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Post by Russ on Feb 12, 2010 23:03:02 GMT
Try a sprinters trick, pick a massive gear about 40rpm and then go for it up to 140rpm, changing gear wastes to much time for them. No good spinning all the time you need to balance it with strength work now and then.
Mark, bit of a guess but it sounds like a combination of two things, you have got fitter so it means a lot harder work to get towards the max, plus you have settled into a bit of a comfort zone.
My own way to shake this all up is to get out on my singlespeed, builds up the leg strength plus if you ride the same routes you normally do it knocks you well outside that comfort zone the only way to get to the top is give up or really go for it.
At the end of the day the difference between riders often comes down to those who only go out for big rides at the weekend and those that sneak in a ride during the week whenever they can, the commute, the sneaky lunchtime ride etc.. It all counts...
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Post by danevs on Feb 12, 2010 23:15:57 GMT
you have got fitter so it means a lot harder work to get towards the max, plus you have settled into a bit of a comfort zone. No it doesn't, but he will be more efficient throughout the range. How could it be harder to reach your max the fitter you get? You will be going faster/further for a given effort but how could it possibly be "harder?" I'm really interested to hear the justification for this one.
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Post by Russ on Feb 12, 2010 23:37:37 GMT
Do I have to get into the physics regarding mass, friction, wind resistance etc...
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Post by Mark on Feb 12, 2010 23:38:27 GMT
well since before xmas i have been doing some 90 mins rides on the roadie at a fair pace (to get back in time for the afternoon school run after geting up early with working permanent nightshift) twice a week, 2 sessions in the works gym concentrating on building all over muscle strength with high Rep/low weight workouts. at the weekend i try to get at least a decent 4 hour ride in at a fair pace to help build endurance. Now the plan to peak in time for the dyfi in may means i now need to start upping the training to involve some interval/sprint training and increase the weights a little in the gym Heres how my week looks so far. Mon. rest Tues am (After a niteshift before going home to bed!! ) 90 mins gym Wed Pm Road ride 90 min Thurs Pm Gym 60min Fri Pm 120min + Road/mtb ride Sat Rest Sun Road/ Mtb ride 4hrs
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Post by Russ on Feb 12, 2010 23:41:31 GMT
It's too late to get to deep into it, but what it comes down to is like a lot of things, there are large improvements to be had for minimal effort to start with but then things get a lot harder, smaller and smaller increases in performance require lots more hard work, time and effort.
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Post by S3dINS (AKA Nik) on Feb 12, 2010 23:43:01 GMT
russ is right. The fitter you get the more efficient your heart works pumping more blood for fewer beats so your resting HR gets lower while your max HR gets higher. The rest of the muscles use oxygen more efficiently so your heart doesn't need to work so hard and it's more difficult to reach higher heart rates unless you really push.
Like I said, it's a deep science.
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Post by danevs on Feb 13, 2010 13:08:44 GMT
Do I have to get into the physics regarding mass, friction, wind resistance etc... Yes, go on... Your statement was you have got fitter so it means a lot harder work to get towards the max, I want to know how mass/friction/drag have any effect on this, how does being fitter make it harder to reach your max heart rate??? Like I said, it's a deep science. If only all the folk I race with were as knowledgeable with regards to this "deep science" as yourself and Russ, competing would be a doddle.
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Post by oldgit on Feb 13, 2010 14:21:34 GMT
Been there done that! Now I use a HRM to see if I'm still alive!!!!!!
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Post by dyls on Feb 13, 2010 15:12:48 GMT
I've been using a heartrate monitor for well over 5 years and whilst i think its good for reminding you you're alive, the only other reason I use it was to keep logs of my excercises/calories burned. I find it impossible to keep within zones on the hills around Blaenau, although I do admit to liking my gadgets.
