have you thought about addressing this through strength work in the gym?
Of course I have, I lift twice a week. Raw strength isnāt much of an issue. I have in my past repped front squats at 255 and a 405 deadlift at 155lbs. My riding style has always been higher cadence. I donāt have much need to generate large torqueā¦ itās a weakness, not a limiter.
Nice.
Strength aside might also want to look at some explosive work in gym if youāre doing it already to supplement bike.
Any jumping, box jump, drop jumps, etc will help the bike work.
Itās not a limiter for me. Iāll worry more about it when it is.
Unlike slow climbing on a mountain bike, on the road I would think that torque generation isnāt an issue for many. Except perhaps sprinting, but thatās more about having a strong PCr energy system and some fast glycolytic energy.
During winter base training it only takes me 3-4 weeks to get comfortable extending my useable cadence range from 50rpm to 95rpm.
That and actually being able to coordinate the movement. Itās always interesting watching some people try to sprint and just the lack of coordination to do it. Similar to a golf swing.
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exactly.
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My sprint is decent for a skinny 45 year old. Iām not planning to win bunch sprints, but I have snap and good enough peak power to hold my own in Cat 2/3 bunch sprints against younger guys. Hence Iām not worried about the strength/torqueā¦ I do strength train, but any low cadence stuff is more about power though a complete circle, muscular endurance, etc.
My low cadence training, when done long enough, say 2-4 hours in a session about once a month, usually results in improved efficiency factor within 2 weeks. Probably some other stuff too but that one I can clearly measure. No idea why it works, just know that there has been and continues to be a clear dose/response.
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and right on queue, even though its only been 5 days, resting heart rate dropped again to lowest Iāve ever recorded. I donāt do a lot of low cadence work, but doing it on longer climbs is when it seems to deliver the best adaptations. I have some guesses but its just that, guesses based on the observation I can climb for hours with a stable HR (around my field estimated aerobic threshold) while holding a relatively high torque.
This morning listened to Tom Bell on That Triathlon Show podcast (Scientific Triathlon), and once again the low cadence discussion turned to athlete anecdotes (āworks for someā) as there is no clear evidence from studies.
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Yeah, I am playing with it. Iām definitely spending some time climbing at lower cadence, and itāll be something I do more in my next block where I plan to do more extensive SST and Tempo (rather than threshold) because Iām going to be lifting heavy as well.
I love Kolieās podcast and methodology - Iām a big fan! - but I do think he takes the science part of it a bit too far sometimes in terms of not really seeming to want to support anything that doesnāt have a study behind it. I get it, but I think there are some things out there that work, and that sometimes coaches find those before the scientists do.
That said, Iām not sure I would read a whole lot into thisā¦
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yes, I agree to not reading much into that alone. However I didnāt paint the complete picture.
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Finding my way around WKO5 has not been overly difficult. Am taking the normal geek approach of refusing to RTFM until I get stuck (lol lol lol)
To save me some searching and readingā¦ is there a ābest practicesā to feed WKO5 the data it needs to model the new metrics?
Iām unlikely to go all in on this as it wonāt alter my plans for fall and winter. But if itās relatively simple, might thrown in the efforts just to have something to play with while learning the software.
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Yes, see webinar here:
Specifically the section that deals with updating the model, and then residuals.
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Many thanks for the time save!
WKO5 release 584 was available to download today (MacBook). The pop up mentioned adding support for HRV channel in .FIT files, however I updated WKO and poked around for a couple minutes and couldnāt find anything in my FIT files (I enabled HRV recording 3 years ago on my Garmin 530).
Iām not on WKO FB group, anyone have more info on where to find the HRV data in my workouts? A quick search on the workout level didnāt show any new graphs related to search terms āHRVā or āheart rate variabilityā
Oh, forgot to add, the release notes at this moment donāt have release 584:
Pretty sure HRV data for workouts will only show for workouts uploaded after the update. You can also see on the workout details tab if hrv channel is present in a workout. hrv is under data channel named hrv. Do you have an hrv chart setup? if not you can create one with hrv expression
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Thanks, the first place I looked workout details to see if the HRV channel appeared. Was hoping the updated WKO would open the FIT file and āseeā the HRV channel upon selecting a workout, but perhaps it is cached for performance reasons.
Too lazy to delete and reupload yesterdayās workout, Iāll see what happens after I ride today.
Iām seeing HRV info w/my run this morning (Run and Workout Insights Run). Itās probably in other places as well 
It looks like I spoke too soon 
I see HRV label on the graph but no values. Guess Iāll have to poke around some more.
yup, rode tonight and hrv channel tag appeared on details. Then I created a simple graph of time vs HRV.
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