New Power meters for team Sky
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So now it's official.In a press release, Pat Warner, Stages Cycling’s Senior Vice President said: “We are humbled and honored to be collecting data for one of the best teams in the sport. It’s a huge responsibility and we both have great confidence that Stages Power can help Team Sky be successful this season.”
Sky, a team known for its strong focus on performance and the aggregation of marginal gains, has made the switch from SRM power meters, which it used until the end of the 2013 season.
It’s another feather in the cap for Colorado-based Stages Power, whose system measures power output in the left-hand crank and transmits data via ANT+ to head units such as Garmin, or via Bluetooth 4.0 to smartphones.
Tim Kerrison, Team Sky’s Head of Performance Support, who was instrumental in masterminding Wiggins’ 2012 Tour de France triumph said: “As a team, we see the power meter as a very useful tool. The results that we get, both from training and racing, help us to quantify how our riders are performing, which then allows us to make informed coaching decisions.
"Stages has worked hard to develop a high quality product that is extremely lightweight, reliable and simple to use, while retaining the precision and accuracy that we require at Team Sky."
http://www.bikeradar.com/road/news/arti ... 014-39552/0 -
ddraver wrote:This is a Road General Topic - but such things (appear to be) very hard to prove in a lab...
yeah I'd assume that was the case, and thinking about it further, our bodies themselves are asymmetric to a greater or lesser degree so how would you even establish the correct balance (or imbalance)!?!
regardless of that at least the Stages PMs look nicer than SRMs?0 -
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The thing is, If you are producing more of your available power with one leg, would it not be prudent to get the strength of the "Weaker" leg up to the strength of the stronger one. Then, hey presto, you will produce more power.
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Trouble is mike that that sounds perfectly reasonable just like it sounds perfectly reasonable that pedalling circles or pulling up on the pedals helps. Or that of course clipless pedals are best. However if you do a lab test to determine by how much, you almost always find that actually it makes no positive difference at all.
IMO what happens is that by eliminating all the variables in a lab by doing a 10-20min test at max power (or whatever) you unwittingly eliminate the variable that your trying to find...We're in danger of confusing passion with incompetence
- @ddraver0 -
Richmond Racer wrote:
Tell that to Nibali when he dropped Wiggo going down hill in the rain on a 700 grm frame.
Pinarello the worst bike on the pro circuit,,,,IMO0 -
Not necessarily - the imbalance might just be part of the overall efficiency. No-one would coach you to run like Paula Radcliffe (or ride like Chris Froome for that matter), but it works for her (and him). Change the pedaling style and you might reduce rather than improve the total output.mike6 wrote:The thing is, If you are producing more of your available power with one leg, would it not be prudent to get the strength of the "Weaker" leg up to the strength of the stronger one. Then, hey presto, you will produce more power.0 -
nic_77 wrote:
Not necessarily - the imbalance might just be part of the overall efficiency. No-one would coach you to run like Paula Radcliffe (or ride like Chris Froome for that matter), but it works for her (and him). Change the pedaling style and you might reduce rather than improve the total output.mike6 wrote:The thing is, If you are producing more of your available power with one leg, would it not be prudent to get the strength of the "Weaker" leg up to the strength of the stronger one. Then, hey presto, you will produce more power.
That was the point I was making Mike - and I'd be very surprised if the team that is now famed/mocked for it's no-stone-unturned approach doesn't investigate all aspects of the bio-mechanical issues involved in getting blokes to make bikes go quicker for longer.
What you say, nic, could also be true - don't tinker with a successful model as it might takes years to adapt and never really regain "that thing".
I'm wondering if that's what's happened with EBH; he clearly used to look much more "up-down pumpy" in his sprinting style... When he was better, some might say...0 -
nic_77 wrote:
Not necessarily - the imbalance might just be part of the overall efficiency. No-one would coach you to run like Paula Radcliffe (or ride like Chris Froome for that matter), but it works for her (and him). Change the pedaling style and you might reduce rather than improve the total output.mike6 wrote:The thing is, If you are producing more of your available power with one leg, would it not be prudent to get the strength of the "Weaker" leg up to the strength of the stronger one. Then, hey presto, you will produce more power.
OK. Statistics, as they say, we all know the quote.
But here is one. If you can produce, say, 400 W at threshold and you are producing 210 with one leg and only 190 with the other, it is not semantics to assume you could train the weak leg as strong as the other, and produce 210 W with that leg. Giving you a threshold power of 420 W for the same effort. 0 -
ddraver wrote:Yeah but, no but
logic and your head says yes, but the lab tests say no. Same with pedalling style...
Lab tests? Dont talk to me about lab tests. The lab said Cavendish did not produce the numbers to become a pro cyclist, never mind WRR champ or green jersey winner.
I maintain. If one leg can produce a given power, the other, weaker leg, can be trained to produce the same power.0 -
rayjay wrote:Richmond Racer wrote:
Tell that to Nibali when he dropped Wiggo going down hill in the rain on a 700 grm frame.
Pinarello the worst bike on the pro circuit,,,,IMO
Reviews of the Dogma consistently place it as one of the best (if not the best) handling bikes... the reason Nibali dropped Wiggins is because Wiggins is pants at descending in the wet.. not because Nibali had a better bike.
Cav wasn't having tantrums when he was on a Pinarello (unlike his Venge).. in fact iirc he described it as 'perfect'...0 -
Correct me if I'm wrong, but max sustained power is determined almost entirely by the CV system, not the force your legs can exert. CBA to look them up for you but think of all the threads there have been over the years clearly demonstrating that a lot of people have no idea of the difference between power and force...
