Road Cycling Academy Podcast

If your goal is to beat your mates on the weekend bunch ride, this might be the most effective workout you can add to your training.
In this episode, Road Cycling Academy founder Cam Nicholls and Head Coach Ryan Thomas break down one of their favourite interval sessions for recreational and amateur cyclists. Rather than targeting a single training zone, this workout combines VO₂ max efforts, sweet spot intervals and anaerobic repeats to replicate the demands of a real-world group ride.
TP Virtual Ride: https://tpvirtualhub.com/84191 
Free PDF: https://shorturl.at/Pw2rp 
You'll learn:
Why most indoor cycling workouts don't prepare you for fast bunch rides
How hard-start VO₂ intervals improve your ability to respond to attacks
Why sweet spot efforts in the middle of the session build fatigue resistance
How anaerobic efforts on tired legs improve your finishing power
The importance of durability and race-specific training
Why Ryan recommends riding in Level Mode instead of ERG mode for sessions like this
How to progress this workout over a 4-6 week training block
Whether you're preparing for your local bunch ride, a gran fondo, criterium or simply want to become a stronger cyclist, this episode explains how to train for the unpredictable nature of real cycling—not just structured intervals.
If you'd like to ride this workout with us, we'll also show you how to complete it on TrainingPeaks Virtual. https://tpvirtualhub.com/84191 
 
Transcript: 
Cam Nicholls (00:01.826)
Welcome to the RCA Podcast, designed for recreational and amateur road cyclists with a focus on performance. We dive into cycling training, nutrition, strength training for cyclists and even bike fitting tips, all designed to help you train smarter, ride faster and hopefully tear your mates' legs off. So without further ado, let's dive into today's episode.
Welcome back to the RCA podcast, which is also on YouTube. Today I'm joined by the RCA's head coach, Ryan Thomas. And I think we're going back-to-back bro science videos here because we're going to talk about the best workout you can do to beat your mates. And this isn't really there's no science literature on this one, is there? No. This is just from us doing, you know, RCA for now about six or seven years, working with recreational and amateurs, digging into the science and
Coming up with a workout that we think that people can do that I did actually yesterday. I'm still a little bit fatigued from it, to be honest. but a workout people can do in on a week to week basis for a maybe a six week block or something like that, if they're looking to to beat their mates. So if people want to do this workout, just know that we've we're gonna be hosting this workout on Training Pegs Virtual, which you can do with us next week. So we'll drop a link below to that. I also
Did this workout on Training Peaks Virtual yesterday. So I've got some questions about it, Ryan. But what is the workout first?
Ryan Thomas (01:27.17)
Yeah, well it's we've done so many different workouts and we're always prescribing something. It's a mix of like a blender that we might have seen on Wahoo system, bit of Bunch ride style, a bit of
Cam Nicholls (01:36.088)
They have the mini blender and the big blender. I've done them both on Wahoo system. Or is it Wahu X these days? I can't remember.
Ryan Thomas (01:42.03)
Yeah, they're incredibly challenging, right? Like you by the end of it, you're on your hands and knees. So it's kind of thinking about what you need to do in a bunch ride or you're riding next to your mate, like how do you get up that climb and they're like, you're starting to drop and you're starting to get a half wheel and it's like it's really challenging. Yep. I've kind of mixed together a bunch of different physiology, but essentially it's fatiguing you and making you stressing your body enough that by the end of it you're gonna have to go really hard on fatigue legs.
So this particular workout's one version of many that we can do and that we can create. And there's many different adaptations, but essentially we do a warm up, do a ramp, up to threshold, activate. And then in this particular one, we've got two hard start VO2s, which I really like. It kind of gets we prime our VO two system, we get our oxygen consumption really hard in the first minute, and then we settle back down into low VO two and where heart rate stays really high and it's but it's still really hard on the legs for four to five minutes. Yep.
Do that twice, recover, and then we get into some sweet spot tempo for two by eight minutes with a short recovery in there. So kind of what you would do in a bunch ride, for example, you've done a couple of hard efforts and then you're settling into a nice pace, settling, rolling turns. And then the final set is one minute anaerobic effort. So in a bunch ride, it's like where that split happens. Usually in a bunch ride is like that really hard one minute effort. Recover, go again, and then go again and again until you until you can't go anymore. So
kind of mimicking that really hard end of a bunchie. Okay.
Cam Nicholls (03:09.966)
Cool. So before I give you my feedback on it, I've got some questions about the ride. Yep. Let's keep in mind that, you know, based off previous conversations that we've had, because this kind of does contradict a little bit some of the conversations we've had about targeting specific zones and spending six weeks there. Yeah. This is kind of like all the zones in one ride. Go smack yourself. So make sure that, you know, if you want to get the most out of these, you've have sort of periodized, you know, through, you know, your lower end aerobic zones. Maybe spend a bit of time on threshold. Yep.
You know, if you really want to get the most out of it. If you don't care about that, fine. But I just wanted to preface that because it does kind of this workout is a bit of everything. Yeah. Right. It there's a reason for it because bunch rides or races or events, they're a bit of everything. And a lot of times people do the training and they're doing, I'm doing the over unders, I'm doing VO two session, you know, max workouts. And but they're sustained and they're they're they're predictable. This is like an unpredictable interval session, if that is not a co not a contradiction in itself. So
Ryan Thomas (03:53.046)
Hundred percent.
Ryan Thomas (04:06.232)
Yeah, it makes sense.
Cam Nicholls (04:09.228)
Yeah. So what I liked about this workout, let's talk about the first intervals. Yep. Was that if you think about getting dropped in a bunch ride or or you know being on the limit, what happens? And I even hear this from recreational amateurs. I hate it when people attack. And then, you know, it's like, why are you training that? You know, and this is kind of doing a big effort where people will attack and then going back into quite a hard effort. So it could be like, you know, someone's attacked in the bunch and everyone's accelerated.
And then you gotta get on the wheel because you know there's a couple of guys driving it. So that first couple of intervals I feel replicates that to a certain degree.
Ryan Thomas (04:45.186)
Definitely. Okay. Yeah. And it's a strategy you can use across any type of interval, like a tempo interval or a hard start anaerobic interval or a hard start threshold. And I use this quite a lot. Yeah. It's really good physiologically, but it's very applicable what you do on the road.
Cam Nicholls (04:59.918)
Okay. The next two intervals that you sp spoke of, which was the probably for me, maybe bottom end sweet spot. Yeah. Tempo. Yeah, around 300 watts for eight minutes. I've been doing a lot of tempo work recently. So I've I found or sweet spot work because I'm not really training for anything and I like just to sit on because particularly from a weight management perspective, I'd rather than do zone two, I'd rather do tempo or sweet spot because I know I'm just burning through some more calories.
Ryan Thomas (05:09.582)
Three hundred watts, yeah.
Cam Nicholls (05:28.866)
Because I'm not doing enough volume at the minute. Yeah, it's different to the actual you know I'm
Ryan Thomas (05:31.126)
One way to think about it.
Do what I say, not what I do.
Cam Nicholls (05:37.09)
Yeah, exactly. But I've been doing a lot of work, so I actually found this kind of quite easy this part. So I was curious to get your perspectives. Maybe it's just because I conditioning myself for this, I found a little bit easier. Other people may not. Is it designed to be a bit easier or like what's the purpose of the sustained efforts in the middle?
Ryan Thomas (05:53.356)
Yeah, I mean this is one iteration is probably the first type that you would do. And and I would increase this up to threshold. Okay. So in the progression, we want to make them harder and harder. If you're doing the s exact same workout for two weeks, three weeks, it's probably not gonna give you much more, right? And you're gonna get pretty comfortable with it. But the next week, so next week go and do them at threshold. Do those eight minutes at ninety five to ninety seven percent. Or I'd go to a hundred percent if you're feeling good. And I think the one caveat for this type of workout is you do it in level mode as opposed to erg mode.
You can probably get a bit more out of it if you're feeling good. Yeah, so go I'm personally as a writ as a when I'm riding on the trainer, I'm rarely in eark mode. I'll go in level mode. This podcast
Cam Nicholls (06:25.23)
I doing erg mode.
Cam Nicholls (06:34.158)
The podcast is brought to you by the Road Cycling Academy. If you're a recreational or amateur road cyclist and you're stuck on a frustrating performance plateau, feeling like you need some guidance, but you're not quite ready to dive straight into one-to-one coaching. At the RCA, we've created something called the 12 week custom plan, which we believe would be your perfect next step. It starts off with an upfront deep dive call with your coach who will understand your goals, your riding preferences, what your not negotiable rides are.
And where you want to go, then they'll create a fully tailored 12-week custom plan that is supported over the 12-week period. We believe it's the perfect intermediate step, giving you a taste of working with a coach and experiencing a customized plan without committing to full coaching. Our writers are seeing real results too, and you can go to our Google reviews to see this. Marvin recently shaved over 30 minutes off his Grafton to Inverel time from doing the 12-week custom plan.
Adam gained 20 watts on his FTP in 12 weeks and 40 watts on his five minute power. And we have riders completing rides that they've failed in previous attempts like Peaks, Challenge, all from doing this 12-week custom plan. So if you're ready to break through, head to the roadcyclingacademy.com. In the menu system, you'll see our 12-week custom plan and take the first step towards that next level performance. Now let's get back to the podcast.
