Trainer Road Team

I finally purchased a TrainerRoad membership.  I added a team for my athletes, friends or anyone else interested in joining.  Just send me an e-mail and I'll send the request.  I thought it might be fun and motivational to see what everyone is doing.  I'll try and either create the interval workouts in there for my athletes or pick a ride to complete.  I have one client at a fairly high volume, so there may be a long & short version of some workouts.

I could think up a better name.... so the team is "Coach Girard's Test Lab".  Why not.

It should be fun.  A little friendly bench racing.  Remember, you performance is always in relationship to your FTP.  So the higher intensity factor is what we're looking for on there.

Facebook Page For Nutrition

I made a little Facebook page to discuss nutrition.  I'll be honest, that not my expertise.  But I challenged myself to drop 17lbs in 6 weeks.  So some fellow triathletes were interested to see how that's possible.

I think it's easy or at least simple.  Eat only what you need to maintain enough energy and critical nutrients (protein good fat, vitamins, minerals, etc.) and cut out what you don't.   Simple sugars, excess carbs, excess fat in general.  Drink plenty, but eat enough sea salt to balance the water intake.  I try and eat cleaner by mixing in fresh vegetables, and more vegetable based protein like edamame, soy milk, legumes.


https://www.facebook.com/groups/1583516201878855/

Hills Are Easy - Part 2

Below is the 2nd more in depth article on pacing and gear selection.  I wrote this is 2 or 3 sittings, so I apologize if it seems to ramble on a bit.   I feel there's some great info, and several good example analyzing the Ironman Wisconsin bike leg.  Before the tentative TBC camp in May, I'll give a more in depth summary of the course looking at the file and possibly the files from a few other riders if I can get a hold of them. 

 Once again, I touch on several subject but wanted to focus mainly on pacing and equipment selection.  I only use my own examples, because that's all I currently have available to make my point without breaking and copyright laws.  I do have access to an Ironman Maryland race file, but I don;t think it's very useful to demonstrate pacing on hills.  I'm not trying to boast about my performance.  I actually made several key mistakes as you'll see that could have ruined my day.  Among them include riding too aggressively up many of the hills and ending up with a higher VI that slowed my overall time.  Remember, when you ride harder up a hill, you are forced in effect to ride a little slower on the flats and downhills.   This is where you lose time.  I also rode I believe 15-20 TSS too high for my level of fitness and paid for it on the run. 

Let me add one thing to consider as you read this.  How hard is riding 85-90% of FTP for 2-3 minutes?   That's right at or just above 70.3 pace.  It's not that hard.  So why should hills be hard?  The answer is, they shouldn't be.

Hills Are Easy – Part 2, Examples     

Mike Girard 11-29-14

Here is the follow-up I promised.  I wanted to give a few examples and better explain gear selection, how gear ratios work and what equipment options there are.  Then I give a few specific rider scenarios using my racing data from Ironman Wisconsin and Kansas 70.3 as well as a sprint race I did in May and an Olympic race in July.  We’ll look at mistakes I made in pacing, things I did well, and then plug in data for 2 theoretical riders.   Steelhead didn't really have any hills, so I’m ignoring that race.   

First let’s review what makes up a hill.  Wind drag is minimal and rolling resistance is relatively small and somewhat linear at those lower speeds, so let’s just ignore those for now and focus on our enemy…. Gravity!   Gravity is pulling us towards the center of the earth, so to change our elevation, we need to perform work or expend energy.  The Amount of energy, depends on our weight and the change in elevation.  Therefore, since energy is power applied over a period of time, to climb faster, you need a higher power output.  In fact, it’s proportional to the rate of ascent.  If you can climb to the top of a hill in 1 minute using 200 Watts, then with 400 watts, a rider the same weight will travel at twice the speed and take approx. 30 seconds.  Yes, it really is that simple. 

