Cycling Fitness / Training Advice

thanks for the advice. what about this kind of thing? overgeared 5-min efforts at 50/60 rpm x 3-5 per session. 7/10 effort level.

not sure if that would just make me slower!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Eux8IktOmGI&list=PLUdAMlZtaV13lU8BaprS3OS5r9a_QtTsB&index=5&ab_channel=GlobalCyclingNetwork
&v=Eux8IktOmGI

That kind of session won't make you slower at this time of year the only thing that will make you slower is not riding your bike. Its a strength endurance session but those won't make you faster for cross or 10 mile tts as they're intense events so you need to replicate that type of intensity or harder in smaller chunks in your training in the 6-8 weeks building up to the season. The low cadence strength/torque endurance sessions are good this time of year as they don't take much out of you if your building volume. A good version of that type of session for you would be to do that but on the recoveries do those under geared at high cadence >110 rpm that makes it more specific for you if your riding sscx as you'll be grinding and spinning during that. I've got plenty of tasty sessions for cx and 10 mile tts when the time comes for those if your interested?

this time of year

i think i'm struggling with the concept of this(!)

here's how my year used to go:

january: final couple of CX races with midweek cross 'sessions' in the park if i could be bothered
feb: 'ah, no racing! can have some time off the bike'
march: see above
april: 'shit, club 10s are starting!'
may: turn up to a 10 with no training and post a short 29. start doing tt-focussed sessions 2x a week, improving times, continue until...
sept: 'ah shit, cross is starting!' do a short session in the park a couple of days before the first race. die on lap 2 of first race. start doing midweek cross sessions with races on the weekends.

what i really want to do is not arrive to the first race of each season completely unfit, but i'm not sure how to structure things over 12 months.

it's kond of obvious, i guess, but there's a lot of advice to wade through!

Use Garmin to create a virtual partner and ride some 5 mile and 10 miles efforts.

Not structured as such and not very scientific but I guarantee it’ll make you quicker.

I’ve always used for pushing myself on 6-10 min climbs and definitely benefitted.

I think you've got a good situation there in that your summer racing is an over-threshold effort and winter is lots of over threshold efforts. So not only can they complement eachother but one builds into another.

If you care more about one than the other, use the lower priority one as training for the other. Then take your time off after the priority one.

If you are chilled about both, then I'd aim to do some race specific intervals about 2 months out from when you want to be at your fastest. If this overlaps with the start of your race season that's fine. If further out than 2 months, just try upping a bit more easy riding if you can on top.

Basically, don't try and get too scientific, with 2 peaks in 12 months for two disciplines you're can't smash both, unless you are from Benelux and have a three letter abbreviation.

This time of year there's no point trying to build race specific fitness with anything high intensity as it will be short term form especially if it's not been built on a base and there's no races happening at the moment that require that kind of fitness so this time of year is better spent building cardio endurance and strength so just building weekly Z2 mileage and a bit of strength work. This will minimise losses if you were fit at the end of last year and make you fit and strong (not super fast) ready to cope with the intensity that follows. Feb and March off the bike is enough time for your body to totally de train unfortunately. However i do believe a double dip for specific race fitness if possible when the seasons are apart and you don't try to peak for the first race of each season so you could try?
January = just ride your bike consistently and log your weekly mileage
February = from your average weekly mileage start building on that weekly by 10-20% a week plus some strength endurance sessions like the ones previously mentioned
March = start moving through the gears so start adding/replacing Z2 rides a couple of tempo sessions a week roughly maintaining weekly mileage not building it but over the month progress the amount of time spent in the tempo zone say from 10% to 20% total ride time over the month
April = swap the tempo with threshold work twice a week same again progressively building your time spent in it from 10-20% a week
May = turn up at tts in decent shape not really fit just yet start racing which will be high Z4 plus one other threshold session a week either building time in Z4 during that weekly session or keep the duration the same and start introducing over/unders (i personally prefer on/overs) you should be getting fitter and faster every week or two now 🤞
June = if your enjoying the fitness and feel good not too tired and have more to give add a session of Z5 work like 6x3 mins @120% ftp (or similar) and bring the over/unders back down to Z4 efforts again. Go fast.
July = just enjoy riding your bike hopefully in the sunshine stop building just add something spicy once a week to liven things up if it feels too slow and boring.
August = as March
September = cross is here don't worry if you're not as fit as you were in June you've got 3 months of racing ahead but start hitting the high intensity Z5 stuff 2x a week on racing weeks on non racing weekends work on some specifics that have been letting you down in racing either technically or specific effort wise there will be some. Improve go fast.
October = same as September but you should be getting quicker every other week. Boss it.
November = drop one of the Z5 interval sessions per week carry on racing until tired and performance starts to drop off.
December = chill the fuck out its Christmas.
And repeat.
So there you go in a nutshell 😂

