by huw williams » Wed Mar 05, 2008 11:51 am
[quote="Sylv"]Yesterday I was reading this interesting post on singletrack about what people thought made the difference between Elite racers and us mere mortals, a few agreed that first and foremost it was the ability to self-inflict pain onto themselves repeatedly and for long lengths of time.
In essence that's correct although its a little more complicated than that. For example a really keen amateur might have the ability to absolutely bury himself for the entire race and the desire to hurt himself as much as an Elite rider, but if he hasn't got the sufficient power, efficiency in using it and tactical nous as to when to use it to call on, then he's not going to win the race. You often see the guy who wins the biggest hardest stages in the tours is the guy who doesn't look like he's inflicting the most pain on himself - Think of Armstrong winning in the alps and looking relatively fresh compared to those who appear to be 'killing' themselves but getting dropped. This is because Armstrong was the strongest rider and if we assume that this wasn't down to devious practices, then it means he trained either harder or smarter (possily both) than his rivals which might certainly include being able to inflict more pain on himself than any of his competitors.
Self inflicting pain in training or racing is essentially long periods spent riding at your threshold while making occasional forays into the territory above it (chasing down breaks etc) and recovering from them. In esence its why you hear the word 'Threshold' used so much when you see training programmes and coaching plans. The longer you can stay at threshold, and the more power you can generate whilst there, the more effectively you'll race. It bloody hurts is the thing!!!
As a mountain bike racer, particularly an endurance specialist, you've got a superb grounding in this area because off road races don't give you the benefit of drafting and sitting in a group to recover - the whole time is generally spent right at your threshold from the moment you sprint off the line to be first rider into the singletrack.
The training group rides and chain gangs are similarly good for that reason. As soon as you start to feel the pace relent, someone who's been sititing in and recovering gets on the front or attacks and raises the pain level again.