Dropped on Alpe d'Huez

If you haven't yet tried it, give The Sufferfest a go - in conjunction with your power meter and Trainer Road it is an awesome training tool.


Today I went for the Angels session - this is what the guy's at The Sufferfest dished up in a tasty hours session*:

• 6:30 warm-up, featuring footage from track racing in San Diego
• 10:00 of over/under intervals, with 1:00 just above your threshold, and 1:00 just below threshold, repeated 5x. Featuring footage from the 2009 Paris-Nice when Alberto Contador got, gasp, dropped by just about everyone!
• 3:00 rest, featuring some beautiful descending footage from cyclefilm.com, effort level 4/10.
• 8:00 climbing, while you try to stay with Andy Schleck in the 2009 Liege-Bastogne-Liege. Effort level starts at about 7/10, attacks take you up near 9/10, until setting down to 7/10 for most of the rest.
• 4:00 rest with more descending, effort level 4/10.
• 8:00 climbing, with a gradually increasing pace up the famous Col d’Eze in the 2010 Paris-Nice, featuring Vockler, Contador, Sanchez…yeah, all the big boys. You do the first two minutes at 6/10, next two at 7/10, next two at 8/10 and the last two at 8.5/10. There are a few accelerations in the group that ask you to increase cadence without increasing effort….which can be a little tricky, as you’ll find out.
• 4:00 rest with more descending, effort 4/10.
• 8:00 climbing, with the freaking mother of all climbs: Alpe d’Huez…can you stay with Contador in the 2010 Dauphine-Libere? You start the climb bridging up to the break with an effort level of 8/10. Then you pretty much do 8/10 the whole way up. Oh, wait, I forgot about the bajillion attacks that push you so far into the red that you’d swear your eyes are bleeding.
• 4:00 warm down featuring a sort of motley arrangement of things to keep you entertained. Including the first Sufferfest xtranormal video. Oh boy.

Here's a little taster:

* Cribbed from their website (hope you don't mind guy's?)

Having been dropped on the final climb of the session - Alpe d'Huez - where there are lots of accelerations at the top end of my VO2max and anaerobic capacity power zones it looks like this might be an area for me to focus on during March and April. 


You can see the training file from today's session online at STRAVA or Trainer Road.

Trainer Road - Angels 01.02.12