Posted by Juerg (207.194.220.174) on January 18, 2004 at 11:15:53:
In Reply to: Re: Intermuscular co-ordination... posted by Frank Day on January 17, 2004 at 18:58:12:
Just to add some more thoughts to the coordination and a very warm thank you to Frank and his perfect information on our Forum. It is always a pleasure to have people on the Forum , who first write in an english we can understand and in a way that also the not as educated reader can get the most out of it.
Thanks once again Frank for your time.
Training for myself (,in an earlier live) in speed skating, we had ,under the slavery from an east german coach, always to skate in the opposite direction on the rink. ( symmetrical development of cross overs)
2. We actually have " spinning " classes and we ride on outside independant pedals with drippling up and down the road with a basket ball.
In Spain we practice with the kids . Bike polo so play indoor hockey on the bike and pedal dependant and independant.
Last but not least : The anatomical institute in Bern developped a bike for backwards pedaling for quite a while ( Prof. Hoppeler ) and the studies sound very interesting.( Eccentric work outs.)Morer muscle stress with less cardiovascular stress as a possible tool for rehabilitation with cardiac patient. I actually use in our rehabilitation independant pedals for stroke people and cardia patients. The limiting factor is coordination and local muscles and very little risk of overload of the cardio vascular system.
Plus it is fun and challanging and is some work for the main center , your brain.
As we see , there are alot of interesting ideas out , some may work , some not , but it may help to keep an open mind.
As Frank states , we should actually only use independant pedals when we bike. I tried this system on a child , , who biked very little and very poorly before, and he was able to ride very fast with this system. Actually now riding from and to school and this even off road. ( It is actually my youngest son )
I think Frank is right , independant pedals on kids , no other pedals ever, may change the way performance could be in cycling.
People , who ride them just once in a while never get the benefit of it ,because the "old " and not as efficient pattern unfortunately will dominate , and this for sure under stress.
Again believing and tradition will stop the improvement , just to say I do not believe that this pedals help is for me a poor way of discussing an idea. Go out , take time and use it the way , that you give your body a fair chance to adjust and than compare.
Just because a high performance athlete can not do it ( old coordination ) and therefor just makes a statement, they do not work , is a very
unfortunate way of improving sport activities.