V-Club Training Corner

We’ve teamed up with Marilyn Trout, certified USA Cycling Elite Coach to answer V-Club members’ training questions.

Send your cycling inquiries to Marilyn, and for a limited time, if yours is selected to be answered in our V-Club column, VeloWear will send you a $20 gift certificate that can be used towards any purchase on VeloWear.com. To submit your inquiry, visit her website at http://www.bicyclecoach.com/profile.php?id=358, click on the “Click to Email” link, and type “V-Club Training Question” in the subject line of the e-mail.

TRAINING IN THE WIND
Question from V-Club member Bob Dunn

V-Club member Bob Dunn is our 6th winner of a $20 VeloWear gift certificate!

His training question that follows was answered by Peg Labiuk (nee Peggy Maass), a collegue of Marilyn Trout, and a certified NCCP level 3 coach with a career in international road and track racing. She is a World Championship medalist, World Record holder, U.S. Olympic Team member, former British national team coach and Kreb's Cycle co-founder (British Columbia, Canada).

When you train weekly, what technique do you use when it's very windy (i.e. do you start out against the wind or with it), and what advise do you have for us who live here in Santa Maria, CA, where it's continuously windy?

Thank You

Bob Dunn

 

Bob,

Cyclists everywhere have to consider wind direction in their training. You in Santa Maria just get a stronger dose of it. Take advantage of your natural resource by selecting wind force to suit the objective of your training ride. For example, if you want to work on speed, use a pure tailwind to assist you. To work on strength, threshold, and tempo pace, ride into the wind. Crosswinds are excellent for testing your bike handling and drafting skills. Creating a training plan, I would use the prevailing wind to augment those three categories - speed, strength, and skills. Of course you usually get several types of wind on any given route. Here are some ideas to make the best of it.

With an out and back route, tailwind can be used for warming up gently and then do your hard effort into the wind on the return trip. Or, you can stay out there, turn around and use the tailwind to recover from an interval effort, go again into the wind and when you are done your sets you'll have a longer spin home. You might have to start out in a headwind to do a wind assisted speed workout. The key in headwind warm-ups is to use an easy enough gear and keep cadence high so you don't turn into a gear masher. One of the best rides I ever did was with the U.S. National Cycling Team while racing in France. We had a point-to-point tailwind ride during Mistrial winds (strong seasonal winds in France.) We were sailing along for hours and got to hop into the team car and be driven back, instead of bucking the headwind home. I have fond memories of that ride. If you can ever get driven out or picked up at the end, do it for a treat.

With a loop, I'd usually prefer to start in the headwind and finish with the fast tailwind. Again, be patient at the beginning so you don't over gear and slog. Now you'll encounter crosswind as you change direction. Think of crosswinds as weaker versions of tail or headwinds and use them the same way; a crosstail like a tailwind, a crosshead like a headwind. If you are riding with others, it's a great chance to hone your skill at finding the draft's "sweetspot", to the side of your partner's wheel.

Knowing the change in wind pattern on a racecourse gives you the advantage of knowing where to position yourself going into corners. Key moves can happen as the field enters a crosswind and those caught unaware don't get a good draft and eventually get dropped. Going into a crosswind section is a good place to attack, thus a good place to practice your hard efforts. The echelon angled paceline formation used in a crosswind fun to practice if you have enough room on the road. Of course everyone feels good with a tailwind, so that's a good place to take a wheel, sip some water, get ready for the next direction change. Headwinds are hard for everyone, but keeping your efforts short and keeping cadence high mitigate.

Hope these ideas help and may the wind always be at your back.

Peg