Can This Average Cyclist Get Fit Enough To Finish A Cobbled Classic?

Can GCN resident statistician and average cyclist survive one of the hardest sportives in the world? It’s time to give cycling geek Cillian Kelly a new target – the Tour of Flanders! With the help of our mates at @wahoofitness, we’re challenging him to get fitter and smash it!

In association with @wahoofitness 👉 http://gcn.eu/Wahoo-Fitness

Welcome 0:00
The challenge 0:45
Fitness test time: how unfit am I? 2:03
Test results 7:31
Cillian gets a cycling training plan & coach 8:00
Yoga for cyclists? 11:59
Mental training for fitness training 12:42
Hitting the road 14:10

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I like cycling indoors I enjoy the fact that you can do it any time of day or night and you can hop on and get going without much fuss involved but I also love cycling outside I love nothing more than getting out on the bike on the

Weekends when I have time I’m fortunate enough to live in the countryside with quiet Lanes everywhere surrounded by gorgeous Countryside and I like being fit I like getting fit I’m a bit of a stats nerd so I like keeping track of my numbers and seeing how I’m improving but

I’m not very good at staying fit I need a challenge something to ride towards now I’ve actually had a pretty good winter already I’m not quite starting from zero anymore and I think I found a way to address all of these things let’s delve into how I’m going to do

It as some of you might have seen on gcn in the summer of 2022 I took on the attap detour in the French Alps but July is miles away I need something a bit sooner than that so what’s just around the corner the spring classic

Yes I’m on the way to Flanders the tour of Flanders well not the actual tour of Flanders the sport Eve the day before which does take in all of the hills of the pro race and to make sure that I can get over all of those Hills and

Hopefully enjoy myself a little bit along the way I’ve teamed up with Wahoo and I’ll be using their Wahoo system to devise a training plan to keep me on track so in order to get myself fit and ready for the tour of Flanders Wahoo have kindly set me up with a dedicated

Indoor training bike the kicker shift now this thing is magnificent it looks great it feels great and two of the best things about it are how quiet it is so I don’t wake up all the Sleeping people downstairs a constant problem in this house and how safe it is I would often

Worry with my old trainer that one of the kids would come up and touch the spinning flywheel as it’s going around with this fully encased so I don’t need to worry about that anymore the only thing I’ve got left to worry about are my own legs now I’m going to use Wahoo system

To do my workouts but I’ve never used this before and I’m told first things first I need to do a test so Wahoo knows how fit or unfit I really am so before I commit to a training plan I need to set a benchmark first and actually before I

Started working for gcn which is over 4 years ago now I knew what FTP was I didn’t really understand it I’d hear you know race reports with numbers watts and uh it would all kind of go over my head because I didn’t really have a frame of reference I

Didn’t know what 200 Watts felt like what a, Watts felt like I did learn that about myself when I started training on Swift I learned what my FTP was and how to improve it and it did improve a little bit but that only tells you a bit

Of the story as one of the guys from Wahoo said to me it’s like using your shoe size to get you fitted for a three-piece suit so I’m about to get fitted for my three-piece suit by doing a frontal 4dp test that raised a couple of eyebrows at The Breakfast Table this

Morning what are you doing there killan oh I’m just uh setting up the cameras to record my frontal today and work all right are you so I’m doing my 4dp test 4dp stands for four dimensional power and those four dimensions are Sprint attack push and endure I think I’m

Probably okay at Sprint I have been known to hit four figures th000 watts in a Sprint I’m not too bad with endurance it’s the middle two attacking and pushing that uh I would imagine I’m pretty poor at and not only those but recovering from them not good so I’ll

See just um realizing how terrible I am at cycling with urg mode off just cycling to power to show him I’ve supposed to have been doing for the first bit of this and uh I’m terrible at it let’s say 30 Watts either side can’t

