Beware of PowerCranks

wrote in message
oups.com...
On Jun 5, 3:22 am, "Phil Holman" pholman@yourservice wrote:

Wouldn't that argument mean that if you did observe a change in
VO2Max
(in ml/kg/min) then the previous value was faulty and shouldn't be
used as a basis for comparison? If one subscribed to that argument,
both the improvement and VO2Max and the improvement in power should
be
discounted.

It depends on the definition of VO2max. I don't see how something
like this
could be so fixed.

Yeah, I was engaging in Socratic dialog. I don't think VO2Max is that
fixed, either -- in part because of the kg vs. "lean" kg issue. OTOH,
one does have to worry about how well the initial tests were done.
Which sort of argues in favor of RCTs.

BTW, do you ever discuss the gastric freezing debacle in your class?
When I used to teach intro I used that as my cautionary tale for RCTs
(I used tuberculous meningitis as my counter-example).

No, and searching through some articles it looks to be very
controversial. Is it universally resolved yet? For the success stories
we do the Linus Pauling vitamin C to prevent colds and the largest
medical experiment of all time with the Salk vaccine.

It's a shock to students when they see the higher contracted numbers of
polio in the placebo group. "You mean, if they had given the vaccine to
everyone there would be a couple of hundred less children who contracted
polio." Errrm.

Phil H

Phil Holman writes:

Wouldn't that argument mean that if you did observe a change in
VO2Max (in ml/kg/min) then the previous value was faulty and
shouldn't be used as a basis for comparison? If one subscribed
to that argument, both the improvement and VO2Max and the
improvement in power should be discounted.

It depends on the definition of VO2max. I don't see how something
like this could be so fixed.

Yeah, I was engaging in Socratic dialog. I don't think VO2Max is
that fixed, either -- in part because of the kg vs. "lean" kg
issue. OTOH, one does have to worry about how well the initial
tests were done. Which sort of argues in favor of RCTs.

BTW, do you ever discuss the gastric freezing debacle in your
class? When I used to teach intro I used that as my cautionary
tale for RCTs (I used tuberculous meningitis as my
counter-example).

No, and searching through some articles it looks to be very
controversial. Is it universally resolved yet? For the success
stories we do the Linus Pauling vitamin C to prevent colds and the
largest medical experiment of all time with the Salk vaccine.

It's a shock to students when they see the higher contracted numbers
of polio in the placebo group. "You mean, if they had given the
vaccine to everyone there would be a couple of hundred less children
who contracted polio." Errrm.

This whole subject reappear under new guises because people do not
want to believe that there is a direct relationship between aerobic
capacity and performance on a bicycle.

I spent years reading how ankling would improve climbing and top speed
and that it needed to be practiced diligently. That went away only to
be replaced by other beliefs that we can fabricate power by trickery.

In recent times, steam RR locomotives, although not rated in Horse
Power (but rather "tractive effort", the pull at which the wheels
would spin) had a conversion chart to HP based on grate area in the
fire box which governs how much heat can be transferred to steam in
the boiler. Grate area is closely similar to lung displacement for
physically fit racers. That is what limits climbing or TT ability,
not ankling, pedaling style or other external means.

Jobst Brandt

On Tue, 05 Jun 2007 13:41:24 -0500, Tim McNamara
wrote:

So I'll find out where more than a month off using regular cranks
leaves me.

That'll be interesting. I could of course be completely wrong, which
would be good for the users of this product.

Results of subjective, non-scientific, biased, anecdotal study:

Tim is neither completely wrong nor completely right. No doubt my
legs were not in the same condition to handle the Powercranks as they
were in mid-April (after two months of practice and use); BUT, I was
pleasantly surprised to find I was able to ride and even climb with
distinctly more strength and less pain and strain that as a total
virgin. Hopefully meaning that there is at least some legitimate
"neuromuscular rewiring" and power conditioning achieved while
training on them, which carried over and remained after a month and a
half of riding normal cranks.

Anyway, they are a challenge, and though I'm a newbie, I like them and
believe they have a lot of potential. So, you won't see mine for sale
on e-bay any time soon.

On Jun 5, 10:40 am, R.E. Chung wrote:
...
The US health care system doesn't have a very good track record on
informed consent. I think it's pretty horrendous that women in the
throes of childbirth get forced to sign "consent" forms for
anesthesia. In many other countries they discuss it with their
physician during the last couple months of the pregnancy. There's
really no reason to wait until the contractions have begun.

However, unnecessary cosmetic surgery has been performed without
consent on nearly 50% of the US population.

--
Tom Sherman - Holstein-Friesland Bovinia
The weather is here, wish you were beautiful

wrote:
Phil Holman writes:

Wouldn't that argument mean that if you did observe a change in
VO2Max (in ml/kg/min) then the previous value was faulty and
shouldn't be used as a basis for comparison? If one subscribed
to that argument, both the improvement and VO2Max and the
improvement in power should be discounted.

It depends on the definition of VO2max. I don't see how something
like this could be so fixed.

