Anyone Interested in Bike training program?

[sumitpal]

Rajesh, you mentioned a TT training plan in a different thread. Can you share that? I am looking for a 3-4 month long plan, I want to buildup gradually.

I measured my weekly MTB-with-backpack TT distance yesterday and it is actually ~30.5 kms so looks like I averaged close to 30kmph last week. I am just focusing on technique right now ( higher cadence and concentration on steady effort ) so my hopes for a good season later are up.

[Pankaj_Chuladhara]

Hi all,

I have been going through the posts in this thread from the begining and have thought of starting my own training. For the first day of the first phase I went for a high cadence ride this morning, without a cadence reader or a cyclocomputer (it has already reached India but yet to reach me ).
Started riding on 39/19 on Sarjapur road and was manually counting my cadence. On flats I was comfortably reaching around 105 rpm and on slight uphills I was still around 95-100. On downhills I shifted to 39/18-17 so as to avoid over spinning (do not have clipless yet) and the cadence was around 105 again.

The whole idea of riding high cadence felt really great albiet it is a little slow. I think i averaged around 25 kmph over a distance of 20 kms.
I am not sure if I have reached that part yet in the thread but it will be great if somebody could summarize the program on a high level. Like how many days of base riding (phase one - high cadence), interval training (phase two) and form maintenance (phase 3). From what i understand it is a 3 months long training.
I am not sure if I will be able to ride the distances mentioned in the program but a shorter version of the training should also be fruitful and that is what I am trying to achieve.

It will be great if somebody can email me the training program. I am also looking for training partners in south bangalore. Pls let me know if anybody is interested.

Cheers
Pankaj

[Pankaj_Chuladhara]

Guys, one more thing. After the high cadence ride this morning I did my regular cool down and stretching. As I was taking my shoes off sitting on a stool I happened to feel a pinching pain in my right knee, slightly on the left side of the knee ball socket. Tried feeling it with some movements and looks like it pains when I am lifting my right leg bending at the knee. The pain is sharper when I lift the leg laterally, bending at the knee. Like when you untie your shoe while resting your right leg on the left.

I have never experienced any kind of pain in my knees in my 5 months of riding before. But this is the first time I rode with a very high cadence.
Could this be the reason for the pain? I might raise my saddle a little and see if it makes any difference.

Cheers
Pankaj

[RNair]

Rajesh, you mentioned a TT training plan in a different thread. Can you share that? I am looking for a 3-4 month long plan, I want to buildup gradually.

Sumit, I don't have it yet. I get it from my team in Italy and I usually get it in winter when the training begins. Do you have the one from this year? You can surely change a few things around for TT. Like Include more climbing and TT at LT for 5-10 min intervals etc.

[RNair]

The whole idea of riding high cadence felt really great albiet it is a little slow. I think i averaged around 25 kmph over a distance of 20 kms.
I am not sure if I have reached that part yet in the thread but it will be great if somebody could summarize the program on a high level. Like how many days of base riding (phase one - high cadence), interval training (phase two) and form maintenance (phase 3). From what i understand it is a 3 months long training. Cheers,Pankaj

Here we were following the 3 month plan. Don't worry about the speed. Put it off if you can atleast for a month! The program has a whole month on 39/21-19 with 100rpm or above. HR should feel at ease at 60-70%. It will be boring and you will surely wonder if it makes any sense! Ride atleast 3 times a week 50 kms or above.

[kk27]

Here we were following the 3 month plan. Don't worry about the speed. Put it off if you can atleast for a month! The program has a whole month on 39/21-19 with 100rpm or above. HR should feel at ease at 60-70%. It will be boring and you will surely wonder if it makes any sense! Ride atleast 3 times a week 50 kms or above.

Ya exactly.... & I'm one proof of how good this Training Program can be. The most imp part which is not mentioned in the Training is..... patience

[Pankaj_Chuladhara]

Here we were following the 3 month plan. Don't worry about the speed. Put it off if you can atleast for a month! The program has a whole month on 39/21-19 with 100rpm or above. HR should feel at ease at 60-70%. It will be boring and you will surely wonder if it makes any sense! Ride atleast 3 times a week 50 kms or above.

What is the max HR we are talking about here and how is it calculated? I am assuming it will be different for everybody. I am not sure if I read it somewhere but is it some test done in a hospital? I should have bought the HR monitor when I went to Decathlon today

BTW the pain in the knee is gone now.

Pankaj

[bappud]

My first post on this thread...

After several months of cycling and thanks to this thread initiated by Rajesh and useful inputs from Prabuddha and Kaushik I am gradually being able to maintain a reasonable cadence between 90-105, calculated manually.

However I need some advice (MC - correct spelling?) on the gear combination. Often, I find that I am bouncing on the saddle when the cadence is too high. This usually happen when there are these small downhills and the gear combo is not changed.

Is this ok ?

Or do I need to upshift ?

[kk27]

you definitely need to upshift if you are bouncing.... but if you try a bit harder to stay on the saddle & let you legs spin freely, then this really helps in training

[Pankaj_Chuladhara]

Ecxactly same question here and I am sure we need to upshift to a point that our cadence is maintained at around 100. Going by the same logic while riding uphill we need to downshift (maybe 39/21 assuming that the base is 39/19); I am right in thinking this?

Also, in a previous post Rajesh mentioned that we need to maintain our HR in 60-70% of max in this phase. My question is how do we measure our max HR? Is it fine to ride on a higher gear (say 39/18) if I can maintain the cadence and HR in the desired range?

