FasCat Cycling Training Tips Podcast

There seems to be a lot of discussion about CTL, TSS, FTP, etc. as it relates to elite or world-class level cyclists, but what does this all mean for masters cyclists? Today on the podcast, we discuss masters CTL and the fundamentals of using CTL to quantify your training load as a masters cyclist and some key tips and advice from the Big Cat on this topic. Lots of good info here! For more info on the subject, subscribe to the podcast on all your favorite platforms and check out our training tips on the website: https://fascat.wpengine.com/tips/seven-habits-of-highly-successful-masters-cyclists/ 12393If you’re listening and reading this tip, check out Sweet Spot #2 — follow the plan, you will go faster. Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/fascatcoaching/    Instagram: @fascatfh Twitter: @FasCat  , @FasCatCoaching and YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/c/FasCatCoaching Remember to use code 25podcast at checkout to save 25% off your next plan…and don’t procrastinate!   Intro music: David Cutter Music // https://davidcuttermusic.com/ The post Chronic Training Load (CTL) for Masters Cyclists appeared first on FasCat.

Welcome back to another installment of our Q&A series, Ask a FasCat! Here we take listener questions from our audience and do our best to answer them. In this round, we tackle a variety of questions including first gravel race tips, nutrition for stage races, and plenty more! Thanks to everyone who submitted questions, and we hope this is helpful in your pursuit of getting faster on the bike! 62802 Gravel Training Plan Work Hard, Ride Fast, don’t forget to Switch from Base to Race, Have FUN and as ALWAYS FtFP Use 25podcast for 25% off training plans Copyright © 2021 FasCat Coaching – all rights reserved. Join our *FREE* Athlete Forum to nerd out with FasCat coaches and athletes about your FTP, race data, power based training, or anything related to going fast on the bike! To talk with a FasCat Coach that exudes these qualities, please fill out a New Athlete Questionnaire to set up a complimentary coaching consultation. The post Ask a FasCat #17 appeared first on FasCat.

 Are you new to riding and training with a powermeter? Here is your beginner’s guide to start training with power.  In this episode, Coach Frank outlines 5 steps to begin training with power and using your data in TrainingPeaks. 62544Power-Based Intervals for Road Racing Training Plan Step 1: Upload your Data to TrainingPeaks Step 2: Look at your Power Graph  Step 3 is to set your power at threshold and begin personalizing your data to you! Step 4: Train Using your Power-Based Zones Step 5: Set up your charts in your dashboard A power meter is a fantastic training tool that can take your training and racing to the next level. Listen to our beginner’s guide to start training with power and learn how to use it and TrainingPeaks! Also: next week is our Ask a FasCat episode #17 : your training questions and our answers. Submit your questions by next Wednesday in our forum or email us at help@fascat.wpengine.com or on the grams @fascatcoaching The Performance Manager Chart Master’s CTL Podcast Work Hard, Ride Fast, don’t forget to Switch from Base to Race, Have FUN and as ALWAYS FtFP Copyright © 2021 FasCat Coaching – all rights reserved. Join our *FREE* Athlete Forum to nerd out with FasCat coaches and athletes about your FTP, race data, power based training, or anything related to going fast on the bike! To talk with a FasCat Coach that exudes these qualities, please fill out a New Athlete Questionnaire to set up a complimentary coaching consultation. The post Beginner’s Guide to Start Training with Power appeared first on FasCat.

What makes a good Coach? Coaches come in all different sizes and shapes but what are the core values that makes a great one? 61959Designed by Good Coaches to help YOU Ride Faster In this podcast, Coach Frank describes the inspiration behind the podcast (we’re hiring) and what he considers the qualities of a great coach  starting with these four core qualities: Results Knowledge Education and Experience Thanks to everyone for tuning in, subscribing and reviewing on Apple Podcasts, and for engaging in our forum! Save 25% on your next training plan with code 25podcast SHOW NOTES: Cycling Coach Job Fatigue Dependent Training Plan Design The 4 core are  just the outer layer and I think there are many many layers and combinations of qualities underneath those 4 core.  When you consider there are many types of coaches from World Tour Coaches at one end of the spectrum all the way to junior an high school NICA coaches at the other. National Team Coaches and Collegiate Coaches but for the purposes of this podcast we’ll be talking about the kind of one on one cycling coach you’d hire – where they work for you. As opposed to a Football coach who’s job is for the TEAM to produce results.  Sure they need to motivate the athletes too but at the end of the day THEY are the boss whereas in a For Hire Coach-Athlete relationship I consider the athlete to be the boss. Back to the many layers under the four core: results, knowledge, experience and education, I think its important that a Coaches have the ability to Make the Coaching fun – create an Enjoyment of the Process Ability to have/achieve positive Coach-Athlete Relationships Ability to Earn Athlete’s Trust Salesmanship – to sell ideas and hard work Ability to help athlete as an athlete and as a person and know when helping the person is more important than the athlete Ability to help athlete be their best in sport and life – that life balance we keep mentioning To be a good motivator Are they a good person that genuinely cares about the welfare of the athlete 3 of my favorite coaches I’ve studied and learned from are : Jim Valvano Nick Saban Mike Krzyzewski All three have great books where they lay out their coaching philosophy and describe their trials and tribulations in their coaching career. Definitely worth a read if you have the time. They all speak to those 8 qualities above. These are all collegiate coaches, coincidence? Not surprising given I coached the CU Buffs for 2 years. Nine Qualities of a Good Coach 1. Enrichment – WHEN YOU ENRICH THE LIVES OF OTHERS YOU ENRICH YOUR OWN This quote is the words we live by. Coaching is in our DNA because all the FasCat Coaches have an innate altruistic personality and ample personal experience training, racing and riding recreationally. Our goal is to use that experience, along with scientifically proven strategies to help you improve your cycling. We’ll tap into our enthusiasm for the sport to coach you better by leading the way (core value #7), keeping you motivated and having fun. 2. GOLDEN RULE OF COACHING “Do unto our athletes as we would want to be coached”. The FasCat Coaches have all had coaches at one point in their cycling careers (many of them coached by FasCat Founder Frank Overton) and know what it is like to be coached. We’ve all had moments where we’ve needed some extra attention, motivation or an objective opinion. Unfortunately too, we know what it’s like to receive bad advice and coaching. Thus, we place a high value on treating each and every athlete we coach with the highest degree of importance. 