And don't forget rest days, rest weeks eat a healthy diet, rarely drink alcohol and may try to drink an extra litre of water a day and get an extra hours sleep. Simples 😁

That's not gonna help win Flanders.

Adjust accordingly if your trying for classics success 😉

Or ignore all of it if you can't actually be bothered 😴

Wow, thanks. Very interesting.

I've got loads of individual sessions and progression variations if anyone wants to focus on any single block within that plan plus a couple of lesser known 2 week out high risk high reward fitness boost if anyone is interested and doesn't mind pain, the taste of blood and vomit 😁
Edit ; power meter and turbo/stationery bike required for those two. Bucket optional but advised

Use Garmin to create a virtual partner and ride some 5 mile and 10 miles efforts.

Not structured as such and not very scientific but I guarantee it’ll make you quicker.

Hmmm. Imma gonna bite. This is pretty bad advice. Any progress will follow a progression. Do you know the above workout is a progression from what otherwise would be ridden?

I can see helping people that don't have a power meter to follow when testing so its just another pacing tool to help squeeze a bit more out in a single effort but not very scientific or part of a plan as stated but it can help.
Runners are using wavelight on the track now which i suppose is the same and BC have used avatars set slightly faster than track riders PB's telling them it was just their PB and most of them were able to match it setting new ones in the process so there's definitely something in it. But then there's strava, zwift etc so there's always something to chase outside of actual races. Personally i prefer caffeine and techno 😁

It’s not the virtual partner bit that’s contentious.

It’s the ‘guarantee it’ll make you quicker’.

Unless I’m reading that wrong. And it’s advocating a virtual partner over no virtual partner and riding exactly the same session?

Yeah sorry i read it like that. So maybe it should be guaranteed to make you quicker than doing exactly the same session without a virtual training partner or access to any other metric to follow and don't like techno (metal also works) otherwise its a bit like saying get a power meter but simply owning one won't make you quicker you need to use it properly to help pace efforts and track progress within a proper training plan

eat a healthy diet, rarely drink alcohol

Out.

Chris Horner used to eat McDonald's and then there was the Floyd landis whiskey defense so maybe you can get away with it 😉 lets not state the obvious about what else they got up to 🤫

blimey this is gold. i have VERY low mileage right now. don't even log it. SAD!

they call me fizzy because the only way is up

we can all be children of jesus through cyclosport

they call me fizzy because the only way is up
Thats brilliant. They (actually only 3 people) call me retro bastard because I'm retro and a bastard so not so cool 😂
Step one then start riding your bike. Its fun and worry about rest of the plan and the beer and chips intake at a later date

i did an hour and a half on my geared pomp today so gonna take 2 weeks off to bask a bit

That bike is so ugly you will never get fit on it.

Well, I don't eat MaccyD's and I avoid any whiskey with an 'e' in the name. If you know of any spectacularly successful cyclists who enjoyed a diet of Reblochon, mature Stilton, red Burgundies and port then that would be great!

No names that I'm aware of this century but that sounds absolutely perfect for watching the tour👌 less so for riding it.