Training everyday or everyother?

rjcgix

Greetings.

Ive been riding now pretty steadily every other day for about 4 weeks now. I rest on Saturday and Sunday.

When will I know if I can start riding even more, like every day during the week and resting on weekends persay? should I just try it, and see how my body responds.....or is riding every other day good enough?

Im not training to race or anything like that, just want to get good excercising done.

thanks

2LAP

This is just basic but if its just for exercise and health...

Try doing a bare minimum of 3 x 30 minutes of mederate (out of breath) activity a week. This amount of exercise takes you from being classed as sedentary into the next activity groups. Seitching from sedentary to the 3 x 30 min group offers bigger health gains than jumping between any other group (e.g. trained to highly trained).

A better figure is to burn 2000 cals during exercise each week (not during one session) which for the average male might be 3 to 4 hours on a bike a week. It is likely that a big person needs to do more than the 2000 and small people less than 2000 to get the same benefits.

Many of the benefits of a single exercise session (i.e. increased lipoprotein lipase activity, improved insulin sensitivity, etc.) last for 48 hours so exercise should be done every other day.

So for health 1 hour every other day is a good starting point. Increasing your exercise will increase your health and fitness more, but for each increase in exercise above this level imporvements in health and fitness are less (i.e. a smaller improvement for each extra hour).

Hope that helps.

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rjcgix

2lap,
thanks for your response. It does help greatly.

but I think I need to be more truthful here(I think im not cause it just doesnt seem possible).

what im talking about is sure, I want to be fit, but come the spring time, I would like to start doing Centuries. therefore, I have about 4 months to excercise/train.

I guess I should now ask all my question in regards to excercising for that. As I doubt that excercising every other day, the 16 miles I now do will help me do a century.

So any help would help.

2LAP

Ah, that makes sense, training is exercise with a purpose!

You need to do some shorter fast rides and some long slow rides (dead easy!).

The shorter faster rides will imporve your 'speed' so that you can do the 100 miles (or km) quicker.

The longer rides will improve your endurance.

For the shorter rides try 45 mins to 1 h; with a 10 min warm up and 10 min cool down. Ride the bit in the middle as fast as you can manage. On another day do 45 minutes to 1 h at a steady comfortable pace.

For the longer rides, start at a distance you are able to do and add on equal amounts (say 2 miles (or kms) a week) until you get to 75 miles (or kms) once you can do 75 miles or kms you'll easily manage the 100 miles or kms! Time your rides, and if the weather is bad or you feel rough and don't go your target distance just go home (no matter what anyone tells you miles on the road are really not that important (do the hours)).

To make life more interesting as you get a bit fitter, start looking for some hills and have some sprints for signs. Anything to get your heart and legs pounding.

Start off with three rides a week and build up to 5 or 6 only when you are fit enough to handle it!

For the longer rides you will need to think about carbohydrate replacement and hydration. If you are overweight, losing a few inches will help as well.

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rjcgix

2lap,
There you go.....now thats what im talking about!!!!!!!!

Thats the kind of recomendations I wanted to hear. A co worker told me about centuries a few weeks back and i thought, woah, that would be awesome. To be able to ride that much in a day!!!

And so I would really like to make that my goal. Just didnt really know what it took to get there. Like you say, I steadily have to increase my hours and mileage on the saddle, so thanks for your ideas!!!

I still get in awe, as im sure many others do, of the professional cyclist who do 100 mile rides day in and day out....that just doesnt seem humanily possible!!!!!!!

thanks again!!

2LAP

We all start somewhere, you know that you have 2 years to build up to the next Paris Brest Paris (1200+ km almost non stop across france). I've not riden it, but know a man who has!

tanggoman

And then adding to all what 2LAP had given, if budget permitting, get yourself a Heart Rate Monitor so that you can monitor with the highest accuracy if your training 'in the zone' or not... Its worth the investment.

Roche

a heart rate monitor is only good when you know how to use though. Personally, i only like using it when i'm doing maybe 20 minute intervals. and need to stay aroung 170bpm on my own or something. I hate looking at it for the longer rides or the sprints. I dont think the guy in question would really benifit from one.....
also rjcgix, do you train with anybody? I find the easiest way to get into longer mileage is having people to go training with. I know it must be hard to find people of your own level but with similar goals. thats the ideal scenario.
I find it difficult to do anything more than 2.5hrs on my own but i'd go out with a group for up to 6.5 hours, just have a laugh, come home knackered and do it again next week.....madness really.