Weight Lifting & Cycling??

It is true that the weight lifting gives us some improvement in cycling. I can find enough information about the best exercises regarding with the main involved muscles, but I would want to know a little bit more based in personal experiences on the exercises that have worked better, mainly the recommended frequency, because I train cycling at least 4-5 days per week and I ignore the best way to mix both exercise types, since I would have to decide among diminishing distance and intensity in order to practice both in the same day or, to maintain intensity and distances diminishing the days dedicated to the cycling and to dedicate them to the strength training, how many days are the minimal/maximal recommended.??

I know that the best thing is the personal experimentation in order to define how adapts our own body better, but I look for some kind of orientation based on past personal experiences that helps me to decide but quickly what would work better

Whether weight training has a beneficial effect is dependent upon what sort of cyclist yopu are: e.g., track sprint or kilo = weight training good), recreational cyclist/keep fit (maybe), beginner (any exercise will make you better at cycling), endurance racing cyclist (e.g., road, mtb, TT) then no it won't help and may well be detrimental.

some research summed up here http://www.cyclingnews.com/fitness/?id=strengthstern


Ric

__________________
http://www.cyclecoach.com

Yeah it helps but mainly best to do it in the off season.

How does it help?
Ric

__________________
http://www.cyclecoach.com

With doing low weights with high reps it enables you to handle harder training loads. dissagree??

I disagree. Endurance cycling isn't strength limited. What would low weights and high reps do?

ric

__________________
http://www.cyclecoach.com

Creates your muscels to be stronger and then you would be able to cope with harder training loads. Its like a short cut!

Also low weights and high reps creates lean muscel without bulk!

Ignoring the fact that it's unlikely to make your muscles stronger, why would that help a road cyclist, when the forces involved (in cycling) are really low? As there's no difference in strength between elite cyclists and untrained people who are healthy, age and gender matched i don't see the point.

Ric

__________________
http://www.cyclecoach.com

Well Lance does weight training in his off season (have a look on his web page!!!).

I dont think he is training wrong!

Three days during the week, Lance begins the day with a morning weight lifting workout.

Paragraph 3 in the link below!

http://www.lancearmstrong.com/training.html

Just because Lance does something doesn't necessarily mean it's good or beneficial. we don't know if he's good because or inspite of his training.

We shouldn't blindly follow the training of professional cyclists -- there are many things that they do, that aren't good (e.g., take drugs).

If you look at the published research on this topic you'll see that the vast majority shows no benefit to cycling performance with weight training (those that do are usually studies on untrained people where any training has a benefit).

For e.g., The effects of strength training on endurance performance and muscle characteristics.

Bishop D, Jenkins DG, Mackinnon LT, McEniery M, Carey MF.

and the other research in the article i presented before, show no benefits.

Ric

__________________
http://www.cyclecoach.com

hmmm..... No difference in stregth between elite cyclist and untrained poeple who are healthy, age and gender matched I dont see a point!!!!!!!!!!!

you make me laugh, define strength??? and then tell me why weight training would not benifit that?

that was good! So you are saying that it helps untrained people! Could you say that every athlete is untrained compared to there greatest level that they could be, therefore it would help anyone!

So here we all are trying to do our best and when the best in the world do well, it means that they have done something better then you or I. Lance states very clearly that he is good from his training. Now you stand here and say that he is doing something wrong and you are a coach that coaches people and I am sure that the people that you coach would love to be as good as Lance. However if what you say is correct and lance is doing something wrong, why arent your athletes beating him??

I beleive weight training does help when done correctly, it helps me and I am sure it would help ffvelazquezh.

zakeen wrote, i responded with >>

hmmm..... No difference in stregth between elite cyclist and untrained poeple who are healthy, age and gender matched I dont see a point!!!!!!!!!!!

you make me laugh, define strength??? and then tell me why weight training would not benifit that?

>>The definition of strength is: "the maximum force or tension generated by a muscle (or muscle groups)" (McArdle, Katch, and Katch, 1991, p. 452)

>>i did not say that weight training would not increase strength, it would. I said what was the point of increasing strength for endurance cycling when the forces involved are very low.



So here we all are trying to do our best and when the best in the world do well, it means that they have done something better then you or I.

>>there are lots of things that people do who are better at something that we aspire too, however, it doesn't mean that we should blindly follow their example.


Lance states very clearly that he is good from his training. Now you stand here and say that he is doing something wrong and you are a coach that coaches people and I am sure that the people that you coach would love to be as good as Lance. However if what you say is correct and lance is doing something wrong, why arent your athletes beating him??

>>i didn't say he was training wrong. i said he could be good because or inspite of his training

>>why not read the article i mentioned previously?

I beleive weight training does help when done correctly, it helps me and I am sure it would help ffvelazquezh

>>irrespective of what you believe, why not do some testing to ascertain this?

Ric

__________________
http://www.cyclecoach.com

So you have just stated before that weight training is good for a Track sprint. So how does a road sprinter sprint differently?? and wouldnt you want to sprint like a track sprinter??

I say again:
Lance states very clearly that he is good from his training.

Oh I am sorry I thought I was on a forums site, where I was ask for what I believed.

Oh did I mention Lance believes that weight training is also good.

Everyones different and I try different training to see what suits me best. I dont read something and stick to it because someone said it was right! I TRY IT AND IF IT WORKS IT WORKS!

Lance won the tour again! Must of worked for him too.

Why cant you crasp the fact that everyones not the same and what works for you might not work for someone else and this is a forums site where poeple are being asked for what they believe. I just stated what I believe and you keep bitting back!

Originally posted by zakeen, i respond with >>

So you have just stated before that weight training is good for a Track sprint. So how does a road sprinter sprint differently?? and wouldnt you want to sprint like a track sprinter??

>>a road rider produces no where near the power that a track sprinter produces. Track sprinters have to vastly increase the amount of muscle they have (hypertrophy) to be able to generate that extra power. the extra mass they have and the lack of aerobic capacity won't do them much good in endurance events.

>>the powers required for road sprinting are best trained on the bike on the road (or track) doing sprint intervals

>>i'm also pretty sure that peak power does not significantly differ between elite and non-elite (endurance)


I say again:
Lance states very clearly that he is good from his training.

>>he would hardly stand up and say his training is rubbish would he? (not that i'm suggesting that).


Everyones different and I try different training to see what suits me best. I dont read something and stick to it because someone said it was right! I TRY IT AND IF IT WORKS IT WORKS!

>>and i ask how do you know if you haven't tested it? Field performances suffer from a lack of validity if you don't have objective data (i.e., a power meter).

Lance won the tour again! Must of worked for him too.

Why cant you crasp the fact that everyones not the same and what works for you might not work for someone else and this is a forums site where poeple are being asked for what they believe. I just stated what I believe and you keep bitting back!

>>i'm sorry that you're so upset that i'm replying to your responses. as a moderator, coach, and sport scientist i'd prefer people had information available to them so that they can make a judgement on training. Sure, you might be a special case or untrained and thus the weights might benefit you, but i'd rather make a decision based on some sort of facts.

__________________
http://www.cyclecoach.com

Actually, Ric, I want to differ with you on one point, and I'm uncertain about another.

1) No difference in strength among elite endurance cyclists and untrained people. I would be willing to bet that cyclists are WEAKER in the upper body than untrained civilians!!! The elite riders are truly waif-like. I think there's value to resistance training, even if it doesn't improve performance. Posture benefits alone (i.e., from training your upper back, back, hamstrings, etc.) are worth it. But that's not the question the original poster asked.

2) You mentioned that sprinters need hypertrophy. Is this really accurate? I would think that hypertrophy wouldn't be the answer, but rather the rider simply wants more power (which doesn't always require more mass). I think of the powerlifters who increase their squat poundages dramatically over time and yet don't add much mass (i.e., 135 lb guys squatting 450, etc).