Increasing power & decreasing body fat
JonEdwards
Posts: 452
Ok, a bargain 2 for the price of one thread here...
I'm primarily an MTBer, who commutes on the road, and also rides on road once or twice a week for the hell of it. Don't really train as such. I'm fairly fit (compared to riding buddies) and climb well (loadsa torque). I'm 33, 5'10", 10stone. My weakness seems to be power output. This usally isn't an issue on the MTB front - I'm quick DH, mostly through having decent technique and not braking, however I've entered the MegaAvalanche (an hour+ DH race down Alpe d'Huez), which I'd like to do well in, and will basically involve me pedalling my t!ts off at 50mph+ speeds down a glacier, plus a 15min sprint qualifier that I *need* to do well in to make the main event. This is where I suffer, and its noticeable on the road bike too - my legs tire quickly when trying to maintain a sustained high speed, even downhill.
The second issue is one of body fat. My fancy (although probably not hugely accurate) scales tell me I'm a fairly steady 18%. No special reason, by I hate the thought of lugging almost 2stone of useless lard around with me. (imagine 28 1lb blocks of lard in a bucket and you'll see why). I'd like to get down to the 10% ish figure. I've whittled most of the sources of fat out of my diet (drink espresso instead of cappucinos, lowest fat "butter" I can find rather than the real stuff, semi skimmed milk instead of full fat, low fat cheese, etc.) It made about 0.5% difference, for a couple of months, then returned to the original figure.It doesn't change, no matter how hard/much I ride.
So. How do I generate more power, and how do I ditch the blubber?
My one request is that its stuff I can do whilst "just riding". I do it for fun, "training" makes it all a bit to serious and not fun. I'm going to up the gear on my commuter bike, which should help with leg strength. Failing that, its just riding as hard as possible, as much as possible.
Thank y'all.
I'm primarily an MTBer, who commutes on the road, and also rides on road once or twice a week for the hell of it. Don't really train as such. I'm fairly fit (compared to riding buddies) and climb well (loadsa torque). I'm 33, 5'10", 10stone. My weakness seems to be power output. This usally isn't an issue on the MTB front - I'm quick DH, mostly through having decent technique and not braking, however I've entered the MegaAvalanche (an hour+ DH race down Alpe d'Huez), which I'd like to do well in, and will basically involve me pedalling my t!ts off at 50mph+ speeds down a glacier, plus a 15min sprint qualifier that I *need* to do well in to make the main event. This is where I suffer, and its noticeable on the road bike too - my legs tire quickly when trying to maintain a sustained high speed, even downhill.
The second issue is one of body fat. My fancy (although probably not hugely accurate) scales tell me I'm a fairly steady 18%. No special reason, by I hate the thought of lugging almost 2stone of useless lard around with me. (imagine 28 1lb blocks of lard in a bucket and you'll see why). I'd like to get down to the 10% ish figure. I've whittled most of the sources of fat out of my diet (drink espresso instead of cappucinos, lowest fat "butter" I can find rather than the real stuff, semi skimmed milk instead of full fat, low fat cheese, etc.) It made about 0.5% difference, for a couple of months, then returned to the original figure.It doesn't change, no matter how hard/much I ride.
So. How do I generate more power, and how do I ditch the blubber?
My one request is that its stuff I can do whilst "just riding". I do it for fun, "training" makes it all a bit to serious and not fun. I'm going to up the gear on my commuter bike, which should help with leg strength. Failing that, its just riding as hard as possible, as much as possible.
Thank y'all.
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Comments
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Do you mean your legs are "spinning out" ie you can't ride at high cadences for very long whilst still producing power?JonEdwards wrote:my legs tire quickly when trying to maintain a sustained high speed, even downhill.
The ideal thing to improve your ability to "spin" is riding a fixed wheel with a lowish gear, but you could just use your normal road bike and keep the gears low and develop a fast cadence that way.0 -
Nope. I spin pretty well ( commute on a fix every day), but the gear is fairly low (46:18) so I get a good snap away from the lights.
Its the other end of the spectrum - keeping on top of a big gear at speed (I'm talking in the 25+mph region). I just run out of grunt in my legs. If I change down to try and spin an easier gear faster, I just slow down... In this case the issue will be exacerbated by needing to keep on top of the rolling resistance generated by a pair of 2.5", 1.2kg supertacky rubber, tyres.
Oh and for amusement - a Mega clip...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L51D8oI_1mE
Takes a while to get going (just under 2 mins), but you get the picture!0 -
JonEdwards wrote:Nope. I spin pretty well ( commute on a fix every day), but the gear is fairly low (46:18) so I get a good snap away from the lights.
Its the other end of the spectrum - keeping on top of a big gear at speed (I'm talking in the 25+mph region). I just run out of grunt in my legs. If I change down to try and spin an easier gear faster, I just slow down... In this case the issue will be exacerbated by needing to keep on top of the rolling resistance generated by a pair of 2.5", 1.2kg supertacky rubber, tyres.
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Keeping on top of a big gear at speed is time-trialling in a nutshell, so maybe do some 10 & 25 mile TTs with a local club. You could just find a suitable road course and do them on your own, but it's a lot easier to get motivated to really try hard with a race number on your back.
If you don't fancy racing then it's just about getting in some hard sustained efforts on the road. It's not the kind of thing that could be done on an urban commute, you need 20min+ efforts where you don't have to stop or slow down.
I'd also suggest using a turbo as the most time-efficient way of getting some hard efforts in - but that certainly is training
Neil--
"Because the cycling is pain. The cycling is soul crushing pain."0 -
Wow Jon that looks like a whole lotta fun. Your lack of sustainable power can best be trained with threshold training. As has been aluded to already try some TT/RR pace intervals in chunks of 2/3 x 15-20mins, each one should be broken up with five-10 mins rest. It should feel quite hard but definitly not flat out. EnjoyJonEdwards wrote:Nope. I spin pretty well ( commute on a fix every day), but the gear is fairly low (46:18) so I get a good snap away from the lights.
Its the other end of the spectrum - keeping on top of a big gear at speed (I'm talking in the 25+mph region). I just run out of grunt in my legs. If I change down to try and spin an easier gear faster, I just slow down... In this case the issue will be exacerbated by needing to keep on top of the rolling resistance generated by a pair of 2.5", 1.2kg supertacky rubber, tyres.
Oh and for amusement - a Mega clip...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L51D8oI_1mE
Takes a while to get going (just under 2 mins), but you get the picture! 0