Gear selection determines the RPM that you will pedal at a given speed.  These create ratios, just the same way that using a wrench with a 2’ long handle will require ½ the force of turning a bolt using a wrench with a 1’ long handle.  But you will have to move the longer handle twice the distance.  The work performed is the same, as its force applied times the distance traveled.  But it feels easier as you muscles are contracting ½ a hard.  Meaning you can engage fewer muscles.  As you approach maximal force you recruit and fatigue more and more muscles leaving fewer available in reserve to do future work until they have recovered.  Additionally, metabolically, you will shift to using other less efficient energy systems and produce more byproducts.  You body operate and can sustain higher energy levels longer at lower intensities.  As you “dip into” your reserves at higher energy levels, you will reduce the energy level you can sustain over the distance.  To avoid hitting those reserves, you want to choose a comfortable RPM for that power output.  Most riders do prefer a slightly lower cadence when sitting up and climbing.  But there’s no rule.  Best to just ride what’s.   But don't let your bike ride you.  You need to ride at the cadence and power level that allows you to have your best race.

So what gear ratio to use?   Here’s a link to a chart of cassette ratios for Shimano 10 speed cassettes http://sheldonbrown.com/k10.shtml#shimano9  So you see there is a compromise.  You can either have gears more closely spaced, or have a wider range.  Up front, the gears are called chain rings and you can have 3 rings, 2 rings or even just a single ring.  Additionally, the cranksets have different bolts patterns that allow different ranges of chainring sizes.  MTB cranks allow the smallest rings, track bikes the largest rings and road & triathlon/TT bikes have a wide range of options.

So how do gear work?  When you turn the cranks, you turn the chain rings which his connected to the rear cassette by the chain.  This turns the rear wheel.  So if the rear wheel is 2098mm (http://www.bikecalc.com/wheel_size_math) and lets say you are riding a 52/13, which is a perfect 3:1 gear reduction, then if you pedal at 90 RPM, the rear wheel will turn 270RPM.  Therefore we take 290 RPM and multiply it by 2.98 meters (circumference of the tire) and you will travel 804.6 meters per minute.   Multiply that by 60 and you get 48,276meters or 48.3 kph or approx. 30mph.  Since these are ratios, if I reduce my speed to 15mph and don't shift gears, I will be pedaling at 45RPM. To pedal at 90RPM at 15mph, I will need a ratio of 1.5.  This could be accomplished for example by having a 42T small chain ring and selecting a 28T rear chain ring.  Again, it’s the same as having a long wrench on a bolt, and holding it 30” away from the bolt instead of 15” from the bolt.  Your hand will more twice the distance pushing, but it will require ½ the force, but in both cases the same work or energy required will be the same.

How does even pacing matter in a race?  Here’s a screen shot of my predicted IMWI race using 280 TSS and here’s a shot of my actual performance.

https://www.bestbikesplit.com/public-race?r=7804

http://www.trainingpeaks.com/av/PCOIM5545SUS5Q54RGZJRZVJMI

*** note, that there’s a 4 minute penalty in there for drafting, so ride time was actually 5:03.  I believe I deleted the time pushing the bike in transition… or a volunteer actually stopped it for me, which his possible knowing how awesome the volunteers are there.***

Comparing the 2 charts, tells me that I should have gone approx. 7 minutes faster if I had ridden more evenly.   Now realistically, you lose approx. 1 minute for the section in and out of transition, probably 1 minute to eat, drink and take handoffs at aide stations, and 1 minute braking for turns more than predicted.  But that’s still 4 minutes just from more even pacing!   There are some opportunities to save time by going slightly harder when you are moving more slowly up hills or with a headwind and going slightly easier when you have a tailwind or downhill.  But otherwise, you overall split will be more closely related to your average power, not you normalized power.   Normalized power reflects the actual physical impact of the ride due to riding above the average.   So riding 200W normalized for 60 minutes should have the same impact as riding 200W average for 60 minutes, even if in first, you rode only 180 Watts average.   Guess which split is faster?  With some exception (such as illogical things like sprinting downhill and riding easy uphill), it’s going to always be the 200W average, not the 180W average, because you put out more total energy.

