- Welcome to another
edition of Ask GCN Anything.
Coming back faster than
Peter Sagan did with a win
after being chucked
off the Tour de France.
And due to popular demand, again this week
we're going to extend
the rapid-fire round.
But first off, two slower,
longer-form questions,
the first of which is from
rob123 in the comments section,
who asks, "How do you guys,
the legendary GCN presenters,"
Thanks very much, Rob.
"How do your FTP compare now to"
"back in the day when
you were professional?"
Well, Rob, thanks very much
for getting in contact.
This question did actually get quite
a lot of likes in the comment section.
Now, Lasty and Dan
didn't particularly want
to share too much information with us
in relation to this particular question.
I don't really know why, but Simon was
happy to give some information.
Now, Si is without a doubt the fittest
of all the GCN presenters, still.
And his FTP is only about 5% lower
than it was when he was racing as a pro,
which, I think you'll all
agree, is mightily impressive.
And that actually equates
to around 20 watts,
So Simon is still pretty fit.
Now, in relation to me, well,
I do try and keep myself
as fit as I possibly can,
but due to working at GCN,
I can't do anywhere near
the amount of miles that
I used to, although I do
commute to work most days,
and a lot of the riding
that I actually do is
relatively high intensity,
because my commute is very hilly.
And I also jump on Zwift and do
a lot of work on the home trainer.
But, I am fair bit older
than Simon and my FTP,
from a percentage
perspective is actually about
16% down on what it used
to be when I was a pro,
which equates, roughly, to about 60 watts.
Now, all this talk of FTP, of course
Functional Threshold Power,
got us thinking a while back.
Is it really that important?
- FTP is one thing, but we also talk
a hell of a lot about
power-to-weight ratio.
The higher that ratio is, the better
the climber you're going to be.
So, to state some current examples, like
Chris Froome, Alberto
Contador, and Nairo Quintana,
have enormously high
Functional Threshold Powers,
but they also weigh next to nothing.
So that's why they are
world-class climbers.
- Next up we have this
question over on Twitter, from
Joe DeSapio, who asks, "I've
never seen my heart rate"
"above 169 beats per minute."
"Am I super weak"
"super strong, or is my
heart-rate monitor broken?"
"Could that be my maximum heart rate?"
Great question, Joe, thanks
very much for getting in touch.
Now, without knowing a
little bit more about you,
or in fact a lot more about
you, it's very, very difficult
to answer that question
specifically because
there are so many
different factors at play,
like your age, how fit
you are, for example,
how much riding you do, but
the most important thing
when considering heart rate
and thinking about heart rate
is that you shouldn't ever
compare it directly to anybody else's.
It is completely unique to you.
You could react differently
to somebody the same level
of fitness with the same
kind of training stimulus,
for example, although,
of course, there are
healthy, ballpark resting heart ranges
depending on your sex and your age.
And of course, resting heart
rate is a great indicator
of disease, for example,
level of fitness, and fatigue.
So, it still could be that
169 is actually your maximum heart rate,
but to get to the nub of that,
we need to fully understand how,
and what method you used
to get to that point.
i.e. did you ride to exhaustion?
Now, what you need to do to establish your
maximum heart rate and to be sure of it
is follow the handy guide in this video.
Now though establishing your FTHR
is relatively straightforward,
(heavy breathing)
you need to bear in mind a few things,
a few factors that could
change things somewhat.
There can be floats, and your
heart rate can be elevated,
or some times even decreased
if you're particularly fatigued
(heavy breathing) and also
if you're training in warm
and hot conditions, your heart
rate could be elevated, too
by as much as five to 10 beats.
Now, it also takes a while for
your heart rate to increase.
So, although you're actually riding at FTP
from the start of your
effort, it could take
from between five and 15 minutes
for your heart rate to
catch up with your power.
Okay, rapid-fire round.
Apparently I did okay last week.
Got 11 questions this week.
Three, two, one, let's go!