Right. I'm always in erg mode. I love erg mode. I don't have to think about it. I know you people should be doing level mode. But it's just like well what that's what's practical for me right now.
Ryan Thomas (08:10.862)
Yeah. So the benefit of level mode in that situation, if you were sitting at three hundred watts and you're like, Well, I'm pretty comfy, like maybe my sweet spot's three thirty today. Like I'll let's lift three thirty and let's three thirty. Okay. There's no negative to that. It's just what your legs are on the day. Or maybe your physiology aligns better to that. So that's a benefit there.
Cam Nicholls (08:28.718)
So it was two eight minute sort of sweet spot efforts. Yeah. With a three minute recovery or was it four minute three. Three minute recovery. Yeah. And while I was doing that, I I was thinking that I was like, so I've got three anaerobic efforts coming up. Four fifty watts on an indoor trainer in erg mode is quite difficult for me right now. So I was like, okay, maybe we're doing this now because if I was doing something more challenging, I'm not going to get through that. So the final intervals was a minute at four fifty watts. Mm-hmm.
Ryan Thomas (08:34.401)
Yeah, sure.
Ryan Thomas (08:52.184)
Yes.
Cam Nicholls (08:58.496)
And then two was it two minutes recovery and then a minute on? Yes. Two minutes off, a minute on. And once again, I was surprised I got through this okay. But I I'm I was thinking like, you know, bunch rides, group rides, where do people often get dropped? It's at the end when it's like like I think about our Tuesday World Champs where I live in Noosa. It's the one minute or 45 second climb up, you know, the final the final climb, which is maybe, you know, after people have got about an hour in the legs where they pop. So I was like, okay.
I've done these initial, you know, intervals which were quite challenging. Ones in the middle, okay, they were sus they weren't that challenging, but they fatigued my legs to a certain degree. I'm now doing these three hard efforts on fatigue legs. So it's kind of like, you know, durability that a lot of people don't necessarily train. And I I felt like that's why you put them there.
Ryan Thomas (09:48.3)
A hundred percent. And I think a lot of people who are just choosing a workout on wherever or making a workout up, you would usually do hard stuff at the start, right? 'Cause that's when you feel good. You want to do hard stuff at the start. That's when you the le the least amount of fatigue in the legs and you can pr probably produce more power. But this type of work or beating your mates around the block or in the bunchy or in a race or whatever, it it's you're never getting dropped in the first five minutes or ten minutes of a of a bunchy or riding with your mates. It's in the last hour.
Or in the last fifteen minutes of that group ride where that one minute, thirty second punch is really important. Yes. And you can progress this. So level mode, if I was doing this workout, I would do if I was in level mode, I'd just go as hard as I can for a minute. And th if I'm four fifty or five hundred watts, it wouldn't really bother me. And as a coach I wouldn't really matter because what we're trying to achieve out of that is what's your ability or how hard can you push after an hour or forty five minutes of intervals, what can you get out of the legs? And we'd
The reason that you wouldn't do this too much early on in a prep or whatever is that if you're pushing that really hard, it's gonna take a couple of days to recover from that type of anaerobic work.
Cam Nicholls (10:53.822)
it's quite fatiguing. Yeah. So while I got through it, you know, reasonably unscathed, and I said to you off camera, I'm actually kind of doing this workout myself. Not the one you prescribe, but I'm making my own one up where I do I'll start off with a s I kind of periodized through the designs. As we talk about, I'll start off with, you know, zone two warm-up, sweet spot effort for 10 minutes, recovery for five, then I'll do over-unders threshold for eight, ten minutes, then I'll recover for five minutes, then I'll do 3015s.
And then I'll recover for five minutes and I'll do an all out 30 second effort. Yeah. And that's kind of my blender. So you yours is a bit more re reverse engineered, which is probably smarter for bunch rides, was bunch rides start off hard. Yes. whereas my, you know, my version not so much. So because I've been doing this workout, so I can just stay conditioned for the local group ride, I found it relatively not easy, but not as challenging as I probably would have if I hadn't done this workout before. But those one minute efforts from a musculoskeletal perspective, while I wasn't cardio, I wasn't
failing, like later that afternoon and even this morning, I really felt it in the legs. Which I and a lot of people don't do that kind of work on the trainer, I don't find the anaerobic work. They do the VO2, they do the threshold, but they don't do the hard thirty second or one minute pretty much max.
Ryan Thomas (12:07.106)
Yeah, and it's important for if you don't have a local bunch ride, for example, if you're just on the indoor trainer or you're not doing any any online racing, then this type you'll never get this type of stimulus. Right. Like you're never getting a really hard effort after an hour or an hour and a half or however long you're doing. But yeah, it's really important. For someone who's ra like I race every weekend. I do a one hour race every weekend. And at the end of that race you're emptying the tank. And that this is what the type of stuff you're getting. But if you're not doing that type of work, then
Not really training that ability to suffer after all when you're already fatigued.
Cam Nicholls (12:38.252)
No, and don't they say this w this is the kind of work that wakes up dormant muscle fibers? Yeah. We're activating more more muscle fibers that are there to be used. Cool. All right. Well, if you would like to join Ryan and I and do this workout, we're gonna do the exact same one or are you gonna mix it up for the next one? I will do the same one.
Ryan Thomas (12:46.658)
Yeah, exactly. Yeah.
Ryan Thomas (12:55.394)
I think we'll do the same one. We'll do the same one and well I'll make the ranges a little bit better. And then use level mode so you can go a bit harder, I
Cam Nicholls (13:04.02)
Use level mode. You can do your your coaching over the over the chat. You can push some people as we're going through it. Yeah, we'll put a link below and we'll catch everyone in the next show.

One of the biggest mistakes recreational cyclists make is relying on estimated FTP numbers from Garmin, Strava or Wahoo to determine their training zones. If those estimates are wrong, your Zone 2 training could be missing the mark—and limiting your aerobic development.
In this episode, Road Cycling Academy founder Cam Nicholls and Head Coach Ryan Thomas discuss a simple "bro science" method that can help cyclists estimate their true Zone 2 power without needing a formal FTP or Critical Power test.
RCA 12 Week Custom Plan: https://roadcyclingacademy.com/cycling-plan-custom/ 
You'll learn:
Why estimated FTP numbers can lead to inaccurate training zones
How to use heart rate and power together to validate your Zone 2 intensity
The one-hour Zone 2 test almost every cyclist can perform
What heart rate drift (decoupling) tells you about your aerobic fitness
Whether you should train to power or heart rate during endurance rides
Why easier Zone 2 training is often more effective than riding too hard
Practical advice for cyclists training 6-12 hours per week
Whether you're training for your next gran fondo, trying to increase your FTP, improve endurance or simply become a stronger recreational cyclist, this episode provides practical, evidence-informed advice you can apply immediately.
If you'd like to try the Zone 2 test discussed in this episode, we'll also be providing a downloadable guide linked below.
#cycling #zonetwo #FTP #endurancecycling #cyclingtraining #roadcycling #cyclingcoach #cyclingperformance #masterscycling #hearttraining
 
Transcript: 
Cam Nicholls (00:01.826)
Welcome to the RCA Podcast, designed for recreational and amateur road cyclists with a focus on performance. We dive into cycling training, nutrition, strength training for cyclists and even bike fitting tips, all designed to help you train smarter, ride faster and hopefully tear your mates' legs off. So without further ado, let's dive into today's episode.
Welcome back to the RCA podcast, which is also on YouTube. Today I'm joined by the head coach of the RCA, Ryan Thomas. And today we're gonna do some bro science, Ryan. Because at the end of the day, with recreational and amateur road cyclists who we deal with, you know, guys that are training six to maybe twelve hours per week if they're lucky, busy lifestyles, jobs, families, you name it. You know, sometimes people just aren't gonna do testing. Yes.
Ryan Thomas (00:36.91)
Knuckle down. Yeah.
Cam Nicholls (00:56.832)
work out their numbers. They're just not going to do it. I've we've recently implemented a quiz at the RCA where people fill out this questionnaire, three minutes, they get presented with results on where we think they should be focusing their fitness if they want to increase their FTP. And off the back of that quiz, if people say they're looking for some tailored advice or maybe want to work one on one with a a coach, I offer a call. And as part of that call, it's just like an intermediate step if people are maybe coaching's too much to jump straight into, they just want to have a chat with somebody.
So I've been speaking to a lot of recreational and amateurs and through that conversation I've learnt that yeah, people are just taking an estimate off Strava or Garmin or or Wahoo. Is that commonly what you see when you bring people on board?
Ryan Thomas (01:37.548)
So common. Yeah, super common. There's a lot of AI predictors out there. Yep. That will give you a rough number. But yeah, like we just spoke about in another podcast that you may or may not have listened to. It's a lot of estimating it doesn't tell you much.
Cam Nicholls (01:51.246)
Yes. Yeah, exactly. So as a result of that, you know, people are getting a zone two number from this estimated FTP. And, you know, often it's external to the fact that they're a lot of them aren't actually doing exclusive zone two work, which is perhaps another rabbit hole for another day. The number that they're getting for their zone two power is inaccurate. And zone two is probably like the mainstay that we wanna be working.
