I’m fortunate to own both a road bike and an XC mountain bike (being delivered as I write this). My road bike has a 170 mm crank arm, and the mountain bike will have a 175 mm crank arm. The MTB is intended to be my fun machine—I used to ride MTB a lot in the past and I want to rekindle that joy.

Since I plan to switch between bikes frequently, I’m wondering if the difference in crank arm length will be an issue. I’m not a pro and don’t spend my entire week on the bike, plus the forces applied during riding differ between the two disciplines.

I’m also considering buying a power meter in the future and using the opportunity to further reduce the road crank arm length to 167.5 mm, making the difference even bigger. Will this be noticeable, or is it nothing to worry about?

Thanks!

When riding on Zwift it tells your your w/kg but it's based on your body weight which makes sense because everyone has the same system weight. Outside though it's different. Not everyone has the same system weight due to varying bikes, water bottle sizes, tools, clothing etc. As such, on my power meter, should I measure my w/kg by my body weight or my body weight + system weight?

I appreciate that focusing on w/kg is unhealthy or not the best metric but I like it as a way to compare myself against those better than me, particularly because I'm a hill climber.

Thanks!

Edit: thanks all for your responses! Much appreciated

https://preview.redd.it/s1xft0e58q4e1.png?width=797&format=png&auto=webp&s=e8f13a05374a732d75e7739eaf4d8a3b0885bf90

Above is a snipet of my recent idea for a traning plan. It will gradually increase in duration and load over a four week period. Been doing 18-20h since june, but when the indoor season started, my form collapsed, even with good ammount of rest and weeks that i know should work.

So for this i want to have some input. I really like the idea of having two easy days in between, so i can be well rested for vo2.
The first week is pretty modest with a 14h total. Last week is around 18.5h. Doing 4 weeks before recoveryweek is added.

For example if 1 person did a 5 hour ride straight with no breaks and another person did a 2 hour ride in the morning and a 3 hour ride in the afternoon, so they both have the same total hours (same intensity, same fueling etc.) which one would be better off?

I can't seem to find a definitive answer on this after some searching. If on a sufficiently steep hill air resistances is minimal and on the flats and decent air resistances increases exponentially. Doesn't that mean I would gain more overall time by varying my power output directly correlated with the gradient of the hill I'm on?

On the other hand I guess you would need to compare normalized power and varying power but holding normalized power equal would result in a lower average power which could eat up all the theoretical benefit.

Are there any studies or general agreement on this?

I also don't even use a power meter outdoor and usually use erg indoors so this is purely academic for me.

So i plan on taking a 2-3 week offseason Late december to Early january.

My riding/racing long been over, and it is too cold to ride outside now so I am riding indoors.
After my season ended, When I rode outdoors (in the fall), I just did literally whatever I wanted to which was a lot of fun. But now that I am indoors, it's not nearly as fun and I honestly dont know how I should be training.

I have my build phase planned out, but that doesn't start until after my offseason. All i can really think of is a bunch of Z2 and some HIT/Zwift events.

What are your thoughts? I don't want to do too much Z2 since I already have 12-15 hrs of Z2 planned per week for my build phase, and it is so boring.

I've been following a training plan and there a lot of zone 2 rides with 4 10-12 sec sprints. Are these beneficial? I had never done these before, so I'm curious what the benefit of them would be, if there is any.

Team kit order is up and I’m trying to decide on my strategy, even with volume/sponsor discounts the stuff is still pricy! I live in the rainy north and don’t have much BMI to my name so I generally get cold at my extremities easily.

My main question is the viability of long sleeve skinsuits in the summer? Will it simply be too hot? I have not worn a long sleeve SS before. Our temps peak around 85F with low humidity. I sometimes wear long sleeve jerseys in the sun to avoid burning but I have never raced in one in the summer. Our kit arms are white, so that’s a bonus. Would love any input!

