Firstly, a quick background on why I’ve been asked to start writing in this newsletter…..aside from being a ‘CycleOps Power’ sponsored athlete, I am a professional cyclist, and slightly embarrassingly, am very obsessed with my power data. I have worked with David Martin from Australia for almost 6 years now, and recently started to work a little with Dr. Allen Lim. Between the two, I am being looked after by perhaps the most forefront sport scientists in cycling.
I have been working with Dave through the Australian Institute of Sport (2002-2005 for triathlon and 2006-present for cycling), and I met Allen when I was out training with some of the Garmin-Chipolte riders in Girona. After a few weeks of talk about how I use power to monitor my progress, Allen had me out behind the scooter with a borrowed PowerTap for him to see what type of watts I was putting out. My first taste of the adaptability of PowerTaps.
I have more then 90% of my data files for a full two years, quite valuable to a sport scientist interested in tracking cycling performance over time. This allows me to keep stock of my short and long term training load, fatigue, and perhaps more importantly where I am at over key power-time intervals.
I really like the PowerTap because I can simply switch the wheel onto any of my bikes, simple as that. With my previous power meter, I was constantly bothering the mechanics on my teams (or my very handy fiancée!) to move my power meter from bike to bike or adjust the sensors because of travel mishaps etc etc. I am really enjoying the ease of use with my new PowerTap.
Usually for the European season I am based in Girona Spain, but at the moment I am in Varese (Italy) at the Australian Team base preparing specifically for the World Championships here on the 27th of September. For the ‘off-season’ I live on the Gold Coast in Australia with a month or so between the two in Bermuda to visit my fiancée's family. Hard life I know. : )
Over the next couple of weeks I will be doing some key sessions on the road course for the Worlds so my next article will include some of the power files from those sessions and talk about where they fit in compared to what I have done before.
For now check out the race from last weekend. It was a UCI 1.1 in Switzerland, ‘Zuri Metzgete’. It was my first race since the Giro d’Italia, so it was certainly a bit of a wake up for my legs. I was able to follow most of the major attacks over the climbs but wasn’t quite good enough in the finale. There were attacks going on and off all race, but there were 2 main parts that made the race, both of which Emma Pooley from Great Britain initiated: you can see at 1.20 and 2.45 into this graph I had to make a significant effort to make it into the front selection. I ended up 8th on the day, 37 seconds behind the winner Georgia Bronzini from Italy.
The overall race lasted around 3.5 hours, with the two race-determining efforts coming about halfway through the race and near the end:
Data summary for whole race:
Peak powers for whole race:
Though the first main effort wasn't the hardest section of the entire race, it was crucial to maintain pace to make the front selection.
Graph for first main race effort:
Peak powers for first main effort:
The second main effort produced the highest 30 second, 1 minute, 5 minute, and 10 minute peak powers of the entire race...
Graph for second main race effort:
Peak powers for second main effort:
...while the finishing sprint produced the highest 5 second peak power.
Graph for race finish:
Peak powers for race finish:
If you would like to know a bit more about me visit www.nikkiegyed.com.
Until next time,
Nikki. : )