Monday – I was planning on a VO2 workout today, but I just wasn’t motivated. I felt like I’ve been in a funk the last two weeks with my aerobic power seeming to drop like a rock. So rather than focus on higher end stuff I decided to focus on threshold. I was expecting the worst but hoping for the best. My hopes paid off in spades. One heck of a workout on the PCs. It’s the best threshold workout I’ve had in over a year and my second best hour power ever. Temperature and humidity were perfect and I just cranked my way through a fabulous ride. One thing I did differently for this workout was to keep my Powertap CPU on the “max watts” display and ride the effort by perceived effort. While I did peak once or twice along the way, nearly the whole effort was perceived effort. I did display real-time watts in the last 2 minutes of the effort just to make sure I’d finish strong. My effort yielded 282 W average (283 normalized) for the hour, with 1:55 total on the PCs. Below is a plot (dashed line is through the 282 W line) of the hour effort, which shows just about perfect pacing, and all with just perceived effort.
Tuesday – No riding.
Wednesday – Hmm, what to do after Monday’s great ride? Decided to do a super secret VO2 workout. I’m toying with a new VO2 workout protocol that is under wraps until I see if it really works. Bottom line – 1:35 on the PCs with some new normalized power bests.
Thursday – Was just going to go easy as pal Alex gave me a ring and said he was doing “215 for an hour.” No problem, except I was on the PC bike that weighs in at 25 lbs, has 32 spoke wheels, high resistance tires, and is overall just a slow tank. I think I actually averaged higher power than Alex, even sitting in his draft. The 1:35 long workout was a little harder than expected, but it was a pretty ease ride overall.
Friday – No riding as I drove up to Austin for the first race of the season.
Saturday – Payoff time. The opening race of the Texas racing calendar at Copperas Cove, about 50 miles north of Austin. Only a couple of teammates decided to make the trip, with Dan joining me in the Masters 40+ “old farts” field and Tom ripping it up in the cat 4/5 field. Let’s see how all this PowerCranking and hard Saturday group rides helped. I didn’t really have designs on winning, just being a factor in the race. I wanted to ride hard and make the race fun rather than the usual sit in, sprint at the end. From the start I stayed near the front and often lead the 60+ rider field. I got in a few early breaks that were quickly caught. A few guys got on a break, then a few more bridged, then another couple. Eventually it got to 8 riders up front and Dan and I knew it was time to shut that break down. It was getting too big and had a real chance of staying away. Dan and I were doing are best, but we were getting help only from 1-2 other riders. We were making only a small dent in the gap due to lack of cooperation in the peleton. Because of this, we both started attacking the field, and we got on several breaks. Eventually I got in a great little 4 man break and was closing on the 8 riders ahead. Unfortunately at that time we hit a section with potholes, and I nailed one squarely on a tight turn at high speed. I lost a bottle and control in the process, and struggled to stay upright and on the road. From then on my concentration and motivation were zapped as I saw the 3 others ride away and Dan breathing down my neck stringing out a dozen or so riders. I just couldn’t grab a wheel soon enough. The second pack sped off and I was left with picking off riders who couldn’t hang on. Ended up in the top 20 and had a good ride – 240 W average and 262 W normalized for 2:15 and 51 miles. I think that’s the hardest race I’ve ever done from the numbers perspective, and I’d say that’s because I was being active in driving the pace for much of the race. I met my goals – I had fun, was a factor, split the field up pretty good with some strong riding at the front, made multiple attacks, and put up some good numbers.
Sunday – An easy 60 minutes on the PCs.
A really good training week. I set some yearly best numbers this week. I set some yearly best normalized powers from 20-120 minutes, had my best ever normalized power for 75 minutes and matched my best for 150 minutes. I also set yearly bests in average power in the 30-120 minute range. The 282 W hour effort to start the week was a bonus, especially since the pacing was by perceived effort. I’m not ready to sing from the rooftops just yet. I need consistency to see if my threshold is indeed increasing. My peak hour normalized power from the Saturday race was 276 W. So it’s clear from my training over the last few months that a 275 W threshold is a good minimum, and my actual threshold is conservatively in the 275-285 W range. That’s where I historically sit. So while I’m reaching historical bests across the board and have been pretty consistent week in and week out, I’m still not busting through my important historical plateaus. I still hold out hope for that, however.
Below are a couple of plots of normalized and average powers for various durations through this week. The red line represents the data since I’ve started using PowerCranks.
I’m within 10 watts of my all-time bests from 10 minutes on, but I’m well below my bests for durations under 10 minutes. Many of those 0-10 minute numbers were set in the summer of 2007, when I was doing some major VO2 work. I also had a great state TT that year. That’s where I need to be, but as can be seen from the data, I still have some work to do. Below is a plot of my yearly totals from the 2007 season in comparison to my all-time bests and the data since using PCs. I’m nothing if not consistent…
PC time this week – 6 hours 5 minutes
PC time to date – 166 hours 10 minutes
2 comments:
I like the slow progression. I think you would be a little further along if you were doing most of those Saturday hammerfests on the PC's but you are doing what you are doing. I am quite certain it is simply a matter of time before you exceed your all-time bests for most of the time-frames you keep track of.
I am not so sure I would worry about power for the shorter time periods since your goal is the time trial. The higher powers require riding at higher cadences to sustain them. Unless you work specifically on this with the PowerCranks it will come very slowly. I am more concerned with your 45-60 min power and I suspect you will be above your all-time best for this time frame within the next month.
The only two questions in my mind is how much improvement will be seen by the end of the year, not whether there will be improvement, and what is the best metric to judge the PowerCranks against, last years best or your all-time best.
sounds good James. From what started out sound like an unmotivated week to perhaps your best ever? The race sounded good 'cept for the pothole. Great w/o in any case.
rick
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