TheKillerPenguin

Since I don't have a bike to ride and have spare time, I've been going to the gym now that I'm back at college. My goal is to increase the power of my slow twitch muscle for cycling. I've been following the advice of Skydive and others, doing 20rep sets with slow reps. I do 3-5 seconds up and 3-5 seconds down. It makes my legs want to explode.

Depending on the exercise, somewhere around rep 10 I get horrendous pain in whatever muscle group I'm workng at the time. I keep going though, and always finish my 20 reps, with each rep lasting at least 6 seconds.

My question is this: when I encounter that pain, am I right to work through it, or am I causing damage beyond normal muscle tearing and rebuilding? If I'm doing it wrong, what should i be doing?

Thanks in advance

DannoXYZ 

You should be fine. That's the purpose of doing weight & strength workouts; to tear and rip the muscles. It's only on the rest and rebuilding period in between that they are made stronger. Keep copious notes and gauge your increase in strength. You're starting early as most people don't get into the gym until the snow falls. When you've doubled your strength, that's a good time to stop as doing more will endup adding more bulk and weight than you want.

BTW, consult some bodybuilders and physical therapists out there. Slow-twitch and fast-twitch describes the muscle's behavior in action, not how you work them out. Pretty much all strength & weight workouts will develop fast-twitch muscles due to the intensity of the strain (anaerobic). Slow-twitch muscles, ironically, are worked out more with lighter loads and faster movements (aerobic).

TheKillerPenguin

yeah, I'm using much lower weights than I'd normally use, since I thought higher reps and lower weight was what accomplished slow twitch muscle growth. Guess I was wrong about the slow rep part though. To build slow twitch muscles, should I be doing a set until I'm either out of breath or start going anaerobic, or should I have a set number to reach each time?

DannoXYZ 

I think what you're implicitly trying to achieve is a balance between slow-twitch and fast-twitch muscles. I'm not even sure weight & strength workouts can do much to build slow-twitch muscles at the exclusion of fast-twitch. Pretty much all gym workouts will increase the proportion of fast-twitch muscles compared to slow-twitch; that's how you get stronger.

Let's back up a little. What's your goal? What's the measurement metric that will be used to determine whether you've achieved that goal or not? ALL goals have to be able to be judged in YES/NO, black & white, all-or-nothing terms as to whether you've achieved them. So what's your goal and how will you know you've achieved it?

TheKillerPenguin

My physical goal is to be able to put out more power than I can currently maintain when riding. I'll know I acheived my current goal if I am able to average higher speeds than I currently can average. It's not about raising my sprint speed, but about raising my cruising speed.

My overall goal is to be able to be more competetive when racing. I understand a lot of that comes with experience and learning tactics, but I figure that if I can intimidate the field by flexing I've already won

DannoXYZ 

Yeah, my teammates and I always had this inside joke about developing the "IF factor" when we trained. We'd do 6-8 weeks of weight-training the winter to develop strength & definition (without gaining weight). We'd shave before races and oil the legs down with baby-oil so they'd be just a little shiny to reflect the light and show off the cuts in the muscles... heh, heh..

"My physical goal is to be able to put out more power than I can currently maintain when riding. I'll know I acheived my current goal if I am able to average higher speeds than I currently can average. It's not about raising my sprint speed, but about raising my cruising speed. "

Well, it all works together and you've just described what a comprehensive training plan will do for you. Weight-training is just one part of that overall plan, but in and of itself, it will not give you the results you want. It really depends upon where you are now as well, what is your limitation when riding at your LT? Is it the muscles, which are getting sore and cramped out? Or is the lungs and aerobic system that's the limiting factor? Depending upon your personal stats, the training plan would be customized to develop you from where you are now, to where you want to be.

In general, weight-workouts and sprints will improve your average speed. There's great debate as to WHY they do, and the exact mechanisms behind it, but there's no dispute that they really do help. My personal take is that by improving muscle-strength, you will be further away from your LT when you're at your maximum sustainable average speed. For example, if you're exerting with 150lbs of force on the pedals at your average speed and LT and your maximum strength is 175lbs, you're close to the limits of your strength and muscles will be close to running anaerobic and develops a lot of lactic acid. However, if you have more strength and maximum output force is 200lbs, that same 150lbs force at average-speed will be a lower percentage of your maximum. Your muscles will be more efficient and not build as much lactic acid at that level.

Here's some articles on weight-training:

Edmund R. Burke, Ph.D (USA national-team coach) - Strength Training for Cycling
NSCA - Resistance Training for Cyclists
PTS - Strength Training: Building a Bigger Engine
Ultra Cycling - Resistance Training for Endurance Cyclists
SpokePost - Training with Periodization (Part 3 of 8: Hypertrophy Phase)
RunnersWeb - Multisport: Strength and Power Training for Endurance Athletes
Journal Of Applied Physiology - Explosive-strength training improves 5-km running time by improving running economy and muscle power
Trinity Endurance/Fitness - Cross Training for Triathletes - Part 1
Power Running - Resistance Training for Runners
Aphrodite - Strength Training Improves Aerobic Power In Seniors

Marcinik - Effects of strength training on lactate threshold and endurance performance (Med. Sci Sports Exerc. 23: 739-743.) <-- this is a great study that's the basis of a lot of current articles, can't find it online though...

If you've got JAMA membership, I can give you a bunch of references from studies there as well. Also NEJM is another good source.

TheKillerPenguin

Wow, thanks for all that information. the NSCA and PTS articles were particularly interesting, although slighty different in the methods advocated for gaining strength. Guess I'll be approaching weight training from a different angle now.

In addition to the sites you looked up, are there any books that are helpful for off season weight training?

Thanks for the help Danno.