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Speed Training Tips

To start off let’s discuss what speed is. In most cases, speed is how quickly you can go from a standing position to running. Being faster will help almost all athletes regardless of what sport they play. Speed can be your strength, your endurance and your top speed. Increasing your speed involves working on all these factores and improving them. Speed training is something that no athlete should ignore.

So, how can athletes develop speed? You can use sprinting drills where you start with a slow jog and then slowly work your way up to running as fast as you can. You always want to do a proper warm up and get your muscles loose. To improve your stride length you wan to work on training your msucle strength and power.   Speed drills take a different approach than other training and require you to develop great flexibility. The speed and strength should be paralleled develop. The skill development technique must be learned in advance, practiced, and perfected before it is performed at such high speed levels.

Speed training is done by performing high velocity for intervals that are brief or short. Doing high reps or long duration exercises will work on your endurance and not your speed and quickness. Developing speed is a very specific type of training and needs to be done in a very controlled manner.

For a runner to be able to move faster and more quickly the muscles of the legs must contract much more quickly and the nervous system and brain must control these movements more efficiently. Speed is a technique that is learned in the muscles and in your brain and missing one or the other will greatly reduce your results. In doing this, an athlete can maintain or even increase his speed and be successful in his chosen sports.

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A Great Memorial Day for Cycling over Brushy Mountain

What a perfect day to Ride up and over Brushy Mountain. Today we had planned on a small group of 5 or 6 to leave Cool Breeze Cyclery at 7:30 am and head up to Brushy Mtn. Brushy is the closest thing to real mtn. riding within an hour of Davidson, NC. With the bigger rides coming up like 3 mountain madness and Blood Sweat & Gears, many riders head up to brushy to get in some good climbing miles.

Our planned group of 6 ended up being 3 with a few no shows. When we showed up at the local church parking lot, several other riders from the Davidson, Lake Norman area, were also preparing to start their ride. As we started out on our bikes we rode by the Church cemetary. One couldn’t help to notice quite a few grave sites with American Flags posted next to them. Thankfully, the former military veterans were remembered on this Memorial Day.

The three of us agreed that we were not going to charge up the mountain and simply planned on getting a good steady workout. I started out wanting to ride a slow pedal mashing big ring. The burning pain in my quads however quickly made me switch over to the small ring. Climbing usually means pain for me and today was spot on for a good leg burn.

Once we rolled into the local Brushy Mountain volunteer fire department near the top of the climb, we met up with the other riders and took a little break. The Brushy Mtn. VFD offers some good shade, a few park benches, and most importantly and old fashion well pump that allows rider a chance to refill their water bottles.

After the break, we headed up and over for the descent down the back side of Brushy. It is always nice to see Wilkes Valley from the top of Brushy on a beautiful clear day. The descent is always fun but like always, never last long enough. Once we got down to the store, we took a quick break and headed back up the mountain.

The back side of Brushy is a much smoother climb with nice pavement. We all found our rhythm and climbed our way back to the top. The switchbacks always prove to be a good challenge. About a mile left to the top one of the other riders caught me and passed me with ease. Until then, I thought I was doing fairly well. I noticed a support bar mounted from his seat running up to his lower back. Geez, with the back pain I was experiencing, I surely wanted to know if it helped or not. I pulled into the fire dept. and realized that I had seen one recently at Cool Breeze. I asked the guy if he liked it. Come to find out, he makes them and also sells them to the LBS.

The product is called PowerBack Performance. From the appearance, I could easily see how the brace could hep you leverage your back muscles and potentially prevent you from pulling on the handle bars with your hands. One of the riders in our group hopped one of their bikes and seemed to like the product as well.

You can read more on this product at PowerBack Performance. They have several versions of the PowerBack brace. Roadies and Tri or TT bikes alike. I certainly look forward to trying one out soon myself.

Til 2mro when I try to hang on to the A group (try being the keyword).

CyclingGuy

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Discover What Cycling Gear Works Best

Avid cyclists know there is a wide-range of cycling gear available to choose from. Determining what you will need means asking yourself some key questions.

•    What gear is required by law?
•    What gear will extend the most comfort for the bicycling I plan to do?
•    What equipment is best for the summer/winter conditions?

Cycling store employees should be able to help you answer these questions as you look to purchase new or updated cycling clothing.

What gear is required by Law?

Nearly every government has a regulation or law requiring helmets for cyclists. Some states require them for all riders while others set an age requirement. A good, well-fit helmet could save your life.  Whether mountain biking or street cycling, a helmet is a must have for anyone riding a bike.  

Though not specifically required by law, many state cycling groups urge wearing reflective clothing when biking as well. This is another safety benefit, ensuring you are able to be seen by cars and pedestrians.

