Cycling Better

We are all exactly what the title suggests, a work in progress. We are either going up, staying the same or going down in our lives and/or performance.

Today I’m going to talk about training more than I normally do. How can we cycle better? It’s a question I think we all ask ourselves all the time – I know I do. The easy answer is ride your bike more. But I have to work, I have a family, I might be in school, (insert your answer here). we have to find our best training time in the most limited amount of space some days.

Intervals!! These are the best things you can do to drive performance. This year I intend to ride less than I ever have and have the best year I ever have as well. All through the power of intervals. I’m starting off with a warning right now – these aren’t fun most times and they do hurt-A LOT! They also provide our bodies with the biggest bang for the buck in terms of time spent/results gained. I’ve been experimenting with a lot of different times so far this training season. I’ve done 60 second intervals, 5 minute ones and also 10 minutes intervals as well. I’m fortunate enough to own a power meter but I also love training with pure HR when on my trainer (see the bottom for the ones I’ve ridden for 10+ years). training with HR while on a stationary trainer is great because you are always having to pedal, no coasting. This provides a very stable accurate way of doing the work needed on any given day. With a power meter I have good days and bad days and I seem to let myself off the hook on both at times by not riding to the correct HR I am shooting for. My suggestion is to use both set your goals for each workout. One might look like this:

60 total minutes of training; 10m warm-up, 30 x 60 seconds @90% of functional power (FTP) then 60 seconds @recovery power, once completed spin easy for the rest of the workout cool down the last 5 mins. This workout kicks your butt and also builds your ability to recovery faster – 1/2 times per week if you are training 4 x week is more than enough.

Plan around with the length and intensity of your intervals but I know you’ll see results coming pretty quickly from these! Enjoy.

Ride safe my friends!

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