Analysis Trail de la Fleur du Roy
I couldn’t miss the opportunity to take part in this Trail on the paths of Corrençon, a magnificent place of pilgrimage for skiers, golfers, hikers, mountain bikers and orienteers. The announced course was much more rolling than last week’s in Chamrousse, but not boring to say the least. A series of short climbs and technical descents would make for a very interesting race. And so it proved!
Figure 1: Profile of the Trail de La Fleur du Roy, with power (red), and climbs selected for analysis.
Average running speed is 12.2 km/h for a CVI (Course Variability Index) of 40, which looks pretty good on paper.
By way of comparison, the CVI for the French Trail Short Championship at Montgenèvre was 60, and therefore much more mountainous, and run at an average of 12.6 km/h. All this above 1800M altitude. That’s some heavy stuff!
It would be interesting to see the power data of the top runners to see at what percentage of their Critical Climbing Power (C.C.P.) they are able to run.
For your information, a top-level marathon runner is capable of maintaining power equivalent to 96% of CP for over 2 hours! That’s impressive, given that the average runner’s PC time is around 45 minutes. (See article on CP)
Table 1: Running times and average values.
Back to the Trail, and my second place behind Jarno.
The start was given at 9 a.m., still too early for me 😉 The tempo led by Jarno was very steady from the start, with peaks of 370 W on the steep sections (~116% PCa), so a little too high for me, especially as my heart rate response was pretty poor (around 160 bpm). Surely my parasympathetic nervous system was still very active for my digestion, because of my late breakfast… 😉
So I felt the acidity and lactates building up a little too early. So I let him go to find a more suitable rhythm, around 90% PCa, to allow the lactates to be reused, and to resynthesize the phosphocreatine that had been depleted at the start. It takes me a few minutes to find my cruising rhythm, being now alone a few minutes behind Jarno.
The climbs, relaunches and technical descents follow each other well. I manage to maintain 90% PCa on all the climbs without too much difficulty, and the heart rate response is stable. Time flies by and I can accelerate on the final downhill section to try and catch Jarno. In the end, I don’t finish too far behind, at 1’16.
Table 2: Details of the 5 climbs selected for analysis.
This analysis shows that I still have room for improvement in my overall effort management, even if on the climb I was able to be fairly consistent at around 90% PCa.
To be more competitive, I’d have to be able to sustain a higher intensity on the climbs, at least the shorter ones, approaching 100% PCa. And be more offensive on the downhills, holding back a little to preserve myself…
The average of 271 W (4.2 W/Kg) on this trail is quite satisfactory considering the technical nature of the course, and especially a week after Chamrousse, which had left me quite sore in the muscles.
In conclusion, these analyses only serve to convince me that the arrival of power in running will be unavoidable in trail running in a few years’ time, and I’m happy to be one of the forerunners, even if the Anglo-Saxons are already well ahead on this. This makes it much easier for coaches: firstly, to plan tactical strategies and race pacing, and secondly, to analyze and guide training at the right intensity.
The aim is to optimize performance! And it’s the ideal tool. At present, trainers work a lot with climbing speed, but it’s clear that this speed depends on the slope, and not directly on the effort made. Power makes it possible to go beyond this problem of analysis and pacing in trail running!
Thanks to the Corrençon fire department for organizing the event and taking these great photos!
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