What gear will provide the most comfort for the bicycling I plan to do?

Having a variety of clothing for cycling is recommended as what you need is founded on how long your ride and wear.  Cycling shorts are great for longer rides. They help to keep you cool while you are exerting yourself on the roadway. Quality cycling shorts are made of special binge made specifically for comfort and moisture control. They usually have a padded seat for surplus protection and comfort for extensive riding. Choosing a sleeveless cycling jersey to help keep you cool on long-rides is also recommended.  

Mountain bikers who ride through brush and trees should look for a long-sleeve cycling jersey to protect their arms from abrasions. Cycling shirts or jerseys worth their salt will be made of synthetic fabric that is comfortable, lightweight and moisture resistant. This will ensure that, whether long or short-sleeved, the jersey will help a rider sustain a good temperature.

What equipment is best for the summer/winter conditions?

Avid cyclists hit the road during all kinds of weather, especially if the bike is their primary form of transportation. For cold days, a cycling jacket or a wool cycling jersey will keep you warm against the cooler air while still keeping you dry by sweeping the sweat away from your skin. Windproof jackets are also available for wind and rain protection. Coupled with cycling pants or knee warmers, which keep your knees and legs warm and flexible, these items will help you have a pleasant ride, even when the weather is less than ideal.

As the weather warms, your cycling apparel should mirror what you would wear on long rides.  Good cycling or bib shorts and a sleeveless jersey will keep you comfortable and cool.  You may want to carry a lightweight, compact cycling jacket with you in case your ride goes later in the evening than you anticipated or you start out your ride early in the morning. There are a number of jackets available that can be easily stowed when the temperature rises.  Cycling jacket made of breathable material that incorporates ventilation, like mesh vents, in the fabric are ideal.

There are many choices in cycling clothing and not all of them are necessary. Depending on what kind of bicycler you are, you may find that less is more. But, if you are seriously into cycling, then choosing a variety of bicycle clothing is in your advantage – you will feel much more apt to get out there on your bike if you have all of the proper equipment, including comfortable clothing that helps to keep your body temperate and dry.

 

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How To Cope With Wind While Cycling

How To Cycle On A Windy Day
Not only is cycling good exercise, but also provides a great opportunity to talk with friends. It is a relatively cheap sport to get into and can still be performed at old age. 
Find out good strategies for cycling against a headwind! Find out how to still ride effeciently against a bad headwind.Cycling TutorialsLearn To Become A Better Cycler

Wind is probably the most annoying thing in all sports. Here, you’ll learn how to cope with it while riding your bike. The first and most obvious tip is to get down. Doing this will significantly decrease your wind resistance. Try to puch your chin onto the stern of the bike. It helps to think of the wind as a hill. If it was a hill, just don’t lose motivation and downshift two gears. Don’t try and maintain the same speed you would if there was no wind. All that does is demotivate you and waste energy. Even though you’ll be going slower, don’t try to go as fast as you normally would. Try not to wear too much of a loose coat. Wearing that will just make it harder.Cycling Tutorials

In the off season for cycling, it’s very important to have another sport or activity to do. It’s good to have one activity that only increases strength. Try taking a weight training class, or if that’s too difficult try just lifting them on your own at the gym or at home. More importantly, you need to be doing aerobic exercise. This means things that get your heart pumping hard for more than 20-30 minutes. Some aerobic exercises for cycling are: swimming, running and spinning classes. Try to be as consistent as you can in your training. You should go to the gym at least once every two days, but the more the better.

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Blacksburg Cycling Classic Results

blacksburg cycling classic results bib number Wow, just got in from the BlacksBurg Cycling Classic. Yes, Blacksburg, VA, home of the Hokies. I say Wow, because after the time trail event in Christiansburg, I made the wrong turn onto highway 81 and drove to Roanoke. A mere 60 miles later, it dawned on me that we were headed in the wrong direction. Yep, I felt like a complete freaking idiot, for sure. Our little 2 hr drive suddenly turned into a 4 hour journey. We may as well stayed over for the road race and competed in the full omnium event.

A quick rundown of my results for the Blacksburg Cycling Classic criterium event and the time trial event are as follows.

Cat 5 Crit event = Finished 15th – Field of 30.

Time Trial event = Finished 4th – time 24:06

Ride Home = 2 hours longer than neccessary

I will post a recap of the event with some photos after I see the official Blacksburg Cycling Classic results.

Kudos to Rogues Racing for their first annual event. Look forward to next years already.

John

Follow up: Still waiting on the official

BlacksBurg Cycling Classic Results

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ETJC Omnium results for the Cycling Guy.

