Creative Commons License

Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 4.0 License.

Date of Graduation

Spring 2012

Document Type

Thesis

Degree Name

Master of Science (MS)

Department

Department of Kinesiology

Abstract

The purpose of this study was to determine whether a second-position cyclist benefitted, in terms of decreased power requirement, from the presence of a third-position cyclist. It was hypothesized that the second-position cyclist would experience a decrease in power requirement with the presence of a third-position cyclist compared to the absence of a third-position cyclist, and that this decreased power requirement would be magnified during the faster trials. Twelve trained cyclists served as second-position subjects. Subjects completed 12 total trials each: 2 solo trials at a moderate speed (MS), 2 solo trials at a high speed (HS), 2 MS trials in a 2-cyclist line, 2 HS trials in a 2-cyclist line, 2 MS trials in a 3-cyclist line at, and 2 HS trials in a 3-cyclist line. Significant main effects were observed for speed (p = 0.000), condition (p = 0.001), and speed-condition interaction (p = 0.017). Post hoc analyses revealed significant differences (p < 0.001) in power production between the solo condition and 2-line condition and between the solo condition and the 3-line condition at both speeds; however, there was no significant difference between the 2-line and 3-line conditions (p = 0.216), despite an average power savings of 4.74% more in the 3-line condition. When the HS data for the eight fastest cyclists was compared, the 3-line condition required an average of 26.88 W less (a 9.18% power reduction) than the required power output of the 2-line condition (p < 0.05). Power output reductions within this range of 4.74-9.18% could prove beneficial to performance throughout the course of a long-distance race.

Included in

Kinesiology Commons

Share

COinS
 
 

To view the content in your browser, please download Adobe Reader or, alternately,
you may Download the file to your hard drive.

NOTE: The latest versions of Adobe Reader do not support viewing PDF files within Firefox on Mac OS and if you are using a modern (Intel) Mac, there is no official plugin for viewing PDF files within the browser window.