Yeah, I was engaging in Socratic dialog. I don't think VO2Max is
that fixed, either -- in part because of the kg vs. "lean" kg
issue. OTOH, one does have to worry about how well the initial
tests were done. Which sort of argues in favor of RCTs.

BTW, do you ever discuss the gastric freezing debacle in your
class? When I used to teach intro I used that as my cautionary
tale for RCTs (I used tuberculous meningitis as my
counter-example).

No, and searching through some articles it looks to be very
controversial. Is it universally resolved yet? For the success
stories we do the Linus Pauling vitamin C to prevent colds and the
largest medical experiment of all time with the Salk vaccine.

It's a shock to students when they see the higher contracted numbers
of polio in the placebo group. "You mean, if they had given the
vaccine to everyone there would be a couple of hundred less children
who contracted polio." Errrm.

This whole subject reappear under new guises because people do not
want to believe that there is a direct relationship between aerobic
capacity and performance on a bicycle.

I don't want to make a 'me' thing out of this post but today I both rode
and ran, and there was quite a bit of difference in the two. Riding I
could only seem to get the motivation to get my pulse up to a whopping
105. Running, as in sprint until ready to fall over, I got to about 150
after a 3 football field dead run. Does that even make sense in a
motivational kind of way? It was nasty windy today which kind of dented
the riding but not the running. We actually had a tornado alert for
northern California.
Now, sneaking in a question, does one full blast run per day make any
difference compared to a few hours on the bike? I'm thinking heart
condition mainly on this.
Anybody??

I spent years reading how ankling would improve climbing and top speed
and that it needed to be practiced diligently. That went away only to
be replaced by other beliefs that we can fabricate power by trickery.

Like maybe those silly oval crank rings about 15-20 years back?

In recent times, steam RR locomotives, although not rated in Horse
Power (but rather "tractive effort", the pull at which the wheels
would spin) had a conversion chart to HP based on grate area in the
fire box which governs how much heat can be transferred to steam in
the boiler.

I don't know if I can agree on that one since I am old enough to have
stood to the side of steam engines in regular service and seen them spin
their wheels starting up a mere 5 or 6 car passenger train. There was
one article I remember that rated a big steam engine at about 6,000 HP
at speed. That was about the time the steam companies like Baldwin were
competing with the new diesel upstarts and they had a sort of horsepower
war going on. I think the steam engines horsepower just went up with
speed in a semi linear fashion until they literally 'ran out of steam'.

Grate area is closely similar to lung displacement for
physically fit racers. That is what limits climbing or TT ability,
not ankling, pedaling style or other external means.

Are you sure enough to stand behind that 100%. My lung capacity has not
changed since last years summer, but my conditioning has gotten rather
lax due to a winter spent more with the computer than the bike. I
definitely can't climb as well as last summer and it isn't due to lung
capacity. Want to rethink that one? There is also the ability to use
what air you do take in with each breath and the amount of reserve
energy in your legs.
I'm waiting for the big equation now. ;)
Bill Baka

Jobst Brandt

wrote in message
...
Phil Holman writes:

Wouldn't that argument mean that if you did observe a change in
VO2Max (in ml/kg/min) then the previous value was faulty and
shouldn't be used as a basis for comparison? If one subscribed
to that argument, both the improvement and VO2Max and the
improvement in power should be discounted.

It depends on the definition of VO2max. I don't see how something
like this could be so fixed.

Yeah, I was engaging in Socratic dialog. I don't think VO2Max is
that fixed, either -- in part because of the kg vs. "lean" kg
issue. OTOH, one does have to worry about how well the initial
tests were done. Which sort of argues in favor of RCTs.

BTW, do you ever discuss the gastric freezing debacle in your
class? When I used to teach intro I used that as my cautionary
tale for RCTs (I used tuberculous meningitis as my
counter-example).

No, and searching through some articles it looks to be very
controversial. Is it universally resolved yet? For the success
stories we do the Linus Pauling vitamin C to prevent colds and the
largest medical experiment of all time with the Salk vaccine.

It's a shock to students when they see the higher contracted numbers
of polio in the placebo group. "You mean, if they had given the
vaccine to everyone there would be a couple of hundred less children
who contracted polio." Errrm.

This whole subject reappear under new guises because people do not
want to believe that there is a direct relationship between aerobic
capacity and performance on a bicycle.

Here we go again.


I spent years reading how ankling would improve climbing and top speed
and that it needed to be practiced diligently. That went away only to
be replaced by other beliefs that we can fabricate power by trickery.

In recent times, steam RR locomotives, although not rated in Horse
Power (but rather "tractive effort", the pull at which the wheels
would spin) had a conversion chart to HP based on grate area in the
fire box which governs how much heat can be transferred to steam in
the boiler. Grate area is closely similar to lung displacement for
physically fit racers. That is what limits climbing or TT ability,
not ankling, pedaling style or other external means.

You continue to repeat this misconception. Lung displacement or lung
capacity is not the limiting factor in climbing or TTing or cycling in
general. If you understood the cause and effect elements you would
understand that extreme "out of breath" is caused by excess CO2 in the
blood stream as a result of lactic buffering. That is, the limits of
aerobic capacity were reached upstream (cardiac output, blood muscle
interface limitations etc) and no further limitations are imposed by the
lungs. It wouldn't matter if you doubled lung capacity, blood lactate
concentrations wouldn't change and this is the culminating event in
limiting aerobic performance. Heavy breathing is an effect not a cause.

