Strengthening legs

Alex_Simmons/RST

poynedexter wrote:

as someone who does road racing, im interested in this.

i find my general endurance is fine, but there are times when i have to put large forces into the pedals. like closing down a gap to a break, riding up a short sharp hill in a large gear, in a finish sprint, accelerating out of a corner. at these times i feel i'm stressing my legs a lot, and wonder if extra "strength" would allow me to work at a lower % for the same result. i'm usually able to recover quickly and get to next high effort in decent shape. my races are typically 60 miles + at the moment, and in a rr situation you have to raise your power output quickly to go with the race.

If you truly had more "strength" in the specific exercise physiology sense of the word, then possibly, but it may well also come at a cost to your performance in other ways (e.g. reduction in aerobic capacity, or increased body mass).

Do you do any sort of short hard efforts in training? Sprints, hill sprints, standing starts, seated accelerations, jumps out of corners? These are best for improving neuromuscular power.

For more sustained top end power, e.g. 20-seconds-2 minutes, then guess what sort of training best helps with that?

meanredspider

Alex - do you have any thoughts on why Wiggo was increasing his race weight?

hypster

When Lance Armstrong won his first TdF, I remember reading that he trained and climbed using lower gears and a higher cadence. As a result of that I started to train the same way and after a few months entered a very hilly sportive in the UK which I found I really struggled on with the climbs. I just didn't seem to have any strength in my legs to keep up with my friends who I would normally be climbing at a similar speed.

That experience made me come to the conclusion that I needed to train with bigger gears in order to strengthen my legs for that type of event. Since that time I have tended to grind lower gears in training but spin a bit more in events so that I didn't fatigue my legs too much over the longer distance.

Recently however, I have found that if I grind lower gears in training, it takes longer for my legs to recover so have tended to move to lower gears for hill repeat sessions for instance and my legs seem to recover a lot quicker for the next session. I have taken on board the polarisation type approach to training this year so I am doing longer, slower rides mixed with 1 or 2 interval sessions a week to push up my FT which seems to be working. I don't have a power meter unfortunately but use a HRM.

I just wondered what others tended to do and what they think of that approach?

imposter2.0

hypster wrote:

When Lance Armstrong won his first TdF, I remember reading that he trained and climbed using lower gears and a higher cadence. As a result of that I started to train the same way and after a few months entered a very hilly sportive in the UK which I found I really struggled on with the climbs. I just didn't seem to have any strength in my legs to keep up with my friends who I would normally be climbing at a similar speed.

That experience made me come to the conclusion that I needed to train with bigger gears in order to strengthen my legs for that type of event. Since that time I have tended to grind lower gears in training but spin a bit more in events so that I didn't fatigue my legs too much over the longer distance.

Recently however, I have found that if I grind lower gears in training, it takes longer for my legs to recover so have tended to move to lower gears for hill repeat sessions for instance and my legs seem to recover a lot quicker for the next session. I have taken on board the polarisation type approach to training this year so I am doing longer, slower rides mixed with 1 or 2 interval sessions a week to push up my FT which seems to be working. I don't have a power meter unfortunately but use a HRM.

I just wondered what others tended to do and what they think of that approach?

Firstly, you need to get out of the 'stronger legs' mind-set. Have a read of some of the other leg strength threads if needs be (there are loads on here). Assuming you have 'normal' leg function, then your legs are almost certainly strong enough already and more strength is not what you need to improve.

Secondly, LA's 'cadence/lower gears' training was almost certainly just a smokescreen to divert away from what turned out to be a huge scandal (I'm sure you must have read about it). Consequently, I would ignore any articles which reference his training regimes. Incidentally, if you study a few YT clips of Lance, would will probably see that his actual cadence was not significantly different to anyone else's, despite the claims.

Finally - in terms of the gears you use in training - just use the same gears as you would normally use for racing.

hypster

Imposter wrote:

Firstly, you need to get out of the 'stronger legs' mind-set. Have a read of some of the other leg strength threads if needs be (there are loads on here). Assuming you have 'normal' leg function, then your legs are almost certainly strong enough already and more strength is not what you need to improve.