So I’ve been 4 months with a power meter and it’s been great. Watched some of Dylan Johnson’s videos on base training and was adjusting my zones and getting my proper FTP etc. I can say I’ve properly been working my way up to 3x10 repeat 2 times on my hard days and some over unders for intensity in my weeks along with 2-3 endurance days one being a longer one. Generally not very structured (8-10hr wks) but sort of getting the idea of how to properly build a base. I decided to opt into a budget and trying out Trainer Road for the first time. Set my schedule for a race due in April and notice the start of base building is similar to what I’m already doing with maybe some workouts I haven’t seen before (1 or 2) along with cadence stuff I haven’t seen before. My worry is that some of these base building weeks seem generally easy including the sweet spot work outs being easier than what I have been already doing? Should I just listen to the plan and go along with it and it’ll auto adjust or retest via trainer road to get a proper reading on FTP? I’ve read countless good and bad stuff about TR I just want to be at a solid point come April ~3.7w/kg, currently at 3.5 w/kg.

How'd your races go? Questions about your workouts or updates on your training plan? Successes, failures, or something new you learned? Got any video, photos, or stories to share? Tell us about it!

—

/r/Velo has a Discord! Check us out here: https://discord.gg/vEFRWrpbpN

What is /r/Velo?

• We are a community of competitively-minded amateur cyclists. Racing focused, but not a requirement. We are here because we are invested in the sport, and are welcoming to those who make the effort to be invested in the sport themselves.

What isn't /r/Velo?

• All simple or easily answered questions should be asked here in our General Discussion. We aren't a replacement for Google, and we have a carefully curated wiki that we recommend checking out first. https://www.reddit.com/r/Velo/wiki/index
• Just because we ride fancy bikes doesn't mean we know how to fix them. Please use /r/bikewrench for those needs, or comment here in our General Discussion.
• Pro cycling discussion is best shared with /r/Peloton. Some of us like pro cycling, but that's not our focus here.

I'm 5 foot 10 and a half, 15, and ~55kg. I'm looking for cheap power savings that don't break the bank. I used to have a BTWIN Triban 500 with Clip on TT Bars (size ~50, 11kg). I could easily maintain ~23km/h on it. I recently just got a new Cervélo S3 with 65mm Knight Carbon Composities (used, size 56, 7.4kg) and can maintain around 30km/h on this bike. I recently got cleats too. I used to have a cheap $50 TT Helmet from AliExpress but realised its not safe and now mostly looking for a normal road cycling helmet. What are the best power savings that I could have for a small price. PLEASE say anything but Aero Socks since theyre already on the way. Attached are photos of my bikes.

Edit: I just did a 70km ride on the cervelo, i averaged 26km/h at an average HR of 146 (Zone 1, Zone 2 and Zone 3 ride). The route I ride on is flat with minimal gradients and winds. Wind was non exist while going towards my destination but otw back it was there but very minimal. There's this 10km straight where I averaged around 35km/h. Another clarification, I could maintain 32ish km/h with TT bars on my old bike. Heres the ride: https://www.strava.com/activities/13041928616

https://preview.redd.it/g92cfjbmpf4e1.png?width=739&format=png&auto=webp&s=37317506f5fcc2b4a21621b68502801baabb2242

the red one is my old bike

https://preview.redd.it/ttjpiajspf4e1.png?width=522&format=png&auto=webp&s=d60937d4a932346b7c3b0e2ba4a054e415846e09

https://preview.redd.it/lgm1tzfupf4e1.png?width=1588&format=png&auto=webp&s=027799566aa760ea02a8c3e5dc3ca22c3312da95

this is my first program so i'm slightly lost, currently on wk6 of my build phase, i only do an hour for ftp sesh 8 minute intervals 95-105% over/under and 4minute intervals 122% for vo2 usually 4-5 sets for both, also two 1 hour zone 2 rides, and two 30 minute recovery rides, plus 1 leg day and 1 upper body day for 1hr each (6-7 rpe), saturday long rides are usually 4 hours long, 1500-2000 meters, sometimes 3000m for 7-8 hour rides. sundays are chill rides, but if i feel good i do hill repeats sometimes. i really prefer mixing ftp and vo2 the same week, end of interval trainings are also okay, i feel squeezed out and gasping for air like what intervals should feel like but not blacking out or dying so ftp setting is probably accurate. weekdays are all indoors
...
to be clear the outdoor long rides don't really suck, but during my base phase i'm not as tired during long rides with the same speeds on the same routes, and i can squeeze out my top end power for longer, right now i find myself shifting for easier gears before cresting the hill unlike my base phase where i can even shift harder gears sometimes before cresting, so should i:
..