3. Qualifications – Experience – Innovation – Communication – Technology – Creative Solutions 4. POWER-BASED TRAINING & SPORT SCIENCE Exchanging power data enhances the coach athlete relationship and maximizes what we can do for you because power data is the ultimate form of communication. Power based training has been around for 20 years by now and if you are using a powermeter the coach you hire should be well versed in the art and the science of power based coaching. 5. BUILD OPEN & HONEST COACH-ATHLETE RELATIONSHIPS When you hire a good Coach, you don’t just get a custom training plan, you get a relationship with a coach that has similar interests to you and that is responsible for your goals. Your goals are your coaches j.o.B. A good coach will listen to your feedback and learn from your data to figure out what makes you tick. Your coach will understand your life outside of cycling and the balance you need to maintain in order to continue to enjoy your cycling. That life balance again. The net results are trust & faith which is essential to coaching & being coached. A good coach will build this kind of relationship with athletes because together they can accomplish more than they could otherwise. 6. LIFELONG LEARNERS No one knows it all and if they give off the vibe they do, watch out.  I am constantly learning news things about the athletes I’ve coached for years. The best way to do that is to ask them what’s going on in their lives – seek out the stuff that you won’t find in the power data.  Get to know them. Now I bet you thought when I mentioned be lifelong learner you were thinking academically,  And that is true BUT its the not the end all. At FasCat we continue to search out ways to help our athletes perform better, ride faster, increase their power output, recover quicker, stay motivated and reach their goals. A good coach will Learn as much as they can about the athlete to help them – alot of that comes down to what motivates the athlete, what makes them tick, and what ways can the coach get the athlete to get the most out of themselves. One of the holy grails of coaching is a motivated athlete and then a motivated team of athletes working together as one. 7. TALK THE TALK, WALK THE WALK We train hard, race hard and compete hard. We are bike racers just like our athletes. Our race performance is a direct reflection of our ability to coach athletes well. We were all beginners once and have applied the proper amount of work, experience and science to improve. I firmly believe all coaches need to have gone thru the kind of improvement you want to achieve if they are able to successfully lead you on that journey.  At FasCat, I only hire Cat 2 or equivalent coaches and higher.  That achievement alone tells me the coach knows what hard work and the the journey is , and  Therefore, we are qualified to show the athlete how to improve as well. We I firmly believe a coach needs to lead by example and know exactly what it is like to suffer while performing intervals, to make sacrifices from taking on a goal and to get psyched up for a race. When we practice what we preach we continue to develop as coaches capable of coaching our athletes better & better. Another talk the talk walk the walk rule I have is that the coach needs to have competed in the event for which the athlete they are coaching wants to compete in.  I personally have never done a triathlon and therefore I do not feel comfortable coaching multisport athletes.  Same for cyclocross – they coach needs to or have been a cyclocross athlete themselves. As I get older (I’m turning 50 this year) I struggle with the walking the walk part because now many of the athletes are younger and I’m not training as much as they are.  However, I think the experience speaks volumes in this case. 8. ACCOUNTABILITY A good coach will take your training, racing, performance and coaching seriously. In fact your goals are our jobs as I said earlier. Tell us what you want to achieve and a good coach will show you how to do it. They’ll hold you accountable to the plan they develop and expect you to hold them accountable for doing a good job.  A good coach is your accountability buddy. I also think a good coach will reach out if he or she hasn’t  heard from from the athlete under their normal communication patterns; it is likely you’ll receive a pro-active email and/or phone call/ text. Good coaches are open to communication about if the athlete is not feeling they are on the right track. Equally as important, expect a call from your coach if you are not training in a way that is aligned with your goals. 9. Ninth and final QUALITY COACHING + GOOD PLANNING + HARD WORK = SUCCESS There are no magic bullets. No elixirs, supplements or trademarked workouts that you can buy to obtain results. There are no shortcuts in cycling. Your improvement is like the Smith Barney slogan, “We make money the old fashioned way, we earn it”. If you talk to a coach that is selling you on something otherwise, run for the hills With that said, a good coach is not going to prescribe a 15 hour training week if you only have 8 hours to train. Instead they are going to use scientific principles to help you make the most out of your limited time. For example Tempo and Sweet Spot advanced aerobic endurance training. A good coach will work with you from the start to develop an Annual Training Plan and teach you how to train properly in order to improve and reach your goals. Will be your mentor! A good coach will have you work as HARD as your goals are HIGH and we’ll even help you set tiered goals in order to balance your time on the bike with the rest of your life. That is the essence of good quality coaching and what you can expect from a good coach. And that my friends and what I’m recruiting at FasCat – check out our job posting we are seeking a new cycling coach with all these qualities and perhaps more.  Get in touch if you are interested. Work Hard, Ride Fast, don’t forget to Switch from Base to Race, Have FUN and as ALWAYS FtFP Copyright © 2021 FasCat Coaching – all rights reserved. Join our *FREE* Athlete Forum to nerd out with FasCat coaches and athletes about your FTP, race data, power based training, or anything related to going fast on the bike! To talk with a FasCat Coach that exudes these qualities, please fill out a New Athlete Questionnaire to set up a complimentary coaching consultation. The post What Makes a Good Coach appeared first on FasCat.

