb the hills faster? I bet you have. Just like any other rider, you can see the clear benefit of riding faster uphill.

This post is the first in my series:

How to Become a Better Climber

Know what you are preparing for

When I make an individual training program I always take the race profile into my considerations. What are the decisive points in the race you prepare for? Is it a short, steep 500m hill or is it a long, steady 4km climb? It’s important to keep in mind what kind of hill you want to ride faster because there are some differences in the physiological requirements that will affect your training.

Some hills require focus on threshold power, others on VO2 max, anaerobic or sprinting power. Body weight and bike weight should always be a part of your planning, but I have to emphasize that it’s not just a question of Watts per Kilogram. I will come back to that later.

If you expect a specific a certain hill to be the decisive moment in a cycling race you prepare for, you must optimize your training for it.

Describe the hill as detailed as possible:

  • Finishing time (length)
  • Steepness
  • Standing /seated pedalling
  • Gear choice
  • Drafting opportunities (tactics)

When you’ve made a detailed description of the hill, it’s easier for you to plan your training. Stay tuned for my next post in this series!

Image by LATriBri.

Maximum power output or watts per kilogram?

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Today is the first stage in Tour de France 2008 with big mountains. This is always an exciting stage to watch because it is the first really indication of who will be able to win the yellow jersey. Nevertheless, we will very likely only find out who will NOT be able to win the yellow jersey today.

But it should certainly be interesting to watch.

You will probably hear the commentators talk about the skill climbing and maybe also a bit more technical about how many watts each rider has performed in tests before the Tour de France this year.

Watts the problem?

It seems like there are two values when people discuss power outputs: Watts and watts per kilogram. The first one is an absolute value that predicts performance in flat races while the second one is often used to predict performance on hills.

Watts per kilogram is often used as a more sophisticated way to present physical performance because it represents a power output that is relative to your body weight. Experienced riders already know that when you climb, body weight matters.

Thus, additional fat stores are more expensive to carry on mountain stages than on flat stages.

Watts per kilogram the golden standard?

Watts per kilogram is often a better indicator of overall performance than absolute watts. But it is not as precise predictor of performance as it could be. With some simple adjustments it would give you a better picture of how you will perform.

What I am talking about is making some values that give the body weight slightly less impact when you predict climbing performance and add some impact to your body weight when you predict time trial performance.

It all depends…

The reason for these modifications is because climbing results cannot be predicted by watts per kilogram only. The problem appears when small riders achieve greater values in watts per kilogram, but don’t win the mountain stages. This can be explained by the fact that the external weight of the bike is carried by the rider independently of body size and several other factors that influence on overall performance e.g. gradient, wind resistance and tactics.

Thus, it is not possible to simplify the prediction of performance by using the metric watts per kilogram. Yes, that is definitively one of the best predictors we have, but it can be optimized with some modification and other factors should also be at least considered.

Watts per kilogram^X would possible be a better predictor of performance because there are no events that can be predicted accurately by watts or watts per kilogram only. Body weight will always play a role and normally play the biggest role in the mountains (X closer to 1).

Also it is worth to remember that body weight influences on time trial performance even though it is not very important in flat time trials with a constant high race velocity (X closer to 0).