Base training

Vo2

Swim!

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bomber

[quote author=Vo2 link=board=19;threadid=974;start=15#21549 date=1034065101]<br />Swim! <br />[/quote]<br /><br />thanks but i think i'll stick to bombing around on the bike, who knows the hills may make me enjoy the 94.7 its the legs that i want to make strong anyway as its them that can't keep up with the lungs!! :P

Vo2

I wished I lived in a valley, I'll ride 'em mountains all day!

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Rhodent

Ha Ha, given that I know you live in G'town Bomber might I suggest that you just learn to love hills. And get some nice solid training wheels. With that the cycle to Port Alfred and Back is a classic, hilly but if you want to make it easy..... Go slowly. Even hills can be easy if you go slowly enough. Also the cycle out past the Golf Course along Cradock Road is a useful little ride. Unfortunately I wasn't cycling much while I was there, and that I did was MTB'ing. I couldn't handle the wind most of the time and for my last year (which was when I was getting into MTB'ing) I lived out in Stones Hill, making a nice ride in to varsity (All downhill there so one doesn't get sweaty, uphill back for the training)

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What do you mean there's no granny gear? How do you go up hills? Ahh, I see, you don't have hills.

2LAP

I ride around North Wales a lot here in the UK. Are there any pics of your training roads on the web? Make me green with envy!

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Steve Junior

I am a juvenille training up for my first junior season, i am building up so that for about 6-8 weeks i will be doing a min of 9.5 hours and a max of 16.5 hours.<br />How does this sound?<br />Bout rite?<br />More?<br />Less?<br />I have trouble fitting in training being at school doing my GCSE's..and coursework!!<br />Anyways...what u think of that sort of time on the bike a week?<br />thanx<br />Steve

2LAP

Thats a difficult question Steve, you must be about 16 years old so its important not to over do it. Find yourself a coach. But as a guide build on what you have already been doing, if last week you did 4 hours and wasn't to tired add on another 5 to 10% in time. Remember rest is as important as training. Realise that your school work is more important (until the summer hols), although some cycling is important for stress relief.<br /><br />You really should get a coach (e-mail coaching@britishcycling.org.uk who will find one for you), they can help you manage your time and work out if your doing too much or too little. Take all advice off the web with a pinch of salt and apply it to your own situation.

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nferyn

[quote author=Lab_Rat link=board=19;threadid=974;start=0#8614 date=1029361677]<br />Training is a pizza - By Scott Schnitzspahn (Insidetriathlon.com)<br /><br />Two things most endurance athletes love are training and pizza. What most people do not realize is that putting together a training plan and making a pizza are very similar processes.<br /><br />The most important component to building a good pizza, and a good athlete, is to establish a large and solid base to support all of the more scrumptious components of your masterpiece. The base of a pizza is the crust of course. Without a thick and large diameter crust, a pizza will not be able to hold all of the sauce, cheese, and toppings that are responsible for a truly great tasting creation. Also, should the pizza crust be too small, the amount of toppings that you will want to add might not fit and could simply fall off. <br /><br />The base of your training program should be aerobic endurance training. Without a large base of endurance training, an athlete will not be able to effectively absorb and recover from higher intensity intervals, anaerobic training or competition. Should you begin adding specific intervals and racing efforts to your training before building a large enough base, you may find that you cannot recover effectively and that your performance, like a pizza without a good crust, is not as good as you expect. <br /><br />Creating a large and tasty pizza crust is not easy though. Chicago-style pizza is famous around the world for the thick, buttery crust and is many people's favorite. However, even the best dough can result in a bad crust if the dough is cooked too fast or not enough. A burnt or undercooked crust can ruin even the best pizza. Are you seeing where this article is going? If you haven't gone to the phone to order your pizza yet, read on. <br /><br />Creating a base of aerobic fitness is probably the most crucial step in an endurance athlete's training program. However, like a pizza, building your base too fast or &amp;quot;under-cooking&amp;quot; your aerobic conditioning without enough volume will result in poorer performance later in the season. <br /><br />To be safe, the base building phase of your training should last between eight and 14 weeks. The less experience you have in endurance training, the longer your base building period should be. Also, the longer and more intense your racing season will be (more toppings), the bigger your aerobic base should be. Workouts that build your base consist of aerobic-paced, low-intensity miles or laps in the pool. Aerobic base building workouts should be at a heart rate approximately eight to 30 beats below your lactate threshold or between 60-80 percent of maximum heart rate. While this training is &amp;quot;easy,&amp;quot; it provides the perfect opportunity to focus on your technique with specific drills, fine tune your biomechanics and positioning and experiment with new equipment and nutrition supplements like sports drinks, energy bars or gels. The duration of these workouts should be increased in small increments, usually no more than 10 percent per week. Additionally, you'll benefit from a &amp;quot;regeneration week&amp;quot; every four to six weeks in which training volume is cut back 20 to 50 percent in order to absorb the previous weeks of training and mentally prepare you for the upcoming workouts in the following weeks. <br /><br />Continue to build your base until about eight weeks from your peak racing period. After your base period, with your aerobic system maximized, you can start to add in threshold intervals, early season training races and high-intensity interval training. These types of workouts and low-priority races serve as the toppings to your aerobic &amp;quot;crust&amp;quot;. The more base you have built, the more high intensity training you will be able to perform and the better your racing season performances will be. In other words, the bigger and better your crust, the more toppings you can add and the better your pizza will be. <br /><br />Scott Schnitzspahn is a CTS/TriathlonGold coach who enjoys base training almost as much as his hometown Chicago-style pizza <br /><br /><br />[/quote]<br /><br />This is one of the best analogies I've come across regarding base building. I would nonetheless add that base should not be viewed in regard to 1 season, but should also be a multi-year effort. You will see the real results from your base training after a couple of years, when your body is fully conditioned.<br />On top of that I would say that the best way to work on your multi-year base building program would be to even stay closer to the 60% MHR and increase the volume substantially<br />Riding indoors on a trainer can be a very valuable help during the winter months, make sure you have the volume<br /><br />I just seriously picked up biking again after a couple of years inactivity and rebuilding my base is the first thing on my mind. Even though I'm off to work at 6.30 and back from work around 20.30, I still do at least 2hrs in the evening on my trainer. On saturdays I go for a solo ride of 6-8 hrs and on sundays 4-6 hrs in a small group. Volume is extremely important. In the springtime I'll go for fast group rides again<br /><br />Niek

