In this episode of our podcast Geoff & Gerry speak with Greg Hillson from INSCYD.
Greg shares how he got into cycling himself and explains all about INSCYD testing.
What is Vo2max and VLamax and how does i compare to FTP? How can you improve your fueling strategy for training and racing. Listen and find out yourself how the best of the best like Mathieu vd Poel and Wout van Aert use INSCYD to support their training and race plans.
Mike, troy and Geoff will be riding the Asheville BWR, aka "The Hell of The North", this year. In this podcast they discuss why they decided to do this amazing, but brutal event. How they prepare for the event looking at training plans, material, logistics, nutrition, and much more. What are their current numbers, weight, w/kg, FTP and what are they aiming for to be in tip top race shape?
Among the cycling community we often find those who are passionate and life-long cyclists, a community made up of individuals with a true love of the sport and the challenges it brings. It is a close-knit community, and one that holds itself together and welcomes friends old and new.
Participants and fans alike appreciate the sport and find value with an exhilarating activity that has the ability to take us to incredible places. As we are taken on a journey trekking across iconic locations around the globe, it presents an often skimmed-over dilemma: housing. This was just the thing noticed by the man behind The ChainStay, Gregg Germer.
Blair Saunders. Originally from Canada, he started with hockey before moving into cycling. Winner of Olympic trials in 1992, he represented Canada in 13 international events as a member of the Canadian National Road, Team Time Trial, and Track team. Lately, Blair performed at a high level competing in multistage mountain bike events like Cape Epic. He also enjoys multisport events like Ironman Triathlons, Xterra off-road triathlons, and represented the USA for the first time in 2017, winning an Aquabike AG World Championship.
Two out of 22 teams starting this year’s Tour de France are American sponsored teams. Each team brings 8 riders for a total of 176 riders competing. One would logically conclude that at least a handful of those riders would be American, right? The answer, sadly, is no. Americans represent 1.7% (just 3) of the total riders. Of the two teams with American Sponsors, EF Pro Cycling and Trek-Segafredo, only EF Pro Cycling is bringing any American riders. Our third American, Sepp Kuss, is on Dutch superpower Jumbo-Visma.
What gives?
In this episode Geoff & Gerry meet with Colleen Gulick. Colleen is a professional cyclist, all women cycling team director, race organizer, small business owner, and much more.
It was great to have a conversation with such a smart and entrepreneurial person who's very passionate about all facets of cycling.
Colleen is a Pennsylvania native who grew up close to the Trexler Town velodrome (T-Town) also know as the Lehigh Valley Velodrome, where she entered the youth program at the age of 6. Colleen rode her first national championship at the age of 11 and has collected 43 medals and 5 gold medals on the national and international stage since.
Geoff and Gerry speak with Daniel Larson. Daniel works as an assistant professor at the University of Oklahoma, Department of Health and Exercise Science. His primary field of expertise is Economic theory in sport; finance and policy for international professional sports; management of national governing bodies (like USAC); participant sport-event management; public finance for sports/exercise interventions; and sport coaching/instruction.
In addition to his work for the University of Oklahoma, Daniel has a wealth of experience as an elite cyclist both on the track and on the road, sports director for the Jittery Joe’s U23 team, Director of Athletics VMG Racing, Head Cycling Coach University of Florida, and event organizer/promotor.
In this podcast Geoff & Gerry speak with Bart Bowen. Bart was a professional cyclist from 1990 to 2000, he was most notably the National Road Champion in 1992 and 1997. He also won the Herald Sun Tour in 1992 and the Tour of Japan in 1997. Bowen participated six times at the World Road Championships with the American team. Bart has been running his coaching and cycling studio business for over 15 years now.
Allison is a professional mountain-biker who started cycling fairly late after spending many years playing soccer and doing gymnastics. Encouraged by her parents and having joined the local West Chester Cycling Team, Allison started cycling more and more. In college, she picked up her first wins, racing collegiate road and mountain-bike. At that moment she started thinking about setting goals to become a pro-cyclist.
In this episode of the Lowlands cycling podcast Geoff and Gerry speak with Rebecca Larson. Rebecca had an an amazing career as a Professional Competitive Cyclist between 1999-2008, won 10 National Championship Titles (Junior, U23, College), won Over 100 individual race victories, World Road Cycling Championships competitor, raced Internationally as a member of the United States National Team in Belgium, Holland, Italy and Switzerland.
Tim started racing his bike on Tuesday and Thursday like training series on it's called River Road in Baton Rouge. from the a Baton Rouge Bicycle Club, Time moved on to the LSU Cycling club. you didn't have to go to LSU to be a part of the cycling club. We talk about his time as an exchange student spending time in France in 1993 where he also raced and got to experience what it’s like riding in Europe.
When Tim returned to the US, he started racing for a team called Tokyo Joe's. Tim talks about how it was riding for this team "essentially the Bad News Bears of us Pro Cycling" and the races he competed in.