 Switching from Base to Race Part 2: a continuation from our 2019 podcast on moving onto an interval phase of training after building a sweet spot base 61785Gravel Training Plan to help you practice what’s described in this podcast! In this podcast, Coach Frank goes thru 10 instances Dave Letterman style of when you should switch from aerobic endurance training to high intensity interval training. This is the sweet spot and polarized methodologies referenced in last week’s podcast! Thanks to everyone for tuning in, subscribing and reviewing on Apple Podcasts, and for engaging in our forum! Save 25% on your next training plan with code 25podcast SHOW NOTES: 2019 Switch from Base to Race Podcast Timing is Everything Let’s talk about the criteria for knowing when to stop doing aerobic endurance work and start doing high intensity interval training because as we’ve podcasted  before timing is everything. How to Know when to Switch from Base to Race – gonna do my best Dave Letterman top 10 list impression: 10. When you are racing* in 3-6 weeks or less 9. When your base is ‘good’ and the returns from doing interval training going forward are going to net greater power increase than if you kept trudging along with base 8. When you’ve been doing base for more than 18 weeks 7. When your Coach tells you to (this would be for the one on one coached athletes) 6. When you’ve been doing some base but want to raise your power even more 5. When you want to do some harder training 4.When your CTL is higher than ever before or within 10-20% of 3.When you can’t ride any more – as in you’ve maxed out 12 hours of riding per week (cant do 13) 2. When you are dog tired from all the sweet spot training and your legs are begging for a break 1. And the #1 reason to switch from base to race is because you are going to be racing soon!  Switch to “Race” Alright – let’s unpack each one of those.  I don’t have any reasons not to switch to intervals unless your base is under developed. Ie. you have NOT been doing any sweet spot base and aren’t racing soon or if you are those are B races. In this case, doing a 6 or 12 week block of sweet spot training before you switch to interval training.  Build the aerobic foundation of the pyramid an stack the intervals on top of afterwards. You may hear some old skool racers talk about racing into shape – but they are building base during the week.  And per our long ride podcast last week – if you’ve been racing on Zwift or similar riding hard – that is not base and now that the weather is improving for outside rides you will benefit from back up and doing a block of sweet spot base training.  Resist the temptation to keep riding hard outside – this is the group ride hero we talk about and also a one way ticket to Burn Out Ville. You don’t want to go there when the world is going to come back to life once everyone gets vaccinated and racing + group rides return. But I digress….. Back to unpacking the Dave LetterMan top ten list to switch from base to race: 10. When you are racing* in 3-6 weeks or less If you’ve done some base say a 6 – 12 week block but your CTL isn’t quite where you want it to be because of life’s limitations, still switch from base to race. Remember races are generally one from your peak power output – not the size of your CTL. I feel like that line could be in the Movie SpaceBalls – anyone remember the light saber spoof scene? Its better to work on your power output 3-6 weeks out than your base.  That’s the coaching advice – that’s what I was talking about last week when the coaches are ahead of the science. Experience! AI generated workouts are going to miss that. 9. When your base is ‘good’ and the returns from doing interval training going forward are going to net greater power increase than if you kept trudging along with base This goes along with #10 I just mentioned – you’ll increase your FTP more than from trying to keep building your base.  Watts win races not CTL. 8. When you’ve been doing base for more than 18 weeks 18 weeks is the point of diminishing returns – you need/want to move on from here to keep progress – your training and progress will plateau out should you keep sweet spot base build. See we advocate both! 7. When your Coach tells you to (this would be for the one on one coached athletes) For coaches athletes, this is the value of having a coach – an expert with the experience to know when to switch – using the 3 criteria above but also the nuances of your training. This is someone who’s got your back and has the experience to give you this advice. Again AI ain’t gonna do that for you. 6. When you’ve been doing some base but want to raise your power even more Naturally what’s better than one thing to help you ride faster? Two! In last week’s podcast we articulated tht we advocate both sweet spot training combine with polarized training – I prefer to call it race specific interval training. And future pod on intervals I’ll described the FasCat Way. We’ve touched on it before if you want to go back and listen to our previous episodes on intervals.  But combine base training with interval training and whammo! Lotta watts coming to ya. 5. When you want to do some harder training If you are like a caged tiger frothing at the mouth to ride fast and ride harder, you should switch from base to race and do some intervals! This would go toward motivation – when you are motivated to do the hard work, do the intervals and make the switch – just make sure you’ve built your base up first. As in for your whacko’s that like to do VO2 Max Intervals all year long.  I jest but I know you are out there…. This is what I call the cross fit crew – who goes berserk every workout.  That can be harnessed .. I am digressing….. 4.When your CTL is higher than ever before or within 10-20% of I like the historical CTL data because it serves as a point of reference if you’ve got last year’s data and can compare.  If you hit 85 last year and you couldn’t ride any longer and you are close to 85 this year (80-90) and you know it’ll be tough to find more time to ride to keep raising your CTL – that is when you know it is time to Switch from Base to race. Use the Performance Manager Chart – the PMC the The Shit that will Kill Them – to help you identify and even project (model out) when you’ll make the switch.  Use the PMC chart to model that out and determine if/when/why to make the switch. 3.When you can’t ride any more – as in you’ve maxed out 12 hours of riding per week (can’t do 13) If you can’t ride anymore than 12 hours per week you wont’ be able to keep increase your CTL , building your base and you would be wise to bank those gains and make more by beginin and interval training phase. I see this alot with athletes that have done a good build but there CTL hovers flat for long period of time as they run up against a brick wall trying to keep riding long and keep riding more when life simply doesn’t let them.  That’s when to stop sweet spotting and start doing intervals. Your PMC chart should only track flat when you are ‘in season and doing intervals’ if you are building base it should be increasing and if its not for whatever reason, move onto the next phase of training, which is intervals or rest and/or a taper to peak for a A race. 2. When you are dog tired from all the sweet spot training and your legs are begging for a break Base training is hard once you really start pushing out the adaptations and it can wear on you.  Rarely does an athlete overtrain from base, but you certainly can overreached.  As I mentioned in # 3 if you are running up a brick wall because your legs are tired and you cant’ make watts like you could when you were fresh – that is your body telling you to rest.  Remember the Greg henderson, Wrestling the Gorrilla analogy – this is when you let the Gorrilla win, your body and your legs – tell you, no mas. Rest , ride less and then switch over to high intensity interval work – especially If you are about to start racing soon. Which is our # 1 reason to switch from base to race. Soon as in 6 weeks or less and you are hungry like the wolf to steal the Duran Duran song and are motivated to ride harder as referenced in #5 previously. Thanks for listening! Hit us up in our forum  forum.FasCatCoachig.com to ask us YOUR question about switching from base to race Don’t just sweet spot all year round – you’re leaving watts on the table if you don’t do your intervals.  It goes right to the core of how we each each episode which I’ll amend for this podcast Work Hard, Ride Fast, don’t forget to Switch from Base to Race, Have FUN and as ALWAYS FtFP Copyright © 2021 FasCat Coaching – all rights reserved. Join our *FREE* Athlete Forum to nerd out with FasCat coaches and athletes about your FTP, race data, power based training, or anything related to going fast on the bike! To talk with a FasCat Coach about your switch from base to race, please fill out a New Athlete Questionnaire to set up a complimentary coaching consultation. The post Switching from Base to Race Part 2 appeared first on FasCat.

