Hello all,
I am a recreational cyclist but I enjoy the ‘competing against myself aspect’. I’m pretty obsessed with hitting higher and higher 1s power outputs and I am curious if anyone has a grasp on what protocal the track sprinters (or anyone with a really high 1s max) do on the bike to train it (I am aware they lift heavy and that isn’t an issue).
Cheers!
The modern track sprinter life is spending most of your time in the gym to get as strong and powerful as possible. The only time you spend on your bike is dropping watt bombs.
For everyone else, there’s still gains to be made on the bike. The bare minimum would be adding 3-5 sprints after your warmup, but before your usual workout.
Once you’ve plateaued doing that, focus on your level of strength. You’ll see another round of quick gains if your core strength is low.
Something that has helped me is high(er) geared, seated hill climbs. low cadence, high power…is similar to leg presses. not as good at building strength as the gym leg work , but not a bad way to do a workout on the bike.
i also do 250m sprints between two roundabouts nearby. it’s not just leg strength, but torque and fast twitch that you need to develop…and sprint technique.
Thanks for the feedback. I’m thinking more in the minutiae of the training. My 1s is close to 1600 (170lb b/w) and I reckon I probably spend as much time in the gym as on the bike over the course of a year so that angle is covered. I noticed that pushing my cadence really high was only way I could top 1350.
I’m trying to see where I can eek out another 1 or 2%.
There seem to be endless plans for cranking FTP or VO2 but nothing in terms of specifics for peak power.
there’s a sweet spot on cadence. if you lower your gearing to get higher cadences, you end up with not enough resistance and your ability to apply power will drop. too high of a gear and you’ll ‘stall out’ and not get the power you’re capable of.
i’m not sure what you mean by the ‘minutiae of the training’? power vs time on the bike?
for my on bike training (hills and sprints) I do multiples and work through specific gearing (starting small…towards biggest and back down…pyramid). your gearing and cadence will be the sweet spots you’ll have to find that work for you to maximize power on the bike.
are you considering racing track sprint events?
I’ve never seriously considered racing of any kind, but if I had to race, it would definitedly be on a track, whatever is shortest.
I’m seeking this mostly to keep things fun and to stop from being biked-out. I have very little desired to slog endless hours to increase my FTP by 2 watts especially since I am not so to speak.
Minutiae: I mean for example: track cyclist X does 10s intervals at 150 cadence, then 5 sec intervals at 130.
Like I said, there are 1000s of plans to increase FTP accurate down to the last pedal stroke - but I can’t find anything relevant to getting really high wattage on short intervals (<60s) asides from .
I know the feeling regarding FTP increases. I race sprint events on the track and i’ve realized my biggest improvements (and successes!) when i made a conscious decision to adjust my ‘off season/summer’ road riding type/style.
My FTP has never been great…but i’m doing quite well at sprint events on the track!
Here are two sources I have used in the past to help guide me towards my own personal training approach:
I can’t find the site where i downloaded this pdf (and i can’t attach a pdf here) so here are a few screen shots and i’ll try and find a way to get the pdf to you.
That is interesting stuff. Especially the part about track cycling and the requirement of needing to be able to maintain cadence at high speeds otherwise you’re braking. Never thought of that (I’ve never tried a fixed gear bike…).
I guess it’s more of the same for me then… basically heavy gym work and sprints on the bike of various lengths below 500m…
Can you tell me what you think is the best training to increase strength, endurance and speed on climbs? What should this training look like? Thank you!
That’s a very general question and depends on a lot of things. What’s your history in endurance sports? What’s the length of the climbs you’re targeting? Just two of maybe a couple dozen questions that needs to be answered before anyone can give you a meaningful advice.
I’m going to assume that you are a beginner…
Endurance is trained by doing lots of volume at low intensity. Low intensity is relative to what you’re capable of doing now. Contrary to what most beginners think, doing lots of slow riding will make you fast. That’s because your body builds all necessary systems to cope better and better with the demands.
Primary advice is to first increase the frequency of your training rides, then the length of them. That will build a base fitness allowing you to sustain moderate amounts of training at higher intensities. If you start out with intensity training without an aerobic base, you will destroy yourself because of the fatigue induced by that type of training.
The nice thing for beginners is that the first couple of months, any training wil rapidly increase performance, if you just not ride ‘hard all the time’.
So first things first, get on the bike and ride as frequently as possible and learn to call it a day if you feel weak/fatigued. You can’t train a tired body, best performance oriented advice in that case is to rest and recover.
I ride for 2 years ago. I made a lot of z2 power training. My Ftp now is 260 w(47 years age)
