I thought that too, and then saw that he biked at 100TSS. Try biking 1 hour FTP, and then run Sub-5-minute-miles for 10K. Also, ITU pack riding is a lot more twitchy, so it's hard to judge effort based off of NP and Average Power.

Haven't you heard the bike leg in ITU is just a blow dry after the swim (shampoo)?

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Steve

"If you ain't first, you're last." Reese Bobby Talladega Nights

the normalized power is 4.7 watts/kg

that puts him in studly cat 2, or lower end cat 1 road cyclist.

You ever done a cat 2 road race?

good luck.

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Kat Hunter reports on the San Dimas Stage Race from inside the GC winning team
Aeroweenie.com -Compendium of Aero Data and Knowledge
Freelance sports & outdoors writer Kathryn Hunter

Yes, very true I didn't notice the TSS and IF numbers. .95 IF puts his Threshold at 315, pretty good for 140 lbs. It does, however, underscore the fact that the superior swimmer runners dominate ITU racing. A racer who was larger, say 170 pounds with the same watts/kg, say like 385 watts, still would have a hard time using the additional power to his advantage given drafting and the exponential increase in air resistance at speeds above 25 mph. The extra weight would then make it harder for him to run the 30 minute 10ks the leaders run. Interesting.

Admittedly this was years ago and Chrabot is pretty short, but imagining his actual weight from racing bikes against him in college as being 140lbs is pretty tough. He's pretty jacked.

even if he is a bit bigger, and merely an average cat 2 cyclist.

that is a hell of a cyclist.

you go do your local sprint/oly tri, there will usually be 0 people there that strong.

and of course aside from the pure power output, it takes a very good cyclist to keep himself in a position where he doesn't have to do 400 watts for an hour, and not crash, and not be TOO far back in the pack.

In other words the rather huge host of skills that are a major part of cycling, suddenly are also relevant in ITU, where they are not in non drafting races.

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Kat Hunter reports on the San Dimas Stage Race from inside the GC winning team
Aeroweenie.com -Compendium of Aero Data and Knowledge
Freelance sports & outdoors writer Kathryn Hunter

I wasn't discounting the skill/power of Matt (or any other ITU racer), merely pointing out that I have a hard time believing he only weighs 140 lbs.

Yes I've done cat 1,2,3 races. I actually didn't do as well since I couldn't sprint and people at that level are hard to break off of you slipstream, especially when they work with their "team mates". I actually have a higher FTP than him but I weigh 20 more lbs so almost the same watts/kg but I cannot run or swim that fast. Like I said very quality athletes in all their sports but I guess more on a relative than absolute basis.

Plus they are doing laps of a small tight circuit, so lots of accelerations to contend with, not the straight forward route of most non-drafting races.

Some events are hillier than others too, no sure how hilly SD was. The bike studs can target the hilly races, or get lucky with horrifically windy days!

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Kat Hunter reports on the San Dimas Stage Race from inside the GC winning team
Aeroweenie.com -Compendium of Aero Data and Knowledge
Freelance sports & outdoors writer Kathryn Hunter

I dunno. He said he's fitter than he's ever been. I could believe he's 140 in tip-top shape. He is 5'9" as well.

Ah yes, well said, cycling is a very "cerebral" sport and requires gambling, risk taking, a bit of luck and planning, not to mention handling skills normal triathletes have no idea about, I think many AGers would be shocked at how different bike races are than triathlon "TTs". ITU definitely has many of these aspects which definitely complicates things.

Yea, I just imagine myself at an inch+ shorter and subtracting 10-13 lbs is tough. Where does it go?? haha

similar thing with swimming, ITU or not, since both allow drafting there. I'm always amazed by how aware of the situation most of the pros are. They know whose feet they are on and where the swim packs are.

I never know anything! Except maybe where the next buoy is, hopefully.