Secondly, LA's 'cadence/lower gears' training was almost certainly just a smokescreen to divert away from what turned out to be a huge scandal (I'm sure you must have read about it). Consequently, I would ignore any articles which reference his training regimes. Incidentally, if you study a few YT clips of Lance, would will probably see that his actual cadence was not significantly different to anyone else's, despite the claims.

Finally - in terms of the gears you use in training - just use the same gears as you would normally use for racing.

I think a lot of the stuff coming from LA was a smokescreen but looking at clips of him he did seem to be pedalling at quite a high cadence especially compared to a grinder like Jan Ullrich. However, thanks for the feedback Imposter, I will look up some of the other threads and continue training with the lower gears that I intend to use in events.

imposter2.0

yep, his cadence may have been higher than some, lower than others. But the whole Armstrong/cadence thing in general was just a huge myth, most likely perpetrated by his 'minders'...

chrisaonabike

Ok, at risk of a savaging from the "it's not about strength" school of thought (which I mostly do get), here's a question.

If I'm doing weights, my arms get tired after, say ten reps, but as I get stronger, I can do more reps without my arms getting tired (and then I increase the weight).

Obviously that's nothing to do with cardiovascular fitness.

Similarly, my thighs are quite a bit bigger than before I started cycling about 18 months ago. I have done zero other lower body exercise. Clearly it's the cycling that has caused the increase in muscle mass, and I always thought that you have to load a muscle close to exhaustion before it gets bigger.

So is cycling really *nothing* to do with muscular strength?

If not, why are my legs bigger?

top_bhoy

I'll post this again.
http://www.theguardian.com/sport/2013/apr/19/camp-mo-farah-london-marathon
It seems Mo goes against the wisdom of some and is doing just a little bit more than his chosen sport. His coach, Alberto Salazar, obviously hasn't a clue!!!

He was always lean but now he is sculpted. He has upped his mileage since joining Salazar – during an average week he will run 120 miles – but it is the weight room where there has been the most radical shifting of plates and mindset. His strength and conditioning coach David McHenry has introduced him to powerlifting: traditionally the preserve of strong men and bodybuilders wanting their muscles to pop out like melons. He can squat 200lb, 1.5 times his bodyweight, for 4-6 reps. He also flings and swings a kettlebell, a device that looks like a cannonball with a handle, to order. And there is a relish to his combinations on the boxing pads, part of a long core workout, even if he does leave his chin hanging in the breeze.

"I was a lot weaker before," Farah says. "All the core stuff, all the weights? I couldn't lift anything. I just used to run and do a bit of core but I never did specific stuff. That's been the difference for sure."

Salazar goes further. "He was flitting around before joining us. His training was haphazard. He was all over the place. He did no weight training. He would jog and do five minutes of drills with no stretching afterwards. And technically, Mo tended to over-stride towards the end of races. That's why he lost at the 2011 world championships in Daegu."

"Now he is not just a skinny guy, he's a strong wiry guy," he adds, pride evident. "And he's not gained more than a pound or two despite lifting heavy weights for power. People have always thought distance runners should lift light. Don't you believe it."

imposter2.0

Top_Bhoy wrote:

I'll post this again.
http://www.theguardian.com/sport/2013/apr/19/camp-mo-farah-london-marathon
It seems Mo goes against the wisdom of some and is doing just a little bit more than his chosen sport. His coach, Alberto Salazar, obviously hasn't a clue!!!

Just to clear up any confusion you may have - Mo Farah is a runner, not a cyclist. How people train for other sports is entirely irrelevant. Hope that helps.

slowbike

ChrisAOnABike wrote:

Ok, at risk of a savaging from the "it's not about strength" school of thought (which I mostly do get), here's a question.

If I'm doing weights, my arms get tired after, say ten reps, but as I get stronger, I can do more reps without my arms getting tired (and then I increase the weight).

Obviously that's nothing to do with cardiovascular fitness.

Similarly, my thighs are quite a bit bigger than before I started cycling about 18 months ago. I have done zero other lower body exercise. Clearly it's the cycling that has caused the increase in muscle mass, and I always thought that you have to load a muscle close to exhaustion before it gets bigger.

So is cycling really *nothing* to do with muscular strength?

If not, why are my legs bigger?

You and me alike then ...