nferyn

[quote author=Steve Junior link=board=19;threadid=974;start=15#22313 date=1036683340]<br />I am a juvenille training up for my first junior season, i am building up so that for about 6-8 weeks i will be doing a min of 9.5 hours and a max of 16.5 hours.<br />How does this sound?<br />Bout rite?<br />More?<br />Less?<br />I have trouble fitting in training being at school doing my GCSE's..and coursework!!<br />Anyways...what u think of that sort of time on the bike a week?<br />thanx<br />Steve<br />[/quote]<br /><br />Seems a bit low volume to me. Are you talking about base building or training during the season?<br /><br />Niek

ric_stern/RST

Volume really is quite important to your training and performance, but training at 60% MHR could be somewhat too low to induce any adaptations. Personally, when doing recovery rides, i'm at ~ 60% MHR.<br /><br />Steve, 16-hrs per week seems a lot, as 2Lap suggests try a coach who will be able to advise you. Try the Association of British Cycle Coaches (www.abcc.freeserve.co.uk) or BC<br /><br />Ric

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nferyn

[quote author=ricstern link=board=19;threadid=974;start=15#22647 date=1037278653]<br />Volume really is quite important to your training and performance, but training at 60% MHR could be somewhat too low to induce any adaptations. Personally, when doing recovery rides, i'm at ~ 60% MHR.<br /><br />Steve, 16-hrs per week seems a lot, as 2Lap suggests try a coach who will be able to advise you. Try the Association of British Cycle Coaches (www.abcc.freeserve.co.uk) or BC<br /><br />Ric<br />[/quote]<br /><br />You're right 60% may be a little too low, but youngsters shouldn't be pushed too much while base building. When I was riding at niewelingen level, I regularly (once or twice a week) did rides of 120-150 kms at 'talking' pace - we didn't have any HRM at that time though.<br /><br />Niek<br />

ric_stern/RST

[quote author=nferyn link=board=19;threadid=974;start=15#22648 date=1037286180]<br />[quote author=ricstern link=board=19;threadid=974;start=15#22647 date=1037278653]<br />Volume really is quite important to your training and performance, but training at 60% MHR could be somewhat too low to induce any adaptations. Personally, when doing recovery rides, i'm at ~ 60% MHR.<br /><br />Steve, 16-hrs per week seems a lot, as 2Lap suggests try a coach who will be able to advise you. Try the Association of British Cycle Coaches (www.abcc.freeserve.co.uk) or BC<br /><br />Ric<br />[/quote]<br /><br />You're right 60% may be a little too low, but youngsters shouldn't be pushed too much while base building. When I was riding at niewelingen level, I regularly (once or twice a week) did rides of 120-150 kms at 'talking' pace - we didn't have any HRM at that time though.<br /><br />Niek<br /><br />[/quote]<br /><br />Niek,<br />can you possibly explain to me why a) youngsters should do little or no intensity -- it's my understanding that when children exercise, they exercise at very high intensities with periods of rest<br /><br />b) why youngsters should be routinely doing rides of 120 - 150 km<br /><br />Ric

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nferyn

[quote author=ricstern link=board=19;threadid=974;start=15#22650 date=1037288344]<br />[quote author=nferyn link=board=19;threadid=974;start=15#22648 date=1037286180]<br />[quote author=ricstern link=board=19;threadid=974;start=15#22647 date=1037278653]<br />Volume really is quite important to your training and performance, but training at 60% MHR could be somewhat too low to induce any adaptations. Personally, when doing recovery rides, i'm at ~ 60% MHR.<br /><br />Steve, 16-hrs per week seems a lot, as 2Lap suggests try a coach who will be able to advise you. Try the Association of British Cycle Coaches (www.abcc.freeserve.co.uk) or BC<br /><br />Ric<br />[/quote]<br /><br />You're right 60% may be a little too low, but youngsters shouldn't be pushed too much while base building. When I was riding at niewelingen level, I regularly (once or twice a week) did rides of 120-150 kms at 'talking' pace - we didn't have any HRM at that time though.<br /><br />Niek<br /><br />[/quote]<br /><br />Niek,<br />can you possibly explain to me why a) youngsters should do little or no intensity -- it's my understanding that when children exercise, they exercise at very high intensities with periods of rest<br /><br />b) why youngsters should be routinely doing rides of 120 - 150 km<br /><br />Ric<br />[/quote]<br /><br />Hi Ric,<br /><br />Maybe I wasn't quite clear in my intentions.<br />a) I don't think that youngsters (14-17) should not do little intensity, but that off season, they should primarily work on their base condition by doing long rides and limiting the higher intensity workouts during that period (late automn - winter); This will bring about long term physiological adaptations (lower lactate buildup, more blood to the muscles, conditioning of slow twitch muscle fibre, ...) This will form a solid base if they want to shine in the higher categories later on. Without that base formed through volume training early on, reaching peak aerobic capacity later will become very difficult without the risk of overtraining<br />b) see a)<br /><br />Niek