The Limit of Triathlon Performance

I will write a list of what it is more important according to our empirical research of 20 years, having a team for that length of time.  I will start with the least important on the list:

Physical:  The way we train makes a different in our performance.  I have talked about the subject before, but let´s Coggan speak about it, Hunter Allen and Andrew Coggan, Training and racing with a power meter.  2010.  I like the way he puts it.  What he says is not just relevant to cycling, but to running and swimming.  It plays the major role in our physiology:

Strength, per se, plays a very small role in determining power output. The growing realization that more traditional forms of resistance training, such as weight lifting, provide little or no benefit to cyclists is possibly contributing to the increasing popularity of strength endurance training. Coaches who employ those workouts are attempting to provide a more specific form of on-the-bike resistance training that will enable a cyclist to make gains applicable to racing. However, it appears that few, if any, of the people who recommend strength endurance training have actually considered whether the forces generated during these sessions are in fact sufficient to cause beneficial adaptations to occur. Instead, most seem to have simply assumed that just because the cadence is lower than usual, and hence the pedaling forces higher, there will be an increase in muscular size and strength, and hence in maximal power. In fact, the average effective pedal force during strength endurance intervals is generally too low to represent a significant overload. A laboratory study performed in New Zealand in 2005 found that such training does not increase either the size (estimated using anthropometry) or the maximal force production (determining using isokinetic dynamometry) of the leg extensor muscles.  (139).

Armstrong has said it, and it is the reason why he has been persecuted and even banned to compete in ironman; because he has spoken clearly (February 16, 2012. ARMSTRONG, THE GREATEST PRODUCT OF OUR SCIENCE in this blog).  Anyone with his attitude toward competition and his physical, which is not unique, can do what he did without the use of enhancing drugs. What he did is doable, but we need to be educated in many aspects.  Unfortunately, there are no people around who can do such a team work and pay “attention to details.”

In 2007, Armstrong was interviewed by Ciclismo a fondo.  267: 46.  He said: “The reason why Johan and I were able to win was because we competed against a bunch of imbeciles.  We had a modern planning…There were a bunch of ranchers running around us…still the same situation in cycling.”

Timidly Coggan speaks about the ignorance that surrounds us.  I spoke about it before reading his book. March 29, 2012. TRIATHLON PHYSIOLOGY FOR DUMMIES AND THE TENDENCY TOWARD THE MEAN Seventh part. What is a neurological workout? Whoever wants to know about cycling should read Coggan´s book.  The problem is that the physical is the least important of the important aspects to win.  I will continue with the second least important point.