Ronan McLaughlin’s data from Mamore Gap; analysis by Forme Coaching’s Stephen Gallagher

Ronan McLaughlin was up the road early in stage 5. He’s pictured here by Toby Watson climbing Mamore Gap.

Ronan McLaughlin (An Post-Sean Kelly) is coached by www.formecoaching.com In this piece former Ras winner Stephen Gallagher of Forme Coaching analyses McLaughlin’s data from yesterday’s savage stage 5 that took in Mamore Gap. The data itself is included here at the bottom of this piece.

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By- Stephen Gallagher

Race - An Post Rás

Rider - Ronan McLaughlin
Height - 182cm
Weight - 68kg

Stage 5 - Bundoran-Buncrana 149km

After his epic effort of Stage 4, it is very interesting to see how a professional rider and a well trained athlete like Ronan McLaughlin can handle and recover from such high stress, coupled with the accumulative fatigue of riding the previous four days ‘full gas’ and being part of the An Post-Sean Kelly team with an obligation to be at the top end of the race fighting for overall honours.

So with a day full of mountain roads and aggressive riding to contend with, and Ronan being a main actor in the play for the overall win his team is searching for, it was going to be a tough day in the saddle.

There was ZERO chance to be on a substandard day and take in the panoramic views on show for the spectators who lined the steep slopes of Donegal.

So from a quick view of the overall average for the stage, you can see Ronan averaged 264w (65-70% of threshold power) for 3hr 35min at an average speed of 41.5kph (with 1242m of total climbing). The tailwind that greeted the riders meant another fast stage over the hilly terrain. Ronan’s total Training Stress Score (TSS) was actually higher than Stage 4. He accumulated 314 on this mountain stage compared to 295 on stage 4.

This points scoring system, calculated by Training Peaks software, is one of the best indicators when judging total fatigue and effort on race day; again a hard day in the saddle.

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So what were the details?

Ronan again proved to be extremely active in the early part of the stage, covering attacks at the front end of the bunch and producing his peak 10min effort directly in the first 10min of the race. He produced an average of 350w during this time, with a peak of 1018w. So it is easy to see that an aggressive start was on the menu for Ronan and his An Post team mates.

What is very interesting from Ronan’s data, and one of the reasons why it was such a hard day in the saddle, is the frequency of his peak powers during the day.

From his 10min power at the start of the day to his peak 20min effort (322w) approaching, and on, the Barnesmore Cat 3 climb - peak 12min effort (348w) on the 3 quick successive climbs between 67-75km’s and further added in here are peak 1min/2min/5min efforts in the last 3km to the finish line.

This indicates that there were no easy periods in the stage with the pressure being kept on during the entire 149km.

The ability to be able to produce peak Vo2 efforts at the end of a 149km mountainous stage clearly indicates the talent and attributes of Ronan as a stage race rider who can handle such stress loads.

Ronan was active on the stage by getting into a 12-man chase group that was swallowed up just before the start of the infamous Cat 1 climb Gap of Mamore. By this stage Ronan had produced some maximal efforts on the previous climbs, so by Mamore he had added fatigue to contend with along with the 25% slopes. His statistics for the climb are: