hey ktalon. i am wondering - your talon is road position, and the new bike is tri-forward, correct ? if so i have a question or two myself for you.

sorry.. don't buy it. great improvement, BUT it may have nothing to do with PCs. Could be some of that good old fashioned training. I can gurantee you I'll knock 10-20 minutes off some of my races this year.. and I don't use PCs.

Never-the-less.. congrats on your race results.

mike

Congradulations! If I had the extra money I might try a set, I could sure use some help on the run.

That's correct, I raced on a tri-postition bike. Trained in a "mostly roadlike" position though.

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Quid quid latine dictum sit altum videtur
(That which is said in Latin sounds profound)

You are correct, it could be due to my training. In fact, I think all of it is due to my training. Training on PCs to be precise. (Maybe I'm just getting better as I hit middle age, I'm 45). If I were younger and inexperienced in working out, I'd agree that it might have simply been because I was getting in better and better shape.

That's not the case with me, I weigh exactly what I weighed when I graduated from college where I played football...the only time I gained weight was when I was body building for a couple of years...too much muscle to move well, so I quit that nonsense. I played on 4 National Championship Hooverball teams, successfully raced bicycles for a local team, ran road races as a slightly better than middle of the packer, etc. (Obviously, none of this ever included swimming!) I've stayed in very good shape all of my life, this isn't just a result of "getting in shape".

I keep very detailed training logs, and although I did ride about 100 miles more this year before the race, I ran about 40 miles less this year...I used that extra time to stay on the PC's. I swam the same # of yards. If the results were due to simply being in better cardiovascular shape, I would have expected the swim time to be better, too.

Since this is such a short race, it is hard to make big improvements in time. Over 10 minutes faster is about 16% improvement.

I know what my run times were last year, and they weren't faster from January through mid-December before PCs. On Dec. 20th I started on PCs, and by January 1st, my run times were already dropping. They've continued to drop every week since then. At this rate of improvement, by the end of the year I'll get to the finish line before the gun goes off...Yukyukyuk!

Mike, you are correct, it could be just a result of training. But, I sincerely doubt it. I also sincerely think you will improve on some races by 10 or 20 minutes based on your training, as long as you are training differently this year compared to last year. As you know, it's not crazy to expect improvement, but it is crazy to expect improvement if you keep doing the same old thing year after year. You don't have to have PCs to train better than you did last year, but, you DO have to do SOMETHING different in your training to get big improvements from year to year. For me, that SOMETHING was PCs.

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Quid quid latine dictum sit altum videtur
(That which is said in Latin sounds profound)

on the issue of training effect vs the use of PC's - i have been thinking about this. straight to the point - people can tell the freaking difference ! ktalon is 40 odd years old. he is a good bike rider. why do people think the man cannot tell the difference between what training does for him and what a new technique of riding does for him ?? if i swim "like a fish" and change my style to a rolling balanced front quadrant high elbow style of swiming and i go better do you think i would be confused as to a new technique vs training effect ?? if i labor all winter to run POSE style andi go smoother with less pain would i be confused as to the benfits of my technique vs just running more ??? hell no i wouldn';t. - the difference between using a new technique and just riding yourself into shape are plainly evident to the the participant in nearly any sport you care to name - why would riding with PC's and enjoying the resultant new technique suddenly lead the user to not know the difference between riding more and HOW they are riding ? answer - they don't. the difference is readily distinguishable to any even mildly discerning rider. ktalon would be one such rider, and he is trying to let some friends know that he has found a technique that helps him in tris. for his trouble he gets told that he can't tell the difference between a technique change and simply riding more. some of you guys slay me, i swear.

whooooboy. sorry about that blast - i have some coffee and feel better. not that i would retract it in essence. anyway - to add a little. . . . . . . . .

i can understand an apathetic attitude toward the product, or even ktalon's and other users experience with them. " don't need em' - " gimmicky toy" - " eddy merckx didn't need em".......and so on. reasonable enuf. b-u-t if you feel inclined to actually expend energy to saying that ktalon can't tell the difference between his technique and more miles, or you post a treatise on mitochondrial vectors as they relate to antequil's thigh length i am given cause to wonder . . . . . . . . . . . . . .why not expend that energy in dialing an 800 number and the ten minutes it takes to put them on your bike to find out ?

i needed help swimming so against my instinct i did drills - glad i did. i neded help running so i triied some POSE stuff and specific workouts - jury is still out. i used to blast PC's on most of the oft used premises but luckily for me i ended up trying them - they changed my perceptions on riding in one long ride. put most simply, you will never know until you try ( looks like our mothers were right again). my whole experience has cemented for me an idea to try things out if i am going to bother blasting them - to wit my new tri-forward position after years of road riding ( so far sux going up hills ). that is one of the things i like about this sport - new ideas and new techniques. i understand fully not wanting to bother, but i do not understand expending energy to discount things you havent experienced when you could just as well find out.

