The Goal
The Dartmoor Classic is a sporting event that has a significant history with riders all over the UK, both good and bad most notably due to the weather and significant demands of the event relative to finishing times, and it is the one event that is more often that others at the heart of a riders goals, either as a one off or a regular event that is attended and taken on, so when Athlete A asked me how to approach a gold gold medal time for this event it wasn’t much of a surprise.
Athlete Details
Height – 181cm
Age – 47 Years old
FTP – 273w (over 20 mins), 206w over 60 mins (2.44 w/pk)
Weight – 87.2 KGS
Let me begin by saying that the above stats any cyclist would be happy with those. What’s more impressive about this is that this athlete achieved a weight loss totalling around 45-50 KGS in total over a period of 2 years with aggressive dieting and endurance cycling (Indoor during lockdown and outdoor when he can), so when I was approached about the gaol of riding the DC and riding to a gold standard time I was pretty excited and charged to take this one on.
Pre coached Power Profile.
So after some analysis of the Athletes current performance area the key areas of improvement that were needed are:
- Aerobic Base and longevity in this operating Zone.
- VO2max above the minimum recommended count for age bracket.
- 45,60 and 90 min power to be brought up to a minimum of 2.8 W/pk
- Lactate processing efficiency needs improving
Timeline to event 20 Weeks.
Given the shortness of time and the demands of the event, it was opted that we went for a 4 week block of training with 1 week blocks of active recovery, and in the middle of this would be a set of Threshold and ramp testing, and the same at the end if necessary. Flexibility was needed to balance the demands of work and professional commitments so a 95% SLA contract of commitment to training was agreed and worked upon, with weekly check in’s and monthly face to face meetings to discuss the progression of his power profile. each block was set out to focus on aerobic base, Krebs cycle efficiency, VO2max, shuttle and active recovery efficiency.
Event Data
Key points of Performance
FTP – 291w (over 20 mins), 215w over 60 mins (2.61 w/pk)
Weight – 82.1 KGS
Overall as you can see from the power data, the endurance ability of the athlete has been elevated significantly where over the course of 6 hours there is a 30-40w increase in the riders power, and the watts per kilo goes from 1.44WPK to 1.67WPK over 6 hours.