Geoff and Tim call up memories how it was racing in the US back in those days, competing with Jittery Joe and riding against Gord Fraser, Chris Tilton and others.
In this episode Geoff and I interviewed Mandy Marquardt.
Mandy Marquardt is an American Sprint track cyclist, representing the US and Team Novo Nordisk, the world's first-all diabetes professional cycling team. Marquardt was diagnosed with type 1 diabetes at the age of 16. We talk about her cycling career and competing at an elite level whilst dealing with Type 1 diabetes every day. Mandy is a role model for others coming to terms with type 1 diabetes and races her bike with a purpose to help others to see what’s possible with diabetes…
In this podcast we interview Jasper Verkuijl. Jasper started with BMX racing when he was 5 years old following in the footsteps of his big brother. He ended up racing BMX at a very high national and international level until his early twenty's. We talk about getting in to flight-school and road racing which brought him amazing adventures and experience racing in the US and the Netherlands both at Elite (P,1,2) level. What are the differences between racing in the US and the Netherlands?
We talk about balancing his racing, work, family and a popular youtube channel. An amazing insight in the life of Jasper and his cycling fanatics community.
Rich has his own YouTube channel (25k subscribers at the time of this article) dedicated to all aspects of mountain biking and he does this in conjunction with "The Ride Series" MTB Skills Clinics.
This interview was an absolute blast and we learned a lot about Rich and his philosophy on learning to ride your bike and improving your skills. Just like he does on his youtube channel, he breaks down every topic in clear and concise details. We reference the sport and mental aspects relative to your life outside cycling from a social, but also professional perspective. Listen to the end when Rich shares his goals for the channel and has some great advise to young mountain-bikers and how to leverage social media to your advantage.
In this episode Geoff and Gerry interview Kim Geist. We discuss her long and extensive cycling career, how she got into coaching and how she deals with challenges like injury and currently events being postponed and cancelled.
We dive into strength training and talk a lot about the beauty of track cycling and her home turf The Valley Preferred Cycling Center in Trexeltown PA. If you are interested in track cycling orienting what it takes to start, or learn more about this discipline, makes sure to listen to the complete podcast!
In this episode Geoff & Gerry speak with Erik Hofman the owner of Dutch Diesel Coaching and founder of the Dutch Diesel community on Zwift. We discuss how Erik got into cycling and coaching and we dive into the principles of "Time Crunched Cyclist" and the importance of structured training. There's a good conversation about the importance of balancing your training with your social and work life so you don't over train or even burn-out.
We also discuss software like Zwift, TrainerRoad and Training peaks tools to support your structured training program.
Copyright Strava
Some big Strava changes announced today. I believe the landscape of cycling has drastically changed the last couple of months. Competition and market share force smaller companies to make choices and and reset priorities. Strava made a number of changes recently and we have to find out if it’s for profit, the cycling community or for survival. Currently I believe it’s the latter, and I truly hope that the former will follow sooner than later. I’ve been a subscription user for years now, and I like the tool, its worth the money to me.
“We’re betting on our athletes”
“This means that, starting today, a few of our free features that are especially complex and expensive to maintain, like segment leaderboards, will become subscription features.”
From the Strava website: New features for subscribers
A big Routes update, with planning & recommendations on iOS and Android
Matched Rides: Analyze performance on identical rides over time
See your full workout history with Training Log on iOS
Workout Analysis is now available for all activity types
Grade-Adjusted Pace (GAP) now on iOS and Android
Coming soon: A whole new way to compete on segments…
New subscription features that were previously free
Overall segment leaderboards (Top 10 view is still free)
Comparing, filtering and analyzing segment efforts
Route planning on strava.com, with a huge redesign launching soon!
Matched Runs: Analyze performance on identical runs over time
Training Log on Android and strava.com
Monthly activity trends and comparisons
Recent releases for all athletes
“Favorites first” feed settings and the return of the chronological feed
Improved impossible effort detection… False KOMs, QOMs, CRs dethroned!
Apple Watch uploading and improved sync to Apple Health
Recorded the drive home by accident? New mobile activity cropping
All activities now show both elapsed and moving time
New or improved analysis of power, cadence and swimming stroke rate
Subscribing got simpler and easier
Lots of new features for subscribers, but prices stay the same! We’ve also simplified our offering to make subscribing easier to understand – we’ve said goodbye to the brand of Summit and splitting subscriptions into Packs. Now you just use Strava for free, or subscribe to Strava for the best of everything we do.
In this episode Geoff and Gerry speak with Dave Grant, a Cat 2 and masters cyclist, who traveled to the Netherlands in the early 90’s to live and race his bike over there.
Of course we were very interested in how he ended up in the Netherlands, how it was racing for the Sauna Diana team and what he’s up to nowadays racing Road, Track, Cyclocross, and Mountain Bike, and how he will never do a Zwift race. Dave also discusses how training has changed under Covid 19, what new technology he’s really excited about, and what his goals will be once the racing season returns.
