EVOQ.BIKE Cycling Podcast

Conserve, conserve, conserve It’s not always a matter of increasing your watts, but increase your execution! Ask yourself “why am I pedaling right now?” Macro and micro! Micro is in the race, macro is the workouts on a day to day level. While I preach #NoCoast on endurance rides, you want to be coasting a TON in a bike race. Save the watts for when it really matters. Imagine a 5 x 5m interval set; the fifth one is brutal. Think about this in terms of race day. Try to make the first interval happen much later in the race; stay as fresh as possible. Don’t close a gap and then find yourself grabbing the brakes; that means you closed it with too many watts! Save the watts! Imagine how strong you’ll be after NOT doing a ton of work. https://youtu.be/7otsYzGfm-0

Shout out to our Physical Therapists!

Four things to discuss: 1) How to effectively race in the chase group 2) Dealing with hot temperatures 3) Having enough left to break away and bridge (or a race winning move), but most importantly, how to pace it. This is not a steady state FTP effort!!! Do that, and you will be caught. 4) My apology for yelling in the feed zone; but please, DO NOT WALK INTO THE ROAD. If your rider cannot come to you, they miss the bottle. Do not cause a wreck to feed a bottle. That said, I should not have cursed and truly apologize for looking like a turd. LactiGo for the win, code Brendan20 if you want to try it. www.lactigo.com/brendan Super fun weekend of bike racing, excited for the next one: NATIONALS!!! https://youtu.be/uTL9ZiG4Knc

Here's a potential future question for you: how should people with limited training time (6-8 hours per week) think about periodization? Chris Carmichael (in Time-Crunched Cyclist) is essentially saying that a traditional base-build-taper really only works for high volume (12+ hour riders), and instead suggests more of an on/off approach (high intensity 11 week build phase, followed by 4-6 week recovery phase, rinse and repeat). Wondering what you think and what recommendations you might have for thinking about planning training across the course of a year.

Glad I didn’t totally ruin the program for the week. I was just shopping for something that delivers endurance-like adaptations in less time. you made a good call, but this is like a one off thing; too much endurace-like ends up usually not being endurance. and even when u hit tempo watts you start to activate glycolytic system which is what we want to avoid. hence my harping on surges duration endurance rides Brendan@EVOQ.BIKE www.linktr.ee/EVOQBIKE

It’s the journey.

Thanks again to James! Part 1 can be found at this link: https://linktr.ee/EVOQBIKE Getting yourself to the point in the race where you can unleash what you are really good at. Seeing the big picture. Now having a coach but not having “every gram planned out” Managing racing and training loads The crazy travel schedule of a World Tour Pro, and managing those last minute calls, “Hey, Go To Milan San Remo” Favorite Intervals: 40/20s and how he arranges them. What do most people have incorrectly about FTP? You’re never flat out, steady state riding, in a race What did James learn from Endure, by Alex Hutchinson. I highly recommend this read! https://amzn.to/2TObA6V Spatial Goals, not pushing versus the clock The only way to know where your limit is, is to find the limit, unfortunately! When you stop getting better….maybe working TOO much! Nutrition: where the peloton has made the most gains in the past 5-10 years. Train your body to utilize the carbs! 120g an hour! 99% of the race is fighting for position https://youtu.be/lLTluUYiNFo

https://linktr.ee/EVOQBIKE

Huge thanks to James for taking the time to do this. We sat down just as he got back from Tour of Rwanda where he was on the GC Podium. Topics below! The soft skills of being a pro: why does he leave in Andorra. He was a Canadian citizen working for an Israeli team and living in Europe. Border crossings can be difficult. James’ trajectory from Local Racing to World Tour Pro. There are so many gems in the humanization of this absolute beast! Talent, potential, and progression: it’s a fairy tale. Benchmarks that he used to measure progress. There was a bit of faith here as it’s not always easy to measure. The character traits needed to become a professional athlete. Reading to become a better athlete. Self coaches athletes; James did it all alone until he reached the World Tour! The obsession with w/kg 2019 Tour of Utah, why is he the most proud of this one? James almost quit cycling! Similar to Taco van der Hoorn. A LOT of athletes experience this feeling of wanting to call it quits Resilience Training: learning what didn’t work Polarized Training: very easy or very hard. Easy means being able to have a conversation with people while riding. 65% FTP or easier. Hard is 400W or up. Tailoring training to the needs of the event. “Where can I make up the most time for the GC?” Using discomfort to increase your fitness is not “suffering”. Intervals: hitting both sides of the power band A little over threshold, and a little under. Small peaks and attacks! Micro bursts in the intervals Once again, another high level athlete points out the obsession with FTP! This does not reflect the skills needed to win a race or be the fastest athlete. James general training philosophy is all about developing skills. You can’t have a weakness. Be an all around! Minimize weaknesses. https://youtu.be/SoQwYMwp9HU

Strava Link: https://www.strava.com/activities/5419750386 Going to run through the pre-race plan and thoughts, strategy for a race with a 7 mile finishing climb when I'm 81kg, and the metrics.  In a couple breaks, then the one that stuck from mile 30-70.   Just imploded at bottom of 7 mile climb.  While I didn’t have grandiose ambitions vs the climbers, finishing the climb pretty cracked is disappointing. Probably a combo of 5 days off and maybe not enough 5h rides lately due to the lowered volume for the QL injury.  ONWARD.  Check out the podcast wherever you stream them! https://youtu.be/CbnI7HZtH5U