 Coach Frank goes on a 14 minute rant about ‘internet scientists’ and the whole sweet spot versus polarized debate.  He espouses how the coaches are ahead on the scientists and bring it all back to the podcast topic: the long ride.  Frank describes his three long rides and how you can progress thru each. 61558Gravel Training Plan to help you practice what’s described in this podcast! In this podcast, Coach Frank covers the benefits of a long ride and goes on a rant about ‘internet scientists’. Thanks to everyone for tuning in, subscribing and reviewing on Apple Podcasts, and for engaging in our forum! Save 25% on your next training plan with code 25podcast Show Notes: How I invented Sweet Spot Training Peter Stetina Podcast I am a man of science with a masters degree in physiology and US Patent # 7202067 from my molecular biology biotech days.  I’ve spent days, nights in the Bowman Gray medical school library going thru thick 10 pound, 500 page medical journals trying to figure out how to get nerves to grow back on Astrocytes to help spinal cord injury patients. I even presented that work at the annual Neuroscience meetings in La Jolla and have to say – sometimes science doesn’t have all the answers.  It’s your experience in the field from trying failure, doing and succeed. Here’s the story and what I mean: I spent 6 months in a medical school laboratory with an NIH grant trying to figure out how to get spinal cord rat astrocytes to grow in petri dish to study nerve regeneration with an in vitro spinal cord injury model.  Say that tongue twister with me again. 6 months culturing hundreds of thousands of astrocytes (cells that make up your spinal cord) day after day.  And they weren’t growing. And my boss started to get pissed and I was going to the medical school library every night to find that one nugget of information to figure out how to get these astrocytes to grow in the petri dish. I Experimented with everything the scientific journals listed in their ‘methods and materials’ section of the publication – the growth media, the way we harvested the cells, you name it. Finally one day I reached out to a researcher in the field who’d published a paper on astrocytes from the University of Alabama Birmingham’s medical school of all places. The next day I cold called him and he picked up! Lo and behold he answered on the 2nd ring and we talked for 20 minutes and a week later I flew down to his lab to work with him and his lab tech to see if we could figure out a way to get the spinal cord injury model to work. Within the first hour of our collaboration the lab tech told me to coat the petri dishes with L-Lysine to give the Astrocytes something to bind too because they didn’t like plastic. And whammo – that was the golden nugget of information.   That was the information that wasn’t in the hundreds of scientific publications I had found on pub med and spent hours making copies of in the medical school library.  I asked the lab tech how she figured it out and she just shrugged her shoulders and said another researcher suggested it to her. Aha – insider information….. Long story short, cells grews, motor neurons were studied, papers were published and more NIH grants were received.  I went on to graduate school and got distracted by mountain bike racing… but I digress. The point I’d like to make is that sometimes the science, the scientists haven’t found what they are looking for. And someone with 20 years of experience has,  like the coaches. Everyone on the internet is quick to point to the science this researcher has published in order to argue their point or to sound smart.  And while I read the same studies, there are paper I wish have been published looking at what I’ve noticed in the field from athlete performance and power data. Sometimes the coaches are ahead of the scientists because they have the ability to perform experiments and gather the power data and see the results from the athletes they coach. Coaches have n = 1000 to the lab studies that had n = 12.  And the longer they coach and the more experience they glean, the better able they are to figure out what works and what does not. By now I have close to 20 years of coaching experience and analyzing the power data of athletes and taking their data set from the whole season and seasons to measure their performance. Good coaches will micro experiment with their athletes:  Did they rider faster , win x y z race, FTP improve, endurance stretched. What worked, what did not.  Perform develop, grow , achieve. Many of you have heard my December 2018 podcast “How I Invented Sweet Spot” If not go back and give it a listen, I’ll put it in the show notes too.  In there I recant my experience training with the polarized method and then the extraordinary improvement I made when I discovered and developed sweet spot training.  I went from P ½ field pack fill to winning P1/2 races. XC MTB races, Time trials and crits all of things which is opposite but I always had a good anaerobic system no doubt developed from all the intervals I did. I’m not trying to start a polarized v sweet spot debate – I think, we (at FasCat think) you should do both and when you combine them together you’ll ride your fastest.  Its taken me/us close to 20 years of training, racing, analyzing to articulate that to you all when everyone else is busy arguing which side they are on. The answer from the coaches is BOOOOOTTTHHHH!! Polarized training gets you so far just like sweet spot training only gets you so far. But when you combine the two together, when you switch from base to race:  whammo – that’s the stuff of peak performances The big point I want to make is these broad connecting the dots types of perspectives from real world experience, working with athletes day in and day out,  takes an open mind and years, decades of experience.  I chuckle when the internet cites a study performed over six weeks.  And then you dig deeper and the paper was written by a graduate student. Nothing against graduate student, I used to be one myself! Six weeks is just not enough time nor experience to really determine an athletes performance in a laboratory studying from following a real training plan. Studies like this can answer one single question that is more or less one layer of dozens that coaches factor into performance. Sometimes these studies answer questions about performance that honestly doesn’t matter too much to coaches because its common cycling sense.  Granted they answer specific scientifica questions but many many times the coaches are ahead of the scientists AND the studies haven’t even been conducted to what the coaches have already figured out. Case in point – the whole sweet spot v polarized debate. Now I like science and I like the research – if these researchers were to go on journey and follow the results then you should perk up and pay attention.  But to my knowledge no study has been done looking at sweet spot training to build one’s aerobic endurance in the off and pre-season and then a switch polarised training pre competition and in season. No study except for the fact that hundreds of my coaching colleagues training athletes with this methodology to help athletes of all abilities from average Joes to World Tour Pros’ ride their bikes faster. A super digression! I apologize, I was going to talk with you about the Long Ride and I just went on a huge rant pitching scientists against coaches.  I think the holy grail is an experienced coach rooted in science (like most of my colleagues)  Real world experience with a scientific background.   But if I had to choose one or another, I’d choose the experience coached over what the science says every single time. And I’m a scientist! But the honest truth is that when I went to research the benefits of the long ride I wasn’t satisfied sharing the results of a paper in the Journal of Sports Med citing the increase in mitochondrial density from aerobic endurance training.  