While power meters have become very popular for cyclists, and are extremely useful as a training tool, there are still many athletes who don’t have that equipment. This is just fine if we have a solid grasp of how heart rate works in the context of exercise. In fact, I...
I don't think I have to tell anyone reading this how different 2020 looks than it did a few weeks ago. For most people, life as we knew it is being rewritten on a seemingly daily basis. Most of our athletes would have just started, or would be just about to kick off th...
For many endurance athletes, focused training is often a solitary activity. Even for folks who do group rides, runs and pool sessions, the majority of training time is spent simply with ourselves. In fact, ALL of our time spent training is with ourselves, even when...
We've all had 'those' days in training. I'm talking about the ones where an effort that should feel like a seven out of ten feels like a solid eleven. The days when we either struggle to hit the planned intensity right from the beginning of the sessio...
Most riders spend a lot of time and effort training to generate more power on the pedals. As coaches, what we see far too often is riders not working on the parts of their game that aren't pedaling. We refer to these skills as Free Speed. That can include anythi...
We live in a time where we're constantly bombarded by information - especially about nutrition. The problem for endurance athletes is the majority of what we see, hear and read is aimed at sedentary people, not us. Also, much of what is broadcast to athletes is being p...
At first, this question might seem like an odd one to ask. Can't we always get fitter? Typically yes, but often no - especially if our goals are focused on optimal health and performance, which they should be. As a coach, I work with a broad spectrum of athletes, many...
Looking back, it seems that all through my time as a coached athlete, I was always trained with the old standard three-weeks-on / one-week-off model. That basically entailed three weeks of progressively increased training load followed by one week of very light trainin...
Endurance sports are really lifestyle sports – where success comes when athletic pursuits are integrated well with the rest of life. When sport and life are in balance, an athlete can train and prepare consistently without big highs and lows. That means finding the rig...
I was having a discussion with one my off-road athletes this morning about the type of power required for mountain bike and cyclocross races. With her focus in these disciplines, we're working on not only bring up her steady-state power, but also her ability to repeate...