At first blush this result seems "outrageous" as a 16% improvement in bike speed "calculates" to about a 60% improvement in power in just 3 months. Even I don't claim that, especially in 3 months. so how can it be explained. I think it has to do with the course. Power varies with the cube of the speed based upon air resistance. But on a hilly course in a city it is unlikely one can attain full speed on the downhills and one is spending a lot of time braking and on the uphills, wind resistance is much lower so any power increase is more directly translated into making the bike go faster (and a 1 mph speed increase at slow speeds is a much more significant seconds per mile improvement than at high speeds).

Further, the power improvements one sees from the PC's is much more evident in the beginning when climbing hills, when the cadence is low.

So, this was an ideal course to see PC improvements and it was short enough to demonstrate this improvement in 3 months. Further, talon did his hardwork to make the changes happen. As someone else pointed out (negatively I am afraid) improvement can happen with hard work. But, when that someone has the base of talon what more likely happens with hard work is he/she is able to maintain the previous years times and sometimes they improve a little. It is hard to find someone who has done the hard work on PC's who hasn't improved A LOT as evidenced (anecdotally, I am afraid) by this result.

Congrats to ktalon for doing the hard work to see this excellent result. Talon doesn't care if you non-believers are transformed or not as it will only give him a further competitive edge in the future (and he doesn't have to feel guilty about keeping any secrets).

Frank

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Frank,
An original Ironman and the Inventor of PowerCranks

Hi everyone. I just completed my first and second races with Powercranks on the bike. Both were low-key tri club races. Sunday before last was a formula one duathlon, 1mile/5mile/1mile/5mile/1mile (run/bike/run/bike/run) on a flat course. It went ok. The transitions were lumped into the bike split times, so I averaged between 25 and 26.5 mph for both bike splits. This past Sunday was my second race on Powercranks, a 10 mile hilly time trial, finished in 23'31", average speed in the 26 mph range. I'm sure that's not fast for most people on this forum, but I've only been riding for almost 2 years. I've been on the Powercranks since December (3.5 months). I think the course was slightly longer, but not by a lot. Would I have been faster racing on regular cranks? I think I probably would have been a little faster on regular cranks. I don't know by how much though, maybe 0.5 mph faster. That's only a wild guess. I want to be going closer to 28 mph, and I know it'll take a lot of work to get there. Anyone know any quality links on what to do to improve TT times? What is a good TT time for various distances, for various Cat. levels? How does a hilly TT compare in overall time to a flat one?

Thanks for your input in advance,

Daniel.

Daniel,

You will only know if you are faster on the PC's or regular cranks if you race frequently and go back and forth between them. Otherwise, it is a big guess although I suspect if you feel fully comfortable on them for these distances you will be somewhat faster on the PC's at this early stage.

Hilly time-trials tend to be slower primarily because you use your brakes on the downhills. Using your brakes slows you down A LOT. The more you have to use your brakes the slower you will average compared to a flat, straight course.

Compared to talon, you are the kind of person who could have expected improvement just due to time and hard work with or without the PC's as you have only been doing this for two years. I suspect the PC's have given you a lot more improvement than you would have otherwise seen because 26 mph for 10 miles is VERY good for a "novice". So you are maturing your muscles and your technique at the same time.

Congratulations

Frank

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Frank,
An original Ironman and the Inventor of PowerCranks

I knocked eight minutes off the bike leg the second year WITHOUT PC's. Maybe the PC's did make the difference but this isn't conclusive evidence.

Firstly Congrats on a great race Ktalon.

One item of note, I did the race in 02 & 03. I have not trained as much in 03 as I did last year. However, my bike time came down 2 min 15 secs. Looking at some other locals times they dropped 2:15 or greater as well.

I do not want to get in the middle of this and a 5:45 time improvement even less a 2:15 course differential is still significant. Take it FWIW.



Peace,

Rockfish (Greg Sheehan)

Okay- I'll jump in-in between actually- both with regard to attitude and placement in the race between Ktalon and Rockfish. Comparisons are hard. We had much better conditions this year (26 low the night before last year and something in the range of 50 this year) and due to the new chip timing the splits are hard to compare. I think Ktalon's lumping of the transitions is a little off. I am not sure where T2 went last year, but he may be right. Also due to placement of the mat, 10 to 15 seconds of T1 are on the swim this year.

Now for me and PCs- I have them but do not come close to using them the way Frank recommends. I will leave that for Ktalon and others. I used them twice a week from just before Christmas to early March and got up to 45 minutes at close to normal rpm but little time in aero position- all of this was on trainer. I have done triathlons for over 15 years (with several 2 year breaks), and have a pretty good grasp of what works for me. My training is a little off this year due to other obligations, but I am low volume always (total of about 4 hours a week for all three plus Sunday ride of 0-3 hours). I am not a PC groupie, and have no desire to ride them full time. Having said that- I believe they have significant training value. How much? Don't know, but I am satisfied that it is more than with many of the other things we spend money on.

One observation I am very satisfied with, but will not try to explain, is that easy rides (e.g. 18 mph) are significantly easier due to usage of PCs.

