Here on GCN we have done a couple of videos in the past
on how to sprint well
Now, bearing in mind that myself
Si, Matt and Lasty, couldn't really sprint to save our lives
when we were full time
we thought we'd rope someone in who sort of knows what he's talking about
a little bit...
Meet Mark Cavendish
He's going to give us 5 tips for sprinters.
Right, number 1...
TITLE: JUDGE THE DISTANCE - DON'T GO TOO EARLY!
If we [the pros] go for 250m, that's 12 seconds, maybe you know?
It's going to be a fair bit longer for an amateur
so judge your distance
It's not about your absolute maximum wattage
because that will be a spike in your power
but it's about how long you can hold that high wattage for the whole sprint for, you know?
You'll know it, and you'll have to train it.
But don't go too early - it's easy when you see the finish line
to go too early
and although you might get a high wattage
if you die at the end you'll lose more speed than the others
TITLE: CHOOSE THE RIGHT GEAR
Number 2
again choose the right gear
We use a 53 or 54 with 11
you know it's a big gear to get around
You have to really get on top of it
I rarely use a 54
because I ride with shorter cranks
I get the leg speed of the gear going,
you have to get the gear going
It's not just grunting out a big gear and that's a sprinter, you know?
It's getting over and on top of the gear and accelerating
And that goes for selecting your gear before you start the sprints as well
You don't want to be changing gear mid-way through the sprint
because, well, you'll lose power then when you're changing
You'll lose the force and the torque through the pedals
TITLE: COMMIT TO YOUR SPRINT
In a bunch sprint
as soon as you're going to go, as soon as you've picked your moment
you go, you don't wind it up, you go, and that's it
No pacing?
No pacing in sprints, it's a flat out effort
and like I said, if you've done your homework and you know what you can do
and what conditions - uphill downhill, headwind or tailwind
you'll know how far you can go for before you're going to die
TITLE: BRING YOUR BIKE TO YOUR FEET
Number 4,
right, you know you see a lot of bike riders
and when they sprint
they go and they are bouncing you know?
And that's because they are bringing their feet to the pedals like they're climbing
When you're climbing, you bring your feet over the top and on to the pedals you know?
When you're sprinting
although it might feel efficient and you may feel like you're getting your power down
I have always found it more effective to bring the bike to your feet
if that makes sense
So, you use your arms
and you bring your bike to your feet
instead of bringing your feet to your bike
I've already found three mistakes that I made for a good 10 years!
TITLE: KEEP LOW
Right, last one, tip number 5 for any budding sprinters
I think it's what I'm most famous for
and that's keeping low
To be fair I always did it naturally
I don't know if it's because of racing the track, or because I'm short legged and long body
but you saw Caleb Ewan doing that, how low he gets it's crazy
and there's a massive aerodynamic advantage there you know?
If you're like this you're really closing the hole here
compared to if you're sprinting like this
The big hole, the big gaping hole to bring in the air
So keep low and you are going to accelerate further
Right, so, 5 tips which you can all use to make yourself faster in the sprint,
so you can therefore either get more wins, or get better results
I'm going to give it a go now, and see how I get on.
I'm going to put all of Mark's tips into this sprint
right so when I go, go. Right gear, keep low
right, 3, 2, 1........
I told you to keep low, keep low!
Right, well you might be able to put his tips to better effect than I did
Now, on the other hand, if you'd like some climbing tips
all you've got to do is click up there, and you'll find Matt talking to Alberto Contador
And if you haven't yet caught the interview that we did with Mark, you can find that just down that side
And to subscribe, click in the middle, there will be loads more good tips.