Therefore, the goal in a time trial, putting aside specific race tactics, is to “flatten the course”.  Meaning ride with as even of a power output as possible.  To do this, while maintain a comfortable pedaling cadence, you need the proper gear ratios.  That brings us to equipment selection.   How do you choose what gear ratios you need for a given race?   Why not always just use a triple chain ring and wide ratio cassette?  Like all things in life there are compromises. Let’s start with determining the anticipated range of speeds for a race.  For this, again we’ll use the subscription based service Best Bike Split (www.bestbikesplit.com).  In my opinion, all coaches should be utilizing this tool when  they need to help their athletes prepare and select equipment for a race.  For the purpose of this article, we’ll just use it to determine the range of speeds we’ll be riding at.  Lets look more closely at the chart for the same ride at IMWI:

We can see that with a power output of approx. 280 Watts, or 3.7 w/kg, I’ll will be climbing at 9-10mph on the steepest hills.  On the descents, on just 4 occasions, I’ll exceed 36mph.  On this particular descents, I’ll need to brake at the bottom of that hill, so it will reduce the benefit of applying power for that short period over 35mph.  On the other hand, a large amount of time will be spent at 18-20mph on all of the rolling hills.  , where you are between the large and small chain rings.

So how do I use this information?  I know that I want to stay over 80RPM, so using gear ratio calculators (http://www.bikecalc.com/speed_at_cadence ), a 38/28 will go 9mph at 82RPM.  On the opposite end, with a 52/11, I can ride up to 35mph at a comfortable 95RPM. I can also ride down to 17mph in a 52-21 which will reduce the frequency that I drop to the small ring.  Also note, that it’s best to avoid using the last 2 cogs to prevent a crossed chainline that will drop drivetrain efficiency.  So the 11 & 12T with the small ring and the 24&28T with the large ring should be avoided.   

Of course, most individuals competing an and Ironman, shouldn't be riding at 3.7 w/kg up those climbs and expect to run well.  What if you're a more typical rider?   Let’s use a 170lb (77.3kg) Male with a FTP of 230Watts.  Pretty squarely “middle of pack”.  Probably looking for a very solid 12:xx finish time.  They might want to stay under 2.7 w/kg.  We can assume rolling resistance and aerodynamic drag is somewhat linear at these low speeds, so power output will be proportional to speed up a steep hill.  So a rider at 3.7w/kg going 9mph up a hill, would only go approx.. 6.5mph @ 2.7 w/kg.   We will give this rider compact crank, with a 50T large ring and 34T small ring.    That should be a low enough gar correct?   Yes, if grinding up the hill at 70RPM is acceptable.  What if this rider tried to hold 80RPM?  They will be going 9mph… and that will require 3.7w/kg.  If their FTP is 3.0 w/kg, that’s 120% of FTP! 

Another example for those making maybe a little less power, riding over 6 hours, closer to 7 hours.    Lets take a 130lb or 59kg female.  Her FTP is 170Watts, so still very solid at 2.9 w/kg.  It’s a longer race for her overall, so let’s limit her to 2.6 w/kg or 86%, a higher zone 3 tempo pace. She will be riding at 6.5mph up that hill.  She is more comfortable spinning at 80RPM up the hill.  We now have a problem.  That’s 7.5mph with a 34/28.  So lets give her a triple crankset with a 50/39/30 chain rings.  That puts her at 6.7mph up that hill at 80RPM.  Perfect!   This last example probably represents roughly at least ½ of the field at that race.

One last example I give is a special case, but could represent older athletes as well.  I passed this individual on my 2^nd lap.  They hung tough and nearly finished the race, but did DNF.   I suspect it wasn’t just fitness and his size, but pacing and equipment selection contributed as well.  It probably wouldn't have made the difference, but every little bit helps.  This rider was approx. 140kg.   I think his FTP was around 350W, so that’s 2.5 w/kg.  A safe strategy would have been 2.2w/kg up that hill.  That’s 5.5mph.  That’s 65RPM on a 30/28.  In this case, the individual would have wanted a long cage MTB derailleur and to choose an 11-32 cassette to get to 75RPM, or a 11-34 for 80RPM.

The key lesson is to make good equipment and pacing decision real data, rather than relying on more subjective information such as the experience of other riders.  Just because that’s what someone else does something, doesn't make it right.  Never be afraid to ask WHY.  In this case, “why” would be why use a 34-28?   Because that rider wanted to go 6.5mph @ 2.7 w/kg.  Always choose the tool necessary to get the job done within whatever restrictions you have and consider re-evaluating those restrictions as well.  Triathlon has been defined more by innovation and trying new technologies based on science, rather than adhering to tradition and myths.