Cheers
Pankaj

[RNair]

Also, in a previous post Rajesh mentioned that we need to maintain our HR in 60-70% of max in this phase. My question is how do we measure our max HR? Is it fine to ride on a higher gear (say 39/18) if I can maintain the cadence and HR in the desired range?
Cheers Pankaj

You don't need a HR monitor or any other numbers. Just use the concept of perceived exertion. At 60-70% HR you should be able to hold a conversation while riding your bike. Thats a good indicator. On downhills, Yes you can upshift so you can still pedal nicely without having to bounce around the saddle.

[kk27]

At 60-70% HR you should be able to hold a conversation while riding your bike

That's why it's good to have a training partner ;P

[RNair]

OMG yesterday was just a bizzare day. The Montgomery county in Maryland was holding its annual farm ride. Some 300 cyclists turned up for the event. All 3 from the family showed up with our respective pinarellos and my wife and Rishi rode 45k. Was the first club ride for him and he did very well. I rode with other 4 members for a fast 110k ride. Half way thru the ride I realized that not many were doing the ride I was on and most were riding the 80K. Soon the reason became obvious when I found myself on a 5k gravel road. We rode fast on it and the curves were gasping. It was soon followed by a 5k dirt road the kind Vandit would love to ride his Candy on! OH god what was I up to!! On top of it it was a 5k climb on dirt roads ( more a XC trail) to the top of the mountain. We were riding fast over it. My Pinarello rode exceptionally well on it. I was shocked with what I was doing! Someone took a pic and will try to post it soon here. I had a great big smile on my face at the end of it when I think of the discussions we have here on the forum about road bikes

Mad Mad Ride. A total cyclo cross ride on a Carbon Frame with 20 spoke racing wheels. Opps

[Pankaj_Chuladhara]

That's why it's good to have a training partner ;P

I think I will have to get a HRM now as I do not have a riding partner

Rajesh, Kaushik and others, thanks for your replies. I will really appreciate if somebody can email me the training program (preferablly in English).
I did a 80 km high cadence ride last weekend and I am getting to feel more comfortable with the spinning. Good that I do not have a cyclocomp yet as the average speed would be really disheartening to look at

Looking forward to get the cyclocomp and frame pump this week.

Cheers
Pankaj

[prabuddhadg]

Looking forward to the photo, Rajesh. You must have gone crazy to ride your Pinarello over dirt roads! Hope it was all dry dirt.

[kk27]

Don't we already know him as a crazy guy!!!!

[RNair]

Looking forward to the photo, Rajesh. You must have gone crazy to ride your Pinarello over dirt roads! Hope it was all dry dirt.

Not dry, there was over night rain, so there were puddles of water too. Anyways my bike was due for a pit stop. today I turned it in. Cannot believe my Pinarello already has over 6000kms on it. Seems like yesterday I got it.

[Pankaj_Chuladhara]

I got my first cyclocomp and framepump yesterday and got them fixed on the bike.
Did a 23 km ride in the morning today and following are the stats.

Gear ratio: 39/19 (base) shifting a little up and down according to the terrain (It is very rolling).
Distance: 23 kms
Average speed: 26.8 kmph
Max speed - 45 kmph (on 39/12 on a downhill)
Average cadence: ~ 100 (cyclocomp does not have average cadence , but I was mostly above 100 except for the climbs where i did not go lower than 85)
Route: HSR Layout - Belandur Jn - Sarjapur road (Salukunte and back) - Bangalore

I have been spining for the last two weeks and I think I will continue doing so for another two weeks. This should take care of my base riding and then planning to ride intervals. What kind of terrain is good for interval training; flat or rolling? I might switch over to Outer ring road (Marathalli - KR Puram and back) if flat terrain is advicable.

Cheers
Pankaj

[RNair]

How about jumping over an obstacle with your road bike? I saw it for the first time during the Italian races when cyclists jumped over potholes with their bikes. I went around it or thru it!

Yesterday at 40km/hr, I found a 6ft snake in my path. The wind was so strong that it was a lot more scary to go around the snake at that speed. Well split of a second decision, I just jumped with my road bike over it. Snake unhurt and me and the bike too! All good.

Anyone has tried this?

[deepakvrao]

Nope. Never seen a snake either, thankfully. You jumped both wheels? at speed? How the hell is that done?

[cryptic_abbreviator]

Nope. Nad never seen a snake either, thankfully. You jumped both wheels? at speed? How the hell is that done?

OT

No clue.

Went right over the only snake I encountered on my Mach1.

The snake continued right on into the drain it apparently was aiming for

And I went on to coffee board.

ciao
gr

[RNair]

Nope. Never seen a snake either, thankfully. You jumped both wheels? at speed? How the hell is that done?

It is just a bunny hop! It is pretty cool, I do it over speed breakers too these days The 'snake' hop was at 40km/hr. Yes both wheels otherwise I would have killed the snake.

We roadies too have a few bike handling skills up our sleeve

[kk27]

I bumped into a snake in SGNP recently... but I just breaked hard & stopped

[prabuddhadg]

Well, to protect the fork and rim I regularly lift the front wheel over things like the lip of a pothole. Haven't tried bunnyhopping yet, though.

[sumitpal]

Well, to protect the fork and rim I regularly lift the front wheel over things like the lip of a pothole.

I have started doing the same but can't bunnyhop yet.

I did my weekly TT today but on the faster route ( Chandni Chowk to Wakad ). I think I am beginning to understand the LT zone, good warm-up, staying aerodynamic etc. better although I can see that a lot of practice is needed to execute a TT correctly. I was about 3.5 minutes faster than my previous best on this route, averaged upwards of 39kmph on the MTB. One of them better days!