Video: Who Are The Fittest Racers? - Pinkbike Academy Season 2 EP 2
PINKBIKE ACADEMY
PRESENTED BY
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SEASON 2, EPISODE 2
PRESENTED BY
SEASON 2, EPISODE 2
This time on Pinkbike Academy, ten riders take on a brutal FTP test to see who has fitness to back up their riding ability.
PREVIOUSLY
Did you miss the previous episode from Season 2 of Pinkbike Academy? Watch Episode 1 here.
Did you miss the previous episode from Season 2 of Pinkbike Academy? Watch Episode 1 here.
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Jason, Christina, and special guest judge Mark Wallace fill the contestants in on the details for their next challenge.
Tori isn't actually this excited about the brutal FTP test.
On your mark...
Flo trying to get in the groove and think about anything other than how much pain she's in.
Cody getting up close and personal with the vomit bucket.
Emmet pushing hard.
Kyra and Israel deep in the pain cave.
Someone has to go home.
Pinkbike Academy Season 2 is available on all of your devices through the Outside app or website, as well as on the Pinkbike YouTube channel.
Official Location Partner of Pinkbike Academy @bikebigwhite
Huge thanks to the brands who made this show possible!
Monster Hydro, Orbea, Shimano, Fox Racing, Fox Factory, Maxxis, Garmin,
Funn, Ride Concepts, Hyperice, Big White, Trailforks, ODI, WPL, and Granite.
Monster Hydro, Orbea, Shimano, Fox Racing, Fox Factory, Maxxis, Garmin,
Funn, Ride Concepts, Hyperice, Big White, Trailforks, ODI, WPL, and Granite.
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Member since Feb 15, 2012
Must Read This Week
I came here to say, there must be a brand that values your positive and personal (emotional) approach to life and to your "hunting my dream" attitude. You may have not been the best "rider" by the standards of this format, but you will engage with your community and with the people around so much that you will surely find your spot in this sporting business and comunity.
I felt sad and angry at the same time when they ruled you out. You are a great person in heart and this is much more valuabel than spinning the cranks harder.
We wont some mexican style in the next Kona release
konaworld.com/contact.cfm
Someone mentioned a training tv/ program for him showing gains.
Also highlighting his country’s riding spots.
-The Bike Industry
I highly recommend the book Mindset: The New Psychology of Success by Dweck. I think it or a coach well versed in the ideas of the book would help Cody.
Someone else said it — Cody is not a bad person, nor does he have a bad attitude.But he has an unforgiving mindset toward himself. He can change at some point in his life, but he won’t change it in the course of season 2. He will do well on challenges and stick around for a while, but eventually it will be his downfall.
If it happened in episode 3, hush! I’m catching up.
If it's still like this next week? See ya.
Side note: I understand this is "reality" tv.
I get that passion and showing emotion shouldn’t be judged but there was always an excuse given, always has something to say but will he actually needs to do a big amount of effort to reverse this profile.
----
I agree for the sole fact that the kind of speed differential is at least a year of solid training for Israel to catch-up....far more than however many days they have to run this contest. It only takes one life-changing event to completely change someone's perspective.
Set a training programme for him and get him recording his personal progress and how doing so in Mexico adds a different perspective.
Semenuk barely shows emotion and PB commenters give him shit about it.
The 98% of us in the middle just want to see someone rip trails up.
That said, he doesn't seem to have the speed nor the fitness of the top men. He didn't really lose that much time in episode 1 when he went off line but was well off the times.
Anyways, they will likely ditch a female next time so it'll likely be the Pilates instructor. Nice enough gal but her fitness is just not there.
I'm certain every rider that was chosen for PB Academy before they arrived rode as much as possible. But in reality there was much more to be gained in overall speed by working on off the bike fitness for several of these riders. If you can't sprint across the finish line there is a real issue.
I may not be an expert but I’d say most people studying physiology would call that a personal ‘Attitude’ towards his efforts as bad.
If you act like a teenage girl who didn’t get chosen as the prom queen, sulks about it in an extroverted manor and then can’t be criticised for it, is that really the type of ambassador a brand would wish to have enrolled.
The production team and hosts have portrayed it and I have a feeling not all of it has been shown in this last two episodes. Adversely, they could have hyped it up more than what it was. That’s the power of media and it’s got us all talking about it. Remind you of anything?!