   

Hills Are Easy - The Science of Pacing, Using Gears and Bike Set-up

Below is a short piece I've written on riding hills.   It was hard to place limits on the topic without going to to 2 or 3 other discussions. I apologize for any grammar mistakes.  I'm heading out of town this afternoon and wanted to wrap this up before I left. Enjoy!  Feel free to ask any questions.

Hills Are Easy – The Science of Pacing, Using Gears and Bike Set-up

By Coach Mike Girard - 11/23/14

I frequently see the comment among athletes that a particular race course is hard because it’s so hilly.  They typically go on to recommend practice tons of hills in training.  I’m not going to say that’s a bad thing.  Not at all.  Variations in terrain or wind are always good opportunities in training.   However, many athletes view these challenges as well, very challenging.  Using the proper equipment selection and pacing plan, it’s possible to make hills or wind no more challenging that a flat open segment of roadway.

To understand how a hill or wind are different than a flat road on a windless day.  First we need to review the opposing forces that determine how fast you are traveling.  From the moment you bicycle starts rolling, you are balancing both drag slowing you down and the power generated pedaling.  If the force produced exceeds drag, you accelerate.  If the force is less, you decelerate.  If equal, your speed stays constant.   SO what forces are slowing you down or potentially speeding you up in some cases?   There are 3 primary forces (we’ll ignore drivetrain losses for now). 

1)      Wind Drag – This is how efficiently you push a hole through the air as you move forward.   For practical purposes, wind drag is insignificant below 10-12mph or relative air speed (not ground speed).  Above 12mph, this is the primary force slowing your down.  Wind drag if impacted by wind.  To reduce this force, you need a more aerodynamic position, or use equipment that is more aerodynamic.   With aerodynamics, the shape and location of an object is often more important than its total size.  EVERY OBJECT on a bicycle impacts your drag, and one object can influence another.  Very, very small changes in shape or texture can have a large impact.  The ideal aero position would make a bicycle impossible to ride, control, is uncomfortable, to is illegal based on the rules of sport.  So your position is a compromise of comfort, ability to make power and safely handle the bicycle.

2)      Elevation gain (or loss) – More specifically, you are storing or recovering potential energy.  A hill is like having a battery on your bicycle, except you don’t get to control when it’s charging or releasing energy.  You can control how quickly it’s stored in how fast you go up a hill.   The rate at which you go uphill is determined by your total weight and the power output.   When you go downhill, the opposite occurs, but because speeds are higher #1 becomes a factor.   To reduce this force, you ride slower.

3)      Rolling resistance – the drag created by your tires as they roll.   The primary drag is caused not by the tire & road interface, but by the tire casing (sidewalls) flexing as the wheels spins.  To minimize drag, you can select tires and tubes that are more flexible.  However, very flexible tires are more suspect to cuts and punctures, so you must compromise.  Additionally, you need to select the optimal air pressure for the road surface and rider weight.   Higher pressure can be slower than lower pressure.  Also wider tires typically roll better than narrow ones, but have more wind drag.

On the opposite side, of the equation, a bicycle is propelled by the rider generating force (torque) at a certain frequency (cadence… revolutions per minute (RPM)).  These combined are the power a rider is making.  Muscle are contracted and your cardiovascular system supplies the muscles with fuel and oxygen.  Over a period of time, muscle become fatigued.  How these systems interact to allow this to happen at different power levels is another topic, but it’s directly related to pacing.   

The power is then transmitted through the drivetrain.   The gear ratio selected will determine what RPM you are riding at.  This will determine the amount of force vs. frequency needed for a given power level.  The range of gearing on a bicycle needs to reflect the maximum and minimum speeds you expect to ride at a given power level.  This doesn't need to be emotional or complicated.  If you want a minimum of 80RPM, and your power level indicates 5mph at you weight climbing a grade, then you need to correct gear ratio to accomplish this.  There are several websites that will allow you to calculate gear ratios for a given speed. This could mean using a different range of gears up front or triple chain ring to have the correct gears. 

