Tuesday, September 4, 2012

Power in the Legs

Back in Memphis, we did many a workout up and down good ole Watkins Street, in good ole shady North Memphis. As a side note, I guess it kind of helped your average speed when you got caught in the neighborhoods on the way home at dusk. Anyway, one of my favorites was the Power in Leg drills (pronounced powwah in leg). The name is a tribute to some of our German riding buddies. Right at 20 minutes into the ride, we'd hit Watkins, and it was on. We clicked up to our hardest gear, and smashed up and down the rollers. I miss that.

Now that I have the power tap up and running, I sure wish I'd had it back when I was racing (really racing, not what I pretend to do now). It's just fun. I haven't gotten obsessed with it yet, like in the sense that I'm disappointed if I don't hit certain numbers. For one thing, the first 5 or so rides I did with it in my jersey pocket, since we hadn't attached it to my bike yet. I kept pulling it out on hills or between those light posts where I always sprint. 

The best part of it so far is that I finally get some credit for the slow grinding uphills and the wind! All I used to see was that I was going 12 mph. Now I see that actually I'm working pretty darn hard. Validation!

I feel pretty good about myself until I get home and see that I'm not really that good after all. Those Tour de France riders -- yeah I know they're the top professionals in the sport, but whatever -- they can produce around 7 watts per kilogram during some of those 30 minute mountaintop climb finishes. The sportsscientists don't believe this is physiologically possible without a little, uh, help, though (see here). But they do believe a decent, trained cyclist should be capable of 40 mins at 4W/kg. I'm pretty sure I'm not capable of that, but I'm going to keep that number in my head: 203W. Maybe in the past I usetocould maintain that, but the legs need some retraining.

Maybe it started in my grad school days, my excitement over numbers. Or I guess I was always a number person. Mom says she used to keep me occupied at church suppers when I was about 4 by giving me math problems on the paper tablecloth. I like the objectiveness of it, which makes me wonder why I got my bachelor's in psychology with all of the paper writing it involved. Anyway, I'm giddy over all the data I come home with after each ride. It records every second, so after  just an hour ride I have 3600 "records, " which can show me my best average power over many time increments. Having taught so so many weight loss classes in my life, I also can't help but notice my energy expenditure. It tells me the kJ that I've used during the entire ride, and by assuming a very awesome 25% efficiency (Lance is around 23%, so I'm being very conservative on kcal expenditure), I can calculate calories burned.

All this data is just sitting on the computer waiting to be pored over, since naptime is one of the few times I have to devote to this. And naps can't be predicted or projected in this house! I also feel like I need a bit more data to analyze before I start making specific workouts for myself. I'm racing again on Saturday, and I'm thinking of riding the PowerTap wheel. It's a bit heavier, but the course should be mostly flat. Any votes?

Update: In my last post, I commented that I'd yet to see Jeremy's coyote. The very next morning on my run, just before the sun came over the mountain, a coyote nonchalantly crossed the somewhat busy road between me and a man walking a few dozen yards in front of me. Maybe not so coincidentally, I had seen a roadrunner in the vicinity just before.

 Now for the required fat baby picture. Speaking of power in legs, these fat thighs are getting strong enough to hold up 19+ pounds of baby for short intervals. He'd be able to escape the Bumbo seat if they weren't so chunky that they get stuck in the little slots. It takes some work getting him in and out.


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