Training Mindset
 

This is a Novice question. I ride mostly on the weekends. I generally ride the same route and have gotten into the habit of timing everything. I am constantly trying to better my times. Therefore, when it isn't optimum weather ( wind), I am not even enjoying the ride because I know I cannot beat my times.
Is this a common approach to training, or should I not be worrying about time? I've been concentrating on speed because I only ride solo, but I hope to progress enough to ride in a group and keep up.

The fastest way to be mediocre is to ride "hard" and push yourself the whole ride, every ride. It's a trap that is very very easy to fall into. Riding tempo/medium-hard all the time will get you really good at going medium fast. To get fast, especially on limited training time, make your hard days really hard. Lots of very high intensity intervals. And make the easy days very easy for recovery.

No, that's not a common approach to training.

Most people mix it up ...

-- long rides at a steady speed
-- hill repeats
-- intervals
-- Time Trial- like rides (which is what you're doing)
-- recovery rides


Get ahold of some books, like Joe Friel's The Cyclist's Training Bible ...
http://www.amazon.com/The-Cyclists-T...dp_ob_title_bk

Great. That was very helpful. I def have to re-work how I've been training. Thanks.

I have learned to appreciate the wind if you don't have hills. I ride hard into the wind if it's not my easy/recovery day

Apart from riding the same route (in more urban areas there aren't many options located close to homes and offices which don't have too many traffic lights and stop signs, and you really don't want to drive someplace to ride six days a week dealing with rush hour traffic on 5) that's not common.

Riding mostly on the weekends isn't enough for good fitness.

Riding at the same perceived high intensity all the time just leaves you tired and slow, perhaps with health problems. It keeps you from being fresh enough to really work hard, and doesn't allow recovery for your body to adapt to training stress. I get my biggest gains after my rest week (1 in 4 is traditional, although some athletes need 1 in 3 and others can go longer) which stick because they're not just from being fresh.

There are too many variables in things like wind and traffic even when riding the same route for measurements to tell you anything about the progress you can make in a month or even two. People use objective measurements like power (210 Watts is 5% better than 200 even if you are slower due to circumstances beyond your control) or heart rate (which measures a side effect of how hard you're working and doesn't show gains, although it does differentiate between feels hard because you're working hard, feels harder because you're fatigued but can dig deeper, and isn't possible without at least a day of recovery).

As an introduction you might like The Time-Crunched Cyclist: Fit, Fast, Powerful in 6 Hours a Week which is built around low-volume training and has complete plans you can follow as-is. Friel's bible is more of a do-it-yourself exercise with some assembly required.

More time will produce better fitness - you'll get more of your energy at endurance paces from fat preserving your glycogen for hard efforts, and your peak will last longer. If you go that route you'll want to spend more time at lower intensities and not base what you do on the Time Crunched Cyclist.

Great info. I am going to use this advice. Thanks.

Not sure if you use strava or not, but I ride alone and often ride the same routes as you do. As a result I found creating "private segments" in strava and adding goals to those segments to be a very helpful motivator. Basically I identify certain climbs, flat sprint, or just sections on my route by streets or landmarks and create a segment. I have several segments setup along several routes for training purposes. For example I have a route that includes a lot of climbing and I have each and every climb setup from start to end. After a ride I can see if and when I’ve beat my PR (personal record) on each climb or not. I can also see a complete history of each segments time by date that also shows avg speed so if it was a really windy day and I didn’t get a new PR I don’t think twice about it. Keep in mind these are not the existing “public segments” that already exist in strava, but my own personal private segments with my own start and end points.

So when I hit a certain landmark or street I really crank up the speed on that “segment” and treat it as a time trial. Then when the segment is over I dial it back and catch my breath. If you setup segments based on distance or time it takes you to get from point A to B you are essentially setting up your own personal tracked intervals via strava. This is a huge plus for me as in the past I often got bored on the same route and found it hard to get motivated. Now that’s not a problem because when I hit a per-defined segment I hammer it and go for a new PR.

Here is a link on how to create your own segments in strava and goals.

https://strava.zendesk.com/entries/2...eate-a-Segment

https://strava.zendesk.com/entries/2...Power-Premium-

Definitely recomend the Cyclist's training bible as a starting place

Great info

You have to know how and when to ride. Don't push yourself to the limit or you'll regret it. All what you have to do is to see what's good for you, if you don't feel comfortbale with wind don't go out. You'll face many problems but i think if you go in group that willl be more comfortable because you'll be more encouraged by them.