Training & Nutrition - Ramping it up

This past week I started the ramping phase of this program I'm doing. Now I have a question or two about it.
Sun 2hr endurance ride
Mon 25-65min ride with two 10 min Intervals@ 88-92%HR Rest for 5mins
Tue Off
Wed 60min ride
Thurs 30mins lifting@gym
Fri 25-65min ride with 4 1min intervals@ 92-95% with 3 min rest
Sat off(yea right no ride on sat I think not!!!!)
So here is the deal I have a 6mile round trip commute 5 days a week not real tuff. And yesterday my buddy wanted to ride after he got off work so after the interval work I met up with him for another hour. Now a two hour ride instead of only 1 hr. Then today I got the family togeather for a family spin local trails. My question is adding the extra hour tues is it going to get me into trouble with over training? My pals and I like to ride togeather after they get done at their jobs but they aren't ready to go until 5:30-6:00pm. I get off work at 3:30pm. As far as the intervals go i don't have a HRM so I'm riding them as hard as I can for the amout of time needed. Is this a bad thing or not? Thanks in advance for your help.;)

10 min @ 88-92% of... ? You say you don't have a heart rate monitor. 88-92% for only 10 minutes is on the far low end of adaptation for threshold improvement.

What are you trying to accomplish with 1 minute intervals? 1 minute intervals are too short for VO2max work, especially with 3 minute breaks to recover any anaerobic component.

The extra time is not likely to put you in an overtraining situation. Your list of riding times puts you in about 5-6 hours of on the bike time per week.

Guess it just depends on what you're trying to accomplish with your plan.

Yes, you could do more riding and not overtrain. The family spin is a good thing, too. More recovery is always good.

I think you could benefit by making your Sunday ride a group ride in the hills, if any in your area. Whatever length, but do some work. Then take Monday off or do a family spin. Then do your Monday work on Tuesday. Lifting once/week won't do much. Better to do it on Tuesday after the intervals. Then do your endurance work on Wednesday, your Friday work on Thursday, with lifting afterwards again. Then do a 45' zone 1 spin on Friday and take Saturday off. A schedule like that will load you up and then let you rest. Lifting after some hard bike work is a good thing. After all, when do you sprint? At the end of the ride. You want to be a little tired when you go to the gym. You can cut the gym down to once/week when your mileage or intervals increase and you feel you're getting too tired on the bike. MHO and YMMV!

OTOH, maybe you don't want to spend that much time at it. Oh and I'd make the short intervals 1:30 or even 2:00. You want to be pretty well gasping at the end of each one. At the end of the 10' intervals, you should be breathing deeply and heavily, but not gasping.

The 88-92% is of my max hr. But Since I don't have a hrm yet i have been going as hard as i can for the time specified. And at the end of a 10min interval I'm gassed! As far as the 1 min intervals I have been only resting for 1 min. Kind of a sprint thing. I do 1 set of 5. The deal with the plan I'm doing i got from my men's journal in Aug of 05. The artical is based off of Lance's programs i guess. I just started doing some racing last year and was not training properly i thought. So i dug this out and have been sticking to it since the first of the year. I think i need to bite the bullet and get a HRM.(Any Sugg??) Thanks for the help.

For a cheapie, the Polar A series. All you need is a big number staring at you. Everything else is nice but unnecessary. If you find you are getting committed to it (and your family hasn't filed commitment papers yet) an HRM that records and downloads into your computer is really good and a fine time waster. Being able to keep track of your time-in-zone totals week by week is a powerful training tool.

I have an older Polar 720i, but it guess there are issues with the newer Polar models, because the ones that have auto start/stop (absolutely necessary for training but not for racing) don't have altitude, and vice versa. People are liking the Garmin unit.

Yes, you could do more riding and not overtrain. The family spin is a good thing, too. More recovery is always good.

I think you could benefit by making your Sunday ride a group ride in the hills, if any in your area. Whatever length, but do some work. Then take Monday off or do a family spin. Then do your Monday work on Tuesday. Lifting once/week won't do much. Better to do it on Tuesday after the intervals. Then do your endurance work on Wednesday, your Friday work on Thursday, with lifting afterwards again. Then do a 45' zone 1 spin on Friday and take Saturday off. A schedule like that will load you up and then let you rest. Lifting after some hard bike work is a good thing. After all, when do you sprint? At the end of the ride. You want to be a little tired when you go to the gym. You can cut the gym down to once/week when your mileage or intervals increase and you feel you're getting too tired on the bike. MHO and YMMV!

OTOH, maybe you don't want to spend that much time at it. Oh and I'd make the short intervals 1:30 or even 2:00. You want to be pretty well gasping at the end of each one. At the end of the 10' intervals, you should be breathing deeply and heavily, but not gasping.
To day in did the commute to work and then headed to the gym after work. I did the 1 min intervals on the way. What a great weight session!! Then did a few more on the trip home. All in all felt good.