Pocket Rocket

poynedexter wrote:

as someone who does road racing, im interested in this.

i find my general endurance is fine, but there are times when i have to put large forces into the pedals. like closing down a gap to a break, riding up a short sharp hill in a large gear, in a finish sprint, accelerating out of a corner. at these times i feel i'm stressing my legs a lot, and wonder if extra "strength" would allow me to work at a lower % for the same result. i'm usually able to recover quickly and get to next high effort in decent shape. my races are typically 60 miles + at the moment, and in a rr situation you have to raise your power output quickly to go with the race.

Thats an interesting point you make there.
If you rode a criterium and sprinted out of a corner 10 times at what you percieve to be a very high level of effort. And a sprinter (more leg strength) who has a lower fitness than you did the same efforts and found the accelerations very easy but the overall pace of the race faster, who would be more fatigued by the end of the race, I know there are so many more factors than that, but it would be interesting to see the findings.

imposter2.0

ChrisAOnABike wrote:

So is cycling really *nothing* to do with muscular strength?

Of course it requires strength - but endurance cycling doesn't require any *more* strength than you already have. You are not limited by strength, you are limited by your aerobic fitness.

meanredspider

Where does "muscular endurance" fit between "strength" and "aerobic fitness"?

chrisaonabike

Imposter wrote:

ChrisAOnABike wrote:

So is cycling really *nothing* to do with muscular strength?

Of course it requires strength - but endurance cycling doesn't require any *more* strength than you already have. You are not limited by strength, you are limited by your aerobic fitness.

So, as I said, why are my legs bigger since taking up cycling? I've been able to walk upstairs for quite a lot of years. So received wisdom says I have plenty of strength for cycling.

Thighs particularly. I've had to buy new pairs of jeans since I couldn't get my legs into the old ones.

imposter2.0

ChrisAOnABike wrote:

Imposter wrote:

ChrisAOnABike wrote:

So is cycling really *nothing* to do with muscular strength?

Of course it requires strength - but endurance cycling doesn't require any *more* strength than you already have. You are not limited by strength, you are limited by your aerobic fitness.

So, as I said, why are my legs bigger since taking up cycling? I've been able to walk upstairs for quite a lot of years. So received wisdom says I have plenty of strength for cycling.

Thighs particularly. I've had to buy new pairs of jeans since I couldn't get my legs into the old ones.

I suppose different people respond to training in different ways. I'm struggling to see how cycling could have had that much impact on your thigh muscles, tbh. Ordinarily, you wouldn't be pushing the pedals with anything like the forces that are typically required to bring about hypertrophy.

Tom Dean

Pocket Rocket wrote:

poynedexter wrote:

as someone who does road racing, im interested in this.

i find my general endurance is fine, but there are times when i have to put large forces into the pedals. like closing down a gap to a break, riding up a short sharp hill in a large gear, in a finish sprint, accelerating out of a corner. at these times i feel i'm stressing my legs a lot, and wonder if extra "strength" would allow me to work at a lower % for the same result. i'm usually able to recover quickly and get to next high effort in decent shape. my races are typically 60 miles + at the moment, and in a rr situation you have to raise your power output quickly to go with the race.

Thats an interesting point you make there.
If you rode a criterium and sprinted out of a corner 10 times at what you percieve to be a very high level of effort. And a sprinter (more leg strength) who has a lower fitness than you did the same efforts and found the accelerations very easy but the overall pace of the race faster, who would be more fatigued by the end of the race, I know there are so many more factors than that, but it would be interesting to see the findings.

It is not the riders strength that determines how easy they find the accelerations, how fatigued they would be, or for that matter whether or not they are a good sprinter.

Tom Dean

I think muscle hypertrophy is a normal outcome of aerobic training, albeit more at the higher intensity end of things. It's wrong to assume it has anything to do with strength though!

meanredspider

I can understand why this thread comes up so often. Everybody can pitch in with the "stairs" point of view but NOBODY is able to explain the observations and experiences of real riders. I know my legs got stronger when I began cycling regularly. I stopped going to the gym (because I no longer had time). When I eventually came back I was pushing bigger weights with more reps. That maybe because I was commuting on a lot of hills over a good distance on an MTB with studded ice tyres (not to mention a big rider) but the facts were there. It was patently untrue to say that cycling didn't make my legs stronger. I do, however, buy the argument that cycling is heavily biased towards aerobic - 90-95% so - but I think the way in which the stairs argument simplifies it too much really doesn't help.

briantrumpet

meanredspider wrote:

Where does "muscular endurance" fit between "strength" and "aerobic fitness"?

