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- Welcome back to Triathlon Training explained
powered by Training Peaks.
This week, we're going to be getting a little bit geeky
and looking at the numbers that you aren't currently using,
but really should be.
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Stats and numbers can be pretty useful
for a personal analysis.
I say they're essential for a coach, and they're also
quite interesting, if you just follow the sport.
Now, I'm going to presume you're aware of the common
measurements such as pace, heart rate, power,
speed et cetera, those sort of things that you're likely
to have displayed on your sports watch
or your bike computer.
Well, today I'm going to be delving deeper
into the world of stats and numbers to help you
to be able to improve your analysis
and therefore performance.
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This is actually relevant to both cycling and running
and it's a number that you can react to pretty much
instantaneously, finding the optimum cadence
for a long or a hard effort or even more importantly,
a race can significantly improve your efficiency.
So for running, it's measured in strides per minute,
if you're on the bike it's revolutions per minute.
You could also then analyse your overall average
cadence at the end of an effort.
If you don't want to get bombarded with too many numbers,
then consider using zones to train with.
So a simple scale of one to five or one to seven
for power or heart rate just makes it a lot easier.
And you can even set your device to alert you
if you fall outside of that zone or prescribed zones
for your session and then you don't need to worry
about looking at the smaller numbers
and constantly checking, you can just concentrate
on your effort knowing you're working the right intensity.
I'm sure you're aware of hills when you meet them
and especially uphills although frustratingly going downhill
isn't always as advantageous as you might hope.
If you're riding with a power metre though,
it doesn't really matter because you're just concentrating
on those numbers.
If you don't have that metric, you will be looking
at the speed that you're going at and you'll need to
take into consideration the gradient that you're riding on.
While it's usually displayed in a percentage,
it's quite useful when you analyse your ride
afterwards as well,
as you can work out your effort level to a certain extent,
by taking into consideration whether it's up or downhill,
or on the flat.
This can be displayed on most bike computers or advanced
sport watches even, but of course you do have to have
a power metre or power pedals in the first place.
The great thing about power, it gives you instant feedback
on any changes in effort and it's really easy to make
sure you're working at the right intensity,
but normalised power, takes it to the next level
as it takes into consideration any changes in gradient,
if you're going up or downhill a lot, or if you're having
to start and stop say through traffic lights
and it usually comes out as a number higher
than your average power.
So it just gives you a slightly more accurate idea
of just what intensity you've been working at.
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Leading on from normalised power, this works out how
smoothly you've ridden your bike.
Variability index and all of these following numbers
are useful for analysing your data post effort.
So, this one is a simple calculation of normalised power
divided by your average power and a score of one
is optimal, but unlikely.
So, so for non-drafting triathlon or time trial,
you should aim to be between one and 1.05.
If you're close to 1.1 that indicates poor pacing,
and inefficient riding.
This is similar in some ways to normalised power.
Looking at pace, in direct relation
to the changes in gradient.
So imagine if you were running up a hill at the same
effort level as you ran on the flat, you'd expect that pace
to be slower, so your watch, through GPS, obviously knows
if you're going up or down a hill, and it can work out
the pace at which you're running at.
Now, if you've done say a hard effort on a hilly route,
you might feel a little disheartened at your average pace.
But, normalised greater power would actually work out
what that pace would be if you were running on the flat.
Using your normalised graded pace, you can actually work out
your intensity factor, and this number is really useful
in determining how hard you've worked in that training
session, the training benefit, and importantly,
the recovery that you'll then require.
Now, if you use a Training Peaks platform that automatically
calculates it for you after each session,
but you can also do it yourself by using your normalised
graded pace, or if you're cycling, your normalised power,
and then divided that by your functional threshold pace,
or functional threshold power and that will give you,
your intensity factor.
Therefore, if intensity factor equals one,
it means you've ridden or ran
at your FTP for that given period.
So, it's likely to be higher in a race of less than
an hour or an intense training session,
but then on a longer event you'll see a number
that's going to be less than one.
As an Ironman age group athlete, you'd expect to see
an intensity factor of around 0.6
to 0.7, in a race, whereas the pros
and elites are going to be between 0.7 and 0.79.
That sort of intensity is the same for an age grouper
doing a half Ironman distance.
However, according to Training Peaks predictions,
they'd say that for an Olympic
or sprint distance triathlon,
you're more likely to expect something between 0.9 to 1.04.