For a cheapie, the Polar A series. All you need is a big number staring at you. Everything else is nice but unnecessary. If you find you are getting committed to it (and your family hasn't filed commitment papers yet) an HRM that records and downloads into your computer is really good and a fine time waster. Being able to keep track of your time-in-zone totals week by week is a powerful training tool.

I have an older Polar 720i, but it guess there are issues with the newer Polar models, because the ones that have auto start/stop (absolutely necessary for training but not for racing) don't have altitude, and vice versa. People are liking the Garmin unit.
I think i have the ol' lady sold on a power tap!! I'm not sure i want to shell out the 1300bucks tho.

Got my HRM today!!!!! Going out tomorrow for lsd and going to see how it all works out. Has most of ya done the 2x20 test or something similar? I haven't done anything like it. Should I try the 10min freil test on the road tomorrow? I think I shall give it a go.:)

Didn't get a chance to do the 2x20 test on sun. The headwind i had going out was around 20-25mph with 30+ gusts.(crappy). Anyway I kept my hr right at 82% of my max for the 2.5 hrs. 156bpm. Is that pretty good for a tempo/endurance ride?

Didn't get a chance to do the 2x20 test on sun. The headwind i had going out was around 20-25mph with 30+ gusts.(crappy). Anyway I kept my hr right at 82% of my max for the 2.5 hrs. 156bpm. Is that pretty good for a tempo/endurance ride?Does your HRM show average HR for the exercise period? If that's your average, I'd say that qualifies as a hard ride.

A simpler way of getting close to your LT is to do a single 10 minute test. Warm up for 30 minutes at 70% to 76% of MHR, including 2 ea. 1.5 minute hard intervals, say at 20' and 25'. Start your test from a standing start right after the warmup period, restarting your HRM as you do so. Go as hard as you can for 10 minutes, then stop and check your average HR, assuming that your HRM has that feature. Your average HR should be very close to your LT. A relatively level road is best, but not critical. Just keep the bike moving as fast as you can. Or you can do this on the trainer. It will be very hard.

Here's a good maximum heart rate test that can be done on the trainer:

Warm up for 20 to 30 minutes at 70% to 76% of your maximum heart rate, this is where you start to sweat. It is important that you keep your pedal cadence above 85 rpm for entire test.
Increase your effort level by 5 heartbeats for 2 minutes.
Increase your effort level by 5 heartbeats again for 2 minutes.
Keep repeating this 5 heart beat increase every 2 minutes until you know you are at your physical limit.
Once you reach that physical limit, Sprint for 30 seconds as hard as you can. Don't quit sprinting until you can't keep the pedal cadence above 85 rpm. Typically when you know you are close to your physical limit, your heart rate number should be close the your estimated MHR number.

For training purposes, it's better to work of threshold heart rate, rather than max heart rate.

Thanks for the input. Forecast calls for heavy rain here tomorrow, Might give the 2x20 a try on the trainer.
Oh yea did a group ride tonight and I was supposed to take it easy. Didn't really do that.(oops). Any who do ya think the test should be done after a day off or so? I got the Polar F6 model and it dose more than i can figure out right now but i will keep reading and learning how to use it.

You should try to do your testing fairly well rested. Don't worry too much about the group ride taking too much out of you. Since it's hard to control everyone's effort, group rides tend to be out of the ideal training range someone might typically set. Just keep that in mind the next time you are supposed to take it easy.

You should try to do your testing fairly well rested. Don't worry too much about the group ride taking too much out of you. Since it's hard to control everyone's effort, group rides tend to be out of the ideal training range someone might typically set. Just keep that in mind the next time you are supposed to take it easy.

Any who do ya think the test should be done after a day off or so?I get the most useful result when I do a recovery ride for say an hour, then take the next day completely off, then do the test. But I don't recover well. You might be able to skip one of those days. I would definitely not do the test after a hard group ride, though.

If you're going to do the 2X20, don't go right hard at the start of the first 20. That's a common mistake. If you blow up at the start, you blow the test. Give your HR 10 minutes to come up. Just slowly keep increasing the load as it comes up. You should be breathing deeply and fast, but not panting. It should be difficult but not really painful. On the trainer, I have the best luck at about a 95-100 cadence, but YMMV. Anyway, look at the gear and cadence you're in when you finish the first 20. Use that gear and cadence from the start of the second 20. As you pedal, try to zero in on that one heart rate that seems to be maintainable.

[QUOTE=Carbonfiberboy I would definitely not do the test after a hard group ride

Yea that is a great idea. I tried on thurs on the trainer and couldn't get mt Hr up my legs were totally cooked from the earlier workouts last week. Have a race coming up this on the 7th that should be fun. It will be my first MTb race ever!!!!!!. Just looking to get a good work out and have a little fun before the road season kicks off on the 22nd of April.