Rather let me simply share 20 years of professional coaching experience with you – what works and I won’t even mention what does not.  And because I’ve gone on a rant let’s skip the review of the week and announcement. Subscribe, leave us a review, engage with us – we want to help you ride your bike faster! We as Coaches know what works.. Why? Because we’ve done that ourselves and have monitored hundreds of athletes over the years that have benefited from long endurance ride training. And when I say endurance I’m talking about your aerobic endurance and you are ‘aerobic’ between Zones 2 thru sweet spot. Even Zones 4 & 5 are aerobic just not for long.  Therefore I like to have athletes do three type of long rides in a progression. The first is the zone 2 ride the 2nd is the sweet spot TSS ride and the third is the AmEx TSS ride. Start with the zone 2 ride then move onto a long sweet spot ride and finally if your training has been going really well move onto the long Amex ride. Save the Amex rides for when your goal event is close.  The Zone 2 and sweet spot long rides are off and pre-season and even in season. Zones 2 is zone 2 – fairly straightforward , steady constant pedalling and avoiding any forays above zone 2 – oftentimes facilitated by choosing to ride on flat terrain. The Sweet Spot ride is actually zones 2 through Sweet Spot for the sweet spot TSS ride and Zones 2 – zone 5 for the AmEx ride.  And we’ll even sprinkle in a little organic zone 6, especially if they are a road, crit, mtb and cyclocrosser. Backing up we are coming up on the end of winter where everyone needs (this is free coaching advice) to get off their trainer and increase their riding volume.  One hour a day is fine 18+ weeks out from their goal event but the progression to your training from increasing the intensity and frequency of intervals only takes one so far.  In other words, there’s only so far you can ‘get’ from one hour trainer rides. The next step is to increase your riding volume. And for most of us weekend warriors that comes from the long ride on the weekend.   2-3 hours at first and then add 30 minutes each successive weekend to work your way to a 5 hour ride. I think the five hour ride is within all cyclists of all abilities: young, old beginner, advanced. This is why centuries are so popular bc 20mph for 5 hours = a 100 mile century. This is also why the pros do long rides. They just do a lot of long rides to add up to some 20-25+ hour weeks. So get off your trainer, put on some cold weather riding gear and double the longest ride you’ve done on the trainer this winter. Say that is 1.5 hours indoors so ride 3 hours outdoors.  Ride 3.5 hours the next weekend and keep going to 4 > 4.5 and 5 hours each weekend. That is a 5 week progression. Why 5 hours? 2 reasons: #1 5 hours is specific to many of the events we are training for like an 80-100 mile road race, a gravel race, fondo, century, etc… #2 5 hours is a large dose of training (lotta mitochondrial biogenesis) but not so large that we can’t recover from. For example – the first time you do a 5 hour ride you are going to be smashed from it the next day. But the next time you do a 5 hour ride you’ll be less tired the next day and less tired the next time.  A 5 hour zone 2 ride will incur a training stress score of roughly 250 or 50 TSS / hour.  Experienced cyclist know they can recover from that. Especially when they’ve done 350 – 400 Sweet Spot TSS rides or events and have experience of what that felt like. The single day long ride progression is to go from not one long 5 hour ride on the weekend but TWO .  That’s another 5 week progression after the aforementioned 5 week progression. For example – so now you are doing regular 5 hour rides every Saturday.  On Sunday’s you are going to go from 2.5 hour ride and increase the duration by 30 minutes each successive Sunday on up to 5 hours. Now you are talking two long rides over the weekend for 10 hours of training + the 3 – 5 you are getting in during the week which adds up to close to are 12-15 hour training week.  That’s a lot of mitochondria. And that’s how you build endurance. FTP gets a lot of hype while endurance is the ugly step sister.  Let me tell you without ‘endurance’ your FTP is going to be subject to fatigue during your event. Aka that 300 watt FTP at the beginning of a 4-6 hour event will be 200 watts or less in the final hour. Scenario:  If you have only been riding one hour a day 5-6 days a week  for a total of 6-8 hours of weekly training for 6+ weeks and your FTP is over 300 watts that is great. But when you start getting into your Springtime and Summer events that require endurance, that 300 watts FTP will decrease each hour going to 275 and 250 and on down and the miles roll on. However for the athletes that have put in the time in the saddle training 8 – 12 hours per week their FTP is going to decrease less over the course of a long endurance event.  Remember our podcast with Peter Stetina? He finished Unbound with the equivalent of a 170 watt FTP as measured by his normalized power in the final hour.  And he finished 3rd! And he has incredible endurance from his training and years as a world tour pro. That race is truly a test of endurance and FTP much less so. And here’s my coaching experience for ya: you can incur less fatigue and have less FTP decline during an event from doing regular long rides.  No scientific paper proves or disproves that – that’s just common cycling knowledge. The cyclists are ahead of the science. The long ride is the quintessential workout of aerobic endurance training for an aerobic sport. Dr Andy Coggan famously exclaimed way back, ‘its an aerobic sport, damit’ referring to the fact that event pursuitors whose event is less than 5 minutes benefit from endurance training. Even MvDP and Wout van Aerto go do 20-25 hour weeks in Majorca in December to get ready for 1 hour event in January. Because it is an aerobic endurance sport. And that’s also why they are such good road racers. Side note who do you think will win Strade Bianchi this weekend? Even Criterium racers and  XC mountain bikers with events less than 2 hours do long rides because its an aerobic endurance sport. Time trialists and hill climbers benefit from long rides because its an aerobic endurance sport.  And of course gravel fondo and century riders need and benefit from long rides because its specific to the event! The event is a long ride. As the expression goes, ‘long live long rides’ because they are fun, can be adventurous and honestly what I’m looking forward to this Spring and Summer. In the mountains of course. Thanks for listening to my rant and be sure to subscribe because next week we’ll be podcasting about switching from base to race part two – and our regular Ask a FasCat user submitted questions # 17 ! And if one of your buddies or the internet argues with you say in your best Big Lebowski voice ‘mitochondrial biogenesis man’ Do your long rides and remember to “Work Hard, Ride Fast, Have Fun and as always FtFP” To practice: ride your Gravel Bike on trails! Descending!  I’m gonna give you all my cyclocross skill tips here: Steam crossings + Roots and Mud:   Copyright © 2021 FasCat Coaching – all rights reserved. Join our *FREE* Athlete Forum to nerd out with FasCat coaches and athletes about your FTP, race data, power based training, or anything related to going fast on the bike! To talk with a FasCat Coach about your long rides, please fill out a New Athlete Questionnaire to set up a complimentary coaching consultation. The post Long Rides, Coaches v Scientists, Sweet Spot AND Polarized appeared first on FasCat.

