On today's edition of the Ask Coach Parry Cycling podcast we chat to our cycling coach Devlin Eyden and find out what makes for a good climb when you are out on your cycling training. He chats about body size and power to weight ratio which allows you to attack the climbs.  We also look at the type of training you are doing which is important for sustained power. Devlin touches on the equipment you are riding and gives some helpful hints in that area as well.

Transcript

David Katz:          You’re with us on the Ask Coach Parry Cycling podcast, thanks for tuning in again, from myself, Mr Active, David Katz and Devlin Eyden, we’ve got another fantastic question for you today and we’ve had one come in surrounding the Tour de France. It’s been such an exciting tour, it’s coming to a culmination, about to finish but looking at the climbers, looking at these guys who are going to be winning the tour, so the question surrounded the likes of Chris Froome, Nairo Quantana, Alberto Contador, what gives them the edges on the climbs? Ie, as simple as, what makes a great climber Devlin?

Devlin Eyden:      David, so this is a question I love and more so in the sense I find myself asking the same question as to what’s going to make me a better climber but what typically makes someone like a Chris Froome or a Nairo Quantana and especially an Alberto Contador actually, as a great climber, is their small frame. I don’t mean the bike frame, I mean them as their human makeup, they’re very small individuals, they’re lightweight individuals, Chris Froome for example, his typical race weight at a Tour de France is hovering around the 67kg mark, so their small weight allows them to get over the hills and be able to drag themselves up where we look at a rider like a Peter Sagan for instance, or a Mark Cavendish, the much bigger, heavier sprinters, those riders are always the ones that are struggling getting back out the back of the Peloton when it’s moving at high speed up the climbs and it’s usually they then having to drag that weight over the climbs.

The body size is going to be the first thing and then secondly, in conjunction with that is their power to weight ratio. These riders, and those three again that we keep mentioning, are also contenders for the overall title and what makes them good overall riders is exactly that. They focus on various aspects of their riding that can make them a complete package. Their power to rate ratio is what’s going to be vital for allowing them to attack on those climbs.

There’s a lot of tactics that do come into it and it’s important to keep that in mind, so we’ve seen that a couple of times, recently now in this tour with Chris Froome attacking and catching people like Nairo Quantana off-guard and that’s key. Being able to, not necessarily just on tactics, but also being able to suss out what’s happening around you and then the type of training that comes in is important. They work really hard on their power output, on their legs, so staying power, being able to, not necessarily attack to have that explosive burst, but also being able to sustain that sort of power of a period of time, just for example, with some stats that Chris Froome and Team Sky actually released last year from some of his pre-season testing, Chris Froome was able to sustain close on a 30-40 minute, was able to sustain 6 watts per kg of bodyweight.

For anyone that has used the Power meter, for instance and has an idea of what the wattage actually means, 6 watts is really high and again, to be able to sustain that for a period of time is actually quite an impressive stat.

Then another thing that adds to that is they are very conscious about their equipment that they’re riding. What gear ratios they’re selecting on the day for a particular climb, unfortunately we don’t all have the luxury to chop and change our chain rings and our cassettes every time we’re going to hit a new stage on a stage race for instance, but for example the stage nine the other day that Chris Foome won, he actually rode a 53 tooth big chain ring on his bike, this is where the riders will typically in a mountain stage ride probably on a 52, so having that extra gear option actually gave him the edge on the downhill, just after the final climb where he actually attacked and was able to not run out of gears and sustain being able to put that power into the pedal stroke for a lot longer on the downs and the flats leading up to the finish.

There’s a lot of tactics and a lot of things, actually thinking that comes in behind it as well, other than just the physical makeup of the rider and the power and the training that they’ve put in.

DK:         Devlin, come to think of it, I maybe should have posed this question to Lindsey Parry, because seeing Froome on [inaudible 0.10.53] two, having to sort of run up the hill, maybe this was actually a running question, but really interesting. I think those guys are incredible, to be able to do that and do that on those climbs and it’s phenomenal and Chris Froome is an incredible athlete, as he’s shown time and time again. Just a reminder, we’ve been giving away some tubs of Peptopro and we’ve still got a few up for grabs, there’s two ways you can win that. Please go to our podcast on iTunes and rate it, you can stand a chance to win that, in conjunction, we’re also giving away a lifetime membership to the podcast or to the exclusive online member community, you can also rate us there and win that on iTunes and furthermore, if you sign up for a cycling coaching package on the Ask Coach Parry or the Coach Parry website, you can also stand a chance to win a few of those tubs remaining of Peptopro, so do get there and do that. From Devlin Eyden and myself, Mr Active, David Katz, we’ll catch up with you again in a few days’ time.