I am very interested in this thread.
IMO a few of the comments on here have been confusing professional with A grade, although i dont think 'everyone' could get to A grade, i think the vast majority of people could.
Some obviously will require more work than others, the factors that i think contribute to this is.
How long they have been riding, you may have a rider that appears to not train as hard as others yet they have more than likely been riding for 15 or more years, so they have a really solid base.
Beginners should understand that it usually takes a good 3 years to build a good base to work on, so slogging your guts out for a year training hard wont get you there.
The quality of peoples training, going out and smashing yourself 5 days a week with no structure is pretty useless.
I think alot of riders probably think they are putting in 100% during interval training but if they were really honest with themselves, they could probably go harder.
While it would be great to get to A grade, it will usually be out of reach for a lot of people not due to lack of natural ability more so due to lack of time, work commitments, kids, poor quality training, bad nutrition, bad recovery.
Disclaimer: This is 'IMO' in my opinion, i am not qualified at all on anything remotely sporty. But have been a fitness freak most of my life.