Cody, I hope you found it within yourself to reassess your personal process and it helped you to progress through the show.
(too soon?)
Say, does anyone of the current contestants have a BMX background??
I wish they'd maybe mention that.
Emmet has an absolute advantage being that he is a local rider to Big White. Without a doubt, he did win the FTP test; props to him for that. Too bad they couldn't have this contest on a mountain that nobody had ridden.
Emmet's time difference to the next man was similar to Flo's over the next woman and she's not a local. Both similarly close to secret pros. I think they're both simply that fast.
Also he didn't just win the FTP test, he blew them out of the water. Like, not close. A fraction separating him from the pro. Which suggest to me his race win was no coincidence.
So exciting to see those super talented guys because we know when Emmet or Flo get that contract they won't be pack fill at EWS, we'll definitely be hearing about them. Tori could be a dark horse. The most athletic woman there, though can she catch up with Flo's speed?
You need the attitude AND the speed. Israel had a slower time than the fastest women’s and a low power ratio. It would take a long time for him to get to speed.
Cody will likely be the next one to go as he admitted he didn’t want it as much as Israel did
To be fair, with his attitude, he'll never lose a thing.
Based of results he was 100% the right candidate to eliminate.
Personally, I don't think he should of been there in the first place as his place could of been filled by someone with more skill/ability and more of a chance of actually competing regardless of where they are from...
As far as we know - Cody might have the best attitude there. Maybe they edited like this - so they can show him later in better light - for a big dramatic reversal.
And all this for larger customer interaction in the comments section.
Episode 1 at 45:33 mark for the race.
Episode 2 at 39:46 mark for FTP test.
So for those like me, that think (or thought in my case) riding alone can make you fast, consider a proper spin cycle training program as it really makes a difference.
While,
BMX means sex
Just checked Pogacar.
When he win stage 8 of the tour.
Slovenian averages 6.5 watts per kilo for 24 minutes and 450 watts for the decisive attack
Also 5.4 here for a whole stage for Nibali
www.google.com/amp/s/www.cyclingweekly.com/amp/news/latest-news/investigation-take-beat-pro-440318
Meaning if we put Jack Moir, Richie Rude and Jesse Melamed in an academy with the top roadies, made the bottom 3 all go home, then based on FTP, the top 3 EWS racers in the world would have all gone home!
Not saying FTP isn't valid but it is a sign of more roadie fitness than enduro fitness (it's a sat down test, last I checked you don't sit down much on an enduro stage). Would have been far better to have had fit for racing on there and put them through a calibrated by weight session.
They should of (IMO) used some sort of pyramid or ramp interval test, 15s on 45s active recovery....ramping up to a max sustainable wattage they can hold for the 15s...something to that effect.
We are all different though and this is just what worked and didn't work for me.
I would do a gym session post turbo to start warned up and my legs fatigued. My times and race results reflected this training really working for me. I just need to get motivated to go back to this training again one day!
For example, if your ftp is 4.25w/kg you can ride steady at just below 3w/kg at tempo watts (65-75%) all day.
But if you're ftp is 3.25 w/kg the same effort puts you up in high sweetspot/threshold territory (85%+) which is far less sustainable. Burning way more glycogen at 3.25 whereas the 4 w/kg person is fueling with fat. So pretty obvious who's going to be fresher as the day progresses.
I recall doing an enduro and the fast boys climbed so slowly, FTP was not on their mind, when it got steeper they just got off and walked up. There was plenty of time for the transfers.
Then they point the bike down....
youtu.be/MK0zWHk0BXM
One of the beat videos to show the difference between a top pro and a good rider.
Your w/kg also affect acceleration, obviously with diminishing returns the longer you have to stay on the gas, as that's here where pure watts comes into play.
Obviously it's not as big an influence as in road or CX, but it's definitely a factor.
That is a cool video!
I bet guys like Sam Hill or Moir don't know their FTP.
When I was racing CX a lot I had a FTP @ 80kg in the 370-390 range and a 1500w+ sprint....reasonable numbers, I'd get done with a enduro stage and I was destroyed....transfers were a piece of piss, but the fitness I did have didn't translate to the parts where we actually raced, in the stages.
I've never raced an EWS but the qualifiers I have done where some top racers showed up...they were riding very conservatively and/or walking....but I realize in the EWS the transfers are timed and can be aggressive.
