that's great, absolutely it helps, (have been wondering what the outcome of your experiments with crank length, changes in aerodynamics as a result of shortening cranks etc., would result in, after reading about them in the last 18 months), thank you for sharing so much good info.

and congrats on you steady, speedy progression in the last few years. keep it going.
:-)

I don't know if there is any hard evidence for the benefit of high RPM sets, but I do them anyway. I try to mix it up and do sets of low, intermediate, and high RPM.

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We have entered the time warp again .... where are Frank Day/ A Coggan/ waterboy when we need them most!!!!. Surrogates just don't give us the real flavor of the never ending anecdotal case for PCs ..... and still no credible study after all these years and nearly 500 pages of history on ST. Its just hard to not log into these threads when they've provided us such comic relief over the years ..... wasn't it a promise of 40% power increase ;-) ;-) ;-)

Dave

Studying this is quite an undertaking (sample size - duration - equipment) and would be very expensive. If you know somebody to fund this, Frank would be more than happy.
On a second note, this kind of comments really add nothing to the discussion and probably make up for 95% of the 500 pages of history. Do us and yourself a favor and don't post if you don't have anything to say...
Anecdotal info is at least info.
Sam
samgyde.com

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Better yet .... do ALL of us a favor and quit posting anecdotal garbage ... anecdote is just anecdote. If FD has data to share ... he should come share it. Glad you like your PCs ;-)

Dave

Nobody forces you to read this garbage. Just stay out of treads where you have nothing useful to add. That seems to be the favorite occupation of most of the anonymous ST crowd though...
Sam
samgyde.com

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I just read it for amusement .... sorry, but I have just as much right to be on this thread as you do .... too bad if you don't like that. FD could have done his "expensive" study long ago on his own dime .... but made his own choice as well documented by some 500 pages of non-factual anecdote.

Dave

Coupon should work now - In any case, if something doesn't, just mail them and they will take care of it :-)
Sam
samgyde.com

It's nice to see that PC is still listing several Pros as "Power crankers" that haven't used them in years.

And the website is still a disaster.

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How does Danny Hart sit down with balls that big?

There are still lots of pro athletes on powercranks that are not listed as well. Lots of worldclass athletes in cyclocross, cycling and duathlon are using them.
And better a disastrous website and a good product than the other way around :)
Sam
samgyde.com

I happen to be aware of a study that was just accepted for publication in European Journal of Applied Physiology. The authors evaluated metabolic cost of cycling in three conditions: normal double leg cycling, single leg cycling, single leg cycling with a counterweight. The counterweight serves to lift the leg and maintain similar biomechanics to double leg cycling. Single leg cycling without the counterweight was much less efficient than the other two conditions. For any specific VO2, power was about 40 watts less with single leg no counterweight. Thus pedaling in a way that mimics single leg cycling is a really bad idea.
This of course has nothing to do with powdercranks so it should be okay.
Cheers,
Jim

Jim, Jim, Jim, don't you know? You're not allowed to post actual science in threads such as these.

Another example of wasted research time, incomplete and misleading.

Yes, we should just take your observations as a given Noel.

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Hamish Ferguson: Cycling Coach

If you knew why non counterweighted single leg pedalling was less efficient, you would understand the reason for my post.

I do know, it's been quite well researched as have many other forms of pedalling. Perhaps you could elaborate on what you feel is missing from the literature. As I recall Jim had kindly offered to set up lab time in the UK to test your claims. Maybe you can tell us what you are trying to do when pedalling as you claim so he could test in his lab. For years you have been dodging the point that if your claims were relevant they would have an influence on performance which can be measured with any power meter. Till that is established pulling apart the pedal stroke would be wasted research time.

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Hamish Ferguson: Cycling Coach

Ok, let's see it.

Well I guess if you are too lazy to test your own claims you are too lazy to search Google Scholar.

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Hamish Ferguson: Cycling Coach

Awww, geez... I leave you guys alone for a while, and this is what happens? A Gizmocrank(tm) thread?
(shakes head)

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Tech writer/support on this here site. FIST school instructor and certified bike fitter. Formerly at Diamondback Bikes, LeMond Fitness, FSA, TiCycles, etc.
Coaching and bike fit - http://source-e.net/ Cyclocross blog - https://crosssports.net/ BJJ instruction - https://ballardbjj.com/

Yes cue a cast of a few odd bods claiming because they think it works for them everyone should buy one. Loved it when Sam Gyde suggested buying a PC over a PM. Hmmmm, the one tool that will burst your bubble. On another forum FD claimed a PCer said went slower in competition when he went back to regular cranks. So there you have it, the Creator claims that using exclusive use of PC's harm performance in competition.

