Cyclingrookie

Hello all,

This is my first post on the forum, and as a relatively new cyclist I am looking for a bit of advice.

At the end of August I will be taking part in a 24 hour cycle, I only started seriously training for this in around February, and up to last week had been working up the endurance distance each week by 10 miles, with the latest one last week resulting in a 140 mile ride. Now after this I obviously didn't feel like running a marathon, but didn't feel awful either, just tired really.

I usually ride five out of seen days a week, with atleast one shorter faster ride and a couple of other steady rides (around 30 miles).

Am I being ambitious in what I'm trying to do? Do you think on the amount of riding I am currently doing I will be able to go for 24 hours? If not, what should I be doing to make sure I am ready? I think I have a fairly good grasp of nutrition and am eating a drinking constantly on the bike.

Also, I am in the middle of a forced 2.5 week break from cycling, due to tweaking my knee playing football, and also going on holiday for a week. Will this have a serious effect on my training, or will I be able to sufficiently recover?

Thanks on advance for your help.

dual650c

2 cents.. about all it's worth....

You don't say how fast you're completing your century-length rides nor if you have a distance goal for the 24 hour ride. These relate to each other simply.

Given enough caffeine and an iron butt, you can ride 24 hours but may not go very far compared to others. OTOH, it may be a simple calculation - 2 x your century-length ride times plus X hours off-bike resting, eating, massage of a certain area, whatever. Are you wiped out after your century-length rides or can you seriously envision doing it all over again without stopping?

As I said, 2 possibly worthless cents.
If I was a gambling man, I'd say that you can probably do a 300k given the progress you've made since Feb and the time left to continue to push yourself. But, as you note, being off bike/not continuing to "train" between now and "event day" will likely have some negative effect on you. How much, totally unknown, especially if you do nothing to maintain the fitness you've built up.

Carbonfiberboy 

Keep up with your core work while you're off.

StephenH

There is some variation in the 24-hour races. I gather some are more competitive than others. Anyway, if you're not in it to win it, go for it. You may be one of the slower ones there, but no reason to avoid it, either. It'll definitely be a learning experience.

I think more training probably helps more in dealing with problems that come up rather than just building muscle and stuff. If you've ridden through rain and through heat and got cramps and fixed them and spent hours riding in the dark and rode on rough roads and smooth roads, you're better prepared for the event. There are people that are excellent athletes and don't know how to fix a flat, and that's not a good combination.

Cyclingrookie

Hi everyone,

thanks for your replies,

My last long ride at 140 miles was an average of 16.2 mph. And I have ridden through nearly all weather conditions so hopefully i will be able to give it a good crack.

I will definately keep working on core muscles, and just try and focus on healing this knee up as soon as possible,

cheers