You know, in our cycling, no matter where we are in our journey, whether you're doing targeting an event or you're doing off season work, you're always doing zone two. Yes. You always want to keep topping up the aerobic engine. So it's arguably the most important number you should have.
Ryan Thomas (02:34.094)
Yeah, definitely. You agree? Yeah, well cycling at the end of the day, it's and it's an aerobic sport. Like it's and if you're cycling for more than f two minutes, then it's aerobic. So the easiest way, less stressful, most the least stressful way to boost that aerobic engine is zone two work and a lot of it.
Cam Nicholls (02:43.096)
Yes.
Cam Nicholls (02:51.544)
Yes. So if we're gonna give somebody an idea of what their their zone two power should be, and if we're using FTP, obviously we use critical power at the RCA, which is perhaps a bit left of field when you think about the whole recreational and amateur cycling community. Most people are talking about FTP. So that's why we're talking about a little bit more. But so if we look at FTP, what number should we be looking at if we're trying to target our zone two power?
Ryan Thomas (03:17.122)
Yeah, anywhere from sixty to seventy percent. The actual zone two zone is fifty five to seventy four percent of your threshold or your FTP. So anywhere in there. Usually we when we set zone two work, it's usually sixty to seventy percent. Yeah.
Cam Nicholls (03:32.6)
Yep, okay. So here's my broscience hack, Brian. Yeah, yeah. Which I haven't really told you about. And I'm keen to get your thoughts. If somebody hasn't done their any formal testing, they've taken an estimate and they think they're doing zone two. Here's what I'm going to recommend to them without them having to go do a test. This is kind of a test, but it's a much easier test than doing an FTP test. jump on an indoor trainer, okay, if you've got one, or go to a trainer.
Ryan Thomas (03:36.76)
Tell me, I'm I'm interested.
Cam Nicholls (04:00.462)
crit track if you've got one or somewhere where you can just pedal consistently for an hour. Yep. Take your what you think is your sixty five, seventy percent should we be targeting upper end zone two for this one hour test? If it's a one hour test, testing your aerobic
Ryan Thomas (04:14.668)
Yeah. Yeah. I would say sixty five, just go in the middle.
Cam Nicholls (04:17.484)
Okay, 65%. So go sixty-five percent of your FTP for this test, right? We're pedaling consistently. We're making sure that we're not compromised by heat. We haven't had a bad sleep. We haven't had eight coffees before we do the test. Nothing is going to affect the heart, right? And then make sure you're wearing a heart rate strap. Okay. Key. Key. Super key to this test. Okay. Because what we want to do is see where our heart rate lands once we get maybe 15, 20 minutes into this one hour test.
Ryan Thomas (04:34.734)
Yes.
Cam Nicholls (04:46.35)
So if you're doing it out, you know, on the road or on on the trainer, make sure you warm up for the first five, ten minutes. And then once you get to the ten, fifteen minute mark, we want to be hitting sixty-five percent of FTP. Then we want to see where does the heart rate land. Now, to calculate your zone two heart rate. If people haven't done FTP testing, I'm gonna tell you right now they haven't done lactate threshold heart rate testing. No. Yeah. But most people know what their max heart rate is, roughly.
Ryan Thomas (05:09.566)
Yeah.
Cam Nicholls (05:14.53)
I could still argue that it's probably not their max heart rate because to get your max heart rate, as you know, you need to be three hours deep in a heart event where it's hot and you're climbing and you're on someone's wheel and you feel like you're about to have a heart attack. Yeah, yeah. Yeah. When was the last time you did that? You know, it doesn't happen all that often. And some people have never done that. So maybe you could argue that people should add three to five beats to what they think their max heart rate is. But anyway, close. Just trying to take your max heart rate, sixty to seventy percent.
of max heart rate is your zone two heart rate.
Ryan Thomas (05:45.73)
Yeah, a bit higher for for max. it's usually around seventy, seventy five for a heart rate, or eighty even, based off your max heart rate. no, that's the threshold.
Cam Nicholls (05:56.054)
That threshold. It's seventy, sixty to seventy percent. Yes. Yes.
Ryan Thomas (06:00.034)
I don't use heart rate zones. I don't use max heart rate. everyone's doing testing, so fine. This podcast
Cam Nicholls (06:01.75)
You don't use Max Right though.
Cam Nicholls (06:07.63)
Is brought to you by the Road Cycling Academy. If you're a recreational or amateur road cyclist and you're stuck on a frustrating performance plateau, feeling like you need some guidance, but you're not quite ready to dive straight into one-to-one coaching. At the RCA, we've created something called the 12-week custom plan, which we believe would be your perfect next step. It starts off with an upfront deep dive call with your coach who will understand your goals, your riding preferences, what your not negotiable rides are.
And where you want to go, then they'll create a fully tailored 12-week custom plan that is supported over the 12-week period. We believe it's the perfect intermediate step, giving you a taste of working with a coach and experiencing a customized plan without committing to full coaching. Our writers are seeing real results too, and you can go to our Google reviews to see this. Marvin recently shaved over 30 minutes off his Grafton to Inverel time from doing the 12-week custom plan.
Adam gained 20 watts on his FTP in 12 weeks and 40 watts on his five minute power. And we have riders completing rides that they've failed in previous attempts like Peaks, Challenge, all from doing this 12-week custom plan. So if you're ready to break through, head to the roadcyclingacademy.com. In the menu system, you'll see our 12-week custom plan and take the first step towards that next level performance. Now let's get back to the podcast.
According to the internet, sixty to seventy percent. And look, there may, you know, as we know with all sorts of zones, there are different variations and different formulas. So maybe for this conversation, we'll just say stick with around 70%. Yep. So we've got a upper end range of maybe the conservative number of sixty to seventy percent. When you get fifteen to twenty minutes into this test, looking at your power, sixty five percent of FTP, where's your heart rate land? Is it around seventy percent of your max heart rate?
Or maybe a bit below or a bit above. If it's around there, then you're probably at your zone two power. But if it's a lot higher, if it's 80, 85% of your max heart rate or a lot lower, if it's 50% of your max heart rate, then fair chances are you've got the wrong zone two power. Now there are caveats because you might, let's say, land at 70% of your max heart rate at 20 minutes in, and then at 30 minutes in you start drifting and you drift by 15 to 20 beats.
Ryan Thomas (08:19.531)
Agree.
Cam Nicholls (08:31.574)
Once you get to the end of that hour. So if that happened to somebody, what would you suggest is going on there? Not in zone two. Or you're unconditioned at zone two for that particular power. So you would drop it back maybe next time you go do that test. Because this is a good zone two ride anyway. This is not yes, we're turning it into a test, but people should do this ride probably once or twice a week anyway. Exactly. And if you want to go longer than an hour, just do the test for an hour and then keep riding. Yeah.
Ryan Thomas (08:36.654)
Yeah, you're not in zone two.
Cam Nicholls (08:58.136)
But yeah, the next time you go do this, maybe dial it back to 60% of what you think your FTP is. So you get to a point where your heart rate's kind of sitting around 70% of max heart rate for the full hour. Yep. And that's it. That's my bro science hack to to work out your zone two power. Of course, if it's the other way around, if your your max heart rate's 50%, you know, if you land at 50% at 20 minutes, then you need to increase your power. Yeah. But you want to be ultimately getting your max heart rate.
Around seventy percent of max heart rate, sixty five, seventy percent of max heart rate for that hour consistently, and that's probably your zone two power. And once you've worked worked it out, then you can work on it. Yeah. And you can work on extending, you know, to ninety minutes to two hours without seeing so much drift. But you know you've got at least maybe not a bang on number, but it's a lot better than, you know, taking this estimate and just assuming.
Ryan Thomas (09:49.474)
Yeah, I think what's really important about or what's really beneficial about this is the the heart rate is the anchor because of the power we know that you stay at a consistent power and you're not conditioned and your heart rate's gonna drift and you're gonna not be in the right zone. So if you're d using heart rate as your number after that fifteen to twenty minute mark, you adjust the power down to keep your heart rate at that. And the other way to do this is if you were if you were looking at your your power and you were keeping your power consistent after that fifteen, twenty minute mark.
And your heart rate starts to change and starts drifting up. I'd argue that that's too hard for you. So if it's staying the same, then you're good. Like theoretically, you're in the right area. But if your heart rate's moving, then that what is that actually saying is that internally you're having to work harder than what you're exerting in your power, what externally what you're putting out. So there's decoupling and drift happening there, the separation between heart rate and power. We don't usually want to see that too much in zone two work. I think a lot of people think zone two work needs to be
Upper end zone two or it needs to be challenging in one way or another. But usually it's in a normal week of training it should probably be easier rather than harder. Mm. Gonna want it to be under si seventy percent or under sixty five percent. There's not much physiologically, there's not much difference from fifty five percent and seventy percent when you're in zone two. There's not much change, right? Yep. But if you go to ninety five percent or a hundred and five percent of social, they're very different things happening. And it's the same zone. Or zone two, there's a twenty percent range there where
Very, very similar physiological markers going on. So there is another argument, and I've heard this a bit, is that like you target the low end of the zones, you're still getting the same benefit, but it's easier. No one likes going low. No, it's very I when you set someone a a workout of sixty percent for zone two, they're like, That sucked. Like I couldn't do it. I couldn't you couldn't do it because it feels way easy.