As for my race, (in slightly worse shape) I improved both in the bike and on the run with a total of over 2 minutes improvement despite a recorded swim time worse by 42 seconds (I suspect about 10 is due to where this is measured), which is significant for a 500 pool swim. My rankings went up 5-7 spaces except in swim where it went down 15 (and in age group where it stayed the same). Unlike my fat buddy that raced with me, I did not lay a foundation last year for most improved like he did. I had decent races both years (did have some clothing issues last year in the cold).

I would not recommend starting with the PCs in season (others obviously disagree) and I personally am not comfortable using them all of the time- I still think they are a great tool and I am satisfied with my purchase. Like all tools or aids, they can be used in different ways.

Good races guys- Rockfish, wish I could run like you- I would move up 30 places. Ktalon- I really thought you would have trouble with your goals, but you blew them out of the water. Hope you were not like my fat buddy who had such a bad race last year, but a very good race this year.

thanks for the link...excellent reading!

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Quid quid latine dictum sit altum videtur
(That which is said in Latin sounds profound)

I disagree. While it is correct that there is something lost because of the big variation in speed (relatively more energy is lost when going fast due to friction, the speed is slowed going uphill because one also has to gain potential energy, but one gets it all back one the downhill unless one has to apply the brakes.

Steve Larsen did a 4:33 in his very first IM on a relatively hilly LP course (but a technically easy one for him in which he did expect to ever have to apply the brakes on the downhills) even though he was taking it somewhat "easy" because he had never run a marathon before and didn't know what to expect. He then did a 4:26 on a relatively flat IM NZ.

The other thing that makes a big difference for most poeple is how "aero" they can get on those downhills.

From a purely physics point of view, there should be little difference in TT times just because a course is hilly. Technical difficulty of the downhill portions is probably a bigger element in these differences.

Oh, PCer (NOT), I have ridden a bike, I just am not very good.

Frank

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Frank,
An original Ironman and the Inventor of PowerCranks

Hey Mantis! I was waiting for you and some of your crew to come over and say hello. Did you get to see the Yaqui? I'm sure it was the only one there. Hope you guys had fun in the "Big Grit".

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Quid quid latine dictum sit altum videtur
(That which is said in Latin sounds profound)

I disagree. While it is correct that there is something lost because of the big variation in speed (relatively more energy is lost when going fast due to friction, the speed is slowed going uphill because one also has to gain potential energy, but one gets it all back one the downhill unless one has to apply the brakes.

Steve Larsen did a 4:33 in his very first IM on a relatively hilly LP course (but a technically easy one for him in which he did expect to ever have to apply the brakes on the downhills) even though he was taking it somewhat "easy" because he had never run a marathon before and didn't know what to expect. He then did a 4:26 on a relatively flat IM NZ.

The other thing that makes a big difference for most poeple is how "aero" they can get on those downhills.

From a purely physics point of view, there should be little difference in TT times just because a course is hilly. Technical difficulty of the downhill portions is probably a bigger element in these differences.

Oh, PCer (NOT), I have ridden a bike, I just am not very good.

Frank

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Frank,
An original Ironman and the Inventor of PowerCranks

i am even more dumb-founded that a guy who likes to post obscure journal articles seems to have such a difficult time with the staement

" putting your brakes on slows you down "

even PRE-novice cyclists "get" that one, mr non.

Looked for you, but did not see you or your bike. We did not hang around long after the race as there was a need to replinish the beer (I sure due miss the Bub Light days. One of us (not a slowtwitcher) was either adjacent to you or one away in the swim. We asked him to say something but he is the shy one in the group. We had a good trip. I should have posted on that vehicle thread. We had 5 big guys, with bikes and gear inside my van.

While I've only been cycling since May of 2001, I ride on average 300 miles a week over the past year, and roughly that the year before. I don't own a car, so I ride 6-7 days per week. I probably should have described the course as "rolling", rather than "hilly". None of the grades were steep, but little of it was flat. There was no braking required, other than at the turnaround- it wasn't a technical course at all. I suppose it's a silly question to ask how much different my time would have been on a flat course. I'm 26 yr old, 5'11", 145 lbs, so hills don't affect me as much as some. I was riding right under my lactate threshold for the first 9 miles, and just over for the last 1 mile. I'd call it a 95% effort. I tried to maintain an even heart rate. I'll be getting a power meter soon, and I know training and racing with that will be more helpful than simply heart rate. Also, I didn't taper my training at all to peak for the race, since it was just a club race, and so I wonder how much tapering would also help my time. All of my winter mileage was true aerobic base, with little speed work and no racing or even training races involved, because I don't want to peak early in the year. So I'm relatively inexperienced in racing, but I train with some cat 3s some of the time. I won it, but I'm not trying to stroke my ego. I just wonder whether 26 mph average for early season is poor or just ok.

By the way, thanks for the link to the power data. I don't want anyone thinking I'm telling a tall tale here, in my rambling way.

Regards,

Daniel.