Velo Quips
Cycling humor and insight
About
Daylight Savings Revelations November 9, 2014
Introducing LetsRide.co October 1, 2014
A Look at the Relationship between Age and Performance in the Pro Peloton November 25, 2013
The Funniest Thing I Have Ever Done October 20, 2013
Can You Imagine? October 14, 2013
How much do you care about cycling?
Each winter, Daylight Savings Time forces working cyclists everywhere to answer this question as the daylight hours shift conveniently in place with the traditional 8-5 workday. There’s no way around it for the next three months – you’re going to have to make sacrifices somewhere.
Do you ride the trainer, get out for a lunch ride, leave work early for a short ride before sunset, mount some lights and brave the night, or just say “fuck it, I’ll see you in March”?
In many ways the winter months are the hardest for a competitive cyclist. The road season is still a long way away, the cold and the wind seep through even the warmest outfit.
But it’s the winter where the differences are made. Your FTP, ability to suffer, and most importantly your fitness base are directly related to what work you put in in the long winter months.
How much do you care?
Today, I’m excited to announce the launch of a new cycling website, LetsRide.co . The goal of this site is to make it easy for cyclists to find group rides and events in their area. If you’re interested, check out the site and let us know what you think!
Hopefully this explains why Eran, Andrew, and I haven’t been blogging this past year!
Can you imagine. . .
. . . a world without Freds? If it weren’t for people who go out for training rides on tt bikes and disc wheels, I don’t know who I would make fun of.
. . . a group ride without Strava? The tactics would be so much different if it was a race to the state line rather than a race to the top of the hill.
. . . a cycling industry without carbon fiber? Aluminum, titanium, and steel can only be engineered in certain configurations; would it be possible for the industry to create a “need” for metal bikes with huge price tags?
. . . a bike race without torpedo helmets? Pretty soon you won’t be able to as the torpedo helmet is quickly surpassing the Air Attack in reference to both cutting edge design and extreme dork-itude (so expect to see them in full blossom next spring).
As another year of college begins for many of you, I’d like to share a few observations from my three years of cycling in college, especially in regards to the benefits and challenges on training.
The biggest benefit of being in college for an experienced cyclist is the flexibility to train when you want. Your expectations as a student are to A) show up to class and B) meet deadlines. Generally speaking, as long as you meet your academic obligations, you’re free to train whenever you please. This means that if you are done class early, you can go out and do a 3 hour Zone 3 ride in daylight no matter the season! The typical 9-5 job doesn’t afford this luxury, so you’re getting much more freedom to arrange your training schedule.
If you are in an intensive major or are an extremely devoted to your studies, having a regular heavy workload can be a considerable burden not only to availability of time to train, but also to the amount of sleep you’re getting. Not having a full night’s rest after a hard workout is one of the easiest way to disrupt your training plan – especially if you’re regularly getting less than 5 hours a night. While the working (wo)man can reliably train, work, and get a full night’s rest, the student is left to the mercy of week to week academic obligations.
If you’re at a moderate to large-sized school, chances are there are a lot of people you can ride with. This is especially beneficial for beginners as they tend to need that bit more motivation, but this is also great for experienced riders to keep you from going insane by yourself on those 3+ hour long rides.
People tend to drink in excess in college. Big shocker I know . This can result in:
Poor sleep
Hangovers
Dehydration
Attempted feats of strength resulting in injuries
All four are pretty detrimental to a training plan. I’ve only ridden hungover once or twice but it’s an absolute drag. If you have the mental fortitude to put out the watts even in a rough mental state, good for you, but for the rest of us, drinking can be a serious inhibitor to training.
There are a number of positives and negatives that college has on your cycling training. All in all, however, I’ve found that sticking to a training plan is easier in college and (at least for me) has a positive influence on grades as you’re forced to work more effectively on your homework so you can ride (amongst other benefits). So, if you’re in college, take advantage of the time to train and get better than all the graduated losers!
