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Team Banana Spokesman
Joined: 09 Jun 2009
Posts: 28
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 Posted Sun Nov 8, 2009 5:51 pm |
I keep reading about swweet spot training. I cant work out where this spot is coz its described by riding in different zones/levels.
i have no powermeter
i have no HR device
can someone describe where the sweet spot is please? without all the tech/numbers/percentages?
is it just "tempo"? higher/lower? should i be in massive pain?
only have 90 minutes a day to train but want to increase the power quickly without wasting time. most times i go out and ride as hard as i can with a warm up/down.
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ride_whenever
Joined: 17 Oct 2006
Posts: 8230
Location: United Kingdom
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Posted Sun Nov 8, 2009 6:05 pm |
If you've got 90 mins a day, no powermeter or HRM and no inclination/funds to get one then just go as hard as you can as long as you can.
It sounds very backward, but until you've seen this sort of program work then you'd be right to be skeptical. But you can do very well from it.
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456!
silly little bike |
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Simon Notley
Joined: 25 Apr 2005
Posts: 1096
Location: Bracknell
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Posted Sun Nov 8, 2009 6:35 pm |
The sweetspot is between tempo and time trial effort. Imagine you were riding a really long TT or riding a 25 but saving yourself for something else...
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chrisw12
Joined: 07 Jul 2007
Posts: 510
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Posted Sun Nov 8, 2009 7:20 pm |
| ride_whenever wrote: | If you've got 90 mins a day, no powermeter or HRM and no inclination/funds to get one then just go as hard as you can as long as you can.
It sounds very backward, but until you've seen this sort of program work then you'd be right to be skeptical. But you can do very well from it. |
I like this advice. I've got all the toys but this has been my mantra for a lot of my rides lately.
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chrisw12
Joined: 07 Jul 2007
Posts: 510
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Posted Sun Nov 8, 2009 7:27 pm |
Also call me ignorant, but what is sweet spot with the number?
I've done a lot of searching on a lot of forums and there seems to be so many different answers.
I'm using the Coggan levels as in training peaks. I assumed it was at the lower end of the threshold scale or about 50/100mile tt power or 90% of ftp?
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JonGinge
Joined: 04 Jan 2008
Posts: 1758
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Team Banana Spokesman
Joined: 09 Jun 2009
Posts: 28
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Posted Sun Nov 8, 2009 8:22 pm |
but the point of sweet spot training is so I can go out and do it every day. tiring myself out means I need a rest day.
i found this: http://forums.roadbikereview.com/showthread.php?t=112091
the graph says that i should go fast but not too fast.
on a side note: i was told that my hard rides where i sprint 10 times in 45 minutes would only train vo2 max and nothing else. true?
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chrisw12
Joined: 07 Jul 2007
Posts: 510
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Posted Sun Nov 8, 2009 8:51 pm |
Thanks for the link, I knew Alex would have the answer.
That sweet spot band seems very wide though 90-75% (of ftp)? Also I don't see much point in the lower end, my longest ride of 6hrs was done at 75%.
To the op, I train between 10-12hrs a week and ALL(except the one above) of my rides average above 80% in other words you can train in the sweet spot every day (easily).
Maybe I am under estimating ftp.  
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oldwelshman
Joined: 16 Oct 2006
Posts: 2423
Location: United Kingdom
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Posted Sun Nov 8, 2009 10:22 pm |
Well when I race I am generally at 155 hr but when I train alone I get no where near that, presumably due to less adrenalin affaecting hr also, so what HR would I train to?
Mine also seems to be non linnear. I can do over 20 mph at hr 110, then it seems to hover there at varying efforts until I do race effort when it jumps.
I normally go on effort as I have a prtty good idea of when I am taking it easy, going hard or flat out.
Same on track but heart rate is higher on track due to igher cadence.
http://s290.photobucket.com/albums/ll245/oldwelshman/ |
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Alex_Simmons/RST
Joined: 14 Sep 2007
Posts: 1771
Location: Sydney, Australia
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bahzob
Joined: 14 Jul 2006
Posts: 1073
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Posted Mon Nov 9, 2009 8:12 am |
Having a powermeter is a great help but its not absolutely essential. A couple of alternatives.
- if got a cycle computer that can be mounted on a rear wheel use speed as an independent variable. Especially useful if training on turbo/rollers. There are caveats about making sure setup is repeated. However if can do this then should be possible to mirror quite a bit of power training but using speed instead of power as your measure. e.g. do a test to see what best average speed u can maintain for 20 mins and do sweetspot around 5% or so under that. Will need a bit of trial and error as depending on conditions relation between speed and power may be far from linear but after a while it should become second nature to relate speed to effort power. If got a HR then can monitor HR vs speed and should help monitor progress.
(* aside - even though I have a powermeter I do sessions using speed to pace just to ring changes a bit and also to avoid getting fixated on given watts number that can become a limiter if not too careful)
- listen to breathing, Bit of chicken and egg here as the fitter you get the easier breathing becomes for a given effort. That said to establish sweetspot zone try doing a ramp test and riding harder and harder as time progresses (perhaps using speed as above as a measure). Monitor your breathing and you will find various points e.g.
1 - can breathe through nose only, dead easy
2 - can breathe through nose only but needs breathing needs effort
3 - got to start breathing through mouth but its easy
4 - heavy breaths through mouth but under control
5 - start to lose control of breathing, start gasping
6 - last 10 secs probably cant breathe.
- if still cant breathe after then probably overdone the test and are dead.
The point just between 4/5 is roughly where sweetspot lies. Again, despite having a powermeter, I use this for pacing my long outdoor sweetspot work (its safer, avoids eyes being fixated on power display rather than road..). I also use this for my events abroad that involve long climbs (another reason sweetspot training is so good is that its pretty much the perfect zone to aim to do mountain ascents in).
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inseine
Joined: 29 Jan 2008
Posts: 341
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Posted Mon Nov 9, 2009 9:32 am |
That's a good post bahzob. Isn't it also a question of how you feel the day after, since part of the idea is that you get good training benefit but you can do it again next day (if you want to). It's, sort of, the max repeateable effort and i guess we're all bit bit different in that respect
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