 Spring is around the corner and that means dried-out roads, sunshine, and GRAVEL. While gravel riding and racing is super hot right now in the cycling world, there are still a lot of cyclists who are intimidated or unfamiliar with how it all works. So, in this episode, Coach Frank breaks the gravel skills  down and offers some of his tried and true tips for gravel riding and racing as a veteran of the gravel scene (he’s been doing it since before it was “cool”). 61385Gravel Training Plan to help you practice what’s described in this podcast! In this podcast, Coach Frank covers: pack riding skills maintaining a line of sight body position and english on the bike braking cornering descending roots and mud Thanks to everyone for tuning in, subscribing and reviewing on Apple Podcasts, and for engaging in our forum! Save 25% on your next training plan with code 25podcast Let me start with the 3 different types of gravel courses that different kinds of gravel skills apply to: the Boulder Gucci gravel  What I jest about here is that the dirt roads around  Boulder, CO are practically paved because out West Boulder County grades the dirt with giant tractors and treats the dirt by spraying the road with magnesium chloride (I think) to help bind the dirt and when the conditions are right – its smooth and hard pack just like a rough paved rough. Incidentally for those of you who live or have ridden in Costa Rica, you know many of the roads are dirt and they are treated with molasses to bind the dirt and keep the dust low.  So riding in Costa Rica smells like pancakes.   But I digress…. In either place not many gravel skills are necessary and I know that because I’ve ridden a road bike on these roads just as I would ride a road bike.  In fact Boulder has historically held a road race called the Boulder-Roubaix on the Boulder gucci gravel and we all used our road bikes with maybe 25mm slick road tires.  And nobody got hurt. The skills required are the same skills you need for road racing: To be able to ride in a pack, group, peloton Draft wheels Conserve energy from drafting and maneuvering in the pack to travel faster with less energy expenditure When I say draft I am speaking about the fact that aerodynamic drag is 30% less riding directly behind a rider in front of you than it is riding with no rider in front of you aka breaking the wind. Over 3-4-5-6 hours + that 30% adds up alot and you can travel farther and faster by riding in a group.  Having a good group to ride with during a gravel race is kinda the holy grail to your performance especially in the final quarter of the race when you are really tired.  You’ll go faster and be more motivated than being stuck out there by yourself in no man’s land questioning your life’s decisions. How do you work on your pack riding gravel skills: why by George practice by riding in groups.  This where a lot of roadies excel and why you see a lot of them coming over to gravel. That and they are aerobic endurance monsters. So to practice you need to seek out opportunities to work on you drafting and your pack riding skills.  This is why we are such fans of the weekend group rides and the weeknight crits and group rides. I said crit – yes – crit racers  are some of the best drafters in the sport of cycling (trackies too) but a good crit racer can draft like nobodies business and out sprint , out kick you on the last lap.  Want to improve your pack riding, drafting gravel skills – do a crit.  Or a road race – that counts too. In fact, the first 30-60 minutes of a gravel race is just like a fast paced road race.  Therefore seek out road races to work on your gravel skills.  Of course you can do gravel races to work on your gravel skills because by doing you are practicing. And with more practice you’ll improve and become more comfortable riding at speed in close proximity to other riders. All the while it is dusty and bumpy. Familiarity plays a big factor. So practice practice practice.  I’ll give you an aside about pack riding skills to put it in perspective for gravel racing.  When I worked for USA Cycling and Directed the US National Women’s Team at all the world cups like Flanders, Drenthe Plouay, etc…  pack riding skills was many time the rider’s biggest challenge. The US National Team would take the best riders in the US used to slower speeds, bigger roads and a not as tight of a pack and put them on narrow unfamiliar roads, higher speeds , closer quarters and that was their biggest challenge. That’s also why racing in Europe is important for athlete development – its a skill that comes from doing.  There’s no practice or drill or workout that is a substitute for riding in the European peloton. The point I want to make is to practice by doing when it comes to your gravel skills.  The more gravel races you do the better you’ll become at them, including our gravel pack riding skills. Okay – that covers the chaotic first 30 minutes of a gravel race but what about after that? After that you will be lucky to be in a smaller group of 6 – 12 riders.  Same skills apply it is just not as scary. Your line of sight is much better! Let’s talk about your line of sight because this is a big gravel skill.  Your line of sight is drafting and looking ahead at the road/trail and seeing the smoother path.  The path of least resistance AND making changes to your line to avoid that rock, or that hole in the dirt or the muddier line. Your line of sight is easier to see when you are out there all by yourself in the latter portion of the race but at the beginning of the race see the dirt is blocked by the pack and your attempt to draft better.   Know why there are so many flats in the first two hours of the Dirty Kanza/Unbound? Because riders are desperate to find a better draft and don’t see the sharp rock because they are literally glued to the wheel in front of them. What’s the skill? Eyes up  #1.  Don’t just look at the wheel just in front of you – looking ahead and around. Look Around # 2 – if possible – you’ll be able to see better by riding an inch or two to the left or the right of the wheel in front of you – riding just to the side gives you a better line of sight.  Sometimes that line of sight comes at the expense of the draft so its a balance.  