Small Ring Sprints on the Trainer

There is a drill I like to do outside where I go in the little ring, slightly more than mid-cassette and from a really slow roll try to spin it out as fast as possible. I’ve used to this to improve snap and it usually results in a new max power. Would anyone have any recommendations as to what the best resistance setting would be on a kickr for doing this? I ideally like to do these outside but I want to get more consistent with doing them and thus it’d be good to know a good way to do them on the trainer.

This relates to an existing discussion you may want to review.

In general, the ERG From Sprints run a way quickly, so the first 3-5 seconds are kind of the important part, but adding the ability to control that fast spin in the latter half (of the typical 10 seconds sprints) is worthwhile as well.

These Form Sprints are common in workouts like Pettit, and others that are often around 60-70% of FTP.

You can find more by going to the Workouts section on the web, and searching for “form sprint”.

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Like Chad mentioned, you can do them in ERG mode.
However, if you want to play with other settings, you could try Standard/Slope Mode in level 3, or mess with the different levels in Resistance mode to find one that lets you start with a really slow-force pedal stroke but that you can spin out. Again, ERG mode is probably your best friend here since it will do both, and adjust to your speed as you increase your cadence.

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Kind of, I’m explicitly looking to not use ERG mode. So another way to ask the question would be, is there a resistance level that most accurately resembles a flat road? It seems like 30% may be the place to start? Is there a way to check the peak power immediately after (But still in the ride) without having a pre-programmed interval?

  • I think a low value in Standard Mode (1-3) might be what you want.
  • In Resistance mode, that is probably good. I use 25-30% for various workouts and that is a good place to start.
  • Not that I know of in TR. You would need something like a separate device capturing the power data to review.