Cam Nicholls (11:40.322)
Yeah. Yeah. And there's a lot of arguments about just using heart rate full stop. You shouldn't be l looking at power. The thing in my experiences, particularly for somebody had an underdeveloped aerobic engine, when I first like took my cycling, you know, to the next level, I started doing proper zone two training. So I guess I just go out and ride at two hundred watts. That was what the coach said at the time. So I thought, what do you mean, just ride at two hundred watts? But he kind of knew from some testing that that was my zone two power. And it gave me something like, okay, just two hundred watts, two hundred watts.
And what happened over time is I was probably initially drifting quite a fair bit into zone three, zone three heart rate at that two hundred watts. But by conditioning myself to just target two hundred watts and stay exclusive at two hundred watts, over time a drift came down and then my overall heart rate came down. And I conditioned myself aerobically to ride at two hundred watts. So then I I asked myself the question well, what if I was following heart rate?
Would have I been reducing the power to keep the heart rate, you know, zone two technically, and then I'm conditioning myself to reduce power as the ride goes on. Is that the right way for a recreational and an amateur to do it? Obviously there's no science on this. This is just my own anecdotal experiences, but I've always found that once you can find that zone two power sweet spot, even if you might be experiencing some drift, provided you're not drifting out of control.
you know, and you're going into lactate threshold territory, which we know changes the workout physiologically, you know, over time it's going to that it's gonna level out. And that's when you know you're stretching the left ventricle, you're increasing lung capacity, increasing mitochondrial efficiency, you your type one slow twitch muscle fiber network, all that zone two stuff is being established.
Ryan Thomas (13:19.8)
I think the key there is it depends how long you're drifting after. If it's after three hours and well, everyone's gonna drift after three hours theoretically. If you're drifting after thirty minutes, forty five minutes and it's probably yeah, you're stressed. Gonna after a three hour ride you're gonna be getting pretty stretched. So yeah, there's a lot of context that comes in there, but I like it.
Cam Nicholls (13:37.742)
Absolutely. So maybe for this one, we haven't put together a a PDF yet, but I think I might put a PDF, my bro science hack, to work out your zone two power.
Ryan Thomas (13:46.958)
Can you send it to me? Yeah.
Cam Nicholls (13:48.428)
Yeah, we'll link a PDF below if you wanna check it out yourself. And yeah, come back to this video after you've done the test and tell us what happened. Be good to hear and we'll catch everyone in the next show.

Are cycling insoles worth it, or are they just another expensive upgrade?
In this episode of the Road Cycling Academy Podcast, expert bike fitter Neill Stanbury sits down with cycling podiatrist Nathan White, founder of Cobra9, to explore one of the most overlooked aspects of bike fit: what happens between your foot and the pedal.
While many cyclists obsess over frame geometry, saddle position and crank length, very few consider whether the insole inside their shoe is helping—or hindering—their performance and comfort.
Nathan has spent over 17 years designing cycling-specific orthotics and insoles, working with everyone from recreational riders through to elite athletes. Together, Neill and Nathan unpack the science and biomechanics behind cycling insoles, explaining why properly supporting the foot can improve comfort, stability and overall pedalling efficiency.
During the discussion they cover why carbon fibre has become the material of choice for premium cycling insoles, how foot pressure is distributed throughout the pedal stroke, and why many off-the-shelf insoles fail to provide adequate support for cyclists.
They also explain the differences between generic, semi-custom and fully custom orthotics, discuss common causes of numb feet and "hot foot", and reveal how subtle improvements in foot stability can influence rider position, knee tracking and overall bike fit.
Whether you're struggling with foot discomfort on long rides, looking to optimise your bike fit, or simply wondering whether cycling-specific insoles are worth the investment, this episode provides practical insights from two specialists who have worked with thousands of cyclists.
Cobra9: https://cobra9.com.au/ 
In this episode:
Why your feet are the most important contact point on the bike
Generic vs semi-custom vs custom cycling insoles
Why carbon fibre is used in premium cycling orthotics
The biomechanics of foot support during the pedal stroke
How insoles improve load distribution and reduce pressure points
Common causes of numb feet and hot foot
Why shoe fit matters just as much as the insole
How better foot support can improve stability and pedalling efficiency
What bike fitters look for when assessing cycling biomechanics
If you've ever wondered whether cycling insoles are worth the money, this episode will help you understand the science, the biomechanics, and the practical benefits behind one of cycling's most misunderstood upgrades.

Hip pain is one of the most common issues cyclists face, but the source of the problem isn't always where you think.
In this episode of the RCA Podcast, Cam Nicholls sits down with expert bike fitter Neill Stanbury to discuss one of the more serious causes of cycling-related hip pain: hip labral tears. They explain how poor bike positioning, pelvic asymmetry, hip impingement and repetitive movement patterns can contribute to chronic pain and injury.
You'll learn:
✅ What a hip labral tear actually is ✅ Common symptoms and warning signs ✅ Why hip pain is often mistaken for a hip flexor issue ✅ How bike fit can contribute to hip impingement ✅ The role of pelvic asymmetry in cycling injuries ✅ Why some riders develop snapping hip syndrome ✅ Bike fit adjustments that may help reduce symptoms ✅ When MRI scans may be required ✅ Why surgery should be considered a last resort ✅ Practical ways to prevent hip pain before it becomes chronic
Cam also shares his personal experience overcoming years of cycling-related hip pain through targeted bike fit changes, including cleat adjustments, leg length correction and improved biomechanics on the bike.
If you're struggling with hip pain, deep groin pain, hip flexor tightness, hip impingement, or recurring discomfort while riding, this episode provides valuable insights into potential causes and solutions.
Subscribe for more cycling training, bike fitting, injury prevention and performance content from the Road Cycling Academy.
Transcript: 
Cam Nicholls (00:01.804)
Welcome to the RCA Podcast, designed for recreational and amateur road cyclists with a focus on performance. We dive into cycling training, nutrition, strength training for cyclists and even bike fitting tips, all designed to help you train smarter, ride faster and hopefully tear your mates' legs off. So without further ado, let's dive into today's episode.
Welcome back to the RCA podcast, which is also on YouTube. So please excuse any visual references. Today I'm joined by expert bike fitter Neil Stanbury, and we're gonna be talking about hip stuff in our injury series. This is the second video in our injury series. I'm quite interested in this one because before I came to you, I used to suffer from hip pain for probably 10 years. I used to get back from my Saturday ride and actually put peas, like cold peas, on my hip to deal with the inflammation. And
Of course, you know, you resolved it through, you know, identifying that I was dropping my right hip and I was slightly twisted to the bike. So you put my cleats in a better position. You gave me I think a six millimeter. Yeah. And maybe widened my Q factor a little bit. And it's funny, like I've never experienced hip pain ever since. So it was positional.
Neill Stanbury (01:02.796)
Shim. Leg length shim, yes.
Neill Stanbury (01:10.328)
Yep. Good. Yeah, yeah, most of them are. This one that we're going to talk about in the as part of our injury series is a bit more specific. I think yours was probably more sort of like an ITB syndrome, like a hip flexor type thing, because it was so easy to resolve. Yes, the other syndrome. This one we're going to talk about labrum tears. Now labrum tears, a lot of people watching this will know what a labrum tear is, but I'm gonna go through it again because there'll be plenty of people that don't. The labrum in the hip
Cam Nicholls (01:25.486)
Yeah. I do have a lot of syndromes.
Neill Stanbury (01:38.516)
is a if you imagine the hip as being a ball and socket joint, you've got a socket and a ball that sits in there. And that ball just sits neatly in the socket. And that socket is mostly comprised of bone, which is the actual acetabulum of the hip, but extending off the top, mainly the top section of this socket, there is a flexible cartilaginous lip. And the job, and this is what the labrum is, right? So that this is adhered to the edge of the the bone here as like quite strongly, but it can rip off, which is what we're going to talk about in a minute.
And labrum tears what happens when that actually separates off. They typically, when we're talking about cycling, they're very common. They often occur when the hip has been impinging at the top of the stroke. Now, what do I mean by impinging? Essentially, your knee is coming up over the top of the stroke. And if you've got there's some anatomical things you can have in your hip joint which can predispose you to this, but the big one is if you're sitting twisted to the bike. And we talk about this kind of as a causal mechanism of almost every one of these problems because it is.
But if your pelvis is out of playing with the bike, the knee typically on the opposite side to what you're dropping your hip. So if you're if you're dropping your right hip, your left leg will get forced away from the bike. And as it comes in from outside the line of the pedal, that femur is going to have to internally rotate repetitively across the line of the pedal. And so as it internally rotates, you're much more likely to get striking of the neck of the femur onto the acetabulum. And that
loads the labrum and it can rip it off. Now, sometimes they're good for a long, long, long time and then it fails. And you're out on a ride one day and you think, geez, my hip is suddenly painful. But a lot of them creep on. A lot of them, you know, it's a bit niggly and then it slowly gets worse over a couple of months. And then one day it's really bad. The typical pain from this from a labrum tear is a really deep anterior groin pain. So right in through the front of the hip.
