The Cycling Brief

In this episode, 3 ways to finish long rides strong even if you don’t have time to train your endurance as much as a pro. Working on positioning, both on the bike and in the group, pacing and nutrition you can get most of the way there - while working on your endurance in training. Plus - heat training revisited - a new study that gives us a new protocol and I talk about how I plan to roll this out to the right athletes.  Find more cycling podcasts and information on our coaching and aero services at semiprocycling.com.

The Cycling Brief — Daily cycling intelligence, produced by SEMIPRO CYCLING. 

With a maximum elevation of 171m or 561ft, Denmark is one of the flattest countries on earth, yet, it’s produced some of the world’s best climbers and cross country mountain bikers. The latest of which is Simon Andreassen who recently won an elite men’s cross country Olympic world cup round and today we are going to dig into his training to find out how a mountain biker from Denmark wins a mountain bike world cup race.

In this episode, we get down and dirty with 18 weeks of training before an elite men’s mountain bike world cup win - taking a look at the guy behind the training as well.  Plus - a core body temperature wearable - can you get big performance gains from knowing your core temp in real-time?

Find more cycling podcasts and information on our coaching and aero services at semiprocycling.com.

The Cycling Brief — Daily cycling intelligence, produced by SEMIPRO CYCLING. 

Take a deep dive into the training of Belgium pro Victor Campenaerts as we get a look at his power numbers, training load, FTP, Vlamax, etc. and the methodology and training his coach uses and a bunch of other cool inside info.

Plus - training masks - are they all hype or do they have some specific use cases for cycling?

Find more cycling podcasts and information on our coaching and aero services at semiprocycling.com.

The Cycling Brief — Daily cycling intelligence, produced by SEMIPRO CYCLING. 

Today, the Aero Testing Field Guide, where share everything I know about reducing your CdA, and the process of testing to find the gains.

Plus - another continuous glucose monitor - this time, a sport-specific option that was co-founded by a cyclist and they have signed Team Jumbo-Visma and CANYON//SRAM as partners.

If you want help with aero testing, we offer this as a remote service. For more information or to get started click here.

The Cycling Brief — Daily cycling intelligence, produced by SEMIPRO CYCLING. 

The Power Speed Profile Aerobic Assessment is used to assess your medium and long critical period power.

There are a few important things to understand. 

During the test, you're going to ride two all-out efforts, 4 minutes and 20 minutes in duration. You will need to keep going as hard as you can for the entire duration of both tests. Pacing is important in these tests and covered in the audio.

That’s it. Ridewell.

Note: If you don’t want to go on RPE, have your computer set to display % of FTP for warm up and recovery.

The Cycling Brief — Daily cycling intelligence, produced by SEMIPRO CYCLING. 

On this show a quick and dirty listicle with 7 Common Mistakes that Cyclists Make (and How to Fix Them). 

Plus - in the ‘Science of Fast’ segment two studies that look at how to maintain performance in a transition period. - so you come back stronger than before.

The Cycling Brief — Daily cycling intelligence, produced by SEMIPRO CYCLING. 

In this episode, the components of compound training that deliver long term compounding growth as opposed to short term results. 

Plus - how Chirs Froome loses weight and measures whether he is fueling his training with fats or carbs.

The Cycling Brief — Daily cycling intelligence, produced by SEMIPRO CYCLING. 

The Power Speed Profile Anaerobic Assessment is used to assess your short critical period power so you know understand your current power.

This is day one of this two day assessment. Once completed you can enter your power data at powerspeedprofile.com to get your profile.

Before completing this assessment, here are a few important things to understand. 

During the assessment, you're going to ride a series of all-out sprints increasing in duration from 6 seconds to 30 seconds, to 60 seconds. The longer efforts will be challenging but will only hurt for a little while.

You will need to keep going as hard as you can for the entire duration of the effort.

You can start each effort as a standing sprint then sit down to finish out the time.

That’s it. Ridewell.

Note: If you don’t want to go on RPE, have your computer set to display % of FTP for warm up and recovery.

The Cycling Brief — Daily cycling intelligence, produced by SEMIPRO CYCLING. 

Critical periods, such as the forcing of a break-away or a final sprint, are often decisive in a cycling race. It is therefore important to know how you perform on these critical periods and how these performances relate to the performance of competitors.

Yes, it's another power profile test but this test takes as much effort as any other test, it's free, and it gives you the information that is missing from other test protocols, that is, performance in 8 different critical periods in racing and using aerodynamic drag it differentiates between the climbing and time trial qualities of a rider.

Plus - I have made an audio version of the test - why audio? - There are some intervals that should not be capped by power prescription - it’s kind of like erg mode on a trainer - it might be holding you back.

Find more cycling podcasts at semiprocycling.com.

The Cycling Brief — Daily cycling intelligence, produced by SEMIPRO CYCLING. 

In this episode - intervals, what is the optimal interval prescription in 2020, what does the latest science say and does it change the way we’ve been doing intervals?

Plus - foam rolling - 8 years after it first came up on this podcast - does a new review give us any scientific evidence to stop foam rolling?

Find more cycling podcasts at semiprocycling.com.

The Cycling Brief — Daily cycling intelligence, produced by SEMIPRO CYCLING.