เรื่องที่ 11. Kill Yourself like Cadel Evans
>>>
The Tour de France is three
weeks of sheer hell that would
kill 99.9 percent of the world's population five times over.
The blokes who excel at it,
like our Cadel,
put themselves through torture in preparation for the event.
A few years back,
cycling expert David Martin of the Australian Institute of Sport said,
"Cadel laid down the highest V02 Max the AIS has ever seen!"
meaning can breathe in a huge a mount of oxygen of his size.
Evans and other world-class riders don't get that until they've trained for at least
30 hours a week over at least five years.
Retired pro cyclist Chris Carmichael, who coached Lance Armstrong,
wrote a Tour de France training program that's just horrible.
Here's a sample : a hill-climb attack that takes 90 minutes (after a 30-minutes "warm-up" ride)
You ride up the slope as fast as you could hit for the climb overall for a minute,
shift down two gears,
get out of the saddle,sprint for 20 seconds,climb at original pace for two minutes,
"recover" with six minutes of easier riding.
Repeat eight times.
He also recommends 53 km time trials so you can "bulid power at your lactate threshould"
or in other words,put the power down even though your muscles feel like they're melting.
Riders will lay down 800-1000 km per week in their base training period,
then work on power at the limit of their aerobic capacity.
The best riders can make 400 watts of power for an hour straight,
while and average,healthy bloke could only manage it for one or two minutes.
To for one or two minutes.
To get there the riders run four to six-hour ressions,three to five times a week,
repeating 30-to 60-minute climbs while they're monitored by a power meter.
The sick bastards.