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Hamish Ferguson: Cycling Coach

Actually, I use both (powercranks with SRM during training, SRM during racing) so no bubbles to be burst... Your ability to pull for a long time when training consistently with pc increases your average wattage (in my case by 40W avg over IM distance - of which probably halve due to increased fitness and the other half because of the pulling).
That is not the most important reason for using powercranks though: the gains are way bigger for running and especially your running endurance.

To summarize: a powermeter is very useful but it is nothing more than a measuring tool. It doesn't force you to engage extra muscles. Powercranks do! If you can afford it: get powercranks with SRM and a fixed SRM. If you have to make budget induced choices, my recommendation is to go for the powercranks and have yourself tested on the computrainer (or whatever device) regularly. You will notice that biking improves. But way before noticing improved cycling, you won't really care because of the feedback on running which is so positive.

Sam
samgyde.com

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Tech writer/support on this here site. FIST school instructor and certified bike fitter. Formerly at Diamondback Bikes, LeMond Fitness, FSA, TiCycles, etc.
Coaching and bike fit - http://source-e.net/ Cyclocross blog - https://crosssports.net/ BJJ instruction - https://ballardbjj.com/

How do you know that it is not just just the training you are doing? Rather than an anecdote I would prefer a comparison between a group of riders using PC's and a group using uncoupled cranks. Just fortunately there are several well performed, even if the creator would beg to differ, studies showing this.



Well fortunately there was a study presented at ACSM two years ago showing that running performance was not improved after a 10 week period of using uncoupled cranks.


Excellent to see PCer who understands what a PM is meant to do. Looking at another thread there are still some people who believe that a PM is meant to improve ones performance.


I thought in endurance sport the aim was engage less muscle. I would assume that was more efficient!


That claim runs counter to the published research on uncoupled crank use .



Another unproven claim that runs counter to the only study published in abstract form from ACSM two years ago.

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Hamish Ferguson: Cycling Coach

I've used PC's for almost 2 years now and prefer training with them over solid cranks.

You mentioned the contradiction of engaging more muscle groups with PC being less efficient for endurance. You're right, but that misses the usefulness of training with PC's. When training on them your , what I'll refer to as support muscles, are trained and built up. When racing or riding on a solid crank the primary muscles are used but now the support group are stronger and able to take some more stress and for me, increase my endurance. ..

Running. Wish I could find my notebook, but two months time I went from around a 9:05 avg pace on the same 11 mile run to a 6:50 pace. When I started that I hadn't run in months and was only on PC's. Also only did that one long run each week. Prior to that I never had done a long run faster than 8:20. I was also 49 years old so usually running performance is hard to get back much less improve.

Biking. I rode and trained with some fast guys in Arizona but no matter what I did it seemed I was going to stay a 20 mile per hour rider. One year of training with PC's on a trainer I did a ride and 30 miles in I had almost a 24 me avg. Even stopped to make sure there wasn't a tailwind. Climbs I used grind out I can shift through gears.

IMO any study shorter than 4-6 months won't show anything other what they have shown. For the first few months I was worthless on the bike because I had stressed those support muscles so much. But after that improved, biking and running showed modest gains.

I like them . But they are not for everyone. Not trying to argue or debate just sharing my experience and observations.

 


Or you just train the muscles that you use to push the pedals down to do the job required as everyone else does. Cycling is not a strength sport. To produce more power you simply produce more power. The question is how long you can sustain this not building or recruiting more muscle. Training for endurance sport is about building energy stores, energy pathways and learning to use what you have more efficiently.

Runs counter to the study that measured running performance.


Runs counter to several studies measuring cycling performance.


INMO a quick glance through most of the performance enhancement literature in the last 100 years interventions as short as two weeks or total training volumes as little as 16min in a two week period have led to huge improvements in performance. Why would independent cranks be any different.

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Hamish Ferguson: Cycling Coach