I snipped that at start of pandemic unfortunately tried looking for it recently, but could not find it. But the training emphasis begins with Zone and doesnât end 3,4,5 or 6âŠ
In terms of efficiency of the muscles if you think about it
The lower the heart rate the more time there is for the left ventricle to fill with blood. Peak stroke volume for your typical amateur is 50-65% of max HR
The more capillaries you have in muscle the slower the blood moves through them
The slower the blood moves through a capillary the easier it is for the muscle to extract the oxygen and get rid of metabolites
The larger the mitochondria and the more there are in the muscle cell. The more energy can be produced at easier cost
The more H+ ions remain in the muscle cells, the more muscle contraction is hindered and more muscle fibre units needs to be recruited to provide the required force and frequency of contraction.
The muscles donât extract 100% of the oxygen in the blood that is passing. But the bigger your aerobic base the greater the percentage that gets extracted with each heart beat.
Separating it from overall weight/ lifestyle down to actual sporting performance, Iâd have it only a few years that carb intake has really come into itâs current focus? The likes of Fuglsang saying heâd effectively been under fuelling for years after a stellar 2019. 2018 was Froomeâs SIS Beta Fuelled stage of the giro.
Well, thatâs not entirely accurate. Consistent underfueling in high level athletes may lead to some initial weight loss, but with time, the body may start compensating in other ways. This is especially prevalent in those carrying large training loads. Many of the symptoms fall under the RED-s diagnosis, and include poor sleep, poorly regulated hormones, bone mineral density loss, just to name a few. Furthermore, large training loads tend to suppress appetite and raise cortisol levels. A suppressed appetite will naturally lead to a decreased calorie intake, and higher cortisol levels may very well counteract the long term weight loss this would otherwise induce. It is worth keeping in mind that these symptoms and issues are most prevalent in high level athletes, or at least those carrying heavy training loads, but simply relying on scale weight to make sure you accurately compensate for caloric expenditure may not work for all.
Well yes, itâs well documented that a number high level athletes in various sports have developed poor relationships with food. But for the vast majority of us, not put under those pressures, itâs quite easy to have a good relationship with food not end anywhere near RED-s and be able to consume enough of the right stuff without needing a number off a device.
There will always be a small minority at the extremes.
Absolutely, I donât disagree with that point at all! In my original response in this thread, I pointed out that this is all likely irrelevant to those not carrying exceptional training loads. However, with this, it may still be important to recognise that there will be a small subset of athletes that cannot rely on hunger cues and scale weight to ensure sufficient calorie intake - thatâs all!
In other words the entire premise of your question is false. You have no clue what power your buddy is riding at. Only what speed. Even if you both weigh the same and are the same height and ride the same equipment, your power will be different.
Why? Aero is a large fraction of the power and aero drag of your body is over 80% of all aero drag. So you would have to be twins with identical bike setup and identical ride position.
You canât tell a damn thing about your buddyâs power without your buddy using a power meter. And therefore drawing any conclusions about calories is also highly inaccurate.
Reading this reminded me of an article I read sometime ago about maximising stroke volume during sub max intervals in non elite athletes. Iâd forgotten about it but have managed to find it now.
One way of doing the intermittent would be to leave your trainer setup and just hop on it for 10 mins every hour.
Itâs interesting that they donât know what the minimum recovery period needs to be and whether it needs to be complete rest or you could drop to say Z1 for a minute then back into Z2 when outdoors.
Iâve been working on a Garmin IQ real time aerobic decoupling data field. I currently have the defaults at 20 mins warm up, and 45 mins baseline. I might do an outing where I set warm up to 1 minute and baseline to 10 mins and see what it reports as it tracks a 10 minute efficiency factor window against baseline. Only need to be out for 30 mins or so, to see what it reports. The field is recorded into the fit file but I donât currently save it into lap data. I might do that so I can get it broken down into 10 minute lap windows automatically. Though I did have negative coupling yesterday, stroke volume increasing as ride progressed!
right thats why I said âI really didnât think that throughâ ! he does use a power meter indoors on his trainer and its basically the same thing, he burns a hell of alot more per hour than i do.
Maybe TR is using net efficiency, which subtracts your BMR from the equation.
Gross efficiency is lower because it includes more than just the work you are doing. It also varies pretty wildly depending on how fast you are, because the harder you ride, the less of the total is being lost to your basal metabolism.
I could be wrong, thoughâŠ
Personally, I want to be told what my net work calories are, not my total calories were doing the ride.
Resting calories are more or less fixed, so knowing totals is really only useful from a perspective of fueling on the bike. As someone more interested in weight loss than absolute performance, net is more relevant.
It does vary based on how fast (well, powerful) an athlete is. Gross efficiency does increase as power does. However, even at 275 watts, riders in some studies previously linked to displayed an average GME of around 21.5%. That is still miles off from 23.9%, and at wattages that high it makes a big difference.
I would be very surprised if TR uses net efficiency in their algorithm, but even if they were, net efficiency still isnât that high. Most athletes in the studies are 65-68kg on average and likely have a BMR between 1700-1850 calories. Divide that by 24 hours in a day and thatâs 80 calories on the high end. 80 calories doesnât really come close to compensating for the discrepancy between 23.9% and 20.7% GME, even at low wattages, especially considering GME is even lower at lower intensities. Just my two cents, I really donât think net efficiency is useful.
In terms of weight loss, I would argue that youâre doing yourself a disservice by not acknowledging a lower GME and higher caloric expenditure. The goal of weight loss is not to be in the largest deficit possible, so if youâre aiming for a 500 calorie deficit each day but also burning 250 calories more than you think during cycling training, youâre likely to set yourself back in the long run. Large calorie deficits are not necessarily practically unsustainable, but physically unsustainable. You may be able to simply refrain from eating and create a larger deficit, but large deficits quickly lead to metabolic compensation and physiological adaptation. Thus, what starts out being a 750 calorie deficit ends up only being a net 400 calorie deficit with time as your body down regulates metabolism and other bodily functions. All people will experience this during a weight loss journey, but those that create a large deficit too quickly will experience it much sooner than those taking a slower approach. At some point, everyonesâ bodies will adapt to a lower calorie intake, and to continue losing weight, a lower daily calorie intake/larger expenditure must be implemented. However, the slower you go abut things, the more likely you are to experience such problems further along your journey. In summary, simply being unaware of how large your calorie expenditure on the bike is may induce a larger calorie deficit than you intend to do with food restriction. Thus, your body down regulates metabolic processes and such more quickly, and you end up struggling to lose weight long term although the initial period may have worked fine. Again, just my two cents, but Iâve got some (well, too much) experience with under eating to recommend it
