Neuromuscular
162 min
Medium intensity
Produce near-gym forces on the bike, fresh and then fatigued: big-gear standing starts at the beginning of the ride and again at the end, with endurance between, to train force production under accumulated fatigue.
Killian O'Brien
Athlete
Neuromuscular
162 min
Moderate
6 / 10
Intermediate
Outdoors
The session
The workout
Written as a share of critical power, so it fits every rider. In Vekta it becomes your watts, with the W′ cost shown before you ride.
Killian O'Brien
Why this workout
The breakdown
Inside the workout
A torque session in two halves: short, high-force, low-cadence efforts fresh at the start of the ride, and the same efforts again at the end under accumulated fatigue. The opening block produces forces approaching those of the gym, in a way that is specific to the bike; the closing block asks whether those forces can be repeated tired, which is a component of durability increasingly linked to real performance.
Each effort is seven full pedal strokes, about twelve seconds, from near stationary in a 53x13 to 53x11 gear, with four minutes between. Sixty minutes of easy endurance separate the two blocks, with two ten-second maximal sprints in the middle to keep the system awake. Killian O'Brien's note: this complements gym work, it does not replace it.
Vekta's torque tab shows peak torque per effort, and the comparison between the fresh and the fatigued block is the session's result. The efforts are ridden by gear and cadence rather than by a share of CP, which the structure states.
Once a week in a strength phase, outdoors on a quiet flat road with a safe run-out. Not an indoor session.
Neuromuscular
Stimulus
Intermediate
Workout level
Outdoors
Best ridden
Road,
DISCIPLINE
WHAT YOU NEED
The stimulus
Neuromuscular, explained
Maximal, explosive efforts that train the nervous system and the top of the curve.
What it is
Very short efforts, five to sixty seconds, at 180% of critical power and above, with full recovery between them. Sprints, standing starts, torque efforts and short hill attacks live here. In Vekta's classification anything above 180% of CP is neuromuscular.
Why it matters
Peak power, Pmax, is one of the three numbers in the performance model, and it is the one most riders never train. It decides who wins the sprint, who makes the split when the road kicks, and it feeds the whole power curve: a higher top end makes every effort below it feel easier.
Quality over quantity. These are the only intervals where you should stop the set as soon as power drops, because the point is the maximum, not the fatigue. They are best placed early in the week or before a hard session, never after a long ride.
Track Pmax and the five-second peak over a block; both should move within weeks. Recovery between efforts is the lever: cut it and the session becomes anaerobic capacity work, which is a different adaptation.
The AI Workout Builder handles the nested structure, and the head unit shows the targets. Afterwards the peaks tab flags the best efforts, and the trophy view shows whether the session produced an all-time or eight-week best.
The Next workout
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