This workout was interesting. Most of the trainerroad workouts so far have been pretty straight forward - spending time in the sweet spot, rest time, and then another sweet spot interval. Maybe some varying cadence and what-not, but that was about it. At least, as far as I could tell - but then again I missed the instructions on a couple workouts that had them.
Right away, the Clark workout looks quite different. Each interval starts with a high power output surge before settling into the sweet spot. The instructions specifically said to find the highest gear and mash during these sections, which were only about 12 seconds long. A couple of them were called out to be done in the saddle, a couple were called out to be standing.
The effect of such a quick, high power effort on the rest of the interval was interesting. First of all, it was a shot to the HR - it brought it right up. So rather than spending the first minute of each interval with a slowly climbing HR, it came up to speed pretty much immediately. Second, it really flooded the leg muscles, so after the interval was done - the quads were pretty heavy. The instructions stated to find the normal 90 RPM cadence and peddle through the heaviness.
To help break up the intervals a bit, so that you weren't watching a clock wind down for 8 minutes - the instructions also walked through cycling and cadence drills. So, for example, it would have you pick a slightly lower gear to spin faster to increase cardiopulmonary effect, or pick a slightly higher gear to increase muscle power. It'd also guide through concentrating on varying portions of the peddle stroke - scraping the bottom of your boot off, pulling up with your knee, kicking your toe into the toebox, and mashing down with your knee. Each section was only a couple minutes long before returning to a more normal feeling peddle stroke.
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