People will often sort of grab their hip with their hand like this. We call it a sulcus sign. And they'll say, the pain's in there. It really feels deep inside. It is often mistaken for hip flexor problems. Okay. So a lot of the time the person will get a diagnosis of, your hip flexor is tight. You know, it's your hip flexor. You just got to stretch your hip flexor, your psoas. What you've got to realize is that the psoas muscle and the iliacus, which together form the hip flexor, they both run directly across the
Neill Stanbury (03:57.966)
top of the socket, right? They are literally like on the labrum. So it's very, very difficult to delineate between a labral tear and psoas irritation because when the tear in the labrum occurs, it'll leak inflammation into the area around the psoas and you'll get chronic hip flexor tightness, which you can't resolve. So these are an underlying trigger, if you like, of some psoas type issues that people have with their hip flexor.
So deep anterior groin pain often comes on suddenly, but sometimes creeps on. Always associated with asymmetry on the bike pretty much, unless you've got terrible hip impingement issues. And often the rider will have a bit of a clunk and a creak in a pop in the hip. So that if they flex their hip up, as they bring it down, it'll go, wow. That's yeah, it's so we call it sort of a a snapping hip syndrome or something or both. Wow. Yeah, yeah. So there's often a bit of a noise.
Cam Nicholls (04:45.006)
That you can feel or hear or both.
Never got to that extent, thankfully.
Neill Stanbury (04:51.946)
Yeah, and I don't think yours was very frontal pain. Was it was it right in the frontal. Yeah, it was lateral. Yeah, so the lateral pain is more likely to be like ITB or TFL type pain, but the actual hip flexor slash labrum tear patterns, they're very frontal pain. So that's a it's a much worse problem to get. They're very difficult to fix. The treatment, when you're talking about cycling and biomechanics, the treatment is obviously
Cam Nicholls (04:55.502)
No, it was right on the side.
Neill Stanbury (05:16.226)
Two things. You must, and we banged down about this in the back pane one, you must correct the asymmetry that's caused it. That makes total sense. The other big ones are to reduce the height at which the knee is rising over the top of the stroke. So basically the higher this hip has to come up, the more likely it is to whack into the edge of that socket and damage the labrum. Yep. Shorter cranks, taller front ends, more forward saddle positions. Often we end up doing a combination of things where we move the saddle up and forward in an arc.
Around the bottom bracket. So we run a higher further forward position and we shorten the cranks and we bring the front end of the bike up. This can cause other slight other issues elsewhere. But if if you're trying to unload a chronically painful hip and let it heal, it's the lesser of two evils. Yeah. So you can end up with a bit too much weight on your hands and that sort of stuff from this type of positioning. But if it gets rid of your hip pain, it's often often the way to go. So you want to reduce the hip flexion, you want to open the hip angle up, shorter cranks are really good, upright front ends are really good on the bike.
And with any luck, it'll resolve. Now, if it doesn't resolve, sometimes these ones you do everything you can and they c they don't get better. We often end up doing an MRI, sometimes with contrast dye injected into the joint, which basically allows us to image the joint with a little bit more detail and determine it sort of increases the sensitivity of the scan for picking up the tear. But a lot of the time you can pick it up on a regular MRI without the dye. it's not very nice putting contrast dye into a hip joint. So yeah, you've got to pick and choose who you want to do that with. It's a big needle.
So we we scan your hip, we determine that it is a labrum tear, and then sometimes, sometimes they have to get off the bike for a period to allow it to heal. If it doesn't heal in that time, you know, which is often like two to three months, if it doesn't sort itself out and kind of the the labrum doesn't glue itself back onto the edge of the socket properly, there is surgical interventions that you can have for these. So is that a sort
Cam Nicholls (07:02.542)
Pre slope, like as soon as you go down that path, is it ever gonna get back to where it was or
Neill Stanbury (07:06.979)
Okay. But then again, if it's that painful that it needs the surgery and it's been that painful for that long, it's probably not gonna get back to how it was anyway. If you did nothing. So yeah, the surgery is definitely not something you jump into early. You do that as an absolute last resort when nothing else is working.
A lot of the stuff we spoke about in the the back pain piece that we did, which is probably coming out before this one, a lot of those anti-inflammatory modalities do help. The fasting and the hot cold and and that sort of stuff. It can help to knock down the inflammation, the chronic inflammation sitting around the edge of the labrum. But the the surgical intervention when all else fails, they basically put a couple of little grub screws into your pelvis and have a ligature that loops around the thing.
They rough up the bone, they stick these grub screws in, they loop it around and they suck it onto the edge of the the the bone there and they hold it in place. The hope being that it will glue itself back on with you know, with conventional healing processes to the edge of the socket. It's a very long, slow recovery. they have a relatively high failure rate within five years. It's not something you do lightly. They're a huge pain in the butt. So prevention is much better than cure when it comes to labrum tears, people. Okay.
So if any of you out there are suffering from a labrum tea, you've been diagnosed by your physio, your doctor, you've had an RI, hopefully this helps you out a little bit.
Cam Nicholls (08:23.774)
Thanks for sharing the wash.
Neill Stanbury (08:25.59)
Appreciate it. You're learning something every day, aren't you, Ken?
Cam Nicholls (08:28.27)
I'm just I'm grateful that I didn't need to go down that path. Now I'm hearing about it. If you know, from my perspective, it was when I was experiencing the bike the hip pain, what I learned was it was all bike fit related. Yes. So people are out there experiencing hip pain and they haven't had a professional bike fit. You know, from somebody who understands human biomechanics first and foremost, probably a good place to start before you start looking at surgery options.
Neill Stanbury (08:33.568)
It sucks. Yeah.
Neill Stanbury (08:53.868)
Yeah, the surgery is like last resort and it it's not that great. The success rate is kind of iffy. This was a like the hip art the arthroscopic interventions that they do for this, they were sort of first pioneered probably twenty odd years ago, so it's a relatively young procedure. Yep. And it's not greatly understood the long term outcomes 'cause it's just such a young procedure. We haven't had it for very long. No worries at all.
Cam Nicholls (09:17.55)
Well thanks sharing. And I will catch everyone in the next YouTube video and podcast.

Thinking about hiring a cycling coach but not sure what's actually involved?
In this episode of the RCA Podcast, Cam Nicholls sits down with RCA coach and sports scientist Ben Treble to pull back the curtain on the coaching process and explain exactly what recreational and amateur cyclists can expect when they start working with a coach.
Whether you're training 6–12 hours per week, struggling to improve your FTP, getting dropped on group rides, preparing for a Gran Fondo, or simply looking to become a stronger and healthier cyclist, this conversation covers the complete journey from onboarding through to long-term performance improvements.
RCA coaching: https://roadcyclingacademy.com/one-to-one-coaching/ 
In this episode you'll learn:
✅ What happens during a cycling coaching onboarding call ✅ Why goal setting is more important than FTP targets alone ✅ How coaches analyse your training history and cycling data ✅ The difference between FTP and Critical Power testing ✅ How TrainingPeaks is used to deliver and monitor training ✅ Why accountability is often the missing ingredient for improvement ✅ The role of recovery weeks and periodisation ✅ How coaches adjust training around work, family and illness ✅ Common mistakes recreational cyclists make when training themselves ✅ How structured coaching helps break through performance plateaus
Ben also explains how coaching extends far beyond simply prescribing intervals. From nutrition and recovery to training load management and identifying performance blind spots, coaching provides the structure and accountability many cyclists need to unlock their potential.
If you've ever wondered whether cycling coaching is worth it, or what the process looks like behind the scenes, this episode will answer your questions.
🚴 Perfect for recreational cyclists, Gran Fondo riders, masters athletes, endurance cyclists and anyone looking to train smarter and achieve better results.
Subscribe for more evidence-based cycling training, nutrition, bike fitting and performance content from the Road Cycling Academy.
 
Transcript: 
Cam Nicholls (00:01.804)
Welcome to the RCA Podcast, designed for recreational and amateur road cyclists with a focus on performance. We dive into cycling training, nutrition, strength training for cyclists and even bike fitting tips, all designed to help you train smarter, ride faster and hopefully tear your mates' legs off. So without further ado, let's dive into today's episode.
Welcome back to the RCA podcast, where today I am joined by the RCA's European correspondent Ben Treble, who's also a science data geek that digs into all the research. But today we're actually, Ben, we're not going be talking so much about the research, although I know your approach is very research based. So no doubt we'll be sprinkling that a little bit into the topic of today's discussion. But what I wanted to do today is talk about what does the process look like if
I'm a recreational slash amateur road cyclist. You know, I've been training anywhere between six to twelve hours per week, depending on the week. And I'm kind of stuck on a performance plateau. I've been thinking about getting a coach, but I'm a little bit un uncertain. Maybe it feels a little bit beyond me, or maybe it feels like it's going to be another thing in my life. But I I kinda I don't really know. I know people improve a lot when they get a coach, but I don't know if I can commit to it or or what's involved. So
I thought maybe you could share how you work with RCA members, which are essentially men, women between the ages of, you know, thirty-five to sixty-five, that busy lifestyles, jobs, families, you know, life stresses, but they want to improve on the bike. So let's peel it back. Let's just say somebody doesn't really know you know they know s coaching's gonna help them improve, but they don't know what's involved. So my name's Joe Blow.