Essentially, if you trained up the weak leg, it would go no faster because you couldn't supply it with enough fuel.
There's only a case for it if you can show that it is possible to pedal more efficiently, and that's what the tests show doesn't happen however you train for it.0 -
ALIHISGREAT wrote:rayjay wrote:Richmond Racer wrote:
Tell that to Nibali when he dropped Wiggo going down hill in the rain on a 700 grm frame.
Pinarello the worst bike on the pro circuit,,,,IMO
Reviews of the Dogma consistently place it as one of the best (if not the best) handling bikes... the reason Nibali dropped Wiggins is because Wiggins is pants at descending in the wet.. not because Nibali had a better bike.
Cav wasn't having tantrums when he was on a Pinarello (unlike his Venge).. in fact iirc he described it as 'perfect'...
Would you expect him to say anything else?
Didnt Cav have a large input into the original Venge? I read he has gone down a frame size this season which is interesting.
I dont like the Pinarello's because the silly squiggly bits on the seat stays etc. If they were straight I would like them, but for me too much going on.0 -
^just as one would expect him to say nothing but positive things about his Venge - instead of throwing a hissy fit as he did0
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Richmond Racer wrote:^just as one would expect him to say nothing but positive things about his Venge - instead of throwing a hissy fit as he did
In the heat of a moment at the end of a race?
Then he said later it wasnt the bikes fault?0 -
MartinGT wrote:Richmond Racer wrote:^just as one would expect him to say nothing but positive things about his Venge - instead of throwing a hissy fit as he did
In the heat of a moment at the end of a race?
Then he said later it wasnt the bikes fault?
After Mr Specialized rep had a word with him
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ALIHISGREAT wrote:MartinGT wrote:Richmond Racer wrote:^just as one would expect him to say nothing but positive things about his Venge - instead of throwing a hissy fit as he did
In the heat of a moment at the end of a race?
Then he said later it wasnt the bikes fault?
After Mr Specialized rep had a word with him
Or Brian Holm reminding him of his duty to that nice sponsor0 -
Richmond Racer wrote:ALIHISGREAT wrote:MartinGT wrote:Richmond Racer wrote:^just as one would expect him to say nothing but positive things about his Venge - instead of throwing a hissy fit as he did
In the heat of a moment at the end of a race?
Then he said later it wasnt the bikes fault?
After Mr Specialized rep had a word with him
Or Brian Holm reminding him of his duty to that nice sponsor
To be honest its more likely that he was having a tantrum about SRAM than anything - wasn't he using the Hydro stuff at the time? But anyway. We should probably get back to power meters!0 -
Come on now everyone knows the Dogma's no better than this trike:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iMOudZG_Bo4Correlation is not causation.0 -
ALIHISGREAT wrote:MartinGT wrote:Richmond Racer wrote:^just as one would expect him to say nothing but positive things about his Venge - instead of throwing a hissy fit as he did
In the heat of a moment at the end of a race?
Then he said later it wasnt the bikes fault?
After Mr Specialized rep had a word with him Aye thats more like it.
It's interesting how he has gone down a frame size though.0 -
mike6 wrote:ddraver wrote:Yeah but, no but
logic and your head says yes, but the lab tests say no. Same with pedalling style...
Lab tests? Dont talk to me about lab tests. The lab said Cavendish did not produce the numbers to become a pro cyclist, never mind WRR champ or green jersey winner.
I maintain. If one leg can produce a given power, the other, weaker leg, can be trained to produce the same power.
Depends if you work off data or imagination innit - The variables tested in the lab were not the be all and end all of sprinting - hence the innacuracy over Cav
What usually happens in the lab tests on imbalance is that by concentrating on pushing harder on one leg you push less hard on the other - hence no gain.We're in danger of confusing passion with incompetence
- @ddraver0 -
I didn't want to say anything but I suspect the Stages deal has something to do with this: http://velonews.competitor.com/2014/01/ ... ter_313589
And Garmin head units all round.0 -
I'm surprised that we haven't yet seen, for want of a better phrase, a bike with an automatic gearbox. I should think it would be possible to use information like power and cadence to determine optimal gear ratio... and then use electronic shifting to adjust accordingly.
This latest technology is a slight move towards that I guess.0 -
nic_77 wrote:I'm surprised that we haven't yet seen, for want of a better phrase, a bike with an automatic gearbox. I should think it would be possible to use information like power and cadence to determine optimal gear ratio... and then use electronic shifting to adjust accordingly.
This latest technology is a slight move towards that I guess.
Yeah but what if you know some other team could like hack into the gearbox like they can hack into the power metres. Carnage. :shock:
Sorry was being flippant. I'm not sure what the added value of such a system would be? Surely the pros know what their optimal gear ratios are after years of getting to know their bodies and how they work in different conditions, I'm not sure what adding automatic shifting would add on the positive, I can think of some detrimental effects, also it lacks I don't know a certain panache. Surely knowing what gear and when to use it is part of being a racer?Correlation is not causation.0 -
nic_77 wrote:I'm surprised that we haven't yet seen, for want of a better phrase, a bike with an automatic gearbox. I should think it would be possible to use information like power and cadence to determine optimal gear ratio... and then use electronic shifting to adjust accordingly.
This latest technology is a slight move towards that I guess.
I think what they will do is map the gear choice across the profile and correlate with power and candace. That's a better metric to crunch.
Auto gear select won't help in windy conditions.0 -
Here's a closer look at the head unit. Modified.
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whiteboytrash wrote:Here's a closer look at the head unit. Modified.
That's just a Garmin 810 with a Stages sticker on the top to cover up the Garmin name and Wiggins' name added to the bottom.0
