Our favorite trainer video series is back with Blender, their longest and highest resolution video yet. On top of those two firsts, it’s also the first one tied to a cycling charity.
Part of the proceeds from the 1:40:00 go to the Davis Phinney Foundation, which helps folks with Parkinson’s enjoy better lives. Why the tie in? The video focuses on improving your speed over the long haul by training threshold and VO2 Max and is put together by Neal Henderson, who coaches World Champ Taylor Phinney.
You can download it at TheSufferfest.com. Click through for the full PR and description…
PRESS RELEASE:
- How long: 1 hr and 40 minutes
- What it’s about: Threshold, VO2 and Anerobic work
- Best for: Improving your performance toward the end of longer distances
- Featured races: UCI Road World Championships 2012 (Men’s and Women’s), UCI Cyclocross World Cup 2012/13, UCI Cyclocross World Championships 2013, UCI Mountain Bike Cross Country World Championships 2012, UCI Mountain Bike Downhill World Championships 2012
- File size: 2.7gb (it’s a big one, as it’s so long and in our highest resolution yet)
Endurance. Turbo trainers. The thought of developing the first on the second is soul-destroying. It means spending time – a long time – on that horrific device. Even our Minions, who love indoor training, have always struggled to stay on the trainer after our one hour Sufferfest videos finish. Not any more. Blender changes everything. This is the video that softens you up, takes you to the edge of exhaustion, sneaks up behind you and kicks you over that edge and down the hill, then makes you run back up while being chased by a raving mob all the while pouring molten lava down toward you. You’ll love it.
Background: As our mission is to heal the world of Turbo Trainer Boredom Syndrome (TTBS), we got in touch with a friend of ours who knows something about spending a lot of time on the bike: Connie Carpenter. Yeah, the one who won a Gold medal at the 1984 Olympics, former World Champion, etc. She put us in touch with Neal Henderson, who coaches her son, Taylor Phinney (Yeah, the World Champion, US National Champion and Giro d’Italia Pink Jersey wearer) and superstars like Evelyn Stevens. Neal happens to be the Elite Cycling and Triathlon Coach at the Boulder Center for Sports Medicine, a mecca for professional endurance athletes. Well, one thing led to another and Neal sent us a workout that he gives to his professional athlete’s and his national-class Masters riders to prepare for competition. It’s got a bit of everything – from longer threshold efforts to leg-searing sprints for the line.
Blender also sees us take the quality of our footage even higher and the design is simply beautiful (assuming you can see it while your head is down, shaking side to side during the intervals). Clear indicators of effort and cadence are always present in the upper right and when new instructions come up, they pop-up from the bottom in a large red bar so you can’t make any excuses about missing them!
We’re super pleased to have the Davis Phinney Foundation as one of the presenters of this video. The mission of the DPF is to help people with Parkinson’s disease live well TODAY. Davis (and Connie) was a personal hero of mine back in the mid 80s and what he’s done with the DPF is sensational. We’d also like to thank Neal and the Boulder Center of Sports Medicine for helping us put the workout together.