I'm thinking about getting coached. Ben, what's it gonna look like?
Ben Treble (02:00.162)
Yeah. You're gonna you're gonna sign up to the RCA and the first step is we're gonna get you scheduled in for an onboarding call, which kind of sets the stage for what's gonna happen afterwards. In that onboarding call, we're just gonna have a big discussion. We're gonna talk about primarily it's a it's an opportunity to get to know each other, but second it's an opportunity for me as a coach to get your context, get your history.
And we're gonna start to have the first conversations on what is one of the most important parts of working with a coach and that's goal setting. I think it's something most athletes are typically not very good at doing.
Cam Nicholls (02:41.304)
Yeah, and I think some people come into cycle coaching with a an expectation that they have to have like a event goal or, you know, a specific of you know, something that's happening on a certain time and I need to be, you know, peeking for for that. Whereas I know a lot of our members actually yeah, once once I have a call with them, because I like I'm typically speaking, you know, as in the inquiry guide to them before they join.
No, you don't need a specific event goal. You don't need to be racing your bike. You can literally just want self improvement. But then within that self improvement, you're breaking down what does that look like?
Ben Treble (03:24.76)
Exactly right. I can think of a perfect example. It's probably one of my longest standing athletes I've worked with at the RCA. He did just do his first event recently, but we've been working together for well over a year now, and he never had any necessary intention to do any events. He wasn't racing in the history. His goals were quite simple in some respects and beautiful. One was he wanted to get fit and healthy
So he was a good role model for his daughter. And he wanted to get fit and healthy for himself so he could enjoy life a bit better. And he also just found cycling really enjoyable. and he only did indoor training at this point in time when we started. Interesting. So a very different set to maybe what is more traditional where someone says, I'm a master's writer and I'm gonna do a grand fondo in twelve weeks' time.
Cam Nicholls (04:09.912)
Interesting.
Ben Treble (04:21.633)
And I would like to qualify for the UCI Grand Fondo Worlds.
Cam Nicholls (04:25.698)
Yep. Okay. So in this call, if someone says, yeah, look, I just want to increase my FTP, do you just go, Great, let's just increase it? Or do you set things a little bit differently? And how do you determine where to go? Because obviously you're having a conversation, but do you in that initial call, are you like looking at the previous riding history? are people, you know
Are you getting them familiar with training peaks, which is the software application we use for the calendar and looking at the data, or are most people already familiar with it?
Ben Treble (05:00.642)
Most people are familiar with training peaks or a similar athlete management system. if they're not familiar with it in this initial meeting, I'm not going to spend massive amounts of time on that because you could spend days doing this. That initial meeting is the time has to be focused on getting the context of the athlete. So what's their training history, which might be I'm very new to the sport to I've been training for fifteen years, you know, varied periods of time from seven to twelve hours a week.
So you could have big different levels of experience and there's often a injury context. So, you know, I've recently had diabetic people who are trying to improve diabetes. I've had people who are coming back from back injuries, very common back or knee injuries. maybe they've not been riding for twelve months because of that and they're trying to come back into the sport. So the context is that's a big part of the conversation.
Then there's the availability piece. We're trying to tick this off relatively quick, which is, you know, what days can you ride? How many hours are you willing to commit to? That sort of thing. Part of that is looking at their training history. So objectively, I tend to look at if they have training peaks, I'll go in before this conversation and look at how many hours they do a week. And I'll ask them, how many hours do you think you do a week? And they always overestimate it. Interesting. And then I show them, I show them the data in training peaks. I'll screen share and be like,
I know you said you think you're doing eight to ten hours a week, but unless you're not syncing your data into training peaks completely, says you're only doing five to six. So there's sometimes we just try and set the scene a little bit here and put in some reality checks. When someone says, I'm doing eight hours a week and I want to move up to twelve, if they're only doing five hours a week in reality, you're not going to jump to twelve. Yep. Straight away. So I like to do that. And then the goal setting is the next biggest piece. And if
That's a very common thing. Someone says, I want to lift my threshold. I want to improve FTP or what's worse is I just want to improve, you know, my cycling. And I'll ask them why. So Cam, Joe Blow, why? Tell me why you want to improve your FTP.
Cam Nicholls (07:10.196)
because I I'm struggling on the local group ride. I'm you know, I'm in in the D in the B group and I feel like I could be better in the B group and I want to get to the A group.
Ben Treble (07:21.816)
Yeah, so tell me what do you struggle with the most in the B group?
Cam Nicholls (07:26.002)
look, towards the end of the ride I just tend to fatigue out a bit and I go from being able to roll some turns and then I'm at towards the back and there's this climb at the end where sometimes I get popped and you know, I I don't finish and then other times I make it, but I'm always just struggling in the last part of the ride.
Ben Treble (07:43.778)
Yeah. So already asking more questions, we're digging into some really nice goals, right? It's not I need to lift my FTP. Maybe that is part of the answer, but often we're already digging into two goals. One, you know, it might not be as measurable in terms of power, but it's still measurable. I want to try and move from my B to A group in a bunch ride. Sometimes it's I want to get from, you know, the the C grade crit race, the local crit, up to the B.
And I want to be able to get to the end of my bunch ride and do the kick, which is a durability question. So, okay, we already have two really good goals. Like how do we get you moving along in your program to improve your durability? And then how do we lift you up into the next grade?
Cam Nicholls (08:32.418)
Yep, okay. And what if I say to you, Ben, but I I also like this is a not negotiable ride for me. It's the Saturday group ride. I go there with my mates, we have a good time. I really don't want to like I'm happy to do stuff during the week with you, but the Saturday ride I'd really love to keep it. Is that okay?
Ben Treble (08:50.37)
Definitely. There might be a time and place where I say you might be better off here missing it for something specific. But at the end of the day, there's a really important component to training. That is you need consistency and volume. Kind of that's the bottom of the the pyramid, if you want. And often to achieve that you have to stay motivated. So if if doing yes, often the bunch ride's not as effective.
If you're doing three bunch rides a week, I'm probably going to try and convince you to drop some. But if your non-negotiable is I want to do one social bunch ride a week, we're going to make room for it. What that might mean though, that might look like, okay, Friday has to be easy or an off day. Or maybe the Sunday has to then be an easy day. I don't want you doing back to backs like doing a crit race on Friday AVO, going into another really hard bunch ride and then buggering yourself for three days.
Cam Nicholls (09:27.704)
Okay.
Cam Nicholls (09:44.812)
Makes sense. So we've kind of dug into some of the actual underlying drivers behind the FTP goal. you've done a deep dive on, you know, my logistics, my injury history, you've looked at some previous training. What happens next? You you send me off into the abyss or what am I looking at?
Ben Treble (10:06.934)
Yeah, we would talk about a few other topics. Always try to touch on sort of in a self self assessment on strengths and weaknesses, which would include reflecting on your recovery and nutrition practices. I don't normally deep dive on them too much, but I just try to get a picture, okay, is that an area that I need to dig into more with you or not? Have you got a good handle? Are you good and up to speed on, you know, modern nutrition practices or not? And if you're not, I usually make a note, a self note to myself.
Okay, next coach call, we're gonna we're gonna have a bigger chat about nutrition as something for us to work on. Once we've got those out of the way, we've got an idea of the schedule where typically we'll have a chat about equipment. I need to get familiar with what power media you're on, do you have heart rate? What bikes do you have? Are you okay doing indoor training? Do you have a preference for indoor outdoor? They're a little bit different. Typically I might prescribe slightly different work if you ride. Some people are very good outdoors with doing their intervals.
And some people really struggle. So there's no point giving somebody thirty fifteens if they have rolling terrain and they just cannot execute them.
Cam Nicholls (11:14.294)
Of course.
Ben Treble (11:15.382)
So yeah, making sure that the work you prescribe is relevant and feasible for the athlete to pull off, I think is an important part. Maybe I'll try build you up to a point where we can get you to pulling off high quality thirty fifteen's outdoors. Okay.
Cam Nicholls (11:30.936)
So then what happens after that? After the call?
Ben Treble (11:34.04)
Or I throw you in the deep end. No, I'm just kidding. No, no. So we would wrap up the call typically with a point where normally there's a couple of days where I go away, I take all the information and I build out your initial couple of weeks of training and we put in place a sort of a higher level macro plan. So often there's if there's not an event goal, I do like to put in place a time bound goal. So that might be we want to try
move from, you know, C to B grade at the crit races by the end of the season. So that might that could be three months away, could be six months away. Who knows? Depends on the individual. But we put a time bound goal in place and that helps drive the the macro plan for the training. So the general blocks. We might say month to month, you know, generally we try and put in place, I want to work on these things. I would hand this over to you in training peaks for you to have a look at in a note.
And you can go in and say, That's not gonna work because I'm going actually going away on holidays for four weeks here, or these are some blackout dates, can't do it here. So then we start to do this a little bit back and forward, getting to know each other and the schedule and making sure that everything fits in place and will work for the athlete. Okay.
