Although running, cycling, triathlon – and the majority of other sports – are still performed outdoors, indoor training and (remote) indoor testing are both very popular. Even in the professional world, the digitalization of training software and performance analysis tools are common practice.
But take two digital platforms (let’s say INSCYD and Zwift), blend them together and you create a completely new, but powerful performance tool that anybody can use to become stronger and faster. Tech is not always the solution, but it can certainly add some value to your training.
“Zwift and INSCYD is a partnership meant to be,” says INSCYD and Zwift coach Kevin Poulton. “Coaching is more and more done remotely: for example, I’m based in Australia most of the time, and my athletes are in Europe and America, and even when I’m in Europe they’re in Belgium, Spain, France. So they’re always somewhere else.”
“However, I’ve been doing the INSCYD PPD test on Zwift lately and the results coming in are really good: accurate, reliable and valid. I think it’s just the start of something big towards these two to reach any athlete around the world with good and accurate testing combination. I’m really excited about it.”
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Kevin Poulton: “What I’ve been doing with professional riders is to implement their training with Zwift and INSCYD. We just had the altitude camp in Andorra before the Vuelta, and we did INSCYD testing there, but we also did sessions on Zwift at altitude, as well as long rides in the mountains. For me INSCYD and Zwift is a package that any coach should be using.”
“I’ve used INSCYD’s lactate testing and compared it to the Power-Performance Decoder on Zwift. They proved to be valid and reliable. Then, in terms of training zones, we use the training zones that are produced with INSCYD and I work with them either on Zwift or out on the road.”
What Kevin is developing here is probably a first and unique declination of INSCYD testing on Zwift and a continuum between the two software platforms – but one that never loses sight of the goal of racing outdoors.
“What I’ve been doing with professional riders is to implement their training with Zwift and INSCYD. We just had the altitude camp in Andorra before the Vuelta, and we did INSCYD testing there, but we also did sessions on Zwift at altitude, as well as long rides in the mountains. For me INSCYD and Zwift is a package that any coach should be using.”
Of course more tech isn’t always better, as some gadgets and software are accurate and reliable and some are not. But the main INSCYD feature that has been leading Kevin’s athletes at Powerhouse Cycling – as Kevin himself highlights – is the elimination of the guess-work.
Poulton: “The results of an INSCYD test enables me to give my athletes an interval, and know how much lactate they’re going to accumulate and how long it is going to take them to recover in terms of how fast they will clear the lactate.”
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“Even more, with INSCYD you also know the best fuel source for the athletes, how much energy they’re using and so on. INSCYD answers all those questions. And when you prescribe a specific training, athletes have much more confidence in what they are completing because they know it comes from accurate testing and accurate data.”
The digitalization of training and performance assessment comes with several perks and opens up several possibilities that were only possibly to fewer coaches and associations in the past. And as INSCYD’s Project-leader Sebastian Weber put it at the Athletik Conference (a conference for Strength and Conditioning coaches) in Hennef (Germany) on the 15th of September: “With INSCYD you can replace the majority of very expensive equipment that was only used in labs before, because the software algorithm provides the same accuracy.”
Last but not least, although the trend is leaning towards a widespread use of tech and digitalization for training and performance assessment purposes, INSCYD would also allow you to test your athletes in a lab, or – alternatively – where it most matters: outdoors.
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