I bet that got your attention didn't it? Well, its true and here's why: your nervous system will only allow you to exhibit the amount of power that your joint stability allows. So they should actually be called "stability meters."
While the cycling world, rooted deep in tradition, has yet to draw a definitive correlation between gym work and generating more power in the saddle, the only place to create joint stability and structural integrity is off the bike.
Can you cheat the system through sprint workouts, intervals, etc? Yes to an extent, but if you want to fast track laying down more power, optimize your neuromuscular coordination (the way your muscles work together to move your bones) and you will drive your power, I mean stability output, through the roof.
This is why you aren't measuring watts on a power meter, you're measuring joint integrity. Another way to look at this is by asking what an activity's perceived threat to your skeletal system? The higher the perceived threat from a lack of joint stability, muscle imbalances, etc the less power your nervous system will allow your body to produce.
"If muscle length is altered as a result of a postural misalignment, then tension development will be reduced and the muscle will be unable to generate proper force," Mike Clarke DPT, MS, PES, CES and Scott Lucett MS, PES, CES, NASM-CPT (NASM Essentials of Corrective ExerciseTraining).
The good news is that cycling is a single plane activity that is very prone to deactivating the glutes, causing the above mentioned muscular misalignment as your legs move in a fixed range of motion. And running is bad for you?
Real quick, its not. Its the way someone runs that is bad for them. Ok, off the soap box, on with the article.
Awesome, right? Not really, because if the glutes are supposed to extend the hip to drive power, and they don't function correctly, the hamstrings and hip flexors become overactive and movement compensations will take place and injuries will occur.
While the cycling world, rooted deep in tradition, has yet to draw a definitive correlation between gym work and generating more power in the saddle, the only place to create joint stability and structural integrity is off the bike.
Can you cheat the system through sprint workouts, intervals, etc? Yes to an extent, but if you want to fast track laying down more power, optimize your neuromuscular coordination (the way your muscles work together to move your bones) and you will drive your power, I mean stability output, through the roof.
This is why you aren't measuring watts on a power meter, you're measuring joint integrity. Another way to look at this is by asking what an activity's perceived threat to your skeletal system? The higher the perceived threat from a lack of joint stability, muscle imbalances, etc the less power your nervous system will allow your body to produce.
"If muscle length is altered as a result of a postural misalignment, then tension development will be reduced and the muscle will be unable to generate proper force," Mike Clarke DPT, MS, PES, CES and Scott Lucett MS, PES, CES, NASM-CPT (NASM Essentials of Corrective ExerciseTraining).
The good news is that cycling is a single plane activity that is very prone to deactivating the glutes, causing the above mentioned muscular misalignment as your legs move in a fixed range of motion. And running is bad for you?
Real quick, its not. Its the way someone runs that is bad for them. Ok, off the soap box, on with the article.
Awesome, right? Not really, because if the glutes are supposed to extend the hip to drive power, and they don't function correctly, the hamstrings and hip flexors become overactive and movement compensations will take place and injuries will occur.