"strength" "muscular endurance" "aerobic fitness" <---- There.

Sorry.

imposter2.0

meanredspider wrote:

but I think the way in which the stairs argument simplifies it too much really doesn't help.

I don't think it over-simplifies it. It IS pretty simple. Cycling is not a strength sport. The ability to lift your own body weight with your legs (which you will do if you climb stairs, etc) is far more strength than you will ever need for endurance cycling.

Tom Dean

meanredspider wrote:

I can understand why this thread comes up so often. Everybody can pitch in with the "stairs" point of view but NOBODY is able to explain the observations and experiences of real riders. I know my legs got stronger when I began cycling regularly. I stopped going to the gym (because I no longer had time). When I eventually came back I was pushing bigger weights with more reps. That maybe because I was commuting on a lot of hills over a good distance on an MTB with studded ice tyres (not to mention a big rider) but the facts were there. It was patently untrue to say that cycling didn't make my legs stronger. I do, however, buy the argument that cycling is heavily biased towards aerobic - 90-95% so - but I think the way in which the stairs argument simplifies it too much really doesn't help.

Your training may have made you both stronger and faster. It does not follow that being stronger made you faster.

- has anyone suggested that cycling cannot make you stronger?

frisbee

Imposter wrote:

Top_Bhoy wrote:

I'll post this again.
http://www.theguardian.com/sport/2013/apr/19/camp-mo-farah-london-marathon
It seems Mo goes against the wisdom of some and is doing just a little bit more than his chosen sport. His coach, Alberto Salazar, obviously hasn't a clue!!!

Just to clear up any confusion you may have - Mo Farah is a runner, not a cyclist. How people train for other sports is entirely irrelevant. Hope that helps.

Of course it's relevant.

Or does commonality only apply when spouting the strength to climb the stairs "theory"? :roll:

Pocket Rocket

Tom Dean wrote:

It is not the riders strength that determines how easy they find the accelerations, how fatigued they would be, or for that matter whether or not they are a good sprinter.

You could argue the first two points, as it is difficult to quantify levels of perceived effort or fatigue, but how fast you are at sprinting is a lot to do with leg strength.

paul2718

ChrisAOnABike wrote:

Imposter wrote:

ChrisAOnABike wrote:

So is cycling really *nothing* to do with muscular strength?

Of course it requires strength - but endurance cycling doesn't require any *more* strength than you already have. You are not limited by strength, you are limited by your aerobic fitness.

So, as I said, why are my legs bigger since taking up cycling? I've been able to walk upstairs for quite a lot of years. So received wisdom says I have plenty of strength for cycling.

Thighs particularly. I've had to buy new pairs of jeans since I couldn't get my legs into the old ones.

Are you any stronger? And if you'd gone to the gym and built some thigh muscle would your cycling have improved?

If you were building thigh muscle would you spend 3 hours doing 16200 repetitions?

Paul

imposter2.0

frisbee wrote:

Imposter wrote:

Top_Bhoy wrote:

I'll post this again.
http://www.theguardian.com/sport/2013/apr/19/camp-mo-farah-london-marathon
It seems Mo goes against the wisdom of some and is doing just a little bit more than his chosen sport. His coach, Alberto Salazar, obviously hasn't a clue!!!

Just to clear up any confusion you may have - Mo Farah is a runner, not a cyclist. How people train for other sports is entirely irrelevant. Hope that helps.

Of course it's relevant.

Or does commonality only apply when spouting the strength to climb the stairs "theory"? :roll:

Not sure what you mean. Farah is pushing close to his own bodyweight with each stride. Farah weighs around 65kg, I believe. On an alpine stage, on average, cyclists are pushing around 12-15kg with each leg rotation (as far as I can recall). On that basis, it suggests that the strength demands of endurance cycling are significantly lower than running. Like I say, different sport, different training.

