J.W.

I was wondering if someone could give me an idea of what kind of interval training to do. I have the strength (from weight lifting) but i need to build endurance..or the strength really doesnt matter. So should i be climbing, sprinting?? How many miles? Should i go off speed(mph) or HR or Cadence....HELP!! So if someone could point me in the direction of some literature on interval training that helped them or something would be great. (this is for road cycling by the way)

J.W.

Ok, so after some reading how does this sound

FLAT SPRINTS
5 30second sprints/ 90 seconds rest
5 60 second sprints/ 90 seconds rest

Then i plan to go to a steep hill and just do repeats with rest inbetween...

timmhaan

the cyclists training bible is pretty good... although it's more geared toward racing.

to build endurance, there is no substitute for time in the saddle. generally you spend the early part of the year doing longer rides at a steady pace. after a while of doing that, then you move into doing intervals of varying lengths (depending on what you want to target).

how long have you been riding?

J.W.

During the winter i did a few weeks of rpm classes, but so far with my road bike i have been riding about 3 weeks (longest ride has been 36miles). I do also lift 5 days a week (have been doing so since jr. high...i am from a football background).

ottsville

Get several hundred miles of riding under your belt and then think about intervals. Although you may have lots of strength, cycling places different stresses on your body that a good base period will help you accustom to. This may help you prevent injury.

J.W.

Ya i probably only have about 115-120mi right now(just got a computer so i'm not sure)...hopefully another 100 after this week.

ottsville

Get some base, then find some people who ride just a bit faster than you and ride with them. When the group becomes too slow for you, rinse and repeat. When you are starting out, you'll get faster and more endurance simply from riding.

ericgu

A few questions first:

1) How much riding are you doing? How many workouts per week, how far?
2) How long have you been doing this?
3) What are your goals for the year?
4) Why are you interested in interval training?
5) What are your weaknesses that you want to improve?

filthy lucre

That's kind of like building the roof before you've poured a house's foundation. That's top end stuff you're looking at. If you need to build endurance you should be looking at doing tempo and sub-threshold rides to start with. Don't worry about dawdling along with Zone 1 and 2 stuff. You'll get greater benefit with less saddle time by upping the intensity a bit. That said, feel free to mix in some high-end work every now and again. After 4-6 weeks you can move on to VO2 work and shorter/harder efforts.

Pick up a training book or 2, those will help you immensely. The Cyclist Training Bible is good as is Thomas Chappel's Base Building book. Their approaches are a bit low key but ultimately they're effective.

J.W.

1. So far about 50mi on the weekends, 35 on sat, 15 on sun. And as many miles i can fit in during the week...going to try and do 60 throughout the week.
2. two weeks so far
3. I have a lot, mainly i would like to get my avg. speed up to 20mph (havent been on a long ride w/my computer yet, so i dont know how much work that will take) also plan to do a few sprint tri's and bicycle tours.
4. I figure that its a smarter way to train, instead of just going out and riding. Again from my background, drills are just what you do...
5. I dont really know...endurance i guess. Maybe cadence, i noticed that i seem to be a "masher"..80rpm is where i like to be, 90 just doesnt feel right...

JPradun

Cycling is an aerobic sport. 30s intervals are not aerobic. Keep doing 2-3+hr rides at hard intensity that you can barely hold for the 3hrs (think 80% of max HR). This should make up the majority of your rides -- 3-4x/wk. Throw in a 10min session at the end of each ride at 110rpm with very little resistance and you'll see your cadence increase while doing longer rides.

J.W.

will do.

ericgu

That helps. Here's my advice:

1) As others have said, it's better to focus on time rather than intensity. It takes a while (a few months) to get your body used to the stresses of riding so that you can benefit well from the intervals. If you do a bunch of them earlier, you can easily get hurt.

2) I'd recommend fewer longer rides rather than more shorter rides - you will get far more training benefit from them than the shorter ones. Those will have the most benefit on your endurance.

3) 20 mph is fast. If you are riding a constant 15 MPH, you are likely putting out around 112 watts. To up that to 20 MPH, you need to more than double that to around 233 watts.

4) I'd suggest doing a field test with a heart rate monitor, to set training zones. That will be very helpful to do guided workouts.

5) Cadence drills would likely be useful for you, for longer rides and especially if you're wanting to do triathlons, where you really don't want to kill your legs. You can find some drills if you search for them, and I suggest you try to work where you can ride at 90-95RPM comfortably.

J.W.

Another noob question...How long should i warm up for? 5-10min?

Carbonfiberboy 

Don't warm up or stretch first. Just get on your bike and start out slow. You can go hard once you start to sweat. If I'm going to do intervals, I try to get in a half hour of riding before arriving at the spot where I intend to do them. But like others said, don't bother. Just ride. And ride hills. The more hills the better. 20 is a very fast average speed. Top club riders might average 18 on a hilly ride. So don't worry about your average speed, either. Just ride and have fun. And as others said, group rides are really fun and challenging.

J.W.

Well on my longest ride ever, 63 miles (Very hilly and windy 10-20mph for about 30 of those miles) i averaged 14.4mph and finished in 4hrs 20min...i am pretty pleased with those numbers (considering the WIND...i hate wind)

Garfield Cat

The main thing is to ask yourself why you want to do intervals in the first place. Just because you have a road bike doesn't mean you need to do interval training.

Interval training will get your body accustomed to riding faster, a faster pace. Is that what you want to do? Then once you reach the faster pace, you still have to work at it to maintain it. Working against all this is father time. As the body ages, so does the speed thing. A 30 year old may maintain an average speed of 30 mph for a length of time whereas a 60 year old will be much shorter.

If you do group rides, then the speed may be important. If you ride mostly solo and are a recreational rider who happens to ride a road bike, then maybe not that important.

If its not that important, then interval training can be incorporated into your daily rides rather than a structured workout, although structured workouts are more efficient.

J.W.

Well i am really interested with Tri's (my first sprint will be in June) and depending on how i like them i am also leaning towards TT's. But right now i am just trying to get to where i can ride longer and faster.