What’s the best way to train/up my fitness ? Currently riding to between 6-14 miles a few times a week. I currently feel I’m riding at an OK pace but would like to up it. The mileage I’m doing currently is mainly old train lines and canals. But my goal is to get back out in the peak and trail centres (preferred riding). My main questions are should I concentrate on my diet or how I ride ?

Any hits and tips would be great

Jon

At the moment I would say up your distance at least a couple of times a week and keep doing the shorter rides as recoveries in between….

As most of my riding is to work and I get chance to do a longer ride Sunday evening. Stretch the Sunday ride out and keep my work ride to 10 miles each way ?

Ride longer as tbh you’ll barely be getting into your ‘second’ breath.

I like to mix long rides with shorter faster more intense rides. I can get lazy on a long ride and just spin away whereas I find it easier to maintain a high pace if I know its going to be over soon. Like everyone I suppose.
I made a decision in the spring to ride every day when I could, it’s not always possible with work, kids etc but even 45 mins keeps me ticking over.

I recently saw a huge improvement in my fitness when I started doing things other than riding… by running, for instance, you can get a proper bit of phys done during your lunch hour with no expensive kit to have to buy / faff about with. My bike fitness improved greatly after a couple of months of regular 10k runs.

20 miles a day commute not bad miles TBH try throwing a few hills in it, a sensible diet can never be a bad thing 🙂

im seeing little degregation in my bike performance by doing just 2 rides per week.
in the week is a hard 1hr effort and at the weekend a longer distance ride. this combined with 2 runs per week of similar, shorter faster run in week with longer run at weekend is working well for my all round ability.
i know we are not there yet but in winter i switch to some more running as its less hassle than bikes and also some cx races where i just need to sustain max 1hr efforts.
also squeezing in some short HIIT circuit workouts
all this is making me feel great all round and takes less time than just pounding out the miles on the bike every day.

,Right then so I need to ride my commute rides harder 🙂 and make my Sunday rider longer. I cant add running as my knees/ankles cant take the impact. I’ll report back in a month or so with progress. With help from strava and how I feel on rides progress should be visible 🙂

Thanks for the help guys
Jon

Jon – is swimming an option for you ? I ride a few times a week and do 1 or 2 decent length swims – has really helped my fitness. I reckon next stage will be giving up the booze 🙂

i am recovering from 5 months off everything (doctors orders) due to bad head injury.
I put 2 stone on and lost all my winter training gains. I have been alternating a run with cycling and on my rest day do loads of gardening. now back to pre injury weight.
the running is hilly (we live near Scafell) and the cycling is on and off road. I can highly recommend cyclocross.
My wife treated me to a Boardman cx team bike. So I ride that now every day on one of my usual hill routes,and do a hill run after work, and do a 32 mile round trip commute. I couldn’t even walk without sticks 4 months ago.
just go at it progressively to avoid injury or over tiredness. hill reps are great.

You probably need a bit of hurt in your rides – if all you do is ride slow, your body will get great at riding slow.

An easy way to start would be to time your ride home, and try and beat it. Get a HR monitor and get your pulse rate up, try for 10min @ 90+% for example.

Increasing your long ride isn’t a bad idea, it’ll improve your stamina (though not necessarily your speed).

Another possibility would be to join a gym. Spinning classes are great for building fitness, perhaps not if you’re an elite athlete but for the rest of us you can get a lot out of them. Remember to sit towards the back for maximum enjoyment 🙂

Finally, the dreaded turbo. There’s a reason people use them: they work. An hour doing a Sufferfest (or similar) video) will do wonders for your speed. If you’re really serious about getting fitter, it’s worth considering one.

Ride more and do LOTS of cardio work. I started doing insanity workouts 3 week ago, road average has gone from 15-16mph to 18-20mph

Those Insanity workouts are hardcore. I actually vomitted when I did the fit test. Put me right off my fags.

Two short rides (or turbo) a week (min 45mins), for the first one time yourself then try to beat the last time each week. Second one, ride fast 3 mins till your legs hurt, then take it easy 3 mins, repeat. One longer ride a week, just increase the distance 10% each time.

Keep a record and see how you’re averages improve over the first 12 weeks. Drink a lot while riding.

Edit – or running.

Fartlek.

(Scuse me)

It all depends on your aims and goals- I am guessing you are saying you want to be able to ride longer to explore the countryside a bit more.

If you try to ride hard all the time (for example every commute) you will only wear yourself out. The real gains come from recovery (of course you need the overload first)… and most people will ride too hard when they should be taking it easy and ride too easy on the few rides a week that need to be properly hard.

Patience in building up the time riding is important too as is consistency. No point in getting in a good couple of weeks riding and then do nothing for the next couple of week or knackering yourself for a month only to pick up niggles.

Strictly speaking the way to “get fitter” is to ride as many easy miles as you can fit in. Cycling is a very aerobic sport and the very hard mid week efforts should be a final tune up for speed if and when needed in the year. Of course this is not the most fun approach in the world and most people do not have time to fit in a decent volume of riding hence the low time/ high intensity approach many here suggest.

I would say to start with at least, gradually increase the easy week rides and extend the length of an easy weekend ride. Going nuts on hills repeatedly or half killing yourself on a turbo might be fun but can probably wait a few weeks 😉

Also, although I might have said ride easy “miles” judge duration by time as distance has far too many variables to judge volume.

That would be my thoughts anyway but I am sure many would disagree 😕

As mentioned earlier – running, last year I started running about once a week just for a change, just a 3 to 4 mile loop, struggled to manage 6 miles.

Did a lot more running over the winter/spring as the weather was awful and my local trails a mud bath, since then joined a running club, Parkrun, 10ks, half marathon next month. Dropped half a stone this summer through the running and a lot fitter than I’ve been even since I started riding again 5 years ago.

Dare I say that wretched Strava is a good training tool, for both sports as you can see the improvement in your times/speed plus moving up the rankings.

“No pain no gain”. Nothing truer. Push yourself.

Intervals, it’s almost winter so ideal time to lock yourself in the garage a couple of nights a week on rollers/turbo and just enjoy the pain that is, then enjoy being quicker when you get back out there.

Some great advice here guys, I do use strava and that his been the biggest help so far and I am happy that I’m in the top ten for most of the off road up hills in my area. I used to just sit back and take the hills easy but now I find myself pushing on. What do you guys use to aid recovery? Be it food or suppliments, I think my food intake is my downfall. What should avoid?

Jon

What do you guys use to aid recovery? Be it food or suppliments, I think my food intake is my downfall. What should avoid?

Supplements shouldn’t be necessary, assuming you’re eating well. Perhaps if you’re doing really intensive training – like for an Ironman for example – but I don’t think that’s the case here.

Foodwise, I feel best when I eat non-processed, home-cooked meals. Lots of salads, veggies, lean meat etc. Cut down on the sugar, and less alcohol. Life’s too short to get too anal about it, but simple measures like no beer during the week make a big difference.

How about a Garmin with a “Virtual Partner”, when you see the text on the screen turn red and the “partner” (you on a good day) is creeping ahead of you it gives you that push you need. 😕