I see why people get frustrated with this forum. It’s not an answer I “don’t seem to want to hear”, it’s just not an answer to the question I asked! I didn’t ask “how can I get faster in the aero position?”. Instead, what I was very clear in asking is “what strength training has helped make people faster in aero position”. See how that’s different? I wanted to start a discussion about the specifics of strength training that has made people better. Instead, nobody has offered much about that and it appears, from the way the question has been answered so far, that the answer is: no one here so far knows or has tried strength interventions specifically aimed at improving riding in aero to positive effect.
I appreciate and respect the opinion that it won’t help me to do strength training and that riding in aero is the ONLY way to get faster in the aero position. Maybe that’s even 100% true!!! It’s still not answering the question I asked. I do think after hearing it so frequently that it’s worth considering how much I train in aero vs. sitting up (which isn’t much, honestly, except that I don’t train exclusively on the trainer and I do have quite a few stoplights and signs that require coming out of aero on all my normal routes). I really do mean that I appreciate it! It’s helpful to refocus toward the things that will make the MOST difference, and I’ll do that, not least because y’all have all pointed that direction so adamantly so many times. STILL, it’s really frustrating to read answers to a question I never asked, and then to be told how much I’m wasting my time in asking the original question. I’m curious EVEN IF it doesn’t help me. I would welcome someone saying “I tried strength training, here’s what I did, I was not faster when I did it”. No one has said that yet. No one has given me much about the questions I asked, except a couple recommendations (which are admittedly very good ones) about replicating the movement angles of riding a super aggressive position.
Here’s a similar point, so that maybe y’all can get at what I’m asking instead of what you want to tell me about how much you know (even if you’re right, though no one asked me how much I ride in aero in training). Ben Kanute does a ton of what I believe to be pretty goofy one-off strength training movements. Are those notably improving his ability to ride in his aggressively low position? Should I, if I will definitively already spend time in the gym, try to replicate that type of strength movement? Are pistol squats and single leg dumbbell deadlifts going to improve my aero riding, if I’m generally flexible enough to fit my position just fine already? I understand there are some specifics to my body, but that only adds to the question I wanted to discuss. What was YOUR (or your athlete’s) limitation, how did you attempt to address it with strength training, and did that work (i.e. did it make them faster in the same position or allow the same power output in an even better/faster/lower position)?
I apologize if it comes off as rude, this thread just isn’t what I was hoping to open a discussion about so far.
Maybe there is no strength training that any of us are aware of that makes one faster riding in the aero position.
The reality is the static and dynamic forces involved in cycling are miniscule given that they have to be aerobically sustained . Strength training by contrast involved anaerobic systems that are barely used in a cycling context unless you are Mark Cavendish having to sprint in a standing aero position at the end of a 220 km your de France stage.
Just to be clear I do strength training of some sort almost every day for general health and longevity reasons. I am not aware of anything I do that helps me ride faster in aero though.
If there is something glad to hear. Flexibility and mobility on the other hand I can see. I am almost 58 and body does not fold over and stretch out and bend backward and twist like it used to.
Still holding out hope to sustain a six-pack to age sixty but almost certain that is not helping me ride faster in aero