As an engineer, W/kg should have been taken into account but its not that simple. I think it would be closer to 500W because even on the flat your extra weight means more rolling resistance. So, I suggest you rent out the velodrome in London and attempt this yourself and hang at 54.5 km/h. Would make for a good vid. P.S. try it in the TT position.

@@mihpop9733 Renting the velodrome? Should he also perform a little dance after? ;) Joking aside: The rolling resistance will make almost no difference. What will make a difference is that Mark is simply a lot bigger and therefore has to displace a lot more air which is the dominant form of drag at any velocity above 15 kph IIRC. And guessing how much more aero-drag Mark would have to overcome is near impossible. A very rough way to do it would be to assume similar body densities (We're all mostly water anyway, no?) and then raising the weight ratio (Mark/Wiggins) to 2/3 approximating the increase in surface area. And there are many problems with this approach..

Any respectable doctor would have given you a TUE for that donut😉

@@derekhill1820 It's the love handles exemption that my wife WON'T give me that matters 😂

Is the Hyrox train like a pro on hold Mark? Was looking forward to following that one - also was laughing hard at the garmin stamina chart 😂 some effort you put in there 😄👍

That’s my kids fault. They are pathetic when it comes to eating hot food and whenever they are served something remotely spicy that’s what they say. It’s become something of a house term for anything that catches you off guard and is a bit outside your comfort zone. 😁

@@MarkLewisfitness Mark, this was awsome! Laughing out loud. Great content :)

Realize how hard 440w is when Froome is about 15KG lighter 😮

2nd that ! used to grind out at like 70 and get shouted at. Spent some time working up to 100+ and big difference.

Yep, 90+ when I am pushing it on a bike. 100+ when I am really going for it.

Power is Energy per Second and Energy is Force x Distance, so if you can pedal quicker then the force you require your legs to put out is reduced, shifting the stress to your cardio system (no free lunch, right?). Related question - how do you change to a lower gear on these zwift bikes?

@@sd3457 the same way you would on a road bike. On the levers, you can even program what group set you have, and what gears. So you can program 11 speed di2 and shimano.

It might be worth considering using a shorter crank on the Wahoo Bike (using the preset holes) to reduce foot speed and allow for a higher cadence. Make a similar adjustment with the saddle, too.

Man it must be so much fun to be able to push 3-400 watts without big effort. Must be a freeing feeling.

He also dropped contador this year and has a sick ftp for his very low weight. Enthusiast is putting it mildly... Fun fact he also did an hour attempt.

@@martinjarc1994 I'd love to see Mark make an hour attempt, but it might be too disruptive to his Hyrox training at the moment. It might be good for triathlon training though

Also, PS - Ollie's post-bonk completion of that ride where he dropped Contador is one of the most inspiring things I've seen on youtube. I have a deep well of respect for anyone that is willing to go outside their comfort zone, and dig deep to finish the task even when things go sideways.

@@DC-lu5qs I guess i was misunderstood. I was only pointing out that Ollie the enthusiast also did an hour attempt. Not suggesting Mark should do it. It goes against his mantra of enjoying the sport not searching for super small details to improve his 1h performance. Better for him to focus on lying down and standing up hehe I guess he is too good at spartan to really train those burpies 😂

@@martinjarc1994 nah the hour thing was my thought from whole cloth. I'm not suggesting he try to set the record, just see what he could do in an hour - as an alternate form of challenge to ones like these. I just thought it would be interesting, and maybe fun for Mark, and maybe fit reasonably well into his overall training once he's back to training for Ironman. Obviously only he can tell us for sure :)

Good point-I normally do cycle between 85 and 95 but that watts increase caught me by surprise and I never recovered

@@MarkLewisfitness The trick is to be at the cadence you want the interval to be before it starts. So the 5 seconds before, ensure you are at cadence or slightly higher.

Define 'harder', trying to attain 440 watts in a more uncomfortable position is easier overal to achieve than in a standard position either on the drops or on the hoods which if you get it right is actually more aero than in the drops (according to some vigorous testing). You train your body to be as small as possible and indeed your TT position isn't something you can replicate on a road bike so your aero is significantly more, thus requires more watts for same speed or slower speed for same watts. By definition that makes it harder physically on a std road bike.

@@ynotnilknarf39 that’s not what his comment was getting at… having your body lower in a more aero position makes it harder to pedal efficiently given the angle at your hips.

Not too sure, the UCI banned Tri bars in the track team sprint. Those boys were banging out well over 1KW in the aero bar position because it was faster and could put more power down.

Moving an object of 69kg with 440 watts is completely different than moving a 100kg object with the same amount of watts. I normally weigh 78-80 kg, when I weigh 85 i'm faster on the stationary bike. But definitely not on the road.

Wiggins weighed 69kg in his Tour winning form where it was all about not losing to the climbers in the mountains. He was a a lot heavier by the time he did the hour record in 2015 - well on his way to the 83kg he was by the time he won gold in the Team Pursuit in 2016.

