Originally Posted by derath
Is it possible?
Basically my situation is this. Without going into a detailed life situation, in a nutshell the ability for me to get away for 3+ hours for nice long rides is near impossible. I can generally swing 1-2 days of 2 hours or so, and several days of an hour max, if I am lucky. If I add indoor rollers after the kids are in bed and such I could have more time, but still maybe 60min indoors.
So are there ways of training which will help overall endurance without being able to do nice long rides on a regular basis.
FWIW I do have a metric or full organized century ride scheduled for each month through october.
I hope this makes sense. Thanks in advance.
-D
It depends on what your goals are and what your previous experience is. You can certainly make gains in overall endurance at that level - the majority of my rides this year were in the 2-3 hour range, with the exception of 3 or 4 50 milers, one century, and my goal event (a double century).
But I have a few years of experience, so I know what my pace should be on various distances, and I know what works for me for nutrition and hydration.
If your goal is to keep your endurance, you can probably do it on that amount of time by spending the majority of your time riding endurance. But you probably aren't going to hold onto your speed at the same time.