Numbers Are Good, It’s How You Use Them That Counts:
An email exchange with one of my athletes prompted me to address the above statement from the Philosophy section in a little more depth. I had him do a power based test on the trainer to get some baseline numbers to work with to prescribe workouts in the upcoming weeks. This athlete is a master Cat 4 racer who is “fit” (running background, been riding a fair amount). He was, shall we say, “concerned” about the results of his test and I think a bit apprehensive about some criteriums that I suggested he should do in the upcoming weeks.
He liked the response and even suggested that I post it on the site. So, here it is:
A field test on the trainer only gives us what you can do on a trainer. I want to be able to look at numbers from training and racing as well from you to draw a more complete picture of your weaknesses/ strengths.
The main thing I want you to remember is this: Numbers are just that, numbers. The only numbers that really count are: first, second, third….
Here are some of my numbers from WKO power profile:
5 second power puts me in the “cat 5” area (~13.26 w/kg)
1 minute power also puts me in the “cat 5” area (7.13 w/kg)
5 minute presently is in the “cat 2” area (when peaking for Master Nationals last year this was the only area that actually corresponded with me being a cat 1) 5.65 w/kg
FTP puts me in upper Cat 3
I have never seen a power number in the 1000 watts range
I am a cat 1 on the road and a cat 2 on the track who came within a botched call from the officials of qualifying for track nationals in the Madison a few years ago and who has won district medals in the elite men in So Cal for the Madison and in Washington for the points race. I also made 3 winning breaks last year locally in Pro 1-2 races.
So…it is not just about your numbers, it is more about what you do with them.
Racing the crits will get you better at them both from a practice makes perfect standpoint but also from a standpoint that it is very difficult to mimic in training the power and speed outputs that you can get in a race.