Cam Nicholls (12:52.974)
Okay. And in that first four weeks where you've sent me off into the abyss, a lot of people get a bit nervous about doing tests because, you know, they need to work out their their numbers. and obviously at the RCA, we don't use FTP, we use critical power. So is everyone doing the tests in that first week? What do the tests look like? Or can you look at existing, you know, data? And are some people already
You know, ticking some of the they haven't done the test, but maybe they've done a three minute all out effort in a local bunch ride. So, you know, you don't need to test that. Well, what does that typically look like?
Ben Treble (13:29.762)
Yeah. I would at least in the first four weeks we're gonna do critical power testing.
Cam Nicholls (13:34.838)
Okay, so what does that look like?
Ben Treble (13:36.728)
Yeah, so we'll talk that through. It's normally for me, I'd like to do three efforts, different durations, short, medium, long. First one's around three minutes, next one's five to six, and a long effort could be from ten to fifteen minutes. Ideally, if someone is more of an outdoor rider, I tell them just go find a segment or a climb that's roughly those durations and try do your best time up it. I like to split them across days, do it on three days.
You can do two in one day if you really want. but I typically try to avoid that. I often find the first time you try this, if the athlete's never done it before, the testing doesn't go perfect. There's a familiarization piece, which I kind of expect and it's normal. but I find often if you let them find a local climb or segment where they just try to do their best time up it, it's a lot easier for them to go repeat it. It's also easier for them to go redo.
testing without it feeling like you gotta try do, you know, testing, which people hate testing, which is fine, but we just try and make it as easy as possible. As you said, some people might have a recent power PB. So we can just easily look in training peaks. If you've recently done in the last, you know, sort of 30 days, even up to 60, I would say, if you've done any of those three efforts, like a good P B, we might use that. So then you might only need to do one more effort.
We just have to fill in the gaps. Yep. Equally, if you've done three power BBs across those numbers in the last thirty days already, training peaks is a great feature in its modeled, it's called modeled FTP, FTP. It's in the the beta, I think it's still called beta function charts. And so we can often rely on that relatively well, at least to get a good idea. So if they're very anti testing or depending on their goals and phase of training, if the first couple of weeks are not great to do testing.
Cam Nicholls (15:06.179)
Okay.
Ben Treble (15:34.092)
And they have some good training history data, we can often get a pretty good idea of critical power without officially testing, but I would still target in that first block to try and do full C P testing. Yeah.
Cam Nicholls (15:47.118)
Okay. And with the training as a general rule, I know this will depend on the person's goals and how much time you have with them, but let's just say they've got a fair bit of time. Their goals are just general improvement. In that first, you know, four weeks, what is there a typical focus you find? Like do they are you sort of peeling them back a little bit and let's have more of an aerobic focus and and get some of that foundational stuff right? Or do you just go straight into it?
Ben Treble (16:17.314)
I actually like to go straight into it a little bit. I do to some respects I get gauge how well they might be able to do some stuff. And I like to put in a a mixture of work because I really want to see how good are they at performing intervals. I want to see how good they are at giving me feedback, like their comments. Do they always put in their RPE? This first month is really important for me to get a gauge on the athlete's ability to do work.
How they respond, what their level of feedback is, and just build upon that. So I might give them quite a mixture of work to do, if there's not a singular focus. But I do find in that initial conversation, it's rare that I can't get them to some good goals. Okay. Everybody who says, I just want to improve my cycling generally, when you start asking them why and really pressing, you get down to those, as we did before with Joe Blow, you get down to those really nice goals of okay, I want to improve durability.
I want to move up from this grade to this grade. I want to get to the end of my bunch ride and still do that big kick. I want to improve my sprint or I'm going on a European holiday and I wanna do climbs, but my nutrition's really poor. Pretty quickly we can put in place some really specific stuff.
Cam Nicholls (17:34.2)
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So head over to the roadcyclingacademy.com and lock in your spot with Ben today. Let's get back to the episode. Yeah, okay. Cool. And you you mentioned comments there, then them providing feedback. So, you know, you put the the workouts in the training peaks calendar software. One of the the benefits of this software is that it's been around for years and all the major head units and indoor training apps integrate seamlessly. So when you sign up,
People just add their their Wahoo account or their Garmin account, they add their Zwift account, or maybe a lot of people are using Training Peaks Virtual these days because it's covered in the Training Peaks license, which is basically the same as Zwift, which means that when you log into Zwift or Training Peaks Virtual or you turn your head unit on in the morning, it's like, there's the workout that Ben's prescribed me. I just need to follow along. So they follow along, do the workout, and you mentioned feedback before. So
Cam Nicholls (19:53.932)
How does that work? Are people just shooting you an email after they do their their thirty fifteens that Ben's prescribed on a Thursday? Or what does that look like?
Ben Treble (20:03.606)
I mean they can, but typically what we try to do is the sort of day to day communication is through the comments function in training peaks. So as you said, you get set up. If people are not familiar or tech savvy, there's sometimes some emails after that initial onboarding to make sure that they get set up in the tech, whatever that is that they want to use with Training Peaks. So connecting their Strava, their Garmin, Wahoo, Swift, whatever that is, making sure it's connected.
To training peaks so that the workouts will sync across from the calendar into their device where they can perform the training and follow along. They complete the workouts each day. And at the end of the workout, I try to get them to put in a comment. It doesn't have to be every time. if a workout just goes well and there's nothing to note, you don't need to put anything in. I do ask my athletes to put in their RPE, that's rate of perceived exertion. In training peaks, that's a score from zero to ten.
Zero being no work at all, feet up on the couch, ten being the hardest thing you've ever done before. Throwing up, puking at the end of a ride. So I try to get everybody to put in an RPE score. It's still a very, very valid measure of tracking how hard was the training. It typically factors in all the other stress you have in your life. So workouts work out. You know, if you're stressed or not stressed outside of the bike training, it can impact how hard it felt.
So that's where it gets measured. And the comments athletes can put in comments like that, that felt really easy. If I give someone, if we haven't managed to do C B testing, we're doing say VO2 work and they put in an I don't know, RPE of two, the intensity's probably pretty wrong. that's an extreme example, but I mean it the the good example here with RPE in those early days is trying to get the zone two endurance work right. So making sure you can use RPE with heart rate.
To look at the power and see what's happening. So yeah, collecting that athlete feedback and the athletes often put in the comments, you know, a little bit about their nutrition. I quite like that. I've got some athletes put in comments about nutrition, managed to eat XYZ. This workout felt super hard, or first two sets felt great, but third set failed like, you know, really hurt, or maybe there was a tech glitch, was riding outdoors, third set interrupted because a car cut me off. So little bits of feedback help give me context. So when I
Ben Treble (22:32.428)
At least once a week, ideally twice a week, I go through every athlete to review and respond against the comments. And when I'm looking at those workouts and looking at the data, if I don't get that context from the comments, often you can miss stuff. So you go, did the power drop off in the third set 'cause a car interrupted them? Or is it because it was the intensity was too hard?
Cam Nicholls (22:52.27)
Interesting. Okay. And what happens if you know, back Joe Blow, he works for a company which is head officed in interstate. I've had to fly to head office for a few days, didn't mean for it to happen. Then I came back and I was a bit sick because one of my one of my kids was you know, gave me something from daycare. So I've had five days off the bike. What happens in in that in that case when you've laid out the four weeks of training after that initial call and there's been a disruption?
Ben Treble (23:22.828)
Yeah, I mean assuming this is a monthly if we say this is a monthly coached athlete, I would try and set up in the initial onboarding that the for anything like this, I would say this is sort of more urgent communication. So if you get sick or injured or there's something more urgent you need a response to within a day or two, is to email me. And pretty quickly I would want to make adjustments. So if I know that you're getting sick, we're just gonna put in, most likely depending on the illness, a couple rest days.
And just monitor. As soon as you're ready to go, we might start putting in some shorter, easier recovery rides and just build you back into the hard work again. If you have to travel for work last minute, that's often something that happens. Someone says, I need to go fly to the East Coast this week suddenly because work needs me over there. I've got to leave tomorrow. We might have to just drop a few days out of that week, but then I might adjust the week after in response.
Cam Nicholls (24:19.342)
All right. And let's just say that I've I haven't been sick, then I I've nailed the month, you know, I've done all the workouts. Training peaks, you know, for those with a bit of OCT gives you a green badge if you do it in a compliant way. And a lot of people like getting the green badge or all the green color code. So, you know, get to the end of the first month. We're doing monthly coaching here and you know, what what happens next?
Ben Treble (24:45.858)
Yeah, I put in a little there's different ways, but typically, you know, we try to have at least one call a month, ranges from a short phone call, twenty minutes, where sometimes people do it in the car, to forty five minutes on a video conference, which is preferred the video conference, because we can share the screen and the athlete can often we will share the screen and I'll bring up a certain workout or we want to talk about certain data or make some adjustments to the program. So
The monthly call can be used for different things. We can review the goals. Often you end up talking about one or two topics though more deeply than anything else. It might be, we need to make some adjustments. I've got travel coming up. Let's adjust the plan. It might be discussing the last couple weeks of training, what worked, what didn't work. And then based on that feedback, I'll be able to make some adjustments going into the next block. We might review the goals, see how we're tracking against goals.
Cam Nicholls (25:41.942)
Yeah. So it becomes more less about understanding who the person is, their writing preferences, what their goals are, and more about digging into specific topics that are relevant based off of the phase of training.
