Need to gain weight... big time.

Hassaan

Etxy! You have answered right yourself.
Two things will make you competitive climber, practice and the second one "practice"

Etxy

Sounds like I'm in for some hill climbing practice, then. Imagine my excitement. I hoped there'd be something easier then that... like, I dunno... tablets. The Hill Pill, yeah.

/ara

__________________
"I loved the feeling of riding downhill-
admiring the scenery then running
over it at high speed"

dhk

That's a major gain in speed. Sounds like you're heading in the right direction. But, don't worry about your speed on the road; just keep the recovery rides easy. And also use your judgement on the track sessions as well. Resist the urge to go to max speed at every Tue/Thurs training session, particularly if you're racing that weekend. Save your best performance for the race...don't leave it on the home track!

Dan

Etxy

Ok, I've just drawn up a training schedule for myself- please give me any advice you might have.

Monday- 7.5 k to track, 2 hour training session, 7.5 k home.
Tuesday- 15 km Mountain Bike (for variety) OR 1 hour road ride recovery.
Wednesday- 7.5 k to track, 1-3 hour training session, 7.5 k home.
Thursday- 7.5k to track, 2 hour training session, 7.5 k home OR 15 k ride to Crit circuit, 11 k race and get driven home.
Friday- 1 hour road recovery ride OR rest day
Saturday- 7.5 k to track, track race program, 7.5 k home.
Sunday- Recovery ride OR 60 k ride.

All of the ones offering two options I'm not sure which to do. Maybe I'm approaching this from the wrong angle, so please help me out here.

Thanks again.

__________________
"I loved the feeling of riding downhill-
admiring the scenery then running
over it at high speed"

dhk

Wow! Sounds like way too much for a 16 year old to me....more like a program for when you are 26, and have 10 years of successful racing. My first thought would be to cut the track sessions to twice a week, plus one race a week, not two. Then two easy recovery rides to round out the week, not more than one hour in easy gear like 39/19. You want to go hard once a week on race day, and back off a bit the other two sessions.

Suggest you find a local coach who can evaluate you and help you find the right level of training volume and intensity. If you're doing track workouts, talk to the coach there about your overall training program. Hopefully, he's not a suffer-or-quit the sport type. You've got a lot of years ahead of you to get fast. If you're steady and patient with your training, the speed and strength will come to you.

Dan

2LAP

Agreed, you need to find a decent coach.

__________________
www.cyclingforums.com

Etxy

Thanks for the advice- I've dropped one of the track sessions, and one of the races too. My schedule now looks a bit like this-

Monday- 7.5 k to track, 2 hour training session, 7.5 k home.
Tuesday- 15 km Mountain Bike (for variety) OR 1 hour road ride recovery.
Wednesday- 7.5 k to track, 1-3 hour training session, 7.5 k home.
Thursday- Recovery ride
Friday- 1 hour road recovery ride OR rest day
Saturday- 7.5 k to track, track race program, 7.5 k home.
Sunday- Recovery ride OR 60 k ride.

I'll make an effort to find a coach- at the moment, the one I've got runs a fairly general session (the Monday one) and due to a nasty set of flats on the way to the track (both tyres popped at the same time as I rode over something, did a Beloki across an entire lane at 40 km/h and somehow managed to stay on my bike), didn't get to see what the Wednesday session was like. I think that it would be a little better, because he has coached people to national titles, and uses more scientific methods like Heart Rate Monitors and Cadence. The other coach gets people to ride as hard as they can....

I'll give another update about my race this Saturday this weekend.

__________________
"I loved the feeling of riding downhill-
admiring the scenery then running
over it at high speed"