ETJC junior cyclingI just arrived back home from a great weekend of Bike Racing near Bristol, Tennessee. (Piney Flats). The event was hosted by the East Tennessee Junior Cycling Organization (ETJC) and it was their first year. Dennis Ley and the ETJC volunteers did an awesome job hosting and running the event. Congratulations on their successful event. The ETJC racers were out in full force. It was great to see such a large group of junior cyclist and their supportive families at the event.

This was also the first time I have competed in an Omnium event. It was certainly an experience for me. Until now, I have mostly competed in single events including Time Trials and Criterium events. The Omnium events inlcude TT, CRIT and also a road race.

The ETJC event started on Saturday with a CAT 5 – 21 mile road race. I rode with the pack until about mile 7 where I messed up and led the group up a nice 3 mile climb. My theory was to see if I could break up the pack a bit. Unfortunately, I broke myself. I spent the next 5 miles working with a few riders until they fell off my wheel. Of all things a train track crossing flashed in front of us and threatened to stop us. Fortunately, I had a chance to see down the tracks and hurried thru the crossing arms. The bad part is that my wheelman stopped and I was all by myself from there on. With no other choice, I hammered down all the way home and managed a 6th place finish.

ETJC omnium - 21 mile Road Race - garmin graph

Garmin graph for ETJC 21 mile Road Race

Next came the 11 mile Time Trial. After 4 hours of rest I was back on the bike and ready to go. Still a bit pissed at myself from the RR mess up, I was in ride it like you stole it mode. This was an open road course and riders started every 30 seconds. When the whistle blew, I just kept telling myself to catch the rabbit, catch the rabbit. The front side of the course was super fast and smooth with some nice descents. I think my fastest speed hit 39 – 40mph according to the Garmin. Before long, I had clipped off 4 other Cat 5 riders and figured I had a shot if I managed a good pace. Then the hilly side of the course appeared (dangit). The fatigue in the legs from the morning ride started to kick in as well. I finally crossed the line at 27:20 and took the Cervelo back to the truck. After patiently awaiting the USAC officials to post the results, I learned I had finished first by a margin of ten seconds. WooHoo!! My First win in an Omnium event.
ETJC Omnium - 11 mile time trial garmin graph

The CAT 5 class competes for either medals or prizes. My prize was a nice gift basket including a Profile Design Time Trial Aero bottle and mounting kit worth about 40 – $50 bucks. I know, because I recently purchased one. The event coordinator also threw in a free RoadID gift certificate. I will be cashing that in within the next 20 minutes.

Bristol TennesseeThe Criterium events were held down in Bristol, TN on Sunday morning. The course there was mostly flat with a couple of false flats. The turns were tight and manhole covers were right smack where you didn’t need them. We had about 25 riders in the CAT 5 group including quite a few of the ETJC juniors who were allowed to compete. On lap 3 I hit a manhole cover and heard a loud POP. My immediate thought was that I cut my rear tire. After slowing down and inspecting seeing that it was OK, I picked my pace back up. A lead group of 5 or 6 riders had separated from the pack. I spent the next 12 laps in chase mode and eventually pulled my group back to the lead pack.

FSA Carbon Seat CrackThe funny thing is every time I tried to get out of my seat and sprint something was hanging my cycling shorts preventing me from standing. Needless to say this hampered my speed quite a bit. We finished with a group sprint back to the line and I managed a 9th place finish although there were only 6 riders in front of me. Oh well, next time, I should put myself closer to the front.

After the event I was standing next to my bike telling a fellow rider about my shorts hanging. He happened to look down at my carbon seat and noticed that my seat was broke in half. The loud POP that everyone had heard earlier was actually my seat of all things. To make matters worse, my brand new Cool Breeze Cyclery bib shorts were torn up pretty bad. Maybe Cool Breeze will throw me another pair before my next event. (fingers crossed).

I ended up with a 5th place finish in the Omnium event. Not great but I’ll take it especially with the TT event win. Now that I understand what events score the most points, I will focus on improving in those events. I had the opportunity to meet several fellow riders from both Virginia and Tennessee as well as some of the USAC event officials. They were all very accommodating and thanked me for traveling up to the event. I certainly look forward to racing with them again soon.

Here are a few more pics from the event.

ETJC Cycling in front of Historic Bristol Post Ofiice

ETJC Cycling in front of Historic Bristol Post Ofiice

ETJC womens crit event - leader

ETJC womens crit event - leader

ETJC Junior Women Crit start

ETJC Junior Women Crit start

ETJC Women Crit

ETJC Women Crit start

ETJC Women Crit

ETJC Women Crit Tight Corner

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How to bleed your Avid Elixer brakes Pt. 1

Bleeding Avid Elixer brakes
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Armstrong plays down Tour De France hopes

Lance Armstrong plays down his hopes of winning this year’s Tour De France on a visit to cancer patients in South Africa. Follow us on twitter at twitter.com
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Shag Nationals 2010 from North Myrtle Beach

2010 NSDC Shag NationalsWOW, what a great weekend of Shag dancing!!

OK, You might be wondering , what exactly is a Cycling Guy talking about Shag Dancing for?

