Why do so many top tri pros keep their training secret? I know the Norwegians and Sam Long place on Strava but Frodo, Lionel, Brownlees and most others do not release. I think that most pro cyclists are now putting on strava including power which is awesome to see. MVP strava for Flanders is astounding. If you have not checked it out its amazing. Wonder what they think they are losing by making it public?
Why do so many top tri pros keep their training secret? I know the Norwegians and Sam Long place on Strava but Frodo, Lionel, Brownlees and most others do not release. I think that most pro cyclists are now putting on strava including power which is awesome to see. MVP strava for Flanders is astounding. If you have not checked it out its amazing. Wonder what they think they are losing by making it public?
Better question is, what do they gain by doing it?
We love to see it, but I don’t necessarily blame pros who don’t post workouts. Some pros just don’t want to show all of their cards, or perhaps they don’t want the distraction of comparing their workouts to other pros.
Fans appreciation, but yes I get it.
Fans appreciation, but yes I get it.
I think it’s cool when they share data from occasional race. But, sharing daily data seems over the top and I have to believe there’s only a very small segment of people who care about such stuff.
Why do so many top tri pros keep their training secret? I know the Norwegians and Sam Long place on Strava but Frodo, Lionel, Brownlees and most others do not release. I think that most pro cyclists are now putting on strava including power which is awesome to see. MVP strava for Flanders is astounding. If you have not checked it out its amazing. Wonder what they think they are losing by making it public?
I don’t think not posting every workout on strava is keeping their training ‘secret’ - or at least if it is, there’s nothing wrong with it. Some celebrities/influencers also post every detail of their personal life on social media, but many don’t and why should they?
Strava’s also a very easy way to advertise your movements/location. Maybe they don’t want to advertise to the world when they’re on a training camp and their home with its expensive bikes is unattended.
Triathlon mockery analysed Gustav’s power at IM Florida (from 18 minutes)…
https://shows.acast.com/...des/a-cocky-american
GI hid his power on strava after that
It probably just invites too much tiring and unnecessary speculation
Why do some people have eggs for breakfast and some muesli? Others skip breakfast altogether?
Some even take a pic and plaster it on instagram.
There has been a big push by certain media outlets to advocate for pro-cyclists to post their stuff to starve publicly… Largely so that patterns of consistency can be shown to combat (or fuel) skepticism on performances re: doping…
In Tri some do it for transparency and others do it to get in their rivals’ heads… I’m not too bothered by who do or don’t post. It ca be cool to see how some of them train, or to nerd out around race stats, but it’s not like I am going to try to replicate their training.
Not that everyone does not know already but being in the lead and paced by the motos saves so much power, that becomes very clear in race power profiles!
Maybe their coaches own the workouts and don’t want them shared?
Did you ever think, if they have a coach, it’s not the athletes’ right to post those workouts?
Tim
Maybe their coaches own the workouts and don’t want them shared?
I’m skeptical that there’s “secret workouts”. There’s nothing to suggest a magical combination of time and pace that is any better than a milquetoast combination of intensity, volume, and recovery. You just do more, harder, more frequently.
I would buy into the premise that an athlete may believe in a secret workout given by the coach, and get a boost from the placebo effect.
Cycling is a bit different because they’re racing for a far higher proportion of the season and most pros are only really posting race data - and for you can either keep up the pace or you can’t so it isn’t a big deal if everyone knows your watts. There are really few cycling pros who are posting base miles or non-race workouts.
For tri, most workouts are of the bread and butter variety so the pros are going to have to make it interesting every time to engage with the fans. I follow Sam Long and Gustav Iden, but after a while their posts are no different than my own - we all have our favourite routes and places - their workouts just have more kms and cover ground faster. Though they do make a better point than I of having both commentary and pictures up so they can engage better with their fans.
I get that some might not want to reveal the secret sauce in terms of workouts - but there’s no reason why you couldn’t hide either watts or pace. If Sam Long posts that he did a 53km bike and hides his watts, I have no idea if its a key workout or if he’s chilling. I guess you can get a general sense based on speed, but that would take much more work and would need to take account of terrain and wind. Plus you don’t know if he’s workout out multiple times per day and only posts 1x per day to engage with the fans (probably). Sam and Gustav only really post bike and run workouts so we don’t get swim, strength, yoga, or any other training stimulus so it would be hard to build a program to mimic what they’re doing. Nevermind that the Norwegian method of training is well enough known that you’re better off researching elsewhere, or if you’re a pro you generally either have a coach or know what you’re doing.
Triathlon is much more about self-marketing so if a pro is going to make the effort then there may be value to posting frequently on Strava.
Almost all of the pro cyclists hide their power numbers, except MDVP who posts it all and says if you can keep up, good luck. Love it.
There aren’t secret workouts. The workouts I write are maybe 15-20% of the value that I provide as a coach. I publish some of them every year when I put on a swim focused camp for pro triathletes.
But I think you can understand, you don’t work for free. Would you want someone else publishing your work on social media?
There aren’t secret workouts. The workouts I write are maybe 15-20% of the value that I provide as a coach. I publish some of them every year when I put on a swim focused camp for pro triathletes.
But I think you can understand, you don’t work for free. Would you want someone else publishing your work on social media?
That’s fair enough. I supposed the true value of a coach was providing feedback, adjustments, support, knowledge, basically a dynamic, level headed thinker who can take an objective view of what the athlete needs. That’s not the kind of info you’d be giving away with Strava posts. I was thinking of it more as free advertising.
Power data for world tour pros might reveal strategic information about how to best attack other riders or execute a race plan. So yeah, I wouldn’t post up my training intervals as a pro bike racer.
Otherwise, if I were a pro triathlete, you can’t avoid folks seeing your equipment and photos/video of you riding your bike. What is good for the goose and the gander isn’t necessarily true with aero as folks are different, but some a’ha moments could be learned from the videos/photos of their fits and the on-road power/speed figures.
So for that reason, I could perhaps see pro triathletes hiding their power data for the bike training stuff. If I had to guess. As without the power data, you’ve no clue if they’re as aero as a brick or really good.
Pros are in the uniquely different situation as triathletes or pro TT riders in that there WILL be lots of photos and video of their bike fit. No avoiding it. That AND power data can be very revealing. For an average joe, having just one of those (usually the power and speed data) doesn’t help you other than to know if a person is an aero wizard or a parachute. As average joes usually don’t have video or fit photos until race day, when it is too late.
Yeah, with triathlon its the same course each year, with less race dynamics than road cycling, so you can gain a lot of knowledge about pacing and strategy that might otherwise take years
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Good point did not think of this but not sure it is a significant reason but maybe.