The Need for Speed
Sunday, March 8, 2009 at 12:43PM In my last post I wrote about muscle fiber types and how their development affects our performance. Basic concepts like, "train long to go long" and "train fast to sprint fast" are simple enough. But are there ways for competitive athletes to develop their speed off the bike that will complement their on-the-bike training? Certainly. Power and speed athletes from many sports use the gym to augment their sport specific training. Gym-based training can provide a stimulus that exceeds that which one might get on the bike. The idea is to then take these adaptations and hone them to cycling specific movements and skills.
The most obvious place to start is under the squat rack. Pedaling a bike requires force applied while extending the knee and hip. These same two movements are replicated performing a squat under load. Because of a greater degree of stability standing on the floor, one can subject the hip and knee extension musculature to greater loads than possible on the bike. Taken further, even greater loads are possible using a seated leg press. The back is supported and the athlete is seated so even more stability is created. The downside of this is that the seated leg press uses less supporting musculature and is a much less athletic skill. This may lessen its overall transferability to sport compared to the back or front squat. Because of this, I favor the front squat as the primary movement for leg strength development.
So, let's look at the various considerations for gym-based leg strength development. I have already pointed out the greater athleticism required to squat versus leg press. It's true that an athlete can probably leg press at least twice or even three times the weight he can squat. Is this overall greater force application important? Perhaps. I don't think we know for sure which transfers to the bike better. I know that a heavy squat feels just as hard as a heavy leg press. My opinion is that the greater complexity and overall functionality of the squat movement lends itself to better transferability to the cycling motion.
Now, that's not to say one should never leg press. On the contrary, I would say that during the strength development part of the pre season, leg pressing can be added as a complement to the whole program. It's just another way to hit the legs. Another point is that overall skill and back strength are key limiters when it comes to loading the squat. Some athletes have trouble with the squatting movement and lack the hip and ankle mobility to perform the movement properly. If they can't develop that in time, they will never get to meaningful loads to get the work done.
Provided that an athlete has the required skill to squat properly, the next choice is whether to perform a front or back squat. There is a significant body of research available demonstrating the efficacy of front squats versus back squats. Overall strength development is similar. Front squats may emphasize the quadriceps slightly more than the hip extensors. The nature of the movement demands overall lower loads compared to the back squat. More importantly, there are less sheer and compressive forces at the lumbar spine independent of load when front squatting which makes the movement safer for the back. It has also been demonstrated that individuals with long femurs (typical cyclists) use less optimal movement patterns when back squatting due to skeletal biomechanics. This makes the front squat the obvious choice once again.
Range of motion (ROM) is an important consideration with the squat. Traditional weight trainers and coaches prefer full ROM. "Ass to the grass" is a popular saying when talking about a good squat in many circles. In a perfect world, everyone would be able to achieve this "ideal" without consequence and with perfect form. Obviously, that world does not exist. Instead, we have athletes with mobility issues and injuries that make some modification necessary. A review of the current literature supports shortening the ROM to sport specific joint angles if necessary. It has been demonstrated that sheer forces at the knee and compressive forces at the patello-femoral joint go way up beyond 90 degrees of knee flexion. Olympic lifters need to go all the way down but cyclists certainly do not. The benefit of shortening the ROM is that an athlete can go heavier sooner as the shorter movement allows higher loads. This is advantageous for an athlete who has a relatively brief training window for pure strength development. To this end, I have adopted placing a bench or box behind me upon which to squat, touching down but not sitting at the bottom of each rep. Thighs are just short of parallel to the ground, a common bench mark for the movement.
Although specific load and rep schemes go beyond the scope of this article, I will say that I prefer low rep programs in the 1-5 rep range with high loads aimed at pure strength development. Supplemental movements like the dead lift, power clean, walking lunge and Bulgarian split squat can add variety and an element of single leg movement to the program. I also like to add in explosive, plyometric exercises like box jumps, depth jumps and weighted jumping squats to further hone the neurologic adaptation. In this way, we hit the type II fibers from both high load and speed demanding aspects.
Placement of this type of training is best done early in the season after a typical end-of-season break. It is well-documented that heavy endurance training inhibits strength gains. To get the most of this block of training, limit endurance riding to an hour or so a few days a week. The focus here is on strength and power. Don't shoot yourself in the foot by getting a few 3 or 4 hour rides in during the week. There will be plenty of time for that later.
In addition to the obvious leg training going on here, the addition of a light upper body and core strength program will help correct a multitude of potentially harmful strength imbalances incurred from a season of pure bike training. A few pounds gained here will be quickly shed once the big miles start adding up in the mid season. This aspect of the program also adds a degree of variety that makes the sessions interesting and fun.
For fast twitch-challenged cyclists, developing strength and power in the weight room during the early season may provide the horsepower needed to finally end a frustrating tendency of good cyclists to make the break but fail to deliver. - Brian
Reader Comments (2)
Tell us how Powderkeg went!!
Uuumm, still waiting for the blow-by-blow. Glad to know it's not just your wife you're not emailing though....