Matt Geraghty in the comments
section, "With Froome winning"
"the tour four times
over on Osymetric rings,"
"why don't they get more
love and acknowledgement?"
First off, they do take a little bit
of a while to get used to.
I know a lot of riders have tried them,
don't really get on with them too much.
And also, they're a massive
faff for mechanics as well.
So, they haven't really caught on
in the way that perhaps
we thought they might.
That's my answer to that one.
Next up, we have this
from Eugene Bachinskiy:
"How do you recover morally,"
in terms of your morale, "after a crash?"
"Being a novice, my wife
has recently crashed"
"on descent at 50 k's an hour,"
Sorry to hear that, mate."
"Luckily, she didn't break
anything, but the crash"
"was quite nasty and she
feels very very anxious."
"How does she get back into it?"
What you need to do, basically,
is slowly, incrementally,
reintroduce yourself,
or reintroduce your wife
back into descending.
What you need to do is not rush it.
That's the most important thing.
Don't rush and don't ride
out of your comfort zone.
And also, people in those sorts
of situation react generally
quite well to some really
understanding support,
so give your wife a lot of support,
get her back on the road,
but don't rush things.
And also, importantly,
remind her of the fact that
she descended perfectly well before
and all she needs to do
is get back to that point.
It just needs patience.
Next up is this from Bruno
Puype, or Bruno Puype,
"Should the UCI change the supply rule?"
"Not drinking or eating isn't healthy."
"Supply in the last kilometres
from stationary people?"
I don't really think they
need to change the rule.
Thanks for getting in
touch, Bruno, by the way.
First 50 k's, no feeding,
plenty of opportunity with
two bottles on board, lots
of stuff in your back pocket,
and then of course no
feeding with the last 20 k's.
What you will see the UCI doing,
or commissaires with a good
backbone and good common sense,
is they can actually disregard the rules
in the last 20k should
the conditions dictate.
So in particularly hot
conditions, i.e. the grand tour
on a mountaintop finish, they can actually
make a decision to actually drop that rule
so riders can feed pretty
much all the way to the line,
or within the last 5k.
It just takes a little
bit of common sense,
so I don't actually think
the rules need changing.
All you need is strong
commissaires, race referees
with a good bit of common sense.
Next up is this from Sean Bailey,
"How good would Matt Stephens have been"
"if he could have clipped in?"
"I mean he was national champion
without even clipping in."
"Maybe if he could clip in,"
"he would have won the Tour de France."
Not sure about that really, man,
but thank you very much for raising it.
And Zwolle has got in touch.
"Hello, do pro cyclists
listen to music when riding?"
"Do you?"
"I found drum and bass
to be very good training"
"as well as for riding."
Personally, I don't listen to
music out on the open road,
and I'm not sure that many pros do.
It's a little bit dangerous to
be perfectly honest with you.
You want to hear what's
going on around you.
So, my advice would be don't
listen to music on the road,
but, if on the home trainer
indoors, fill your boots.
Rock and roll, drum and bass, yeah.
I liked a bit of indie,
to be perfectly honest
with you, back in the day.
Next up is this from Michael Green.
"Seems like many pros and GCN presenters"
"don't wear gloves any more."
"What is going on?"
"Are gloves no longer cool?"
Michael, it's all about the tan.
So, basically, when we're out training,
wanna get a proper tan on our hands,
not that kind of weird cyclist tan,
but if I was back racing,
I would be wearing gloves.
The vast majority of riders
still wear gloves when racing,
but training, it's all about the tan.
Next up is this from bikeboy1976,
"What is the best way to
break in new cycling shoes?"
Well, these days cycling
shoes are that well made,
made of a lot of modern synthetic fabrics,
you don't really need to break them in
like you would a leather
shoe, for example.
The only breaking in
that you kinda need to do
is to make sure you do a couple of rides,
a couple of longish
rides to make sure that
the cleat is in the correct position.
But in terms of breaking
in the actual shoe,
well you can pretty much
ride with them straight away.
