Skipped most so if this has already been said then I apologise but the way I would go about it would be a 3 day split at the gym with push, pull and legs covered, rides on your rest days and either the entire weekend off or fit in some pilates/yoga with one day completely rested.

Monday – Push
Tuesday – Ride
Wednesday – Pull
Thursday – Ride
Friday – Legs
Saturday – Yoga/Pilates
Sunday – Rest

Are weights really necessary? How comes lots of scrawny kids with no muscles are really good at cycling?

OP is training for enduro, not a road race. The enduro world champion is far from ‘scrawny’.

Ha I’ve been on a bike ride and its descended into my dads bigger than your dad! 🙂

Thanks for all the tips and viewpoints . I’m definitely sticking with an element of strength training as I enjoy it and from what I understand it’s pretty crucial for enduro and DH.

Thing I’m going to find hardest of all of this is getting the base miles in , especially over winter here in Swedenland. I can see some 3 hr rides on the turbo coming up.

Also interesting to see about doing gym work early then cycling later that day , I presume to allow more recovery time?

If you do that your just going to end up burning off muscle unless you find the time to eat like an absolute monster inbetween

Gym early then bike ride later you mean?

Yeah, you’d be better doing it the other way around if you wanted to do both the same day.

Winter in Sweden? Cross-country skiing over trainer sessions any day… Keep one ride per per week or you can do short trainer session after skiing/running/gym.

Previous suggestions for weekly schedule have been good, two rest days per week allows proper recovery.

OP is training for enduro, not a road race. The enduro world champion is far from ‘scrawny’.

I’m assuming he’s a professional; he’s probably got enough time to get stacked in the gym and ride his bike.

Here’s a scrawny kid who’s pretty good

And another one!

If you do that your just going to end up burning off muscle unless you find the time to eat like an absolute monster inbetween

Burning off muscle? Do you know what you’re on about?

Hi all, ive had a little bit of time to do some thinking and have started to come up with a better plan. just looking for some thoughts really. I still need to do more research (as to what actually consitutes for example, aerobic intervals) but the basic plan is as follows:

Main date for my diary is the second week of July, an enduro race with stages of approx. 5 minutes each.

So working towards that….

Sunday November 8th will be my first zone 2, 3 hr plus ride… So week will look like :

Sunday : long ride zone 2 3hrs Plus
Monday: Rest with stretching
Tuesday: Lower weight training. will probably include a 3X5 squat session, step ups, leg press and pikes. Gulp.
Wednesday: a light ride, zone 2, most likely on a trainer at home (this is the one im not sure of, as it may be too much after legs)
Thursday: ride, 2-3 hours zone 2
Friday: Upper weight training. Bench, shoulder press, deadlift, pull ups
Saturday: Rest

I’ll do this for 8- 9 weeks. three weeks on, one rest week.(total rest?) each week will get progressively harder. I’m fine with this with weights I think as I have knowledge of this, but should the cycling get progressively longer each session? is this enough to build a good base?

Will then continue in 8 week periods but change cycling to move towards interval training 8 weeks before the main race. once May comes around it’ll be bike parks and downhill stuff for skills refresh.

One other thing, what happens after that race…? ? there are five other races I want to do , finishing end of September 2016.

Thanks again all , feel like im getting somewhere, but feel free to rip my ideas to shreds!

Looks like a good plan. Rides should get longer each week but if you haven’t got time for that then fair enough.

With the other races, fit in single rests weeks and you can also use 4 weeks blocks of intervals, etc. Try moving strength stuff to more explosive power and endurance work in spring as well.

hi all, dunno if anyone is interested but to follow up on this. I’ve been cycling 3-4 times a week , changed my gym routine to tuesday and thursday, lower upper split , (the weights wipe me out, brilliant!) and a lighter gym day on monday wednesday with core and yoga. first six weeks were hard, but now feeling very good.

Food though… diet is decent except sat and sunday (not awful but will have a curry and a sweet thing or two). any tips for food monitoring/ diet plan. its something I don’t really follow closely, just ‘eat well’
ta!

I am currently finding “meal prep” working for me for improving my diet. I basically make 3 or 4 days base meals in one go.

For example last night I made a big pot of quinoa, with lots of veg chopped in (flavoured with herbs and spices). I portioned it out into 8 tupperware containers, I then stuck some chicken breast in the oven and chopped them up into 2 of the containers for the next two days lunchtime meals. Tonight I will do some salmon fillets and have them with two more portions for my tea tonight and tomorrow. Later in the week I will do some honey mustard chicken breasts for a couple more portions, and then a different fish.

At the moment I am swapping between quinoa and bulgar wheat for my “meal bases” and maybe I will try chickpeas as another alternative.

It sounds kind of repetitive and boring, but you can change it around quite a bit by using different herbs and spices, chopping different vegetables into the mix, adding a bit of salad etc.

I find it a good to have meals ready in the fridge that are healthy and ready when I am tired and hungry, which is when I would usually go for bad options.

I am thinking of getting some smaller containers to split my work time meals up.

edit: I think I probably didn’t answer the question you actually asked.

For monitoring I use fitness pal every now and then just for a week or 2 at a time. It just teaches awareness of cheap calories, but I find it pretty annoyingly useless for monitoring mainly self made meals.

For monitoring I use fitness pal every now and then just for a week or 2 at a time. It just teaches awareness of cheap calories, but I find it pretty annoyingly useless for monitoring mainly self made meals.

For monitoring and planning your food, my fitness pal is great. As mentioned above it gets very tedious when cooking most meals from stratch but brilliant for gauging how to hit your recommended daily macros so worth doing for a little while.

thanks, i’ll give my fitness pal a go. From memory it was awful for homemade food done from scratch as said but yep good to get a better idea

Thing is also that have no idea what i should be eating. With the amount of excercise (not boasting but its clearly beyond the regular go to gym three times aweek diet advice) i have no idea what calories i should be aiming for.

From memory it was awful for homemade food done from scratch

Not really. Use the “recipe” function. You can also import recipes direct from a website to save typing if it’s an online one you’re using.

i have no idea what calories i should be aiming for.

Give this a go http://www.iifym.com/iifym-calculator/

no idea what calories i should be aiming for.

First step is to start tracking what you normally eat. Then figure out where you want to be and what you need to change. Then start making small changes to get you there over a period of time.

https://www.britishcycling.org.uk/knowledge/nutrition/recipes

Then figure out where you want to be and what you need to change. Then start making small changes to get you there over a period of time.

I was thinking about this only the other night – it doesn’t just apply to diet. Thanks mrblobby, I’ll be borrowing that quote.