Training – the next step after just riding your bike?

[Samuel D]

This spring and summer I rode a lot (by my standards), mostly blasting around Longchamp racecourse with a hoard of fitter cyclists (the shaved-leg bunch).

I tend to ride out to get warmed up (it used to be about 9 km through city traffic, now 6 km), do 5 to 15 laps (each 3.5 km) depending on how I feel, then warm down on the way back.

This has done wonders for my fitness.

Now I’m thinking I’d like to build on this over the winter with a slightly more structured regime. However, I’m not deadly serious, so:

• no power meter
• no turbo or indoor cycling
• no heart-rate monitor unless strictly necessary.

What sort of programme should I be looking at?

My goals are to do a handful of long rides (~200 km) over the winter and enter spring with enough fitness to start doing hard rides immediately. Maybe next summer I’d like to tackle something semi-serious, like a mountain tour or audacious long-distance ride.

Is there a book I should know about? I learn best from books.

Thanks!

[LMT]

The best books to learn from will tell you to get a power meter...

[mattc]

The best books to learn from will tell you to get a power meter...

.. or if you find some slightly older stuff, HRMs.

The really really old books will of course avoid those too. They have a certain charm, and probably a few gems of wisdom that have been lost. Arguably!

There is plenty that you can do _without_ these gadgets, but there is no market for gadget-free training advice.

( Incidentally, I don't find a basic HRM much more intrusive than an old-school distance/speed computer. And they cost <£30 )

[zigzag]

to train at the right intensity and track your progress you need a point of reference, hr monitor at least, or better - a power meter.

[tom_e]

I'd guess the others are probably right for best effect.

But I did have some success based on perceived effort, using a document from a british cycling organisation of some kind as a hint.  It was a pdf, but I can't find it.  The text is here:

http://www.machinehead-software.co.uk/bcfguide.html

Vaguely using the frequencies and intensities given, I definitely had some improvement over just riding my bike.  But again, I won't attempt to argue with those claiming that using a measurement tool might be more effective.  Depends how far down the road of seriousness you wish to go.

[Samuel D]

Thanks.

My problem is vanity, I suppose. I don’t want to turn my cycle rides into ‘training’ rides, especially if that involves wiring up myself or my bicycle and crunching data every evening.

Power meters are very expensive, it seems, especially when you add the head unit. Don’t think I’m up for that.

A heart-rate monitor is much cheaper but not an especially pleasant thought.

I think I should read a well-reputed book and see what it suggests before buying any gadgets. Any suggestions?

[LMT]

The best books to learn from will tell you to get a power meter...

.. or if you find some slightly older stuff, HRMs.

The really really old books will of course avoid those too. They have a certain charm, and probably a few gems of wisdom that have been lost. Arguably!

There is plenty that you can do _without_ these gadgets, but there is no market for gadget-free training advice.

( Incidentally, I don't find a basic HRM much more intrusive than an old-school distance/speed computer. And they cost <£30 )

Agreed, but how much of this will be junk miles?

The OP imo does not know what they want, in order to have structure in a training programme you have to have a point of reference, and RPE does not cut it imo because there are too many external factors to account for.

I was initially against getting a power meter and all the stuff that went with it, FTP, TSS etc. But once you get into it your training really does come on in leaps and bounds. 

[LMT]

Thanks.

My problem is vanity, I suppose. I don’t want to turn my cycle rides into ‘training’ rides, especially if that involves wiring up myself or my bicycle and crunching data every evening.

Power meters are very expensive, it seems, especially when you add the head unit. Don’t think I’m up for that.

A heart-rate monitor is much cheaper but not an especially pleasant thought.

I think I should read a well-reputed book and see what it suggests before buying any gadgets. Any suggestions?

Yeah, what you have just said that you don't want to buy!!

LOL, don't waste my time.

[mattc]

You don't need to "accurately track your progress" to improve, or indeed to get the best from yourself.

I think that stuff leads to the Golf Handicap / Strava PRs mentality. But if folks want that, fair enough

[rob]

I made loads of improvements using HR-based training.    I did, however, invest in a second hand turbo and do 2-3 sessions a week of around an hour but quite high intensity.   There was a good article on the ABCC website :-

http://www.abcc.co.uk/how-to-use-your-turbo-trainer/

I also bought a HR based custom plan for a few quid from a time trialling website.

You can do something pretty similar by finding a hill that takes you 5mins to get up a decent effort - so you're out of breath - and ride up it repeatedly, freewheeling/spinning back down.   Start with 4-5 efforts but pace them so you struggle to complete the last one.   You can do intervals without an HR or power meter.   Couple this with some hard/tempo 2-3hr rides where you should try to avoid pootling.

[rob]

You don't need to "accurately track your progress" to improve, or indeed to get the best from yourself.

I think that stuff leads to the Golf Handicap / Strava PRs mentality. But if folks want that, fair enough

Indeed.   There's some very fast records out there from the times before HRMs and power meters.    The only progress I'm bothered about is the one I see on the results sheet when it comes out.