Rat race events are awesome-you will have an amazing time!

My most recent on a concept 2, resistance set at 10 was 6.5km in 29 minutes, it was my 3rd time doing it. Have been addicted to the wattbike since and not been back to rower yet haha

@@blaneysiktube resistance set at 10 is crazy. Drop it to 5 and set your drag factor to about 130

@@jimjamthebananaman1 true that, I used to stick the rower up to 10 didn't realise that 17 stone Olympic rowers have it on 5 or 6.

@@blaneysiktube be careful , you can really hurt your back on this resistance.. Try to set 5 and be more dynamic, work with legs as a real rower

Mark has already done a 1'24'' 500m row vs. his son, so he should be able to maintain WR pace for... around 500m 😉

@@XavierMontet I reckon I could drag that out for 503 m now 😂

@@t.e.r.sven2.0vs.daskaltest59 weight is important because more weight = more muscle 😁 and if you're tall you have more amplitude. @69kg you're in the lightweight category (

@@MarkLewisfitness loving the channel. I've just recently gotten into erging on the C2..i saw your 500m time with your son. Man i wish i had either of your power. i can't get below 1.34 (we're the same age). On many sites i see ..add 5 secs to your split for double the distance....well..you mentioned what challenges should you try......2km erg around 6'30? That would make you extremely above average!

@@ivorwrench5409 2km challenge is happening! VERY soon!

Yep that why a guy like Campanaerts could get the record with much lower wattage. Small guy so he cuts through the air like a bullet. Wiggins is 6ft+.

Kid ate it 🙄

@@MarkLewisfitness kids eh 😜

The first time I rode more than 40 miles, I rode 140 (West Houston to Galveston Beach & back - yes, I know it’s illegal on a bike - this was the 90s!). I did it about 10 times; the last time I had such a tailwind on the way out, I did it in 2:45…but then I had to come back…over 6 hours fighting a constant 20-25 mph headwind (it had worsened a bit). Since I lived in Houston, I had put a 13-19 corncob on my Trek 1200, and never made it out of first gear (42/19) the whole way, often struggling to maintain 60 RPM! Did I learn anything? Probably, but I’m not sure what.

On balance though the high altitude increase speed more than impacts oxygen levels for the negative, obviously or it wouldn’t be used.

Disagree. Being a larger person inarguably offers a huge physiological advantage in terms of raw power output. I think it's clear Mark is rejecting this argument with his tongue firmly in his cheek.

W/kg is certainly less of an issue on the flat, but not so much for a challenge like this where the power target (440W) is a muscular rather than aerobic or anaerobic test for the vast majority of non-elite athletes. For this sort of challenge, greater muscle mass and strength is undoubtedly an advantage relative to someone of similar conventional cardiovascular fitness but lower strength/muscle mass. I suppose I actually serve as a decent example of this, as I have running PR's that are slightly better than Mark's (18:30 5k, 39:45 10k, 1:28:3x HM) and equivalent to maybe slightly inferior cycling fitness (assuming Mark's FTP is somewhere in the region of the 3.2W/kg he said he does Alpe de Zwift at) as I doubt I could hold 440W for longer than 90s before my legs give out because I weigh ~60% what Mark does and simply turning the pedals over at 440W causes much more muscular fatigue for me relative to Mark. Basically, this is a test of muscular endurance and strength with a high absolute load. If the load is absolute and strength and muscular endurance are the primary determinants of performance, the person with greater strength and muscle mass is going to perform better most of the time. A technically more "fair" comparison would still be to scale a challenge like this to W/kg, but as Mark points out in the video it doesn't really work for someone like him as he's carrying a lot more muscle mass than the average person, and certainly a lot more than the average cyclist. Wiggins' 6-6.2W/kg is based on a super lean weight with no upper body muscle mass to speak of, whereas Mark is easily carrying 10+ kg of "excess" upper body muscle mass that skews his W/kg against him. There's really no perfect way to make something like this comparable, and if anything this demonstrates how insane 6-6.2W/kg for a full hour on a track bike is as a guy of above average fitness in an upright riding position who weighs ~30kg more physically can't turn over the pedals after 4 minutes. The fitness required to make that a threshold effort that can be held in an extreme TT position remains incomprehensible.

Is it just me or is it impossible to say her name without doing it in a South African accent 😂. Maybe one for when the rain has stopped. In fact, I’m actually loving that idea. As somebody who has gone all about barefoot style running so much it does sound pretty cool. And will be a nice answer to everyone that says heavy people need lots of cushioning.

@@MarkLewisfitness That's awesome if you take it on - and yes - it is impossible - Just like "Drago" can only be pronounced as Dolf says it in R4...

Made me chuckle to 😂 and I put it in the video 😄

Heart rate strap on chest