Get it bang on I don’t know how the pros do this well they’re Pros I guess they’re Pro they’re professional got my first Free Ride coming up Sprint I have to go all out for 7 seconds but have to twice Jesus second Sprint in 10 seconds I think I can increase my gear a bit here I think I undergeared the last time okay go Now comes the hard part recovery next up is the 5 minutes you know as hard as you can go for 5 minutes free ride I think my FTP at the moment is roughly 190 so I mean I should be aiming for over That finished the 5 minutes and and there’s only 5 more minutes until I have to do a 20 minute FTP test 20 minutes it’s told me to go for a walk for a minute Woo back on the Mik I’ve just finished my 20-minute effort and again quite pleased with how I measured that I mean it was awful was really struggling towards the end but I I did manage to keep the graph relatively flat I don’t think I’ve could have paced it much better or gone much harder so

Kind of pleased with that one what I’ve got to worry about first is my last of the four things the fourth dimension is a one minute effort after I’ve fatigued myself this far I’ve got 1 minute free ride to go and then I’m Done so now I know my four dimensions and I’ve been diagnosed as a sprinter I think for cycling in the Alps it’s definitely a bad thing but for cycling in Flanders maybe it’s not so bad the tour of Flanders sprinters win that race all the time Alexander Kristoff Peter

Sagan Matthew Vanderpool is he a sprinter not really sure don’t really know what he is anyway what I do know is I need a training plan working for gcn certainly has its advantages I’ve met some incredible people throughout the world of cycling and now I’m lucky enough to be on

Firstname terms with somebody who has ridden the tour of Flanders several times knows what it’s like to be at the front of that race loves Belgium and hopefully will be able to give me some solid advice on how to tackle the burgs of Flanders unfortunately sha Kelly

Wasn’t available this time so I’ve had to settle for this guy so you’re taking on the tour of Flanders well yeah distance 179 km oh yeah well I think it’s doable not the full length no but I think because you’ve got it in your mind already that you’re doing that length

Yeah that’s your goal if somebody told you on the day after 170k you’re doing the full 270 that might be a stretch if you were doing the shorter one somebody said the 180 that would also be a stretch but because you’ve got that goal right here right now yeah it’s more than

Durable yeah 200 km is just kind of a a thing and it’s less than that so it’s uh yeah it’s mentally it’s uh it’s okay it’s an okay shape in my head yeah well I would say that a lot of the advice you probably got before the

Attack would stand you in good stead for the tour of Ls as well i. don’t get too excited at the start yeah which is really easy as you know when there’s thousands of riders alongside you yeah you spent months trading for thinking about the big day yeah and you look down

Think I’m flying and that’s just the adrenaline talking well it was one of the big pieces of it was before the attack and I think I think I did it well cuz I started in a group that I probably shouldn’t have started in and I knew I

Was going to be passed out for about 2 hours salad and and I I did I kept kept myself to myself and I didn’t didn’t go bananas so yeah I’ll remember that one again obviously the climbs and the cobbles are a big part it’s going to be busy I imagine there’s thousands of

People taking part so I’m not sure if this is possible but if it is one of my bits of advice to you would be to allow a little bit of a gap to the next Rider in front of you at the start of each of the clients particularly the steeper

Ones like the pober ETC yeah because then you’re less likely to be stopped by other people and be forced to uncp at which point it’s very very hard to get going again when you’re not climbing you’re not on the cobbles use that time to recover eat and drink go easier than

You think you should do at least for the first twoth thirds of it at which point you’ll know how much strength you’ve got left how much energy you’ve got left in the tank to tackle the last third of the race yeah or sportif as we should call

It climbing style well I would say sit in the cell as much as possible I mean I know that we’ll see the ma wonderful incredible attacks out of the saddle yeah but in general you’ll have more grip at the rear wheel especially if you’re not used to riding Offroad like

Therol is where you get that weight distribution where you can keep the grip at the rear wheel in general and you’re a bit new cycling or less experienced having the weight on the saddle and therefore on the rear wheel it’s going to stop you slippy less of a

