By Mara Abbott, Olympian, CTS Contributing Editor The pre-tour pundits took note of Simon Yates at this year’s first Giro d’Italia press conference, after the Michelton-Scott rider gave a one-syllable answer when asked who was the number-one favorite at this year’s race: “Me.” Fans immediately lined up, as fans will do, to categorize Yates’ analysis …
When I give training talks, I can inevitably count on being asked, “How long should my longest run be?” When I get this question, I usually retort with, “Why do you need a long run?” Silence ensues. The silence stems from the fact runners rarely think about why they need a long run. And even more specifically, …
By Mara Abbott, Olympian, CTS Contributing Editor Last week, a Seattle Times article revealing that 1980’s cycling legend Rebecca Twigg is now homeless ricocheted around Bike World social media. In many of the posts that crossed my feed, it arrived adorned with a single word: “Shocked.” My only shock came upon reflecting how wholly unsurprised …
By Jason Koop, Head Coach of CTS Ultrarunning When I first started coaching ultrarunners in the early 2000’s, one of the things that I lamented most was the lack of specific research on the sport. Other endurance sports I worked with (marathon running, cycling and triathlon) could base their best practices on decades of …
By Chris Carmichael CEO/Head Coach of CTS As we announce the opening of registration for the third annual CTS Figueroa Mountain Gran Fondo on November 9 of this year, I’ve been thinking a lot about what makes for great gran fondo experience. I have been to a ton of amateur cycling events around the world, …
By Paul Ruggiero CTS Triathlon Coach Whoa. How did you get here? It’s still dark, the sun is just peeking over the lake, and you’re standing here in neoprene with hundreds of your closest friends listening to the National Anthem. It’s the pre dawn start of your first triathlon. So you read our article about …
By Jason Koop, Head Coach of CTS Ultrarunning One of the entertaining, and educational, parts of my job is filtering through all of the latest and greatest gadgets athletes can use to track or improve performance. In the pre-Kickstarter days, this would mean unsolicited packages arriving at the office for us to unpack, test out …
By Mara Abbott, Olympian and CTS Contributing Editor The weather is warming up, and there are already more bikes and more cars on the road. It’s not just a seasonal phenomenon either: According to an analysis by the League of American Bicyclists using the latest U.S. census data, in some cities the number of …
By Jason Koop, Head Coach of CTS Ultrarunning In Training Essentials for Ultrarunning, I wrote that elite ultramarathon athletes have three things in common. First off, they are tough. Nobody wins a race that lasts several hours or days solely with sheer luck, fitness or genetic talent (although the latter is one component that all …
By Jason Koop, Head Coach of CTS Ultrarunning Sleep matters for a lot of reasons, and may even matter as much some of your training! For starters, the physiological repair and growth that actually makes you better happens when you rest, but predominantly when you sleep. It improves motor learning (learning a new skill) and …