Training & Nutrition - Training on a lunch break

Now that 14 to 15 hours of my work day are dedicated to work I really dont have much time to ride on work days so I would like to start trying to get in what I can during my one hour lunch break. I figure I have about 45 minutes of actual ride time once I account for getting there and changing and all that.

Can anyone suggest a simple short work out that would be good for someone that rides a lot but hasnt ever done any hard training? I dont have a computer so I cant really use cadence as a tool. I do have a heart rate monitor though. I figure I can do some sort of old fashioned telephone poll intervals. If I am only going to be able to ride for 45 minutes a day I want to make sure I am maximizing that time.

this is sad

thanks

no need to limit yourself to one workout:

you could do 2 x 15' intervals at just above threshold (up to 105% threshold heart rate), with 5' for warmup, 5' recovery btwn reps, and 5' cooldown.

you could do 5 x 4' intervals at vo2 Max (hardest you can go for about 5'-6' @ more than 105% threshold heart rate) with 5' warmup, 3' btwn reps, and 5' cooldown.

you could do 10 x 1' all out efforts with 10' warmup, 2' btwn reps, and 5' cooldown.

thanks fuzz! I will try those out. Ive never trained before and I am looking forward to starting.

The latest issue of Bicycling Magazine (pix of race chick on cover) has what they are calling "911" workouts for people who just realized they have a major event (century, TT, MTB race) in 4 weeks. Some of the workouts, esp. for the TT prep, are about 1 hr and may be what you're looking for. HRM required, cadence helps (and the Cateye Astrale is usually on sale someplace, or use the gear calculator at sheldonbrown's website to figure out cadence vs speed for your gearing).

thanks ks1q,

Ive been looking into getting a edge 305 or polar 720 but perhaps I will just get the cheapo cateye to get me started.

My only advice is not to start with really intense training too quickly, especially considering how much you work. I'm guessing that since you work 14-15 hour days, you probably don't sleep quite as much as you should for someone who is training hard [which is 8-10 hours a night], and perhaps you don't eat enough either.

That being said, a really good way to temporarily wreck your body is to do a whole bunch of training which is greater than your current capacity. it'll leave you spent and needing lots of time to recover. so try to develop a strategy where you're working up to the level you want to achieve.

I definitely do not want to over train and burn myself out. Would you suggest I only train on my days off then? I have 3 days off every week and 4 every other. This definitely gives me a lot of time to train but ive never knew how to handle the 3-4 days of work where I really cant do much of anything besides work.