Do you trust the wheel, the rider in front of you and follow them verbatim or do you ride just a little off to the side? Its a balance – but don’t use your brute strength in the first few hours of the race riding off to the side because that will come back to bite you in the last quarter of the race when you are dog tired. One final gravel skill or tactic is when riding in a group of 20 for example position yourself towards the front but not on the front for a better line of sight. You’ll still have a good draft but less likely to be surprised by a rock, a rut, root, patch of mud etc… Kinda like the Paris-Roubaix entering the Ardennes Forest – be up front. But not on the front…. That covers the roadie esque portion of your gravel skills. You’ll use those at nearly all your gravel races. Let’s shift over to the gravel skills per the terrain – the gravel conditions getting away from the Boulder gucci gravel course and on to the medium and chunky sections – even sections that are like mountain biking. For these sections of a course line of sight is critical and the draft is not that important.  In fact you will negotiate these sections better by not being around other riders.  For example – you’re riding in a pack, drafting well , traveling  faster and life is good but you come to a singletrack section: The skill here is to enter that section first out of the group you are with or if not give the rider in front of you space ahead – like 3-5 bike lengths so you have a clear line of sight to handle the turns, the rocks, mud, slick section, roots, etc…. Often times these sections are only a small fraction of the whole race so my best piece of advice is to try to negotiate them safely and then you can put the hammer down when the technical aspect is over and the gravel road is in better conditions. In cyclocross we use the adage, “you know what’s slower than riding a section carefully? Crashing.” Crashing is slower and often costly to you and your equipment.  I know its cool and all to rail a section like Matthew van der Pool or Christoper Blevins but remember from our podcast with Amity Rockwell – the tortoise beats the hare every time. Your goal for these sections is to safely steadily negotiate your way thru. Gravel Skills include: Check your speed before entering a technical section Eyes up – look ahead Ride light – and by that we mean get up out of the saddle so if you do need to roll over a rock or a root your whole weight sitting on the bike does not compress the tire and potentially damage your rim, cause an flat etc… While you are out of the saddle use your knees and elbows like shock absorbers.  Let the bike move up and down and around underneath you while your arms and legs are extending at your knees and elbows. I took a mountain bike lesson from 2000 World Downhill Mountain Bike Champion Myles Rockwell and he said – ‘dance with the trail’ let the bike move underneath you while you are stable To practice: ride your Gravel Bike on trails! Yea, its fun and will help you train and practice for these portions of your gravel race. So for the Boulder gucci gravel riders – head over to Dowdy Draw where the xc mountain bikers go and practice riding your gravel bike on the singletrack. This reminds me of the announcer of the Crusher and the Tushar which is billed as ‘no matter what bike you choose, you’ll be dead wrong at some point in the race’ – and of course this was in the early days of gravel racing when some choose to ride a mountain bike and some choose to ride a cyclocross bike – the crusher had/has mountain bike sections and road bike sections. These days ride your gravel bike on mountain bike terrain as well as the road.  Be diversified. The more you do it the better you’ll become. Back to the more in the moment skills here are a few more tips to consider and implement when you are out there getting your groad on: Use your rear brake more than your front brake unless the traction is good and consistent.  Like 70 % rear 30% front. This is especially important for descending and corners. Again criterium racers and cyclocrossers have the upper hand here and often times take their skills for granted. For cornering – my number 1 tip is to check your speed before you enter the corner.  While you are coming up on the corner read the line and the terrain. Is it loose and dusty, muddy slick or buttery smooth? How tight is the corner what are the safe speeds? At the Crusher the corners come in the form of switchbacks on the descents and the speeds are really slow. At Steamboat Gravel the corners are more like bends in the road and the speeds are high and some don’t even require braking at all. Just  remembering the tortoise and the hare its better to go thru a corner safely than by crashing. No one ever finishes a gravel race wishing they’d of cornered faster. Descending!  I’m gonna give you all my cyclocross skill tips here: Keep your weight back and feather your front break, use your rear brake more. To get your weight back even further stand up and get your hips behind your saddle over the back wheel. Keep your elbows loose to dance with the terrain and avoid having a death grip on the handlebars.  Be loose and flowy so the bike can move underneath over rocks, roots, etc… Avoid the death grip. Hand position: hoods are ok but for better brake modulation be down in the drops – the curly bars as the enduro folk poke fun of us endurance types. To practice: descend!  For the Bouder gucci gravelers – descending down the gravel section of Sunshine Canyon – it has similarities to Steamboat and the Crusher.  The gravel road at the Crusher get chewed up big time and stutter bumps forms as well the corners get loose. So descend Sunshine when its like that : awful. You can let off the brakes more in the straight sections and check your speed as you enter the corners.  Even in the drops keep your elbows and shoulder loose.  If you can remember to laugh and flap your arms like a chicken you’ll get bonus points. Steam crossings + Roots and Mud: Gravel skills for stream crossings mostly depends on how deep the water is, visibility and the conditions at the bottom.  At the legendary Winter park Tipperary Creek MTB race way back when, Lance Armstrong was racing and came to the famous Tipperary Creek crossing in the lead of the race.  In late summer the water was still running pretty high and there was no visibility to the rocks below. Rumor has it Big Tex did a full on superman endo with a full face plunge into the water. Local honch Jimi Killen who was about a minute or two behind dismounted and overtook Lance for the w. The point here is safe passage is faster than crashing. There’s a lot of stream crossing at Unbound and a lot of flats after because the visibility is poor a riders slam a rock underneath. So run your big tire and don’t be afraid to get off your bike if you can’t see you line. Roots!  There’s dry roots and wet muddy slick roots.  