Cycling UK Forum

I am in shock. Why?
The sitting rising test
The sitting rising test is a standard test. In bare feet fold your arms and sit on the floor. Now rise. Easy?. No your aim is not to use your knees forearms or hands. If so, deduct one point for each. You get 10 points if you can do this and deduct one point if forced to use any of the former deduct one point. In a Brazilian study a low score is indicative of death in six years. A high score indicates one will live to cycle for many years.

Now here is the thing. I cycle every day. I run under 40 miles a week. I could just not get a perfect 10 score. On the ground I was like a 747 with multiple engine failure. Grounded.
My guess is cycling on the down leg stroke builds muscle. The different leg muscle is not stressed on the upward motion. My solution is to now try a variation of squats. To sit on the staircase and get up and down 10 times daily. I hope in 3/6 months to strengthen that neglected muscle group so I can go for a 10 score and rise directly from the floor.
The sitting/rising test can be googled.
Hope lots of cyclists try the 3-minute test and let us know how you got on.I found that i am a faster cyclist (for a snail) and I can once again sprint up stairs!
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Fitness/VO2 Max tests.

We have all seen the TV fitness documentaries. Doctors in white gleaming coats usher candidates through the door and then get them to pedal as fast as possible on a stationary bike (or running machine) and test their fitness.
I wonder if these tests might be slightly unfair. I would fail as I take 15/20 minutes to get to my full operating temperature. This after a slow warm up that does not risk damage.Also if you’re a sprinter cyclist with fast twitch muscle fibre you will excel. If you’re like me a tourer with lots of slow twitch fibre you will slink off in despair.
Do you think these tests might be tweaked a little to improve?
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I ride Brompton and a 100% British Vintage

I'd add a grip strength test to the sit / rising test.

"Grip strength has been proposed as a biomarker. Supporting this proposition, evidence is provided herein that shows grip strength is largely consistent as an explanator of concurrent overall strength, upper limb function, bone mineral density, fractures, falls, malnutrition, cognitive impairment, depression, sleep problems, diabetes, multimorbidity, and quality of life. Evidence is also provided for a predictive link between grip strength and all-cause and disease-specific mortality, future function, bone mineral density, fractures, cognition and depression, and problems associated with hospitalization. "
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6778477/
Plenty more information available to be googled.

I've never had a 'lab' VO2 Max test but would assume you get a period to warm up whilst they're monitoring your heart rate.

Edited to add Grip Strength had it's own thread in 2015.
viewtopic.php?t=96780&hilit=bbc+health+test

Seems more of an intelligence test than a fitness test: how the heck do I stand up without using my knees? Levitate?

OK, I googled, and once I knew I was allowed to bend my knees, and to uncross my arms for balance: 10/10.

To me, it seems much more about technique/balance than strength.

Nearholmer wrote: ↑20 Jul 2023, 5:02pm To me, it seems much more about technique/balance than strength.

Flexibility?
I can't actually do the first bit, fold arms and sit on floor. ( or rather, I'm not going to try! )
But having sat on the floor I can stand up by putting one hand on the floor and getting up sort of sideways, to get my feet under me.
I wonder why anybody needs to do more than that..... Score =9?
I'm 76 , and flexibility (physical and mental) is a difficulty.
Google tells me that the modal age of death for men in the UK is currently 86
I was surprised!
I think both this test and grip strength are an indication of how active a person is, and that foretells longevity?

Yes, I’m “only” 64, but as I do it I can feel certain tendons/ligaments coming under test.

Muscle strength.
If you don't exercise muscle, the muscle-nerve connection breaks, and then the loss becomes irreversible. (From 7m00s)

"Yes, I’m “only” 64, but as I do it I can feel certain tendons/ligaments coming under test."
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Nearholmer nailed it.At 64 he is a nipper. The people who died were mostly in the 75 plus category. The other thing to factor in is what did the people die off. Cause and effect. Its easy to assume its falls that cause the fatalities. However it could be a cycle crash or cancer. So if you feature in anyone's will who gets a low score on the sit/rise test. Don't give up the day job yet.

The real reason I posted is I thought the "hard exercises" cycling running weights were al one needed. However it can be beneficial to cut these down and do the "Soft" ones like Yoga or Tai Chi. Although these are probably hard in reality.
I wonder how accurate VO2 max is. On a car its not the petrol but increased air intake that gives the speed when you blip the throttle. In life some of us are Cheetahs .They get outpaced by the slower tortoises. I fondly remember a fun run. A well known international sprinter came far behind very average fun runners.
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I ride Brompton and a 100% British Vintage

I had a look for the distribution of people at various ages, and what scores they get, and here is what I found:
I also asked an 11yo to do it, and boy did that make me feel old; it was so easy for her, that it looked as if she was being lifted by a magic force, and she could go up and down, time after time, with no apparent effort.

briansnail wrote: ↑23 Jul 2023, 4:42pm ...
On a car its not the petrol but increased air intake that gives the speed when you blip the throttle.
...

