Cycling High Intensity Training

-What does High Intensity Training in Cycling exactly mean for you?-

If you've been reading on this site for awhile then you might know that most of your training time is probably best spent on your bicycle as the cycling part can make up to 50% of a triathlon race.

Well I don't want you to get it confused. You will hear me talk a lot about the 'basics': basic endurance, basic concepts, basic training knowledge etc. But of course you don't get very far if you stick with them forever. That's why we now get into a much more fun part: cycling training at very high intensities.

You will improve your stamina. You will improve your speed. Your will improve on your resistance to high levels of lactate. And you will also increase your degradation rate of lactate. All of this is important for your further improvements in triathlon.

Lactate is being produced inside of your body when you exercise above a certain 'threshold'. This threshold is different for each person and depends largely on your training constitution. Exercising above this threshold is compulsory to improve at a certain level of your career but it can actually harm your progress if you're lacking basic endurance.

There are basically two ways to increase your speed: One is the coordinative component. You will want to work on your intramuscular coordination, that is more muscles being fired more efficiently during a pedal stroke. This part also includes optimizing your stroke so that you can pedal more holistic. The second one is the strength component. Increasing the size and the amount of muscle fibers to be able to push more energy down into your cycling system.

Let's talk about the first aspect more in detail. Cycling high intensity training involves a good amount of coordinative work. Yet most triathletes don't do that for whatever reason. It costs them minutes and even hours over the period of only one season.

Here are two great drills on this topic that I use on a regular basis:

• Using the whole pedal stroke
  The simplest, yet most effective way to teach your legs to pedal more effectively is to ride one legged. That sounds much easier than it is done, so it's best exercised early during your ride when you are still fairly fresh. After having warmed up properly just unclip one foot and pedal with only one leg. You don't even really need to unclip. Just pretend that one leg is paralyzed. That feels really different as you now have to go the whole round with only one leg. Do this as long as it feels comfortable then pause. After several repetitions switch to your other leg. You can do this in different gears and pedaling at different paces. Your focus should be to pedal fluently though.


• Increasing your spin
  The next thing you can do to improve your cycling skills is to pedal as fast as you can in an easy gear for several minutes until it starts to feel uncomfortable again. Try to pedal as smoothly as possible without upper body bounce. This way you can work on an increasingly faster spin that also preserves your muscles and saves energy.

How do you go about training your leg strength? Will you need to punish yourself with boring, stubborn workouts in the gym? Not at all. At least not at this point and as long as you follow the simple guidelines right here on this site.

You've got all you need for the 'weight part' of your high intensity cycling training. You've got yourself and you're very likely to own a bicycle.

There are several approaches of which I'm going to show you the two most important ones today:

• Extensive Weight Cycling Training and
• Intensive Weight Cycling Training (uphill).

With Extensive Weight Cycling Training you exercise by pedaling at a very slow pace and with high gears. Try to keep up a cadence of 50 to 70 rpm. on plane or slightly molded terrain for at least 20 minutes and no more than 2 hours. Your heart rate shouldn't exceed 80% of HRmax.

Intensive Weight Cycling Training or more commonly called hill training is done in the way of interval training on slow or decent rises each 0.3 - 1.3 miles (0.5 - 2 km). Warm up properly before you start with this little gem. Don't give "everything". Keep your heart rate below 90% of HRmax.

With both methods make sure to give your body enough time to rebound from each training input before your repeat the process. This can be done actively by simply reducing the intensity for up to 10 minutes and until your heart rates drops below 70% of HRmax.

When starting out with cycling, high intensity training shouldn't be on your schedule. It might rather harm you than do you any good. Work on your basic endurance first. I can't stress that point enough. Basics first, Goodies second. After you mastered the basics it's time for the Jedi to learn using the full power of 'the force'. Not before.

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