1. tough it out and accept it is part of the normal process?

2. i'm doing something wrong and should i decrease something like the loads in the gym? nutrition? training? etc.

Hi All,

I started cycling about two months ago and jumped straight into Zwift. After my initial FTP test, I started at 98W. Over the past couple of months, I completed the FTP Builder plan and tested every two weeks to adjust my training zones. My most recent test shows an FTP of 138W, so that's a 42W improvement in 8 weeks, which I understand is decent progress. For my bike, I've been using the zwift ride with some Trek SPD shoes and the wahoo kickr core trainer it comes with.

However, I feel like I'm still lagging behind. I can't sustain much more than ~120W for an hour (so possibly my real FTP is closer to 120), and based on other posts here, even 5 foot tall women who weigh 100lbs seem to have higher untrained FTP''s than me.

Here’s some background:

• 22M, 6'0" (1.83 Meters) I started at 120 lbs (55Kg) 2 months ago but have gained weight through eating and training and now weigh 138 lbs (63Kg).
• I don’t have a strong endurance background. In high school, I trained for the military and was running ~30-minute 5Ks, and swimming sidestroke 7 minute 500M, so nothing spectacular.
• Mostly lived a pretty sedentary lifestyle up until now, I have a desk job.
• Two years ago, I spent about five months building muscle and gained ~30 lbs, but I’m still not back to my peak strength or size on upper body, but my legs are bigger than ever.
• According to my watch, I average about 6:45 of sleep a night.

Am I overthinking this? Is it normal to still struggle at these levels after two months? Any tips for breaking through this plateau would be appreciated. I can DM my strava/zwift if you think you need more context.

I have playlists of workout songs and could loosely time them for warmup and work/rest intervals, but it’s pretty imperfect. Would love to be able to drop songs into, say, 4 minutes of work (higher energy songs) and have them fade/cut off when the interval ends, then 4 minutes chiller music, then repeat that format for the workout.

Does anyone have a tool or approach to lining up songs exactly to intervals?

It's pain cave season here in the PNW and I'm looking for some new music for intervals. One of my current favorites is, It's a fast driving rave up with the Dandy Warhols 16 minutes - The Dandy Warhols

What's on top of your playlist?

TL;DR - Is anyone aware of any references on pubmed or similar for "athlete-normal" blood marker ranges for common blood test markers?

Reason for asking / long version - I'm in the UK and get bloodwork done a few times a year (NHS) due to a long-standing (minor) health issue, which is managed. Every so often, it seems as though there's a box-ticking error on the bloodwork form and my blood gets tested for all kinds of exciting things unrelated to my treatment.

The latest was "ALT" (which I now know is a liver enzyme that is used as a marker of liver function), which came back as off the upper end of normal range. Cue concern at the doctors that I was an alcoholic (I'm not an alcoholic), obese (I'm not obese) or have hepatitis (I don't have hepatitis). After getting fed up and simply googling myself, it seems as though raised ALT levels are common in amateur athletes, both from gym work or cardio/endurance training. But since my treatment is via a GP (general practice doctor for those not in the UK) rather than a hospital specialist, they only seem aware of "population-normal" ranges, and panic whenever they see a result outside these.

This has happened to me a few times now for a couple of different markers, and I'm guessing that *someone* on this sub must have hit a similar issue before, or be knowledgeable enough about this stuff to know where I can find information on which markers have "athlete-normal" ranges that differ from the "population-normal" ones.

I'm pretty unexceptional - I train hard but only in the same way as is r/velo-typical or "Zwift-normal" or whatever, and I don't drink smoke or do any drugs either recreational or performance-enhancing, so I'm pretty confident my bloods are "amateur-athlete normal".

This year I started racing and it already happened twice that at the end of the race there was a 20-25% climb that I was not able to finish on the bike so at the last bit I had to get off and push the bike which felt quite humiliating tbh (even though there were a lot of us doing it). Now I have 52-36 on the front and 11-30 on the back that I would rather not touch, unless the vast majority suggests otherwise.