If you don't agree with that, you will have to demonstrate how and why strength training for runners is applicable to cyclists. Jocky Wilson's training used to consist of drinking ten pints of lager before a darts match, but I don't see anyone suggesting that on here. Let's stick to cycling.

meanredspider

Tom Dean wrote:

Your training may have made you both stronger and faster. It does not follow that being stronger made you faster.

- has anyone suggested that cycling cannot make you stronger?

The body tends not to make adaptations it doesn't need. I likely got stronger because I needed to get stronger to do what I needed to do. I tend to think it's related to fatigue - I think the closer to maximal loads you put through your legs, the more fatigued they get quicker. A 30% (of maximal) load will fatigue the muscles quicker than a 20% load. Much of the time you can gear your way out of this (the stairs argument) but there are times that's harder to do: climbing steep inclines being one - that's analogous to taking 3 stairs at a time. Instead, people get off and walk (cycling, in this instance, must be harder than stairs). Don't get me wrong - I'm not in the weight training camp I just don't think the aerobic only argument covers it adequately.

Tom Dean

I don't claim to understand the specifics, but I think you're oversimplifying what goes on when you stimulate adaptations though training. The body doesn't just flick the 'get stronger' switch. All efforts are the result of a combination of different processes, each of which may contribute and be improved in differing proportions at different effort levels.

Obviously higher loads are more fatiguing, that doesn't mean that your maximal ability affects fatigue. There are specific high force situations like track standing starts where strength helps (and would require more force than climbing the stairs) but they are not really relevant to endurance cycling.

If what you say about fatigue being related % of max load is correct, why wouldn't you be in favour of weight training?

I don't know what you mean by 'aerobic-only argument', I don't see anyone saying anything like that.

frisbee

Imposter wrote:

frisbee wrote:

Imposter wrote:

Top_Bhoy wrote:

I'll post this again.
http://www.theguardian.com/sport/2013/apr/19/camp-mo-farah-london-marathon
It seems Mo goes against the wisdom of some and is doing just a little bit more than his chosen sport. His coach, Alberto Salazar, obviously hasn't a clue!!!

Just to clear up any confusion you may have - Mo Farah is a runner, not a cyclist. How people train for other sports is entirely irrelevant. Hope that helps.

Of course it's relevant.

Or does commonality only apply when spouting the strength to climb the stairs "theory"? :roll:

Not sure what you mean. Farah is pushing close to his own bodyweight with each stride. Farah weighs around 65kg, I believe. On an alpine stage, on average, cyclists are pushing around 12-15kg with each leg rotation (as far as I can recall). On that basis, it suggests that the strength demands of endurance cycling are significantly lower than running. Like I say, different sport, different training.

If you don't agree with that, you will have to demonstrate how and why strength training for runners is applicable to cyclists. Jocky Wilson's training used to consist of drinking ten pints of lager before a darts match, but I don't see anyone suggesting that on here. Let's stick to cycling.

I didn't say training specifically targeted at running is applicable to cycling, your statement was "how people train for other sports is irrelevant". It would be extremely foolish not to learn from other sports.

And if you climb out of the saddle then you do lift your body weight?

meanredspider

Tom Dean wrote:

If what you say about fatigue being related % of max load is correct, why wouldn't you be in favour of weight training?

I don't know what you mean by 'aerobic-only argument', I don't see anyone saying anything like that.

Well, pretty much the definition of fatigue is a reduction in the ability to deliver force (layman's definition of "strength"). But I don't think weight training is an effective way of developing cycling muscles. As a timely reminder, I was riding my MTB up a wet muddy mountain at the weekend and even the small geometry differences between that and my road bike (which I ride 98% of the time) showed up the muscles I was using differently - they were the ones that fatigued much quicker. Even if weight training might help some muscles, it'll be the others that slow you up.

I hear the aerobic-only argument all the time. It's pretty much the basis of the "stairs" argument

Tom Dean

Track sprinters seem to manage to transfer their weight training strength to the bike. Why can't you if it's so important?

The stairs thing is just an illustration of the forces required in endurance cycling vs the definition of 'strength'. It in no way implies that endurance cycling is aerobic-only.