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Post by S3dINS (AKA Nik) on Feb 13, 2010 15:49:03 GMT
"Individuals respond to exercise in different ways. This is one of the reasons for using a monitor to determine heart rate (rather than using tables and charts). Under a constant workload, the heart rate of a fit person increases more slowly than that of an unfit person. Differences in skill and technique during exercise also affect heart rate, and a person's heart rate can vary from day to day. Other factors affecting max heart rate include age, gender, stress, disease and fitness level, along with genetic factors." From www.collegesportsscholarships.com/using-a-heart-rate-monitor.htm"As your body begins to adapt, you will discover that you must exercise harder and faster than before in order to keep your heart rate at the same level it was in your initial workouts. For instance, you may find that when you first began to train that your rate reached 165 BPM while running two miles in sixteen minutes. A month later, you may find that your heart rate only reached 156 BPM while running at the same pace. You will then have to run faster to keep your heart rate intensity in the same training zone as before. Another adaptation that can be measured by heart rate is how fast you recover from exercise. As your condition improves, you will find that you can recover from exercise faster. For example, you may find that two minutes after an exercise session in which your heart rate reached 170 BPM you may have recovered to 128 BPM. Several weeks later, you may find that you can recover to 120 BPM in two minutes after the same bout of conditioning." from grfx.cstv.com/photos/.../auto_pdf/AerobicConditioning.pdf I suppose this might explain why some runners choose to start running up hills and mountains in order to keep pushing themselves, but as mountain bikers we already start by trying to go up hills. Having gears will make a difference to this argument too because if you are excersising at too low a level you can allways try to stay at the same speed but shift up to a higher gear. Dan, I understand where you are coming from but you are restricted to how fast your legs will turn even if you are the fittest guy on earth and you can turn the highest gear
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Post by danevs on Feb 13, 2010 18:17:29 GMT
Everything there makes sense Nik but it's all about efficiency and not the supposed increased difficulty in reaching max HR that Russ mentioned.
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Post by S3dINS (AKA Nik) on Feb 13, 2010 18:56:45 GMT
It may be that the heart becomes efficient at a faster rate than the rest of the body, so as it gets more efficient it's able to move more blood for each individual pump but the legs for instance take a while longer to become as efficient. The result would be that your legs are working almost as hard on ride 12 as they were on ride 11 with a slight improvement but the heart has gained a significant boost since it doen't actually stop workng so it's not going to lose it's ability to work efficiently as other muscles.
By ride 15 the legs would be at a similar level of efficiency as the heart was at ride 12 so the legs are always playing catch up. The lungs will be working as hard (with small improvements each ride) as the body is still screaming for more oxygen but the heart is more efficient so at ride 15 the heart only needs to beat 150 times as opposed to the 160 times it was beating on ride 12. The legs and lungs are still having to work hard but the heart isn't so it would seem to my mind it comes down to how much pain you can put yourself through to get to the higher BPMs.
Another way to look at it is-
An unfit fat bloke who has never exercised will get to his maximum heart rate a lot quicker than someone who walks their dog everyday simply because his body is struggling to do the simplest exercise. at the same time the guy who walks his dog every day is going to reach high BPM faster than one of us who rides regularly. Again we are going to hit our high BPM faster than a pro athlete who runs all day doing marathons for a living. It's about relative input per given % of BPM. Also as you get fitter your max heart rate will inevitably go up. It's not about how much effort is being put in but rather how the heart reacts when the effort is put in.
I'm not sure I can put it any other way and I may be completely missing the point but hey I tried.
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Post by Damon on Feb 13, 2010 20:24:07 GMT
I can testify to the fact it is easy to get my heart rate very high as I am out of shape.
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Post by danevs on Feb 13, 2010 20:48:22 GMT
I can testify to the fact it is easy to get my heart rate very high as I am out of shape. I can hit max HR (201) in next to no time and almost on demand and as far as bike racers go I'm decidedly average. I'm pretty certain I could hit my max HR much faster than you Damon and you're just starting out after a bad injury.
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Post by Damon on Feb 13, 2010 20:57:13 GMT
I am having this discussion with my Wife atm.
She ran the Helsby half in 1:32, her avg 174bpm, resting 47bpm. Looking at the data from her Garmin her bpm didn't raise much on the climbs so I said she was backing off and she could break the 1:30 if she didn't...but she disagrees as she says their wasnt anymore power in her legs than she put in...so its kinda like even though the heart could cope and transfer the oxygen as she hasn't done the hill work she could (she admits she needs to do more hills).
Complex issue.
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