It just so happens to be that my second most liked hobby is Shag Dancing. I spent a lot of time at North Myrtle Beach during my college years and always liked watching shag dancing.

Finally about 4 years ago, I decided to jump in with both left feet and do my best to learn how to dance. I am glad to say it was a lot easier than I expected and I’m glad I found the courage to do it.

Shag Dancing has been around this part of the country since back in 50’s and early 60’s. In fact Myrtle Beach, in my honest opinion became famous because of the dance. Without Shag dancing, there’s really not a lot left besides the beach, the ocean, and a bunch of fried seafood joints. When you go to North Myrtle Beach (NMB), expect to see someone dancing to Shag music at almost any place on the Ocean Drive Boulevard.

Over the past 4 years I have had the opportunity to learn about the history of the shag dance. I have also become familiar with many of the great shag dancers of yesteryear as well as today. That’s one of the cool things about the dance. You will see young kids, teens (Juniors), college kids, young adults, middle age, and elder dancers. Everyone that dances to shag understands that if the dance is to survive, it must be passed down to new generations. There are even organizations like the Preservation of the Dance, Keepers of the Dance, Association of Junior Shaggers, Foundation for Junior Shaggers and many others that focus on passing the dance down to others.

Jennifer and I were invited to come down to North Myrtle Beach this past weekend to attend the 2010 National Shag Dance Competition (NSDC). This event has been held for 27 straight years now. This year it was held a the Spanish Galleon ( a popular night spot in the heart of O.D. inside of the O.D. Resort). Knowing that this was the heart of Shag central, we couldn’t resist.

We were told to expect to see the best shag dancers in the counrty and let me tell you, we were not let down one bit. In fact we were totally blown away by watching the juniors dance. There must have been 7 to 8 young junior couples in Junior 1 and 12 or more couples in the Junior 2 division. These kids came from as far away as California.

I truly beleive that the Junior dancers are a huge reason that the venue was slammed full of audience members. The place was packed for three nights straight from 6:30 to 11pm just to watch the great dancing. The crowd couldn’t help to erupt in aplause and standing ovations after watching the Juniors dance. This alone made our weekend. Even before we got to see the remaining dancers.

***Major Kudos to all of the professional dance instructors that take their time and have the patience to work with the Juniors.****

The three nights were also packed with non pro, professional, and past pro dancers. Some of the great dancers there include: Sam West & Leslie Jennings, Earl & Beverly Robinson, Don Bunn & Debbie Peterson, Charlie Womble and Jackie McGee, Grayson Smith and Jessica McAlhany, Jason & Holly Cagle, Jaff Hargett and Nicki Kontoulas, Rusty and Donna Hosaflook, Alan Stokes and Cameron Davis, Danny Johnson and Melissa Calabrese, and many more.

If you would like to read more about the Shag Nationals, see the winners from each Division, or perhaps plan a trip there next year, Check out ShagNationals.com . I don’t feel that posting the results on my site is a proper thing to do, so please visit NSDC to see more.

We had a really great experience watching all of the great dancing at this event. The volunteers that work so hard to host the event did a wonderful job. We are looking forward to the 28th Shag Nationals in 2011.

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Blood Sweat + Gears – Riding Clean to the Tour de France

Go here to buy the DVD: firstrunfeatures.com Blood Sweat & Gears is the story of a unique American professional cycling team, a team devoted not only to cleaning up the sport of cycling but to succeeding in the Tour de France. Setting off from the frozen roads of a Colorado winter, racing over the dangerous cobblestones of the Spring classic Paris-Roubaix, and finally arriving at the Champs-Elysees, the grand Parisian boulevard which marks the end of the Tour de France, this riveting, eye-opening documentary takes viewers on an incredible emotional journey, following the ups and downs of an underdog cycling team as they try, against all odds, to ride triumphantly into Paris. From the intensive daily training required to compete at the highest level to the glory of winning races against the worlds best pro riders, Blood Sweat & Gears captures the passion and suffering of this simultaneously beautiful and brutal sport. FEATURING: David Millar, Mike Friedman, Magnus Backstedt, Christiane Vande Velde, Jonathan Vaughters, Matt White, Doug Ellis, Lara & Danny Pate, Will Frischkorn, Allen Lim, Team Garmin – Chipotle/Slipstream.
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