[bikenrrd]

Peter Read's "The Black Book"
Based on heart rate, not power, but have a read anyway.  And it's really old, so a more modern book might have better training methods in it.

If you want to improve a bit you can build into your ride intervals where you hit a higher average pace than the rest of your ride. Try 2x20 at 150% of your normal pace, with a 10 minute rest of 50% of your normal pace, for example.

Running training is all based around pace.  A normal week running training is usually : 1 long run at endurance pace, 1 shorter tempo run, 1 or 2 interval runs and 1 or 2 short recovery runs.

So, you could apply the same where your endurance ride is a long 100km to 200km ride, your tempo ride is as fast as you can sustain for 2 hours and intervals are hill repeats: find a hill, ride up it, freewheel down, repeat (straight away) until you can't turn the pedals.  Recovery rides are very slow.

Some ideas there but to improve a lot (say for 10m TTs) you will need at the least a turbo and a heart rate monitor.  To really do it properly you need a power meter.  The most important thing is to vary your pace and not just stick to endurance pace for all your rides.

[trekker12]

I agree with Matt

It depends on your goals. I have comfortably got up to 200km distance without any thoughts of training or HRMs, just riding to work 3 times a week gives me 100 miles Monday to Friday and can easily be topped up at weekends. If you just want to get to the end of a 200 by the end of the year then I say just ride your bike. That will give you enough of a base to go on a tour which I find less strenuous anyway as you accept the lower speeds and less distance in a day.

Further or faster than that will need some specific training and for that then a basic HRM won't cost very much or be particularly intrusive. There are many free training plans online and they can guide you - British Cycling has some I've downloaded to get some structure from, I assume they can be downloaded from France - but I think for what you are intending then I wouldn't worry too much if you don't stick to them religiously. Just tailor that to your normal rides and try to learn your personal zones into which you can add some intensity or interval training without overdoing it.

From your other posts on here I think you enjoy the simple freedom of riding your bike and why ruin that by insisting you have to go out for three hours at medium intensity in the rain when you haven't got a Cat 4 race next week.

Power meters and HRMs are fine for someone aiming to better their best 10 mile or whatever but to go a long way on a bike is more about base miles and bloody mindedness IMO.

[mattc]

... but to improve a lot (say for 10m TTs) you will need at the least a turbo and a heart rate monitor.  To really do it properly you need a power meter.

I believe the Pareto Principle applies here.

I have no doubt that if Chris Froome came from some Amish-style tradition and refused HRMs, powermeters and PEDs etc, he would not be able to take as much time out of Quintana in a TT as he does. But he would be pretty blimming close.

(DISCLOSURE: my personal "sweet-spot" of tech vs cost/convenience is a £20 HRM. But it's all a compromise - there is no clear "right" answer. I'd like to ride like Graeme Obree or Wiggins! )

[bikenrrd]

I'd like to ride like Graeme Obree or Wiggins!

That reminds me: the Obree Way is a brilliant book to read for this kind of thing.  Not so much a prescribed program of training, more a philosophy of training.  I apply that to my running as well.  The fasted rides / runs are quite unpleasant, though

[rob]

... but to improve a lot (say for 10m TTs) you will need at the least a turbo and a heart rate monitor.  To really do it properly you need a power meter.

I believe the Pareto Principle applies here.

I have no doubt that if Chris Froome came from some Amish-style tradition and refused HRMs, powermeters and PEDs etc, he would not be able to take as much time out of Quintana in a TT as he does. But he would be pretty blimming close.

(DISCLOSURE: my personal "sweet-spot" of tech vs cost/convenience is a £20 HRM. But it's all a compromise - there is no clear "right" answer. I'd like to ride like Graeme Obree or Wiggins! )

You can get faster or ride long distances easier by pushing yourself until it hurts, recovering, and then doing it again.   You will get fitter.

You can then start to quantify using HR data, which a lot of riders have had a lot of success with.   It's a guide but does have a level of variability that causes top riders to now ignore it for pacing purposes.   I ran my HR way higher than usual in this years 24 as it was hot.   

I don't believe that you need a power meter in order to get faster/fitter.   it's a £1,000 of kit that has the potential to make you less happy.

[T42]

You can take the cheapskate option and buy a counter that offers wattage - there are a few out there.  They infer power from total weight, speed and rate of climb.  They get it wrong because they can't take wind-speed into account, but you can make allowance for that yourself.

Or you can buy a GPS and write a programme that does the same thing from the GPX file.  If you do that you can take wind-speed into account.

None of the above will give you the true wattage, but that doesn't matter. What you want is for the figures to get better.

An interesting idea is to divide average wattage over a ride by average heart-rate: this yields a fitness coefficient that should improve with time.

Lastly, whatever kind of doodah you buy, do lots of hills and long false flats. Do mountains if you can, they're great for building physical and mental endurance.