To build/increase that 10-20sec anaerobic you need to know your zones right? And the higher your FTP or W/Kg, the higher your V02 or Anaerobic power zones (sometimes, I know V02 can be anything from 110% to 130%)...but you get where I'm going with it. They would use the FTP as basis for enduro-specific training.
Your numbers were not reasonable...they were nuts, you were nearly 5w/kg. That's super strong. But I would say CX effort (I raced too, but not with your numbers lol) is a bit different. More comparable to an over/under threshold type effort (obviously a few anaerobic efforts too) whereas race an enduro race run is pretty anaerobic right down with very much Zone 1/2 efforts on the transfers.
Anyway, I don't want to paint myself into a corner as saying FTP is be all and end all, but as stated I agree with original poster, it's an important element for training and racing.
I agree though on the zones and % of projected FTP...I guess my original comment was more along the lines of don't base enduro fitness on FTP as there are several dudes with average FTP who are very explosive riders and great athletes....maybe if they focused on FTP they could bump it up, but not at the expense of other elements of fitness.
Going out on a limb and I'll say EWS racers FTP is probably just above average for a dedicated cyclist that trains consistently and in the 'normal' range...but their 10 second and overall sprint power is probably significantly above that normal range.....
There are 2-3 people who can realistically take it (Emmet, Flo, Tori) unless someone can massively improve or pull some Ultimate Brand Ambassador talents out of the hat. Even then, it's gonna have to be one of the relatively fast people.
Also, I feel for Cody being the literal token black guy. I'm not saying that's the reason why he has that attitude, but it's gotta feel pretty othering and the only other poc just got eliminated. Mtb is already a way whiter sport than most others, so it feels pretty weird to have two white judges just keep talking about how angry and what a bad attitude the only black contestant has. Also incredibly awkward when Jason Lucas used the term "hissy fit". Also like, you don't know what people are going through. The edit makes it look like he has a spoiled racer attitude but there could be a lot of other things going on in his head. As someone who just has a fairly flat affect, I'm really sensitive to the toxic positivity thing and there's definitely some going on here.
I get that it's reality tv and you need some kind of conflict for there to be narrative and some of it is just going to be really dumb and goofy. That's actually part of why I liked season 1. I'm all for that. It's just handled really poorly and sloppily here in a way that can come off as fairly offensive.
I whole heartedly agree. The show is going for the “serious reality elimination show” vibe, and that segment just completely burst that bubble. If you’re going to discuss poor attitudes and performances, find more professional language that doesn’t make it sound like you’re ranting to a friend about a co-worker.
Cody’s attitude was notably worse than everyone else’s, but to me it came off as him putting a lot of pressure on himself to live up to his own expectations and maybe he just doesn’t have the coping skills to deal with a poor performance. He even talked about how on the outside he could just walk away and deal with things, but in front of the camera he has to process it real time, so everyone sees him at his worst. Racing and being in front of a camera is not easy, and not everyone is going to deal with the pressure of either. I hope things improve for him.
I don't disagree that they are the weakest of the contestants in terms of raw results. The problem is they made a half hearted gesture to include a more diverse group of people, but based on his descriptions, it sounds like Mexico does not have the same mountain bike infrastructure and culture as the us and Canada do. The guy is more passionate about the sport than half the people I know including myself, and he's never been to a lift access bike park. That's a reality. And pba invites him on the show as a gesture to show diversity even though it was clear with the format, he was never going to win.
It's hard and not always necessary possible to account for these kinds of inequalities. I'd propose either a training show, where you find a group of people that all ride at a similar level and have them train for one final race where it all counts.
My other idea wouldn't account for the socioeconomic issues the show has, but I was also thinking it would be interesting to have the first episode be a qualifying event of a large group of riders, then have the 10 best perform challenges and then all race each other for the final event where it's all on the line.
We did hear the presenters state speed was going to be paramount this year, so it seems logical that the slowest contender departs first.
"the race and gender stuff is handled poorly". Well, I think it is handled the way it should if it isn't a factor at all and I am not going to look at it with the presumption it is a factor. My brain doesn't work that way... because there's little racism and gender bias in there, at least that's what I hope and aspire.
You also need to use an accurate method of measuring power.....
A non-fit cyclist at a true 4.5W FTP would ride the wheels off 99% of people on the trail, many XC guys included.
The wrong elimination was CLEARLY MADE. Something we did not see in editing must have happened.