CycloCross Training

Evening all
Just started cyclocross racing and the race meetings are weekly (Sunday). Just wondered how much I need to train during week if I’m giving it 110% during Sunday’s race. I keen to improvide but don’t want to over do it. I’ve plenty of stamina but struggle with strength side. Any pointers?

I wouldn’t train now, maybe do a recovery ride on the Tuesday following, and look at doing specific training next July, August and September.

I wouldn’t say not to train at all, depends what you’re used to. If you’re used to riding in the week you can change them to something cross specific. If you’re not used to riding a lot during the week then add in something gentle and build up.

I will generally ride 4 times in a week when I’m racing. Mon & Fri will be complete rest days, Tuesday will be a recovery ride on the road, Wednesday will be the only hard session of the week which I do on the turbo trainer, I might run on Wednesday too but only 5k max. Thursday will be my club’s evening MTB ride, usually 2hrs. Saturday will be a very gentle ride, usually with my lad (he’s 10) probably do an 60-90 mins.

Leading up to the season the Tuesday ride will probably be less recovery, and will swap with a skills session, dismount/mount, running with bike, shouldering, tight turns etc…

To be honest with all that, I should probably be performing better than I do! 🙁

Cross training should be like a pygmy with a bad attitude; short and hard.

Find a circuit that takes about 6 or so minutes to complete, including a run up.
Ride to it with an extra top on to warm up, then take the extra layer off and batter yourself around it for 3-4 laps, then do 2 laps concentrating on style and technique, then batter for 2 more laps, then put warm top on and gently ride home.
Repeat 2-3 times a week.

You should be going hard enough to feel sick on the last two laps..

This is quite useful. My turbo session is usually the tabata sweat fest.

CX training

Thanks all. I should have been more specific. I normally training daily, either running or cycling. I just don’t want to too knackered for racing 100% Sunday.

I’m with aP. What you got now is what you got! Racing every week doe’nt allow enough time between for much meaningful improvement. It takes me till midweek to recover from a Sunday race! It’s hard to do race simulations anyway…..I certainly don’t have the willpower to ride for an hour at near threshold unless I’m being chased by 80 other riders. Work on skills,work on being smooth and work on pain management :0)

To late to significantly improve your system now… Most cross riders train on the road as it improves power output. Reduces time cleaning and means more time can be spent on the bike.

I do no FTP in the week at all. JUst base. Generally race at least one day at weekend. Will always turbo in morning before a race. My system seems to function better.

End of the day everyones body is different. Its kind of a trial and error thing.

I have to disagree with the ‘too late to train’ theory .. if you have a solid base to work from then some good interval work mid week focussing on the short and sharp efforts of cross you should be able to move up through the finishing field before the season is over.

After a race on a sunday I will do a light road ride monday, tuesday I will be doing 1 leg drills and spin ups to improve my pedalling efficiency especially important in mud when being smooth counts, wednesday is a 2 hour ride on the cross bike… its important you spend time working on cornering etc as this can buy you valuable time, thursday more turbo intervals, friday in the pool for 45 minutes, saturday a steady 3-4 hours road.. sunday back to race and repeat.

I have missed alot of training before the cross season due to injury but have managed to start to creep my way back to solid top 10 finishes.

I’ve got to disagree that it’s too late as well. I would certainly do some steady rides in the week as just riding hard leaves me completely knackered. Plenty of stretching and make sure you recover well after the race. A turbo session on Wednesday leaves you time to recover for racing sunday

Depends on goals I guess!! 😉

I’m in the same position as the OP.

Excuse my extreme ignorance but what are 1 leg drills and spin ups? I’m only on my second ‘cross race and loved the mental descents in mud and even the climbs were not too bad but yesterday there was soggy flat and soggy cornering that were draining my will to live.

I can finish in the top 10 on my commute ‘training’ but then the field’s a bit smaller if you’re a girl :wink:. Kinda hoping to do better so thanks for the information – I’m really interested in how the more serious people do it.

One leg drill, pedal for a minute with one leg, both legs for a minute then the opposing leg for a minute …repeat 5 times … the aim is to work out any imbalance you may have between legs.

Spin ups, as fast as you can spin on a light resistance without bouncing in the saddle, aim is to smooth your pedalling stroke.

Both aim to increase your pedalling efficiency .. in mud its best to be smooth.

When racing once or twice at the weekends, I’ll rest Monday, ride rollers Tuesday and Thursday and do a Tabata session on the Wednesday, rest again on the Friday.

The roller sessions will be an hour tops and enough to get a good sweat on, but not too strenuous, the short session will be hard, intensive, but structured so that I maintain a consistent output over all the intervals, (as was the original Tabata idea).

How are yoy guys finding the tabata session? I’ve heard some people say they tend to be a bit too hard and target your v02max rather than threshold. Have u found a big improvement since doing them

I did a couple last year but I’m scared of doing another as i know how painful they are!

There are two schools to Tabata, the original which was each effort should be done 170% of FTP, and therefore consistent over all 8 efforts. The other being go all out from the first, die a death around the 5th, and limp home.

I use the former approach and find that I have more confidence to go into the red whilst racingm, knowing I can recover quicker from it.

i recommend tabata is all out hard as you can. are you really going to monitor a % or effort over just 20 seconds?

the main problem with tabata is that riders think it’s not enough so they bugger around with extra wasted time which just interferes with the recovery.

to the OP I’d suggest rest monday, easy rides tue and thur, rest fri, hard intervals on weds and very short intervals with long recovery periods on sat

Thanks for the information. I’ve now googled tabata… 😯