Photo credit: Aaron Ruttcamp
In this episode Geoff and Gerry are joined by Mike Kuhn and Todd Strauss. Mike and Todd are members of the PICL management team promoting youth mountain biking in Pennsylvania to inspire healthy lifestyles, build strong communities, and teach respect for the environment. Together with their team, many parents and volunteers they strive to build strong minds, bodies, and character in an equal and inclusive environment.
A very inspiring conversation about youth cycling, building a community, cycling-life and much more.
PICL is a member of the National Interscholastic Cycling Organization (NICA)
PICL's vision is: Empower youth through mountain biking!
"We are driving toward a future where every student in PA has access to Adventure and Competitive mountain bike programming and is encouraged to robustly engage in community service through Teen Trail Corps directed trail stewardship activities.
Every day we work to develop and support programs and curriculum that allow us to reach into communities across the Commonwealth and introduce students of every skill level and background to the many diverse, positive benefits of mountain biking.
We welcome students with all levels of riding experience and invite them to explore this life-long sport. We provide class-leading Competitive experiences across the state, with more to come as we grow in more places, but there is no mandate to race. For riders uninterested in racing, We’ve created an entirely new opportunity – to participate in Adventure experiences, which are open to those who just want to explore and smell the roses. Students can incorporate Adventure rides into their racing schedules too. We weave threads of community service and character development through it all, even as we’re out having a blast weaving our way through PA’s incredible forested single track trails.
Our goal:
At least one PA Interscholastic Cycling League program in every PA county by 2025. Get in touch to find out how you can make this happen where you live!"
Image credit: Eurosport/insidethegames
On the front of virtual racing, starting May 4th (may the forth be with you ;-)), there is a very exciting virtual race series starting. At least I think it’s really exciting, but with ZERO racing in real life, virtual racing is as close as it’s get. The exiting part for me its a pro only event backed by GCN (Eurosport) and Zwift using the experience from a virtual racing and a network broadcasting point of view, to hopefully give the best viewer experience as possible.
“Both men's and women's racing will be screened each day between 1400 and 1600 BST with some of the best cycling teams in the world including Mitchelton-Scott, EF-Education, NTT, Alpecin-Fenix, Bahrain-McLaren, Canyon//SRAM Racing, CCC-Liv and Boels Dolmans competing for race honors.”
Another amazing benefit is that the pro’s are racing for a good cause….not only their fitness and bragging right, but more importantly a charity.
“The Tour for All professional racing series will open a month-long charity fundraising initiative that will see Zwift donate a total of $125,000 to Doctors Without Borders/Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) and its COVID-19 crisis fund. An additional $125,000 can be unlocked once 250,000 people complete a stage of the Tour for All. The professional racing series is designed to showcase the mass-participation stages and encourage Zwifters to take part by riding some of the same courses that the pros have raced.”
The stages are more than just a short exhibition. Most of the stages are about an hour long and it will be very interesting to see the pro riders skill levels and experience Zwifting will come into play. Not to forget team tactics……the online races i’ve seen so far was basically all men/women for themselves..😉
4th May - Stage 1
We kick off the Tour with a flat-ish stage for the sprinters. Both courses feature one short steep hill so expect some action with multiple ascents.
Course: Innsbruckring, Innsbruck. Elevation Gain: 72m (237ft). Total distance: 52.9km (33miles)
5th May - Stage 2
Our first hilly stage.
Course: Cobbled Climbs, Richmond. Elevation Gain: 126m (413ft). Total distance: 46.2km (28.5miles)
6th May - Stage 3
Our first mountain stage. We begin by taking Ocean Boulevard around to the reverse Hilly KOM, which is the first half of the Figure 8 route. Then it’s over to the Volcano and up to the top before descending down and heading to the Italian Villas then the Mayan Jungle for a reverse loop of the circuit. After climbing out of the jungle, we descend back to sea level, hit The Esses and spin a quick around the Volcano Circuit. Then it’s through downtown Watopia and out Ocean Boulevard once more to the forward Epic KOM. Our route finishes at the Epic KOM banner.
Course: Medio Fondo, Watopia. Elevation Gain: 981m (3220ft). Total distance: 72.9km (45.1miles)
7th May - Stage 4
We give everyone’s climbing legs a break with a mostly flat and fast stage. Enjoy it while it lasts because tomorrow is the Queen Stage!
Course: Sand and Sequoias, Watopia. Elevation Gain: 147m (482ft). Total distance: 42.6km (26.5miles)
8th May - Stage 5
The Queen Stage with a finish up Alpe du Zwift.
Course: Quatch Quest, Watopia. Elevation Gain: 1710m (5610ft). Total distance: 46.5km (28.9miles)
Link to the original article: Cycling news