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Kat Hunter reports on the San Dimas Stage Race from inside the GC winning team
Aeroweenie.com -Compendium of Aero Data and Knowledge
Freelance sports & outdoors writer Kathryn Hunter

"I know he's 140lbs but still"??? TJ is over 11kg heavier than he is. As in almost a 15 percent difference. As in thats not a but still, that a huge difference.

If you use 4.7 watts like jack has that means that if they had equal power/weight ratios TJ's would be close to 350 watts. The FTP range for ironman difference is 70-80 percent, and since TJ is a great biker i'll use 80 percent that puts him at about 278 or so. Essentially right where Chrabot is based on FTP. I think TJ's is actually a bit higher so that is probably an overestimation of the percent he's racing at but still they aren't that far apart. Which you would expect since they are both pros.

LMAO...this is so me too. I always wonder how they know those things in the water...I don't have a clue. I just go....

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I'm faster in Kilometers!
Wattie Ink Triathlon Team
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That's kind of what I was saying, the "but still" part meant that although it is a good number relatively, absolutely speaking its a lower number than I expected. They swim and run fast "absolutely" yet the power numbers are lower than I thought although "relatively" very good. Its just a point in saying a guy like TJ is significantly "absolutely" stronger on the bike but could not hope to use his additional power to his advantage because he would never drop those guys off his wheel.

That chart is off, FWIW. When I was a cat 3, I routinely had an NP of 310-315 from my races. As a cat 2 (in the P12 field), it was in the ballpark of 340.

They are running flat out, no sitting in the pack and catching the draft. The swim is probably pretty similar. Sure there is some drafting but I doubt anyone is "sitting in" and just riding the pack into T1 - they are at the max of their abilities. On the bike, unless someone is on a solo break away most everyone is only working at their max a portion of the time - except the guys hanging on for dear life at the back. You save a lot of watts in the pack, which is how so man relatively weaker riders can manage to hang until T2. Even though Matt was in a small lead pack and working hard for a couple of laps with Brownlee, after that he was sucked back into the pack and was able to back off a little and hold position with the majority of the athletes. The power file is a result of the nature of the draft legal format, not necessarily a good reflection of their absolute abilities.

One thing that people overlook is the rest periods. There is always talk about how hard the ITU rides are (and I agree they are hard). But these are highly conditioned athletes. They recover from those spikes and are able to pull off very fast runs. If they were not able to recover from those spikes during the rest, their run splits in draft legal racing would be generally slower than their very own 10K splits in non drafting events, but what we see is the same guys generally run slower in non drafting. So realistically as much as everyone wants to look at NP (which is an artificial construct and may not really approximate the physiological cost as closely as we think), perhaps the more fair view is to look at Average Power which is the actual energy expenditure that gets the athlete from T1 to T2. In non drafting races the average power and thereby the actual calorie depletion is higher. The key is that the athlete can recover from the spikes in draft legal racing. Generally these guys do recover from the spikes during the zero watt/low power periods. Otherwise perhaps they don't run that fast.

If we look at the Hyvee results from 2011, not a single man broke 33 and Haskins and Laura Bennet only ran 38 and 37 respectively....perhaps Hyvee was a bit longer than San Diego, but still. Hunter Kemper than 33.12.

Anyway, all good monday morning quarterbacking, and as hard as the ITU ride is, seems the physiologically it is still easier than a constant non draft effort with no rest breaks. If not, non drafting run splits would be faster. They almost never are.

Might be that these guys and gals are simply trained specifically for the spiky nature of draft legal racing. NP may or may not be an appropriate metric but they are just able to withstand more highly variable efforts than non-drafting guys. Then they get into non-drafting races and aren't as well trained for the steady state riding. How do 10k times compare from someone who has focused on each type of racing at different times in their career?

FIFY.

Does it really change that much outside of Boulder? The only events outside of Colorado that I've raced are the really big ones, which are always hard, so my experience might be jaded.

That doesn't mean the chart is off.

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Kat Hunter reports on the San Dimas Stage Race from inside the GC winning team
Aeroweenie.com -Compendium of Aero Data and Knowledge
Freelance sports & outdoors writer Kathryn Hunter