Tommy Taylor with professional cyclist George Hincapie

Finding a sub for your typical Indoor Cycling class can be a real challenge at times… finding someone qualified to coach a room full of experienced cyclists and endurance athletes expecting a Performance Cycle class can be nearly impossible. Impossible that is unless you happen to be friends with a popular, local cycling coach like my friend Tommy Taylor 🙂  Tom agreed to coach this week's Performance Cycling class for me, while I'm in Phoenix for a family wedding!

This week's class profile is a repeat of week one – which was very well received by my athletes – Coach Troy’s Spinervals Competition 22.0 — Time Trialapalooza. This week will be different with many now having a true understanding of FTP after our assessment last week!  Tom is a believer of the “Best Effort” I include in every class to give everyone a baseline wattage to work off of = no one is sitting there wondering; “what the heck is my threshold you're telling me to work below, @ or above?

Class length 75 minutes + Cool Down

Warm Up — 10 minutes. 5 minutes of gradual increases in wattage. During the second 5 mins. we’re finding the wattage where everyone is first noticing a change in breathing; VT1 / Aerobic Threshold = the top of the Recover Zone shown above. This establishes a rough understanding of a base wattage that we use throughout the rest of class.

3 x 30 sec. Hard / 30 sec. Easy – Openers to AT/LT. I cue these by first having everyone find the amount of load @ 70 RPM that has them feeling they should (not just could) come out of the saddle. The 30 sec. Hard is then simply accelerating to 90+ RPM which results in some pretty impressive power numbers. The 30 sec. Easy is back to 70 RPM — many will stand during the Easy portion.

2 minutes rest – I encourage riders to focus on their recovery. Once they feel calm in their breathing, bring back the Base level work wattage.

20 min. Tempo — Here I included a 4 min. “Best Effort” to establish a benchmark PTP Personal Threshold Power (top of the Perform Zone) or ride at 110% of FTP if known. It’s very helpful to riders to have that understanding of their personal upper wattage number. The “Best Effort” Threshold # + the Base Threshold # we found earlier form the three Power working zones I use in class.

– 1 min. build at preferred cadence (suggested as 85-95 rpm) — press the Stage Button to reset the averages.

– 4 min. “Best Effort” This should hurt, but be do-able. I ask everyone to observe their average at the end and then…

– 15 min. reduce effort slightly (15% — 20%) and maintain wattage in between the two Thresholds.

I have everyone note the combined average, over the full 20 minutes, at the end of this effort. I’ll use this wattage in the Tempo Intervals to follow.   

5 min. Rest — Once breathing calms we bring back ~ Base Wattage and ride out of the saddle for a break.

15 min. Tempo — Quickly establish the average wattage from the 20 min. Interval. > Stage Button and then maintain. You may want to offer slight changes in cadence & load, while keeping wattage = to the initially established #.  

5 min. Rest –

10 min Tempo — Time is shorter… so we should be able to work a little harder. Again quickly establish the average wattage from the 20 min. Interval + (if possible) add 10-20 watts > Stage Button and maintain

5 min. Rest

5 min. Tempo — What have you got left? I’ve got a really competitive group and although I heard some grumbling, they all appeared to push this 5 minutes at (some above) their PTP / FTP 

Cool Down

Here’s my Playlist from week one's class in Spotify and Deezer – all are 10 minute+ songs. As this is a timed class, I don’t worry about trying to match the efforts to the music.

Originally posted 2014-01-12 05:48:33.