Cycling-Related Strength & Conditioning

Right. You chaps are well up on your fitness know how so, in a nutshell, I'm feeling like I've really losing shape over the last year through being really unsettled and moving round a lot so I'm wanting to set myself a goal for next year and do a few sportives leading up to either l'etape or marmotte in summer. Am I being totally unrealistic to take something like that on? a guy I know that's done it says you need to train 2 years in advance to have good core fitness and also get a lot of experience riding in packs. I get out on my bike for long rides when I can (50-75 miles normally) but it's mostly short commutes during the week,

A lot of sites tell you general info about how many miles you should be doing per week in the lead up to something like the etape but could/should I be complimenting this in the gym/doing spin classes, or at my level is it just a case of htfu and get a better alarm clock and some thermals for long winter miles?

Post this up in the winter training thread. You are more likely to get responses in there