Are you frustrated with racing? Well I am. Over the course of the season, I’ve noticed a steady decline in name-calling, crashes, and general irritation in the peloton.
AND THIS ISN’T WHAT CYCLING IS ABOUT. Competitive cycling is about those two guys getting in a fight over some shenanigans that went down in their sprint for 18th place. Competitive cycling is about that burly Navy racer sitting up and removing his gloves 2 miles from the finish, almost taking down half the peloton in the process, all in the name of improving his chances to *maybe* finish in the top 10.
Let’s restore competitive cycling to its roots by implementing these seven annoying techniques:
Snack on awkwardly messy stuff – Crunching on a big bag of Chex Mix before a race is sure to piss off your fieldmates. Taking your hands off your bars during the last leg of an ascent to wipe some Cheesy Gordito Crunch off your face will make them go bananas.
Sarcastically comment on other racers’ equipment – Ask the guy with the Air Attack how his spacewalk went.
Do zero work on the flats – I’ve heard sitting in is very pro.
Attack in the feed zone – Because you are a self-sufficient cyclist and/or nobody loves you, crush the field when their guard is lowest… in the feed zone. They deserve to feel your pain.
Don’t point out hazards or turns – Hey, its a race, isn’t it? You snooze, you lose . . . And crash and break your collarbone .
Sing the songs you like to sing – Whistle, hum and sing along to your favorite song. Double points for “Call Me Maybe” or “I Love It.”
Race in these :
Now that the road season is coming to a close, I feel that it is apropos for this week’s workout to be anything but a workout.
With Facebook, Strava, Twitter and all the social media networks out there, we get a constant barrage of “epic” ride updates from our friends, nemeses, and ‘friendemies.’ It’s easy to forget about the lesser publicized form of training: the recovery.
For every quality workout, there needs to be quality recovery in order to create a quality athlete.
If you’ve been training and racing for a while, putting in a recovery day here and there is a no-brainer. But let’s expand further; what about consecutive recovery days? Recovery weeks? A couple of years ago in mid-Fall, I was riding with a Junior racer interested in the University of Delaware. On the ride, he mentioned that his coach makes him take off 6 weeks from training at the end of every season. Six weeks! He said that his coach felt like this was an adequate amount of time to avoid overuse injuries that can be so damaging to young athletes.
If I spent that much time not on the bike I would definitely go (more) insane, but I think taking a few weeks off at the end of the season is a smart move, especially based on what my body is telling me. A little knee discomfort here, a twinge of pain there, these are signs that my body is tired of the strain and needs a full recovery. So the doctor’s orders are two weeks off the bike.
Maybe some people can just keep it going year round, but taking significant time off at the end of the season or even during can work wonders for achieving a complete recovery and even getting your mind back on track.
How much time do you normally take off at the end of a season? Or do you just jump into the next sport (i.e. cyclocross)?
VO2max workouts have been the emphasis of this Workout of the Week series because it’s getting close to the end of the road season. This is because VO2max work has been shown to provide significant, somewhat unsustainable gains in fitness across many athletes. So if you’re looking to pack in a few last punches before you hang up your Zipp 404s for the season, keeping reading on!
Tabatas are evil. You’ll be hard pressed to find a more sapping 3 minutes in your life. BUT, it was this workout that spurred me out of my post-collegiate slump and into the top end of the results book all summer long!
Warm up for 15 minutes, working in a few long sprints to loosen up your legs
Ride 20 seconds at a pace you think you can handle for 1 minute (~2xFTP)
Ride 10 seconds as easy as possible
Repeat steps 2-3 five times for a total of 6 repetitions and 3 minutes
Recover 5+ min
Repeat step 2-4
Cool down
I really like this workout for three reasons:
It doesn’t take much time or training stress
You can do it on the trainer
You can easily do it without a power meter
My first go at Tabatas this summer (over two months ago). Ideally each 20 second interval would be at the same power output (red), but nobody’s perfect.
If you’re not doing it on the trainer, I’ve found this is best done on a long hill with a slight (~3%) gradient as it makes it easier to hit the power targets. Happy training!
