England Football team prepare on Wattbikes for South Africa

Filed under: General — Tags: , , , — Steve Marshall @ 11:25 am

England at South Africa

Wattbike

Yesterday, Ben joined the England Football team for some of their training for the upcoming World Cup in South Africa. Ben meet the team at the Altitude Centre, a group of sports scientist who have trained many top sporting teams, most recently the Great British Lions Team before their tour of South Africa.

Ben provided Wattbikes for the fitness testing during the sessions at the request of the Altitude Centre scientists as they needed reliable and consistent results on cadence, power and performance . The team underwent various tests designed to measure physiological and mental performance in similar high-altitude conditions as the team will find in South Africa next year. Protocols such as ramp tests and co-ordination tests were undertaken under varying altitude conditions simulated through masks feeding different oxygen levels during exercise.

Players from teams already using Wattbike equipment, such as Manchester United, updated Ben on how they train and are tested on the Wattbikes in their clubs as well as their peak power performances. We would tell you how powerful the players are, but we wouldn’t like to give the opposition any help….

BBC Radio 4 Audio Slide Show features the Wattbike

Filed under: General — Tags: , , , — Alex Skelton @ 10:29 am

An audio slide show featured on the BBC Radio 4 website takes a look at the lessons that can be learned from British Cycling – the most successful team at the World Championships and Olympic Games. During the slide show the BBC Interviewer Adam Shaw met with Sir Chris Hoy who explained how the British Cycling team of coaches, athletes and support staff all aim for excellence in everything that they do. Over the last eight years we have worked very closely with British Cycling in the development of the Wattbike and have been impressed at every stage with the professionalism and focus on what it is that they are trying to acheive. British Cycling talk about the ‘aggregation of marginal gains’, they try and think of everything, and once they have thought of it, improve it. We have been able to benefit from that philosophy as we returned to them time after time with their previous tick list of requirements completed only to be presented with a new list. It was in that environment that the Wattbike was born and continues to develop. We are currently working on a number of developments to the software that should be available for download shortly.

Towards the end of the Audio Slide show Sir Chris also takes the opportunity to put Adam through the peak power test on the Wattbike to give him an idea of what it takes to be an Olympic Sprint Cyclist. Adam produces 992 Watts, compared to over 2300 Watts that Chris is able to produce. That can be a target for 2009!

Listen to the full Audio Slide show at: http://news.bbc.co.uk/today/hi/today/newsid_7796000/7796283.stm