I still have PTSD from racing the NorBA Nationals at Mount Snow and in West Virginia.  If at all possible square off and ride the roots perpendicular.  Whatever you do try to avoid riding a root diagonally because the chances are much higher for the rubber tire to slip sideways on the smooth wet muddy root.  That is nearly impossible at Mt Snow or West Virginia but thankfully I do not know of any gravel course that gnarly. Pick your way over these sections. Light out of the saddle eyes ahead, feather the front brake and this is where doing a course inspection will help a ton.  Ie. riding the course and knowing about the sections coming up. Finally let’s talk about mud! I think we’ve all seen the picture from the Mid-South last year – just soul crushing slow peanut butter heavy mud.  The biggest mud riding skill is a light gear and to keep your momentum, moving forward. Once you stop or dab you are going to probably need to get off an run to a less muddy section or expend a lot of energy to get going again. Fortunately for most of the gravel races out west you’ll be battling dust rather than mud.  But races further east have the potential to be muddy and that means slower speeds and more patience is required. That is more tactics but skills are to simply keep your arms and shoulder loose – and honestly let the bike slide underneath you and keep your center of gravity overtop the bottom bracket.  Avoid the death grip.  Letting the bike slip around in the mud is for sure an acquired skill so how do you practice? That’s right ride in the mud. 10,000 muddy miles for mastery. ha! Alright that’s all the gravel skills I have for you in this podcast, if I missed some please let me know in the comments.  My biggest take home point is that gravel skills is like riding a bike – the more you do it the better you’ll become. So while you are out there FtFP’ing weave 10-20 minutes here and there to ride singletrack or mountain bikey terrain. Use your long gravel simulation rides not only for the physiological aspect of the training but for the skills practice too. Not only uphill but downhill as well! Copyright © 2021 FasCat Coaching – all rights reserved. Join our *FREE* Athlete Forum to nerd out with FasCat coaches and athletes about your FTP, race data, power based training, or anything related to going fast on the bike! To talk with a FasCat Coach about Over Under intervals for your training and racing, please fill out a New Athlete Questionnaire to set up a complimentary coaching consultation. The post Gravel Skills and Tips appeared first on FasCat.

“Happy spouse, happy house” is an important mantra to keep in mind as a cyclist. Training and racing can be a selfish endeavor, and it’s often easy to get sucked into the tunnel vision of goals and TSS and forget about the home life. Coach Frank shares some Valentine’s Day wisdom for finding and keeping balance in the household while still hitting your cycling goals! 59525Sweet Spot part 3 top off your base!” We are having a 30% off Valentine’s Day sale!  Use the coupon code FAST30 for 30% any training plan on FasCatCoaching.com.  Note: if you’ve already used your limit 1 25podcast coupon this is your 2nd chance to save again. Thanks to everyone for tuning in, subscribing and reviewing on Apple Podcasts, and for engaging in our forum! Save 25% on your next training plan with code 25podcast The post The Relationship Podcast appeared first on FasCat.

 Welcome to the 16th edition of our “Ask a FasCat” podcast series, where we gather questions from our forum, website, and social media to help you ride faster!  This round Frank and Lacey dive into questions ranging from course pre-riding, long term development in cycling philosophy, starting training again after a crash, and tons more. Thanks to everyone for the thought provoking questions! 58364Sweet Spot part 3 – as mentioned in the podcast!” The FasCat community now has access to discounts on Stages products, learn more by clicking on the Stages logo in our latest power based training tip “Top 10 Reasons to Ask Santa for a PowerMeter” Show Notes: Leaving post-activity comments: https://fascat.wpengine.com/tips/how-to-leave-post-activity-comments-for-your-coach-and-be-coachable/ Secret Training: To Race or Not To Race: https://fascat.wpengine.com/tips/secrettraining-to-race-or-not-to-race/ How to use the VIPR tube: https://fascat.wpengine.com/tips/how-to-use-a-vipr/ Use 25podcast to receive 25% off your first training plan! Join our *FREE* Athlete Forum to nerd out with FasCat coaches and athletes about your FTP, race data, power based training, or anything related to going fast on the bike! Copyright © 2021 FasCat Coaching – all rights reserved. The post Ask a FasCat #16 appeared first on FasCat.

Show Notes: This week on the podcast we are talking about ways to help you stay motivated!  That’s right motivational tips and tricks to beat the mid-winter blues and follow your plan.  Coach Frank with sound bites from Coaches Isaiah & Jake expand on using these 18 examples to stay motivated in order to achieve your goals: 57324Sweet Spot Part 3 with Over Unders and Criss Cross Intervals Remember your Goals Set a Daily Goal to FtFP (General McRaven’s Make your Bed EveryDay) Make it Turn Green – same as above, daily goal Indoor Training – lower the barrier to completion If you have a 3 hour ride on your plan ride 1.5 hours one way so that you have to ride 1.5 hours to make it back home! Ride a different bike than the day before Ride in a new place or new route Set an FTP – plan a 20 min field test and or a Strava PR into your plan Travel to somewhere warm and sunny Ask yourself what would Alaphilippe Do (WWAD)? Coach Jake :: Zwift Meetups / Group Rides Coach Jake :: get to Daylight Savings Coach Isaiah : focus on progression goals Coach Isaiah :: focus on feeling faster / improvement sensations Sweet Spot TSS rides when there are no group rides Watch a Pro Race – like the World CX Champs in Ostend this past weekend Buy a Training Plan Hire a Coach Watch the podcast here: Listen on Spotify: Phil’s Everesting Video with Coach Frank Dr. Michale Roshon’s VeloNews about early season racing Previous Podcast Episode on Motivation Indoor Workout Motivation Don’t forget Ask a FasCat # 16 is coming up and the deadline to submit your training and racing questions is 5pm mst February 4th. Thanks to everyone for tuning in, subscribing and reviewing on Apple Podcasts, and for engaging in our forum! Save 25% on your next training plan with code 25podcast The post Motivational Tips and Tricks appeared first on FasCat.