I was thinking about doing my vo2max efforts with low rpm (60ish) from now on, would it prepare me more for these climbs? I usually do them on 95rpm. Any other suggestions maybe?

I was also feeling my knees suffering a bit on these climbs, maybe I should start with lower intensity?

Any advice is appreciated.

Hi all,

Does anyone program Bulgarian split squats as your primary strength exercise?

I currently am because I can only strength train from home. Currently doing 3 sets of 5 reps twice per week with 30kg added (in addition to a few other exercises: hinge, push, pull, core).

What are your thoughts on them?

How heavy is "enough" considering its single leg and you have to lift your bodyweight too.

Would 3 reps be going too low?

Thanks in advance!

I’m doing about 10 hours a week and happy with a 3:1 schedule on a TrainingPeaks plan. This week is the third week of a build and I was hoping to have a nice, high volume week with some productive intensity in there. But instead I got a cold and had to sideline my intervals. I’ve been doing some low intensity spins because it’s mostly just head and neck symptoms. I am on the upswing and should expect to be mostly better by Sunday.

Next week I have a recovery week scheduled. Would you consider this week to be the recovery week and just flip-flop the planned workouts from this build week into next week’s workout calendar (whilst considering my low intensity rides this week to fulfill the recovery week plan) , or still take the recovery week next week?

Just curious what you’d do. Happy Thanksgiving.

Long time TR user and just paid for the Fascat deal thinking I’d like to try it out. I’m extremely displeased with what I see on Fascat.

I’m a middle aged dad with a chaotic life and things are always changing. I can’t add multiple events. It doesn’t even add an event on the correct day I choose. I can’t move the workout to another day or even choose what days I’m available. What is this nonsense what am I missing? TR gives way more flexibility in adding events and training days.

hi! It may seem like a basic question, but I just want a little more precision and information so I can train better with what I have. I recently acquired a heart rate band. Before, I simply used the heart rate monitor on my watch but it lacked a lot of precision and sometimes I got it wrong, so I trained more by feeling as if I lived on the 70s (Pls don't judge me) but it has worked for me, but. so now I want to use the HR monitor with the cycle computer and I want to do a good test to establish the ranges of the training zone. What test would be best to configure the HR max, HR rest and HR of the theorical FTP?? (I do not have a power meter yet). Considering the variability of the heart rate.

Hi everyone,

I’m planning to update my cycling wardrobe for the next season and was wondering if I should focus on buying white-colored gear (helmet, road shoes, jersey) to help reduce the effects of heat. Are there any particular studies on this, or can anyone share their personal experiences or practices?

Thanks in advance!

Is it possible to improve your sprint by 100 or even 200w and keep that improvement over the season? For my exact case if I am fresh I can peak up to 1430w but I would like that to be my 5 sec power lol Let me know if you have any specific tips or workouts to do…

I am a female cyclist riding a road bicycle and mostly climbing routes. I’ve been riding Canyon Ultimate CF SL 8WMN in size 2XS. I am extremely happy with my bike and fit. However, this size of bicycle comes with smaller wheels that are 27.5-inch, this particular one came with DT Swiss Carbon wheels. I use shorter cranks 165.

I would like to get a second pair of lighter carbon wheels as well as tires for racing. DT wheels cost a fortune and I am not ready to spend that much. I was looking at lighter and cheaper Chinese brand like Drive or other. These brands don’t have wheels for 650c wheels.

What possible problem would occur if I were to install 700C wheels on my bike frame, there seems to be enough clearance. Would I endanger my life on the long and steep descents that I usually ride after climbing? Are there any people out there that tried that or any cycling mechanics that know about this issue? I would really appreciate your opinions.

Thanks Everyone for responces. I decided to just search for second pair of 650b wheels. I am not that good with bike handling and cannot deal with toe overlap and other problems especially safety concerns.

Backstory: been racing bike for 4 years. The last 2 years of racing I have developed knee problems towards the end of the season usually after a week off the bike. Both times I had gotten knee pain I did glute exercises religiously and it went away.

