J Wakefield

Can I ask what Powermeter you are using please?

Tyres are brilliant and their road tyres aswell. I often laugh at guys who spend 800-1000 ZA Ront on brand name tyres to puncture often. these are very robust and very strong in terms of being bullet proof.

Hi Guys I am not getting into the deep end of this but I do understand where you coming from - including myself - with regards to the way this all came about and Strickers approach to the article. We did speak about this prior to the test and so forth. He came in, did the test, paid for it as per the agreement and shared the results. I believe he delivered 100% on his part of this agreement to date and to call me his coach as of test date would be correct (for now) I don't think its now fair to give the guy abuse for coming through which a lot of people wouldnt of I don't believe. I have had a lot of people talk but not walk the walk. However, he now has to actually follow a program which when times are tough and rough is not the easiest thing to do. So lets not crucify the guy completely just yet, I need him to follow a program going forward or not then we can take it from there. Thanks

As I said to him, its not for me to splash his test for the public to see without his permission. If I am allowed to I will otherwise once I send the report in full to him he can then do as he wishes and if there questions I can answer if need.

He came in for testing today, had some good laughs, watched him suffer, laughed some more, changed his bike set up alittle and that was that. Test was good and he went deep. no question.

I have sent you the relevant info, please do not ask here what is required. Thanks

If you are serious about the commitment and actually follow the prescribed training given correctly, submit data on time and have a test performed (at your cost) before hand, I will be open to your 1k per 5% deal depending on a meeting and seeing where and what. money would need to be held in a separate party for when or if payment needs to be made. Note that a correct time frame for a re-test will beed to be made to allow for adequate training and adaptation so both benefit. We can even put your test, training and relevant data on here for all to see so there is no hiding.

Stricker - not all coaching options on offer to athletes are that amount per month. If that is out your price range then looking for a cost monthly to suite your needs and budget is definitely a exercise worth doing.

The problem that comes into this is that PPA haven't had a decent league for about 4 years now and have introduced the mind-blowing incorrect way to get a higher seeding via a once off hill climb that allows riders who very much lack the bike handling skills, race knowledge and tactical experience needed to race in a group that this requires. I know someone who went from G to A in 10:30min up redhill and personally says he should never have the seeding but will take it. Before it took you a long period and sometimes years of hard work to get your seeding up which is correct. Its one thing to smash a all out once off on fresh legs Hillclimb than being able to sit on someones wheel in the gutter at 50km/h and still have the required skill to know what and when. All of this has been lost over the years via PPA and the lack of quality racing and makes any type of racing at this required level dangerous for everyone involved. Last year at PPA there were crashes in the front groups basically every race. Before we would race for years with none, except maybe one all season. The cost alone seems high for the "League" but I don't know their reason behind it but WP have got it right with some very impressive routes to race and the racing is good with a lot of old faces. Im not bashing PPA here, I think its good they making a potential comeback to introduce a league type of series but seems like they missing the boat here in a lot of departments personally.

I would really disagree with you on that personally. Many - read most - mx gloves do not have that.

I've only ever used them coming off my background and work. I have a bunch I use: JT Fist Thor Novik Sinisalo Cheaper and more durable than any mtb bike glove out there. My 2c

If you cant get to the line it doesn't matter what your sprint power is. Sprint power isn't going to get you to the line so work on the weaknesses that are contributing to not getting you there and improve.

while racing is good as a form of training, there is a fine line. If you race all the time and weekends on the go consecutively, you lose quality training cause you always want to be "good or fresh" at the race. Race every 2nd week in off season or once a month. Build form for 3 weeks and test at a race. Then build again.

Big question is how often can you repeat those numbers in a session? if you did 10 x 1min with 2 minutes rest between, do you hit 600W each time or within 5% of that? Or do you start at 600W and end on 400W? Do you calibrate your unit before every ride? For example on a none interval day do you calibrate and then on interval days calibrate - go warm up and then calibrate just before intervals? If not, do that going forward. Based off the above you 68kg and have a PPO of about 5.5-5.6 w/kg. Your 1300W is that your 5sec power or just 1 sec kick? While your FTP looks good in terms of PPO your 1min needs work which ultimately looks like you need to work on your 30sec / 1min and 2min efforts. You need more High intensity efforts into your training and not so much sweet spot (Hate that word)

#3 - what is regularly? 1 or 7 times a week? twice a week for intensity is more than sufficient. #4 - Cadence is personal - for intensity efforts 75/80 and above is perfect. Personally I could never ever do a intensity effort at 100 rpm. I would produce no power and only elevate my HR and go no where. People need to find the cadence that works for them during efforts. #6 Spot on coffee is always a WIN!

