I come from a background in time trialling where short term bursts of high power don’t really help in races but, purely out of keeping things interesting and because I struggle mentally with longer intervals, I’ve started Criterium low volume plan.
I’ve discovered that my 30 sec max power is woefully low, I’m 80kg and just about manage to string together 5 x 30 sec at ~550W in sessions like Detling.
How trainable is this aspect of my physiology? By this I mean intervals up to 60 seconds.
It’s not a trick question folks 
Based on what I’ve learned from a short time listening to the podcast, that aspect of your physiology is very trainable. There have been several episodes recently where rider profiling (sprinter vs climber vs other) is discussed as well as training the short neuromuscular efforts, acceleration, as weel as slightly slonger maxmimal efforts. Essentially the takeaway is that it is all trainable and while you may not become a world class sprinter you can dramatically improve your capabilities. The hard part is that you have to train what you want to improve.
If you haven’t regularly been training your sprint why would you expect to have a great sprint?
very trainable…those short efforts require lots of rest between, like a full 10min, so go ALL OUT, then ride very easy.
keep at it, you’ll get better!
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OK thanks, that’s the difference between sessions like Detling where you only get a 4 min rest and getting to full recovery. I should probably clone the session but get the rest interval increased.
The aims of Detling and this new session would clearly be different.
Thanks.
Just to add to this, high power outputs on trainer do not train you to handle the bike at those, possibly can damage the bike too. Putting down a good power is likely impossible without handling the bike accordingly. Doing those outside is of more benefit in my mind…
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100% agree; outdoors is always better and the rider almost always hits higher numbers
I did a three week focus on this back in January. Using the similar workouts to the one you listed, 30s all out with 4 min recoveries. My average over the 6 intervals went up by about 90 watts. The hard part is managing the workload for this sort of training. Ss and threshold work during this block suffered considerably and i ended up losing aerobic fitness, but did end up having a pretty successful short power build and now have that aerobic fitness back with most of the same 30s ability.
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