My daughter just demanded that she type her name…. her name is Brielle.  Sorry about that.

So why does a hill feel different than a flat road.  The reason for this is the same reason most indoor trainers feel different than riding outdoors.  In fact both hills and in indoor trainer are very similar.   The first is that you are moving slower and therefor have less inertia or in other words the stored energy determined by the weight of the bicycle and rotating mass of the wheels. The result is that when you are pedaling, you pedal stroke is less smooth since you decelerate more between the most powerful parts of you pedal stroke.   This is more noticeable the lower your cadence and will have a small influence on which muscles are used more when pedaling. The second is that you have less air moving over you, so you feel hotter, which can make riding harder, or at least feel harder.  Finally, a rider may sit in a different position.  This too will engage slightly different muscles more than others.

When it comes to racing an individual time trial or bike leg of a triathlon, you time split is most closely related to your average power or in other terms, your total energy output. 

It sounds obvious, but too commonly riders are trying to maintain a given speed during a race.  In reality, you should completely ignore speed, and maintain the ideal power during the event.  For the moment, we’ll ignore special situation such as race tactics, legal drafting or pacing out of T1 due to the stress of swimming.  The ideal power level when going uphill or downhill should be only slightly harder or easier than a flat road without a headwind or tailwind.

How can you determine the optimum power level for bike leg or race?  The easiest way is to use a tool such as the website BestBikeSplit.com.  The details of how to utilize this tool is another long topic altogether.  But what you can get out of this tool are power targets for different situations and the associated speed given your ability and equipment selection, which will give you the fastest bike split.   If you rider harder or easier than the pacing plan, you will go slower. 

Putting this together, a rider only needs to know how hard they can ride based on their training & fitness, choose the correct gearing for the course and conditions and execute their pacing plan by shifting their gears to maintain an ideal RPM at a given power output.  The rider needs to resist the temptation to ride harder than planned as they slow down due to conditions or how others are riding around them.  While this will take practice to use good discipline when riding, physically, the training stress of riding actual hills is not necessary and can be counterproductive in an overall training plan in some cases.  You goal, should always be to build fitness by creating the most adaptation possible, while still having fun while being challenged and staying mentally engaged.

Updates & announcements

I'll go ahead and make the official announcement.  I have joined Training Bible Coaching.  It's an amazing opportunity to work with so many brilliant coaches.  Its very humbling to say the least, to dive into coaching and start out with such a top notch organization.  Now i just need some better logos for my blog.

Going to launch/share my facebook page this weekend as soon as I add some finishing touches.

I had a chance to have lunch with Adam Zucco this afternoon (thanks for lunch).  I feel like we crammed in lot in a short lunch, but i'm really excited about all the new programs and the chance to work with this group..  I'll be spending some time sifting through the info and resources I now have available for my athletes.  The advantage of working with such a broad group is you don't need to be an expert at everything, only knowing how that information, workouts, plans, strategies can best benefit the athlete.

A few other Announcements:

I'm putting together an article on riding hills including pacing, race planning and equipment selection.  I hope to have that wrapped up soon.

TBS Camp at the National Training Center in Clermont, FL.  This looks like a lot of fun and a great chance to really immerse yourself in the sport for a few days and get some hands on coaching to improve skills.  For me, it will actually be the first triathlon camp I've attended and the 1st time I will have flown with a bike.  A dry run before Kona isn't such a bad thing.  Details on the TBC Website.

Team TBC!  Details coming soon, but this is happening.

2015 Ironman Wisconsin Training Camp -  This will be a free camp hosted by TBC, tentatively planned for Memorial Day weekend.  This includes riding the course and usually an open water swim and run.

If anyone has any comments or questions, please feel free to ask or email me at mgirard@trainingbible.com

Made a Facebook Page

Its just a shell right now.  I'll add to it when I get a chance.  I'll try and regularly post a few short tips, hints, links to good articles, etc.  I'll also try and create some athlete spotlights.... as I have more athletes to spotlight.

https://www.facebook.com/coachgirard