But my advice would be,
if you got an important
sportive, event, or a race,
give yourselves a few days
just to make sure the cleat
is in the perfect position
as won't give you
problems with your knees.
Next up is this from Sebas:
"Hands and arms as relaxed
as possible during climbing,"
"or pulling back to help?"
"I've heard both."
It's a bit of a combination.
You need to grip the
bars reasonably firmly
but not tightly, just so your
arms have a little bit of give
and you can pull a little bit,
but you certainly shouldn't be
gripping the bars knuckle tight,
just that nice kind of
happy medium in between.
Tom Blount has got in touch.
"What happened to #SayHiOnYourRide?"
Well, it's still there, Tom, I hope!
I'm encouraging people all the
time to say hi on their ride,
and quite a lot of the comments
on Facebook and Twitter,
people are saying they still do it.
It hasn't gone away.
In fact, let's try and
get it trending again.
So, it's never gone away.
Please always say hi on your ride.
Brian D has got in touch.
"Since you've done videos on
the neutral support vehicles,"
"why not show us the
broom wagon in detail?"
What an absolutely cracking idea.
We'll try and do that at the Vuelta.
Dan's going out there.
Finally, Wes Glassford has said,
"Hey, GCN, is there a known
cure for the N+1 equation?"
"I'm suffering today."
"Keep me off the internet!"
Well the N+1 equation is always
basically wanting a new bike
as well as the bike you've already got.
Sadly, Wes, there is no known cure.
Well, I hope you enjoyed
that rapid-fire round.
Just gonna slow things
down with one more question
before we end this week's show.
This question is from the
comments section, from Ritchey T,
who asked, "How fast or
good do you have to be"
"until you should start
worrying about being aero?"
Well that is a really,
really good question,
which I'll answer as best
as I can, using science.
Now as long as you're
moving through the air,
aerodynamic drag will
account for some proportion
of the energy that you need expend.
Although, there's no real
kinda magic threshold
at which aerodynamic
drag suddenly appears,
but let's take slow speed first.
So, let's assume that you're
travelling on a bike at 10
kilometres an hour, six miles an hour,
and let's also assume
that you're at sea level,
there's not much wind, and
it's on a pretty smooth road surface.
Well, at that sort of speed,
aerodynamic drag will account for 25%
of your total energy expenditure,
and the other 75% will
be rolling resistance.
So, let's speed things up a little bit,
again, to put it into
some further context.
If you're travelling
around 40 to 45 k an hour,
even up to 50 k an hour,
then you're looking at
around 80% of your energy
is spent on aerodynamic drag
and then 20% on rolling resistance.
And that will, of course,
depend on many, many factors,
primarily, how aerodynamic you are,
how aerodynamic your equipment is,
and obviously, how small a
hole you punch through the air.
To put it in even more
perspective, when Bradley Wiggins
broke the hour record, remember
it was 54.526 kilometres in the hour,
his total expenditure of
energy on aerodynamic drag
was 90%, and then 10%
on rolling resistance.
So, in answer to your question,
aerodynamics really is everything,
especially if you wanna go
faster and more efficiently.
And we actually look at this very subject
in a bit more detail in this video here.
- [Narrator] The difference
simply swapping your jersey
and your helmet, then,
was a quite remarkable
one kilometre per hour,
nearly, at 200 watts.
And then at 300 watts and 400 watts,
again the difference went up
to nearly two kilometres per hour,
which is quite remarkable for
such a small change, I think.
- Well that's it for another
edition of Ask GC Anything.
Please keep those questions coming,
using the hashtag #torqueback
down in the comments section
or across on social media.
Now if you haven't
already subscribed to GCN,
it is absolutely free if
you click on the globe.
That way, you won't miss another video,
two of which I'm going
to point to right now.
How about clicking just down here
for how to train like a pro
with the Cannondale-Drapac team.
Or click just up here for six reasons
we think you may need a power metre.
And don't forget to like and share, too.