Typically it takes 3yrs of proper structured training for an athlete to see his/her potential and even then there is always room for improvement. For example once your limit on producing power over a certain duration i.e. 10min @ 330W then the next step is produce that consistently over a session of 5 x 10min or consistently over a race. No point in doing a once off 330W effort and then finish on 275W. Take the average of the session and its not looking so good. Hours are hours but thats where it ends. They mean nothing to be honest. I have no idea what you do or how you structure those hours but there is a big difference riding for 15 hours and training specifics for 10. The shorter more specific hours would produce greater gains all round. You always see guys doing 15-25hrs in a week and then always after race day post on their social media feeds how they cant understand why they sucked and its always "back to drawing board" but then the drawing board seems to be the same each week. Anyone if you have time can ride 15-25hrs a week, its a jol and awesome but try add specific structure into those hours and its a different story. You mention you doing want to hut yourself cause you love riding your bike - that is a double edge sword - racing hurts and so does specific training sessions. If you not prepared to do suffer / hurt in order to make progression then you need to be happy with the results that are forthcoming when you race. You cannot be upset being dropped if you don't train for that situation. Also tactically you may be inexperienced. Where were you when you were dropped? At the back in gutter? Did you start in scratch and not +1? Where you fatigued going into the race? All these play a major part for some examples. Also Killarney is just that - 60min full tilt. Killarney does produce "specialists" for that 60min. I give them huge credit as I have been personally smashed in a gutter and dropped before Ive pressed start on my Garmin but then a week later when its a road race and it goes up I've done the same back to them and ridden 15min into the guy who hammered me 3 days before.

Finish in Cape Town Stadium

Hahaha, yes that's me. If you come off a meter that used L&R and now on a single leg just adjust the numbers accordingly and use those going forward. Drop FTP by 5/10/15% accordingly and work from that. At the end of the day your VAM and time will be the same if not quicker as you get stronger. If you worried that you no longer do 300w for 20min and now only do 270W and don't like the number then there is bigger issues at hand here. Progression is progression regardless of the meter used.

Typically you see a 5% left discrepancy in individuals between L or R leg depending on dominant side. Sometimes due to injuries and so forth it can be greater. However, it does not mean you producing less power or are worse off if you have a PM that is only reading L leg for example. You still climb the hill at the same speed just power is read differently. People look at the number and think "Im useless this unit is wrong" its not.

Racing with a power meter is good and bad in both respects. To many people try focus their race effort on power. "if I sit at 250W I will be good and should finish in "X" time or placing" while this may be true there way to many variables to take into account. For example what if you not feeling to good on the day and the 250W is actually to great of an effort? You end up blowing possibly and finish worse off. The other end holds true where what if you feeling really good and you could in theory average 265W? This would exceed your overall time / result. I am a strong believer that numbers are vital for training and progression but when it comes to a race it is based on how you feel on the day, not on numbers but where numbers will and can play a significant factor is for example during a marathon type event you don't want to typically sit the 1st hour at a IF of .9 or higher as you will without a doubt feel that hour effort in the latter stages. So to not get caught up in that hype at the start and be controlled and sit at .85 IF will do you significant justice in the latter stages of the race / stage where others who have gone to deep will not. A useful tool I used to use when our road racing here was really strong in the Cape during our League (08-12) was on the longer climbs around the peninsula was that if I was sitting at say 330 -350W (61kg) and saw who was in the bunch I knew that a significant number wouldnt hold that pace for more than say 5min and drop off leaving as it typically was 5-7 of us at the top of a starting 15-20. Or if we were the select group of 5-7 on the final climb that I would do a very quick calculation on weight and numbers of riders and work out efforts from that in order to try get rid of as many as I could ( or myself for that matter) So, it has and does not have benefits but for the person wanting to finish strong I still to this day believe racing on feel is a good measure. If you feel good go strong, if its to hard your body will "shut down" and ease off until you have recovered to go hard again. Once the race is over, gather that data and make the corrective steps going forward.

Great addition to the thread.

Good morning Christian 1 race was not based on a series of criteria races leading to the selection. Alan was 2nd on that list going in. His place is was earned, not gifted. If you are wanting to look at a single performance, then do we count Alan's result at African Champs in Lesotho where he started well behind the elite men as a U23 and caught and passed all but Phil but posted significantly faster lap times than him? He would of won that race by almost 2 minutes. 1 race is not the answer here and to single him out is not fair I believe as all he did was race his bike, qualify and get selected.

This is terrible news at the highest level. I have been coaching Randall for 3 years now and was and always has been an amazing person. So sad for everyone involved.

Hahahaha, true story.

I have the Valor's on my Scalpel and they are incredibly light and stiff.