Happened across this article and thought it may be useful to track cyclists, especially those that compete over several events during a day.
As we all know warming up is an essential part of performance, it is always thought of as an injury prevention tool. But did you know that it has been demonstrated that there is a ~4% per degree improvement of vertical jump as muscle temperature increases. Also during track sprint cycling, peak power output increases between 2% - 10% per degree (C) that muscle temperature increases.
It is important to keep in mind those that compete in longer duration events the risk of glycogen depletion during extensive warm ups.
So seeing as performance improves as muscle temperature rises, the exact opposite is also true. This can be a problem when riders experience delays between warm up and event or between multiple events. This article looked at the effect of artificially heating the legs after a standard warm up using heat pads and insulated pants.
Cutting a reasonably long story short, unsurprisingly the heated pads improved the sprint performance after warm up when compared to standard tracky bottoms and also tracky bottoms with insulation.
It may seem a bit obvious but when its been tested thoroughly it really hits home! So for you guys that compete at multiple events throughout the day the warmer you keep your legs between events the better!
I'm not sure you can get heated pants down Decathlon or on Wiggle so it may mean digging your nan's electric blanket out of the loft!!!
For those interested in the full article it is.
Faulkner et al. Reducing Muscle Temperature Drop after Warm-up Improves Sprint Cycling Performance. Med. Sci. Sports. Exerc, Vol 45, (2) pp. 359-365 2013
Part one of my strength training for cyclists is coming soon
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