Phil H

"Phil Holman" piholmanc@yourservice wrote in message
. ..

wrote in message
...
Phil Holman writes:

Wouldn't that argument mean that if you did observe a change in
VO2Max (in ml/kg/min) then the previous value was faulty and
shouldn't be used as a basis for comparison? If one subscribed
to that argument, both the improvement and VO2Max and the
improvement in power should be discounted.

It depends on the definition of VO2max. I don't see how something
like this could be so fixed.

Yeah, I was engaging in Socratic dialog. I don't think VO2Max is
that fixed, either -- in part because of the kg vs. "lean" kg
issue. OTOH, one does have to worry about how well the initial
tests were done. Which sort of argues in favor of RCTs.

BTW, do you ever discuss the gastric freezing debacle in your
class? When I used to teach intro I used that as my cautionary
tale for RCTs (I used tuberculous meningitis as my
counter-example).

No, and searching through some articles it looks to be very
controversial. Is it universally resolved yet? For the success
stories we do the Linus Pauling vitamin C to prevent colds and the
largest medical experiment of all time with the Salk vaccine.

It's a shock to students when they see the higher contracted numbers
of polio in the placebo group. "You mean, if they had given the
vaccine to everyone there would be a couple of hundred less children
who contracted polio." Errrm.

This whole subject reappear under new guises because people do not
want to believe that there is a direct relationship between aerobic
capacity and performance on a bicycle.

Here we go again.


I spent years reading how ankling would improve climbing and top speed
and that it needed to be practiced diligently. That went away only to
be replaced by other beliefs that we can fabricate power by trickery.

In recent times, steam RR locomotives, although not rated in Horse
Power (but rather "tractive effort", the pull at which the wheels
would spin) had a conversion chart to HP based on grate area in the
fire box which governs how much heat can be transferred to steam in
the boiler. Grate area is closely similar to lung displacement for
physically fit racers. That is what limits climbing or TT ability,
not ankling, pedaling style or other external means.

You continue to repeat this misconception. Lung displacement or lung
capacity is not the limiting factor in climbing or TTing or cycling in
general. If you understood the cause and effect elements you would
understand that extreme "out of breath" is caused by excess CO2 in the
blood stream as a result of lactic buffering. That is, the limits of
aerobic capacity were reached upstream (cardiac output, blood muscle
interface limitations etc) and no further limitations are imposed by the
lungs. It wouldn't matter if you doubled lung capacity, blood lactate
concentrations wouldn't change and this is the culminating event in
limiting aerobic performance. Heavy breathing is an effect not a cause.

As proof of what Phil has to say about this - when you're staggeringly out
of breath and can hardly move your blood oxygen is still more than 90%.
Normal blood oxygen runs about 98%.

I have an ex-brother in law who was the longest surviving person without a
main coronary artery. Until he got a partial heart transplant in 1999 his
blood oxygen was normally 70% or less. Proof that blood oxygen is NOT the
problem in climbing - rather lactac and excess CO2 is. BTW - he's still
alive at about 55 years old now.

In article ,
Doug Taylor wrote:

On Tue, 05 Jun 2007 13:41:24 -0500, Tim McNamara
wrote:

So I'll find out where more than a month off using regular cranks
leaves me.

That'll be interesting. I could of course be completely wrong,
which would be good for the users of this product.

Results of subjective, non-scientific, biased, anecdotal study:

Tim is neither completely wrong nor completely right. No doubt my
legs were not in the same condition to handle the Powercranks as they
were in mid-April (after two months of practice and use); BUT, I was
pleasantly surprised to find I was able to ride and even climb with
distinctly more strength and less pain and strain that as a total
virgin. Hopefully meaning that there is at least some legitimate
"neuromuscular rewiring" and power conditioning achieved while
training on them, which carried over and remained after a month and a
half of riding normal cranks.

Anyway, they are a challenge, and though I'm a newbie, I like them
and believe they have a lot of potential. So, you won't see mine for
sale on e-bay any time soon.

Thanks for the report!

In article .com,
Johnny Sunset wrote:

On Jun 5, 10:40 am, R.E. Chung wrote:
... The US health care system doesn't have a very good track record
on informed consent. I think it's pretty horrendous that women in
the throes of childbirth get forced to sign "consent" forms for
anesthesia. In many other countries they discuss it with their
physician during the last couple months of the pregnancy. There's
really no reason to wait until the contractions have begun.

However, unnecessary cosmetic surgery has been performed without
consent on nearly 50% of the US population.

Ummm. What? Ah. Circumcision.

In article ,
Bill wrote:

Now, sneaking in a question, does one full blast run per day make any
difference compared to a few hours on the bike? I'm thinking heart
condition mainly on this.

The literature I have seen in the last year or two has indicated that
sprint training has significant benefits for endurance. I don't think
your heart can tell if you're running or riding a bike.