A common phrase used in the UD Cycling Team is “make it happen,” coined by VQ contributor Eran. It’s a simple philosophy that has allowed him to be so successful, and certainly the deciding factor in my good finishes this summer. So what is it? Making it happen means throwing out your fears and doing what it takes to get a great result.
From my experience in bike racing, there are only two things you can do in a race:
Makes excuses; or
Make it happen
If you pay attention to those around you, it become pretty clear who falls into which camp. The people making it happen are the ones shaping the bike race; forcing people to chase them down, putting their teammate in prime position for the sprint, making a solo late move.
Don’t get me wrong, people making it happen don’t always do well – no one does. A late solo flyer, while probably the epitome of making it happen, is usually going to end up in disappointment. This is because, for the non-sprinter, it’s a hell of a smarter move than sitting in for the field sprint.
Making it happen isn’t about getting results, it’s about eliminating your fear of failure. If you did pretty much everything you could have done to do well in a race, can you really be too mad?
Christophe Riblon would never win up Alpe d’Huez by sitting in all day with the group of main favorites and conserving his energy. His only option is to go out in the breakaway and get a large enough advantage at the base to hold them off until the end. And that’s what he did.
How can you adopt this mindset? Like any psychological change, it takes time. Some things to try to speed this along:
Attack when no one else is
Ride aggressively in group rides
In the last 5 miles of a race, think of nothing except where you need to be and how you will get there
Never make excuses
Attack
I woke up this morning and flung open my laptop. I was sure I had overslept and missed the live feed of whatever race was on today. Wait, is it still the Tour of Utah? No. Eneco? No. Oh, it is the US Pro Challenge! And apparently the live video doesn’t start until 3pm today.
I am quite sad to see the Eneco Tour end. This was probably one of my favorite stage races to watch….of all time! This was a stage race for the big guys! There were time bonuses everywhere: 10 seconds for a stage win and 3 seconds at intermediate sprints! And if you were sleeping under a rock, or just past 9am, you missed Zdenek Stybar teach everyone how to ride these skinny tired road bicycles. After his performance in Eneco and Paris-Roubaix last year, I think he is my pick to win like every classics race except San-Remo. Even with T-bones as his teammate and Fabo and Peter “loves to fondle” Sagan as stiff competition it is hard to argue with Stybar’s skills.
So that’s something to take away from Eneco. But now onto America, Amurika, Murica! The US Pro Challenge, Tour of Colorado, the return of the Coors Classic. I was looking at some pictures from last year and I realized something: Is it possible that Garmin has to ride Shimano because of their rider Peter Stetina? Peter’s Dad is the VP of Road products for Shimano and kind of a big deal. It would be a major conflict of interest his kin was riding that SRAM crap. Haha…Daddy’s boy!
My second stunning observation is that domestic professional teams have no money. Below is a picture of a Bissel rider on what I assume is his primary bike (stage 1) with a sweet SRM PC7 head unit. The only problem is, he ain’t got no power meter! Damn too bad the Campagnolo SRM costs 4 grand and that is probably half of his yearly salary.
Obviously you have learned a lot from me already, but I will leave you with one parting thought. Last year at the US Pro Challenge, Tyler Farrar won a field sprint… ‘Murica!
EDIT: One of our very insightful readers correctly pointed out that Bissell is sponsored by SRM which makes this rider no longer look like a fool. Unfortunately as a pro rider in a stage race not using a power meter is still foolish. YOU LOSE TEN POINTS BISSELL RIDER!
Sometime this weekend we’ll be moving the blog to a different host and platform. The site name will remain the same, but this may affect those reading this via RSS or the WordPress blog reader. Check back next week, as I’ll give you the updated subscription options.
If you’re interested, the reasons we’re moving are:
We want to have complete control over how the material for this blog is presented to you. WordPress.com-hosted blogs don’t have that option.
We have a number of new features (!) we’re working on that will require a more complex domain mapping.
Thanks for reading and we’ll see you on the other side.