It's both. Preferably in the correct ratio.

Jonathan

I think it's even easier than doing "soft exercises" it's more a matter of building the movement patterns back into your lifestyle. Children naturally sit on the floor so are used to getting up and down. But those are movement patterns that we tend use less as we get older as chairs become the norm.
Something as simple as adding some lower seating or cushions on the floor for use whilst watching TV can be a start to adding those movements back.
Squat movements not only benefit the muscles but also help to increase the ankles ability to dorsiflex, the lack of which can make using stairs trickier as we age.

I am off to buy some cushions!

briansnail wrote: ↑20 Jul 2023, 3:31pm I am in shock. Why?
The sitting rising test
The sitting rising test is a standard test. In bare feet fold your arms and sit on the floor. Now rise. Easy?. No your aim is not to use your knees forearms or hands. If so, deduct one point for each. You get 10 points if you can do this and deduct one point if forced to use any of the former deduct one point. In a Brazilian study a low score is indicative of death in six years. A high score indicates one will live to cycle for many years.

it's also used by MI5 at whitehall as a covert test to detect enemy infiltration by decapods. if a candidate scores below 4 it means more than two knees or hands have been used...

briansnail wrote: ↑20 Jul 2023, 3:31pm

Fitness/VO2 Max tests.

We have all seen the TV fitness documentaries. Doctors in white gleaming coats usher candidates through the door and then get them to pedal as fast as possible on a stationary bike (or running machine) and test their fitness.
I wonder if these tests might be slightly unfair. I would fail as I take 15/20 minutes to get to my full operating temperature. This after a slow warm up that does not risk damage.Also if you’re a sprinter cyclist with fast twitch muscle fibre you will excel. If you’re like me a tourer with lots of slow twitch fibre you will slink off in despair.
Do you think these tests might be tweaked a little to improve?
***************
I ride Brompton and a 100% British Vintage

It would be unethical to ask anyone, even an athlete to jump cold onto a bike and thrash away on it. Every protocol I've read, and there are more protocols than hot dinners in a kebab shop, includes a warming up period, often as part of the test. i.e one was something like a non cat 1 would start at 50 watts, and increase their output by 10 every minute. So if you were un-fit, you'd peter out at around 250 watts probably, quite warmed up over 20 minutes. Cat 1 athletes would start higher simply because as they will peak out at above 400, it would take too long for the tester.

It's supposed to be quite accurate as they understand the science better now. They're recording heart rate plus whatever else they can afford to. And there are 3 points where there is a definite kick in the heart rate. Without digging out the book, I can't say the accurate details, but it's something like, in the noodle range when you're burning mostly fat, your heart rate increases linear with the work rate and you can in theory noodle all day long, then you enter the more carbs than fat region, and the heart rate increases at a faster rate per watt. Then when you reach the all out point, your heart rate will rise even if you maintain a steady power out, because you're rapidly running out of rocket fuel and going into oxygen debt as you can't replenish the ATP cycle in the muscle fast enough. Something like that.
So any programme you saw them slam a cold athlete onto a bike and threaten to shoot them if they don't boil a kettle connected to the ergometer, is misleading, except possibly, at Stanford University...

"its both"
Thankyou to Jonathan for pointing out as extract below confirms.

he way your car gets moving involves multiple working parts inside your vehicle. The first step of car acceleration is the throttle to the engine. Your throttle pedal is connected straight to your car’s engine and controls the airflow in the throttle body for fuel injection. Then it’s met with a spark (such as fire) and enables the engine’s piston to move down to rotate the crankshaft. When your throttle pedal gets closer to the floor, more air is sucked in to rotate the crankshaft faster. These functions allow you to accelerate on the road.

That is a quite complicated and potentially confusing way of explaining something simple.

The energy to drive an engine is derived by burning fuel, and it won’t burn without oxygen.

If you want to use energy faster, in order to make a vehicle go faster, you have to burn fuel faster to release energy from it faster, which means that oxygen has to be supplied at a higher rate to allow that burning to occur. Both more fuel and more air are needed. If the fuel-air mix is not optimal, too much fuel, or too much oxygen, various unwanted effects occur which result in reduced efficiency and/or increased pollution from the exhaust and/or damage to the engine.