As many areas do, we here in Central VA have training tt that we do once a month (big shout out to Eric and Alice Fletcher who make it happen). The challenge in this area is to find a course that has any sustained flats. The best place has a fairly steady false flat on the way out and a correspondingly slight down hill on the way back. Here’s quick Google earth shot of the course.
The past two weekends I’ve done two crits and in both I’ve focused on "racing stupid." To race stupid means to do lots of work, to get into every break you can, and chase down any you can’t. It means burning every match you’ve got, lighting it up early and often. Unfortunately, for me at least, it also means a fairly anonymous finish, having nothing left to contest the finale.
However, the point of this post is not to make excuses for poor performance, but to give a quick visual showing how one can tell if tactics not training might be a problem — in other words, are you racing stupid and not knowing it? Below you see the cadence distribution from the Cat 3 race I did last Saturday. Notice how little time was spent coasting (less than 4%, less than 2 minutes out of the 45 or so the race lasted). If you see this same pattern in your race files (be sure to look at the race alone, not any warm up or cool down), you need to start thinking about how you can conserve energy better during the race.
For a more substantial discussion, see Allen and Coggan’s book Training and Racing with a Power Meter.
Just a quick follow up to yesterday’s post when I questioned Liquigas’s tactics — well, today they got it perfectly right. In the closing kilometers there was a small group off the front with 2 LG riders in it, meaning that the rest of the team didn’t have to chase to bring it back. That group was caught with ~2k to go and then the rest of the team launched the train with 3 guys left to get Bennati to the sprint. Petacchi was second, Greipel 3rd, Farrar 4th — of course there was a crash @ ~3k to go that seems to have taken out most of Petacchi’s train and I’m not sure who else (Boonen was no where as far as I could see), but still, a perfectly executed lead out is a thing of beauty — the LG riders were celebrating with 50m still to go. Go have a look for yourself at www.universalsports.com/cycling
I just watched the end of the second stage of Tirreno-Adriatico, won by Tom Boonen. What struck me was the work done by the Liquigas team. They were the only team to have a real train organized, leading it out from at least 3k out, and yet their guy, Bennati, only managed third. But guess who was attached to Bennati’s wheel the whole time — Boonen. So my question is whether or not pro-teams employ a "sweeper" on their train; that is a guy who sticks to the sprinter’s wheel and prevents another rider from essentially getting a lead out from the team’s effort. It seems a fairly basic tactic, if one only rarely executed well at the amateur level. Perhaps it’s considered amateurish and that’s why we don’t see it more often in the pro-ranks? or is it because the pro-level leadouts are so long and intense that they need every rider doing his turn on the front?
I don’t think this stage was a case of Liquigas getting it wrong leading it from too far out and exhausting the lead out men — they still had two guys with in the last kilometer, but Boonen starts his sprint before Bennati and Bennati never comes close to coming around.
Have a look a the stage here or if that link is no longer live at universalsports.com and let me know what you think.
To lift or not to lift is a question that has, well, exercised physiologists, cyclists, and coaches for quite some time. Two recent papers have just come out (one a study, and the other a review article) with opposing conclusions as to whether or not lifting weights will benefit cyclists, and the appearance of these two articles combined with a continuing interest of mine prompted me to return to this long-neglected blog.
Let me begin with an apparent contradiction: I personally lift and suggest that some of the athletes I coach lift regularly, but not because lifting will benefit directly their cycling performance. There are very few situations in which pure strength (such as the effort needed to squat 2x your body weight) factors in cycling. Some common instances would be steep, technical climbs off-road in which you are moving at a slow speed, track sprinting, and BMX starts. (Interestingly enough, apparently some of the highest wattages ever recorded at the national level come from BMX riders training for the Olympics, but those numbers are from a dead stop and not after several hours of racing). So, then why lift? There are several reasons both physiological and psychological; I will cover them in what I see as decreasing order of importance below.
Reston Town Center Grand Prix, Cat 4. I had my worst race result of the season today — a voluntary DNF. The first few laps were a crash fest and though I avoided all the crashes, I missed the key break, even though one of the riders I knew I should have been watching was in it. After the break got away, the group continued to hammer, but the with all the big teams represented, there was little chance it was coming back. I suffered at the back, moving up a few spots here and there but never getting near the front. With 12 laps to go, I pulled the plug.
The past two weeks have seen my races follow a familiar pattern — ride well for the first 9/10ths of the race and then fail to execute in the last lap when it really counts.
6/13 Amphibious Assault Crit
The Amphibious Assault Crit is a unique venue — we literally race around around parked hovercraft used by the Navy to, well, assault things amphibiously (see video here ). And because it’s on the landing apron, the course is pancake flat and relatively smooth — a crit racer’s dream. The course is extremely wide and not all that technical, although the organizers did throw in a nice chicane on the backside just to keep things interesting. The final corner was a good 500 meters from the line. My race went accordingly to plan — I marked Dominic Meier who has been just tearing up the VCA Cat 4 Bar. I lost a sprint for an early prime by less than a wheel (to Dominic of course) and then we settled in. The course nearly guaranteed a field sprint, despite the heavy rain falling at the race start. On the last lap, I was 3rd wheel, but as the rider leading out tired coming out of the last corner, we got swarmed, and in that instance I hesitated and my shot at the podium was over. I still managed to worm my way out and unleash a decent sprint, passing several guys, but only managed 8th.
The Ride Sally Ride cat 4 crit was marred by a serious crash, involving Charlottesville’s own Jake King. I neither heard nor saw the crash, but it left Jake with severe facial lacerations and potentially a broken jaw. The accident happened fairly early in the race, and we went past the scene several times, until with 17 laps to go, a bell was ringing and the chief ref was shouting 1 lap to go; they had to bring an ambulance in for poor Jake…
Often times when I mention that I have a coach, other riders respond with surprise: “wait, aren’t you a coach yourself? Why do you need a coach?” It’s a good question, and one I’ve been meaning to write about for a while. I think the answer, interestingly enough, connects back to my “other” life as a professor.
Not much to report from Sunday’s Bryant Park Circuit Race, and what there is, isn’t good. My race started well; I snagged a front row starting spot, stayed in the top 10 at all times, and marked the guys who’d been winning all of the races recently. Unfortunately, after just one such move, I found myself on the front and in an effort to get out of the wind, moved to the left following a wheel. Unbeknowst to me, someone had overlapped on my left, but must have been far enough back that my peripheral vision didn’t catch him. Apparently my move hooked his front wheel, his skewer ripped most of the spokes out of my powertap, and even worse, he went down. Thankfully, he was ok beyond the usual road rash symptoms.
The one positive is that my form is coming around; now all I have to do is put the tactical pieces together.