And have fun, it's the whole point.

[Samuel D]

The OP imo does not know what they want

I see why you think that, but I want to get as fit as I can without turning my rides into work (other than physical work).

A lot of things roughly follow the Pareto principle mentioned by mattc above, and I’m hoping something similar applies here – that I can get pretty darned fit without Excel spreadsheets and power meters, even if those things would extract my final bit of potential. Based on how quickly I’ve been improving by just going out and wrecking myself a few times a week, I believe there’s still plenty of low-hanging fruit to gobble.

I think I need to learn about fitness in general – what it is in biological terms, what causes the body to develop it, etc. I’d like to learn exactly why a power meter can be so useful. I only have vague notions at the moment.

Does Peter Read’s book explain the theory of fitness, so to speak?

And have fun, it's the whole point.

Cheers. I’ve been loving it in the last few years. Why did I give it up for a decade in my twenties? Beats 34-year-old me!

[bikenrrd]

Does Peter Read’s book explain the theory of fitness, so to speak?

Obree's book is good for that, as well as "Faster" by Michael Hutchinson.

[trekker12]

The OP imo does not know what they want

I see why you think that, but I want to get as fit as I can without turning my rides into work (other than physical work).

With all training be it physical or educational/theoretical you need to be specific or it will peter out into a vague idea without a real beginning or end.

At work we all have stickers on our monitors (yes I know...) with SMART on them:

Specific
Measurable
Achievable
Realistic
Time Measured

So you can't just say 'I want to get fit' but you can say 'I want to be fit enough to complete a 200km ride in under 10 hours by the 1st April 2017' or a ten mile TT in under 25 minutes or whatever you feel is achievable to you.

That way you can actually measure progress and see how much fitter you are getting. Use your target date to work backwards so then you can say 'by the end of 2016 I can ride 100km without stopping which is then on my way to the main goal' or something like that.

It's still not 'work' (although all riding is work to some extent, energy in = movement forwards) but without a time constrained goal it really won't go anywhere. Once you achieve one target you then set the next and so on - in small increments.

[ElyDave]

Peter Read's "The Black Book"
Based on heart rate, not power, but have a read anyway.  And it's really old, so a more modern book might have better training methods in it.

If you want to improve a bit you can build into your ride intervals where you hit a higher average pace than the rest of your ride. Try 2x20 at 150% of your normal pace, with a 10 minute rest of 50% of your normal pace, for example.

Running training is all based around pace.  A normal week running training is usually : 1 long run at endurance pace, 1 shorter tempo run, 1 or 2 interval runs and 1 or 2 short recovery runs.

So, you could apply the same where your endurance ride is a long 100km to 200km ride, your tempo ride is as fast as you can sustain for 2 hours and intervals are hill repeats: find a hill, ride up it, freewheel down, repeat (straight away) until you can't turn the pedals.  Recovery rides are very slow.

Some ideas there but to improve a lot (say for 10m TTs) you will need at the least a turbo and a heart rate monitor.  To really do it properly you need a power meter.  The most important thing is to vary your pace and not just stick to endurance pace for all your rides.

I have a PDF copy of this if anyone wants it?

When I was TT'ing I stuck to it quite well over two winters and I think it made a difference.  May throw in some of the harder sessions this year as well.

[mattc]

The OP imo does not know what they want

I see why you think that, but I want to get as fit as I can without turning my rides into work (other than physical work).

With all training be it physical or educational/theoretical you need to be specific or it will peter out into a vague idea without a real beginning or end.

At work we all have stickers on our monitors (yes I know...) with SMART on them:

Specific
Measurable
Achievable
Realistic
Time Measured

Just curious;  what job requires this ... sort of sticker?!?

[ElyDave]

The OP imo does not know what they want

I see why you think that, but I want to get as fit as I can without turning my rides into work (other than physical work).

With all training be it physical or educational/theoretical you need to be specific or it will peter out into a vague idea without a real beginning or end.

At work we all have stickers on our monitors (yes I know...) with SMART on them:

Specific
Measurable
Achievable
Realistic
Time Measured

Just curious;  what job requires this ... sort of sticker?!?

pretty much any kind of industry these days, all coming out of the Japanese management methods that they gave us  in the 90's after us having given them initially after the war.

SMART targets very much in vogue in all fast moving manufacturing, also those with clear quality requirements generally, those that require stock control etc so automotive, pharma...

[trekker12]

Ha yes you caught me I work in manufacturing but for a small company where everything is hand built so not fast moving but I work in the sales dept where my boss came from corporate banking and he was trying to encourage us to apply SMART to our next actions targets and sales follow up calls.

I think it's applicable in this context though

[Samuel D]

I have a PDF copy of this if anyone wants it?

Think I’ll try to get the dead-tree version. Thanks though.

As for SMART, that’s the sort of technique/jargon/mindset that profoundly repulses me. Remember, I don’t want this to remind me of work, much less the unspeakable horror of the modern workplace.