Training Question: Pre-base Training

Hi,

I got back on the bike this year after a 12-year lay-off. Without much
of a mileage base or structured preparation of any kind, I've performed
OK in competition. I've decide to quit racing for the remainder of the
season and start thinking about next year.

Popular wisdom suggests that I should beging building my base in
November (for a May-September season).

How would readers suggest I use my time between now and then?

Dope Control

wrote:

I got back on the bike this year after a 12-year lay-off. Without much
of a mileage base or structured preparation of any kind, I've performed
OK in competition. I've decide to quit racing for the remainder of the
season and start thinking about next year.

Popular wisdom suggests that I should beging building my base in
November (for a May-September season).

How would readers suggest I use my time between now and then?

Between now and November? Get out and ride! Use a bike computer (and
HRM if you're really serious, but learn how to use it). Alternate
long rides at a steady pace with short (10-25 mile), fast rides.

The goal is to build up endurance, aerobic and anaerobic capacity.

The cycling equivalent of running's fartlek is a great workout, too.
Ride "normally" for a while, then go into a furious 20-30 second
sprint (up hill if you're feeling brave!). Then return to the normal
pace for a while, and repeat.

Make sure you rest properly between rides, and watch your nutrition,
too. (You do not want much excess body fat, and you might need to
increase your protein intake).

By coincidence I was reading an article about cycle race training
this weekend. Most of it is useless, but I'll link it anyway:

http://www.bodybuilding.com/fun/peak33.htm

There are also lots of training articles here, if you poke around:

http://www.cyclingnews.com/

Finally, are you sure about not entering any events? Keeping yourself
motivated to train between now and next March with no external events
to spur you on will be tough.

--
jc

Remove the -not from email

Jeremy Collins writes:

Finally, are you sure about not entering any events? Keeping yourself
motivated to train between now and next March with no external events
to spur you on will be tough.

What we did with rowing was use that time of the year for less serious
races: odd distances, odd teams, races that involve crosstraining (running
and cycling in our case), races in heavy boats, things like that.
The idea is to give yourself a break from monotonous serious raining
while still being active.
So how about some mountain biking? A tandem tour? A duathlon?

Roos

Thanks jc,

I use an HRM, and have a well-structured approach to my training that
has unfortunately come too late for this season. I didn't get serious
until around March and I've been mixing up lactate sessions on the
trainer with long and short rides of varied intensity on the road,
totalling about 10 hours a week.

My rationale for curtailing my season now is that after such a long
lay-off, if I want to have a really good crack at next season, and
following a racing program for the rest of this season may not be the
best approach.

You make a good point about motivation - looking to peak 7 months form
now is a little unsettling.

I guess what I'm asking is, what would others do with this 'luxury'?

DC

Roos Eisma wrote:

The idea is to give yourself a break from monotonous serious raining
while still being active.


A move down sarf would fix that ;-)


--
Tony

"I did make a mistake once - I thought I'd made a mistake but I hadn't"
Anon

in message .com,
') wrote:

I got back on the bike this year after a 12-year lay-off. Without much
of a mileage base or structured preparation of any kind, I've performed
OK in competition. I've decide to quit racing for the remainder of the
season and start thinking about next year.

Popular wisdom suggests that I should beging building my base in
November (for a May-September season).

How would readers suggest I use my time between now and then?

Get out on your bike and enjoy yourself. Do some other kind of cycling
you wouldn't normally think of (mountain biking, audax, whatever).
Have /fun/.

--
(Simon Brooke) http://www.jasmine.org.uk/~simon/

[ This .sig intentionally left blank ]

Tony Raven wrote:
Roos Eisma wrote:

The idea is to give yourself a break from monotonous serious raining
while still being active.


A move down sarf would fix that ;-)

Not to Cambridge, it is drier in Dundee than almost anywhere else in
teh UK (bar lincolnshire)

...d

David Martin wrote:
Tony Raven wrote:

Roos Eisma wrote:

The idea is to give yourself a break from monotonous serious raining
while still being active.


A move down sarf would fix that ;-)


Not to Cambridge, it is drier in Dundee than almost anywhere else in
teh UK (bar lincolnshire)


Are you sure about that?

http://www.metoffice.com/climate/uk/...2000/rr/17.gif
http://www.metoffice.com/climate/uk/...cambridge.html
http://www.metoffice.com/climate/uk/.../leuchars.html

--
Tony

"I did make a mistake once - I thought I'd made a mistake but I hadn't"
Anon

Tony Raven wrote:
David Martin wrote:
Tony Raven wrote:

Roos Eisma wrote:

The idea is to give yourself a break from monotonous serious raining
while still being active.


A move down sarf would fix that ;-)


Not to Cambridge, it is drier in Dundee than almost anywhere else in
teh UK (bar lincolnshire)


Are you sure about that?

http://www.metoffice.com/climate/uk/...2000/rr/17.gif
http://www.metoffice.com/climate/uk/...cambridge.html
http://www.metoffice.com/climate/uk/.../leuchars.html

That is 15 miles away, on the coast (rather than slightly inland) and
in Fife. They get worse weather than we do.

Being a) hilly and b) coastal there is a lot of local variation.

Checking the stats for the local weather station so far this year
indicates that there were 58 days when it rained more than 0.1 cm, and
83 where it rained at all (ie non-zero).

Looking at the averages you can see that Leuchars has more sunshine
than Cambridge (which seems to have gone up a lot.. where in cambridge
gets up to the dizzy height of 26m above sea level?

...d

"David Martin" writes:

Checking the stats for the local weather station so far this year
indicates that there were 58 days when it rained more than 0.1 cm, and
83 where it rained at all (ie non-zero).

Looking at my plants it certainly hasn't rained enough in Dundee while I
was on holiday

Roos