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For these next few numbers, I think I need a little bit
of help from my laptop, because we're going to be delving
deeper into some more analytics.
Well, this is another metric used by Training Peaks
and it's a great marker for your overall fitness,
especially just at a glace
if you're using the graph for example.
So an increase in your training stress score indicates
that you're training low so your intensity or your volume
or both has increased and therefore your overall fitness
in the long term will also be improving.
It is a slightly more complicated calculation on first
glance, but it's basically adding together your
normalised power, your intensity factor,
and the length of your training session and then dividing
all of that by your FTP.
Though the more straightforward calculation which you can
do looks like this.
So, intensity factor squared times by the amount
of hours times by 100 and that will also be called your TSS.
Training Peaks actually has some guidelines for training
using the TSS values to give you an idea of how hard
and for how long you need to be training,
depending obviously on your individual target.
Now these are just a rough guide, but a great starting
point if you are new to using these numbers.
Leading on from TSS, there are some other useful numbers
that'll contribute to your daily fitness chart,
and obviously we've talked about fitness being key,
but you must consider fatigue alongside that as then,
combined together, they will give you your overall form.
This is a measure of the long term effect
of your training load and actually takes into consideration
the last 42 days and uses an average,
but it does put a bigger weight on the more recent days
as obviously they're gonna have more of an impact
on where you are right now.
This one goes hand in hand with CTL as it's a measure
of your overall fatigue so, it takes into account
your TSS, your training stress score from the last
seven days, but again, puts more weight on the final
few days as they're gonna have more of an impact.
This one is the important combination of your chronic
training and your acute training load and together you
can then work out your training stress balance
which is also known as form, that all important number
that you're looking at ahead of a race that's coming up.
So, to calculate these, you take yesterday's chronic
training load and you subtract yesterday's acute
training load to get your TSB score and hopefully you're
going to have a positive number, that's good,
and the higher the number the better, especially if you're
looking for a strong performance.
And interestingly after a big race, if you've had some rest,
you'll notice that your TSB gets a second peak,
and this is because your fatigue
is dramatically decreasing, but you haven't really
increased your training so your form is dropping off
ever so slightly, but the amount of rest will actually
give you that second peak and this is where you'll
see some athletes able to perform quite successfully
again, after a big race two or three weeks later.
And it actually becomes much clearer if you take a look
at the Training Peaks Performance Management Chart.
You can see the peak from my A race this year and then
a sub peak couple of weeks after when I've recovered,
but before my fitness has really dropped off.
You can also look at your predicted form,
to give you an idea of where you're going to be in the
next week or two and this is a really useful tool
for your coach so he can tailor your training exactly
to make sure you peak for that A race.
Let's take a step back and look at a slightly lighter
element of training, yet still an equally important number
and that is sleep.
Now you can track your sleep on most fitness watches
or even using an app on your phone and it's a good idea
to record this data over a period of time so you can
start to see any patterns, work out how much sleep you
need and the quality of that sleep.
Now with the Polar products,
there's an app called Polar Flow and that'll actually tell
you the quality of sleep you've had on a scale out of five
and then also, as well as recording the amount of time
you've spent in bed, it'll give you a percentage of that,
that was spent asleep.
And all these stats are really helpful when you're
analysing your training.
'Cause if you've had a few days of not such continuous
sleep or reduced amount of sleep, than it could have
a knock on effect on your training and it's worth
taking that into consideration when you're planning
your next few days as well.
It's pretty common these days to hear people talking
about how many steps they've done in a day,
with 10,000 being that ultimate goal,
and that's great for someone who's
not naturally that active,
but if you're a triathlete and you're training for
swim, bike and run, then really you want to try to reduce
the extra steps that you're doing and reduce that active
time so that you can optimise your recovery.
Now, another similar figure, are calories.
It is pretty satisfying after a big training day
to look at how many calories you've burned,
but really just glance at it and just concentrate
on getting the fuel back in so making sure you've got
the right proportions of protein, carbohydrate, fats,
and of course fibre, minerals and vitamins
to make sure your body can really recover.
There are of course, plenty of other numbers out there
so focus on the ones that are going to help you and your
coach work towards your goal.
And remember you did still need to listen
to your body as well.
Well, if you've enjoyed it, give us the thumbs up like
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all of our videos here at GTN and if you want to see
some other videos from out Triathlon Training Explains
series, you can find those just over here.