Consideration if it’s dry and if it’s wet perhaps but that would be my advice why do we love it I think it’s because icons of the sport have been at the head of the race that we’ve watched for decades at this point and that newer cycling fans are just getting into but

They learn it very quickly you know so now we’ve got the W vanarts the pagat and the vanderpols of this world and people that go into cycling three four years ago they’ll look at that they’ll immediately recognize the names of the quot and the kenberg and the patberg and

They can go out to Belgium and ride at any time of the year but it is just better if you’re doing it amongst a group of people it’s easy to give up I think if you’re out there on your own no one’s watching so you’ve got too motivations firstly or three actually

Firstly the roads that you love to watch you’ll get to ride on secondly you’ll have thousands of like-minded rides alongside you and thirdly we’re videoing the whole thing so you can’t really fail yeah and uh yeah that’s it it’s the fact that you can imagine all of the the

History and the Riders as as you’re going up these climbs and uh and the beer well exactly that is the payoff at the end one final bit of advice yeah don’t crash yeah I’ve just finished my first yoga session not just of this training program whatever and uh I think I’m pretty uh

Terrible at it I’d say I haven’t been able to touch my toes for 30 years and uh I’m no closer now to being able to do it but uh I mean kind of felt good don’t think I was quite ready for the levels of um flatulence wasn’t prepared for that I

Can’t really imagine myself ever doing yoga in a group environment probably best for everybody so I’ve just finished my latest training session on uh on Wahoo system and the eagle eyed among you might realize I’m not wearing any cycling gear and that’s because this particular session was all in my mind

Part of the system program is um mental training to focus your mind and to kind of give you a toolkit to trick yourself into becoming fitter and stronger and and that you’re able to do things that you didn’t think you were able to do and uh I up until recently I definitely

Would have been one to look at this and think this isn’t for me this isn’t going to work but a few years ago I I received a piece of advice I actually can’t remember where I heard it but I you know the way you get these like Instagram inspirational little things which which

Uh try to improve your life and a lot of them are nonsense but one of them stuck with me and uh it was if you find yourself saying oh I have to go to the shops or I have to go out and cut the grass or I have to bring the kids

Somewhere if you just change one word and if you change the word have to get so I get to go to the shops I get to cut the grass I get to bring the kids to wherever they’re going doesn’t work all the time but it works just enough to

Make it worthwhile it’s changed my outlook on these kinds of things things these mental focus exercises so it being part of my cycling training is uh something I would have dismissed before but now let’s give it a go I’ve just done a workout outside for the first time

Ever I don’t mean like gone training outside for the first time ever I mean like a an actual structured workout normally when I do those it’s you know it’s on urg mode or E mode where uh the trainer inside is making you do the power that you’re supposed to do and you

Don’t really have to think and you just keep turning the pedals and and and that’s it and uh I’ve never had to do it outside before and uh Wahoo system kind of encourages you to do this so I had it all loaded up on my head unit so my head

Unit is telling me and I have a power meter as well so the head unit is telling me what par to ride to and uh it got to really make me think like about pro riders and how they ride to power and it’s really not easy I think I’m

Pretty bad at it so I’m on my way the road to Flander starts here got my fancy new indoor bike lovely new aoo kit got my Wahoo system training plan now I’ve been quite fit before although it was nearly 2 years ago now but it means I

Know I can do it again all I have to do is just tick those boxes ly’s advice for me was okay I guess but allow me to throw it to you the gcn viewers have you got any advice for me I’ve never ridden a Belgian Berg before

I’ve never ridden in Belgium before at all so is there anything I should be doing or maybe things I shouldn’t be doing let me know in the comments section down below and don’t forget to give this video a big thumbs up I can’t actually give a big thumbs up

Myself because I’m holding a GoPro and I can’t cycle a bike with no hands so something else for me to work on