Ben Treble (25:56.066)
Massively, yeah. And some athletes bring certain topics. I think the advantage of working with me as a coach is I'm an accredited sports scientist, so I am a bit of a data nerd and I'm very happy to talk about some of those other topics like nutrition or talk about physiology on why something's working or not working. And a lot of my athletes love that. It's not for all of them, but yeah, the ones who are interested in going deeper on the data can take full advantage of that.
Cam Nicholls (26:23.384)
Yeah. Yeah, cool. And I also you know, know that on that topic in particular, so a lot of our members also go to the gym. So even like strategic placement of the gym, especially when you're doing, you know, high intensity interval training, is a is a super important one. Because you know, once again, it's not a one size fits all gym needs to go here because people will respond differently. Like I know myself, for example, it took me years to figure it out, but
I actually can do a high intensity interval training quite well the day after a gym session. but two days after a gym session and even sometimes three days, I really struggle. So, you know, it was I had to play around with that a a lot initially to figure that out. And no doubt this is something you would do with your clients, whether it's gym or some other cross training activity or maybe maybe a family stressor, just adjusting things to suit that particular individual and how their physiology responds to, you know, the training.
Ben Treble (27:20.94)
Yeah, and it's a different circumstance where the adjustments are really important along with the feedback. If I think of the North Americans and the Europeans, they have very distinct, you know, seasons. And going into winter often means a significant drop in volume for recreational cyclists. It's a lot trickier. They don't ride outdoors as much. It's often too cold or snowy. It's not possible. Riding indoors, you're not gonna do most people anyway, are not doing six hours on the indoor trainer twice a week. So
Managing that and managing them through that with motivation and is there even talk about cross-training or just keeping fitness up in different levels varies athlete to athlete. But it comes back to the importance of those monthly conversations where you can collect the feedback about the context. And that helps me as a coach work out what's appropriate, what adjustments do we need to make to keep this athlete going, moving forward towards their goals.
Cam Nicholls (28:17.006)
How long do you feel it takes for people to embrace, you know, the the periodization schedule? So obviously one of the big benefits of working with the coach is I think people conceptually understand like building and progressively overloading and having an easier week, but a lot of people don't just don't do it. They listen to podcasts, they watch videos, they just don't do it. But obviously when people work with the coach, they're kind of like committing to, all right, I I know this is something that I need to do. And the coach is gonna, you know, put it in the plan and is gonna make me accountable.
But then there's also the buy-in aspect. So some people might start off doing it apprehensively, where it's like this D-load week, I'm doing not doing enough training. you know, this feels a bit weird. And then I've I've found anyway, and this is from my experiences when I used to coach, maybe after the first four to twelve weeks of training, all of a sudden they're looking forward to the D-load week because they are starting to experience real freshness and real fatigue and
They're buying into it. Like how how do you find, you know, people that you've trained at the RCA respond to that sort of the process?
Ben Treble (29:24.928)
Masters male athletes are not good at taking time off the bike. So it's often something that takes time. Some of them are better at it than others. I often kind of let them I try to show them how they come to this conclusion, which sometimes means I have to let them mess up a D-load week on their own. And then, you know, in our monthly call, we're gonna go back and look at the data. And and you can often see in the data, they if they mess up the D load week.
You go into the next block and midway, they're really struggling. And you see it in the comments. And when you review it together objectively like this, they're like, I probably should have taken that rest. Then I then I could have got through the block. Okay, this D load week in a week's time, I'm I'm gonna try to stick to it. I'm gonna take the extra rest day. Like putting data to it often helps. I think a lot of these athletes really see why it's valuable. But sometimes they have to go through the process of sort of
messing it up that first time and and then struggling through a block to realize that. And that also gives you the data to kind of convince them that it's really valuable that they need to do it.
Cam Nicholls (30:31.51)
And as we're talking here, I'm just pulling up the RCA Google reviews. maybe I I I'm not gonna have time to pull up some of your really good ones because I know there are some great reviews in there about working with you as a coach. I was trying to I'm thinking of Josh as he's dropped a recent review. I was trying to find his his results. But people can go and read them, of course. When do you think I've just pulled it up here? I don't
helped my FTP grow by over forty percent. So you help Josh increase his FTP, we might be talking about critical power by over forty percent. So there are some really massive numbers people achieve, whether it's FTP, whether it's critical power, whether it's their local climb or their bunch rides or or events, you know, shaving half an hour or an hour off peaks. I know you recently took a guy who'd failed peaks challenge three times previously.
Yep. And then on the fourth attempt under your guidance, made it through with half an hour to spare. So obviously you're static. So there are some really big, juicy goals people are you know, that they might have had for years and they've been on a plateau and the goal seemed out of reach and they get coached and all of a sudden they they're achieving what they wanted to achieve. Like people are inherently impatient as well. So like I I gotta ask you the question if people get coached.
When should they expect the big gains? Is it is it in the first eight, twelve weeks or is it more so they've kind of done a build, then they've d dialed it back and then they're into their second build. So maybe it's twenty four weeks down the track or thirty six weeks. What are you saying?
Ben Treble (32:11.656)
I think there's often some big gains in the early blocks. In the first eight to twelve weeks you often see really good improvement. This is often just because you're changing their training and giving them more stimulus or different stimulus and trying to get them to take on more recovery and give structure to it. This alone, most athletes see massive jumps in that first sort of eight to twelve weeks.
But I think you bring up two really good points here. You brought Josh up as an example, and he's a great example because he really struggled with taking time off the bike, recovering, right? He's a sort of person that if he doesn't ride on a day, he feels like he's missing something. So how do we get him to take recovery? Because that's why he was stagnating in performance. He was going nowhere in his bunch rides, but he really wanted to improve. And I think when we started
He had a lot of capacity to improve, which obviously he's had really significant improvement with a lot of commitment and hard work. But what Josh needed was accountability and permission. So most athletes, I think what they get from a coach is you get this accountability piece. Like as soon as you're paying someone for their service, you feel a bit more committed to it, and there's this other person involved.
Right. And they're going to come back to you and say, Hey, on a monthly call, I'm going to talk about it and say, You missed these sessions or I think you could improve here. This could be done better. I'm going to be constructive. I'm going to give you positive feedback as well, but I think a lot of people thrive off constructive feedback, especially in those early days. There's a steep learning curve and that comes from getting constructive feedback. The permission piece is equally as important. A lot of these masters, male athletes, in my experience, they need to be told.
They need to be given permission to take a day off the bike. And they need the confidence to go, Josh knows I'm a sport scientist. So if I tell him he trusts me, and he knows if I tell him you need a full day off and this is why, because if you don't do it, this is what's going to happen. He goes, okay, I can have a day off. It's okay and it's actually going to be good for me. But he needed that human interface and he needed the verbal permission to do it for it to work.
Cam Nicholls (34:31.074)
Yeah. No, it's great. Great examples. And look, you know, one of the I appreciate you breaking that all down, Ben. You know, one of the the the challenges that you know, I face as running the RCA is really trying to to normalise cycle coaching because it's funny if you if you if I was speaking to a triathlet this morning and they were talking about a coach all these coaching they supply triathlet gear, custom triathlet gear to co and a lot of it to coaching businesses in in triathlon.
And what I was just talking about how in the triathlon culture, it's very normal to have a coach. But in the road cycling culture, which they're reasonably intertwined, it's probably less normal to have a coach. And I feel like a lot of that comes down to just education. A lot of people don't really know what's involved with cycle coaching and also don't think that they've got the right goals for cycle coaching because they're not racing or they don't have a
big UCI event that they're targeting. But in actual fact, look, it's just for anyone that wants, you know, self-improvement. So yeah. Appreciate your time, Ben. anything to add to that before we wrap up?
Ben Treble (35:44.224)
No, just that coaches help you identify those blind spots. You can be an excellent cyclist, potentially even have a some very good working knowledge on how to train. Maybe you've been even coached in the past, but human nature, you know, we're quite biased to ourselves and we're not good at identifying our blind spots. So sometimes having that human interface, the coach, there to call you out.
To help you identify those blind spots and break those problems down and how do you solve them? Sometimes that becomes more valuable than saying, I can do a Zwift program and get 30, 30, 15, you know, VO2 hit sessions. Right. So sometimes the I think the value of the coaching in those first few blocks is probably from the training itself more than anything. But after this, it's the monthly or weekly conversations where you identify these little gaps.
And you can find a solution from them, that's where I think athletes get these really big value out of having a coach.
Cam Nicholls (36:51.704)
Good. Well, if you're listening and you'd like to try cycle coaching yourself, make sure you head to the RCA's website. It's www.roadcyclingacademy.com. Check out you can either there's two spots you can check out. We've got a 12-week custom plan. and it's that's what it's called in the menu system, which is more of a one-off call with the coach, like Ben described, but then he'll build or they'll build you out twelve weeks in advance and it kind of stops at twelve weeks or
What we've really focused on today is more of that monthly operating rhythm. we also have a weekly, which is perhaps a rabbit hole for another day, but monthly coaching is kind of what Ben's described today. So that's in our menu system as well, where you subscribe and you work monthly with the coach. Catch you in the next podcast.