Fast forward to 2 months ago. I was doing a lot of threshold work up building up my FTP. I noticed my left leg started to feel “sloppy” in the pedal stroke. Almost as if there was no stability and it was causing me to curl my toes.

I have taken a month off the bike up until today. I went and rode z1 and my knee felt fine but my ankle felt unstable and like I was pedaling heel down. Any one have advice? Thanks! Ps I’m not sure why but it won’t allow videos here. I have some of me riding for reference

Bonjour à tous,

J’ai acheté une manivelle 4iiii shimano 105 avec capteur de puissance intégré. Tout fonctionne bien pendant plusieurs semaines mais depuis 3 sorties, je remarque des puissance qui certaines fois explose littéralement ! Moi qui tiens 300w pendant 3 min environs en poussant bien sur HT, me voilà à 145bpm pour 500w en pleine bosse… c’est dans un premier temps agréable pour l’ego mais le retour à la réalité est rapide et douloureux : mes stats sont foutues pour cette sortie.

Pour comparer, j’ai branché mon compteur en même temps que le home trainer pendant un entraînement. Hier, 15 watts de moins sur HT et aujourd’hui les scores sont clairement inexploitables, lors des intervalles à 300w le compteur m’annonce presque 700. C’est vraiment dommage et un peu frustrant car je ne sais pas quoi faire, l’étalonnage est effectué sur le compteur et via l’application 4iiii avant utilisation. Lors de la dernière partie à 170w sur HT je suis à 500W sur la manivelle !!!!

Je ne sais pas si cela vous est déjà arrivé. Ou s’il faut simplement ajuster un réglage que je ne connais pas encore

Merci d’avance à tous !

Today I did 1,5 hours in Zone 2 (65% of my FTP), and my HR has been higher than normal. I was expecting an average of 135, but this time it was 142 which is in theory the starting point of my Zone 3 (I know that there is no strict separation between zones, but you get the gist).
I understand that other components (coffee, digestion, etc.) may have affected it, and since I also felt okay in terms of RPE, I didn't give too much value to the absolute number.

What I noticed though is that while the absolute HR value was higher than normal, the Power/HR decoupling was negative (-2.4%).

This makes me wonder: are you riding Zone 2 if the decoupling is negative? Wouldn't a negative decoupling mean that you can continue for hours, which is kind of the definition of Zone 2?
As a counter example, I know from experience that my decoupling is positive (> 10%) for intervals sessions.

Hi,
I am a relatively new cyclist/endurance guy, who wants to get a bit more serious next year in road cycling and also attend some amateur races in the end of the year.

After starting running in April (6 months training), I had a bit of a 'weird one' in the middle of October, after a couple of days with odd numbers reading on my HRV, HR & significant drop of performance. I was suspecting it might have been a overtraining strain, as my body was doing all sorts of weird things like heart palpations, sudden increases in resting HR (used to be 40, but now suddenly went to 100 just before bed), and general fatigue. After 1.5 months with a significant reduction in weekly training. I have started using cycling as my primary Zone 2 exercise of choice as it is a bit less straining on me, while I am able to perform it on Zwift in my gym.

Though there is still some things bugging me, I can do the 1-1.5 hour Zone 2 workout no problem, and sustaining the wattages somewhat decently (usually I drop 3-4 HR beats after 1 hour to account for fatigue etc).
I usually go for around 2.9-3.4 watts per kg at around 220-240 watts depending on feel for the day, combined with my lab tested HR zones.

My struggle is that after the workouts I struggle from HARD EPOC, basically having increased heart rate for up to 16 hours afterwards, even if it is just a 1 hour endurance ride - is this normal after coming back from a 'detraining/time off' period of only 1.5 months?

During the 6 months where I was training quite serious I could do 1-2 hour zone 2 workouts everyday, and be recovered a couple hours after (HR wise). Should I just trust the process I used earlier for building my base, which was ONLY zone 2 workouts until I started doing Intervals & Threshold workouts.

I know why I overtrained, don't get blackout drunk, sick & sleep deprived and continue with double threshold days without taking 1 day off.