What are some good sessions on the wind trainer

You can replace it with most of the sessions you'd normally do on the road, although most programmes I've seen, don't recommend you do much more than 45-60 mins. I think you're right that 60 is equivalent to roughly 90 on the road.

I've just been spinning on mine whilst watching the Tour, doing intervals during the commercial breaks...

I find it best to keep the trainer for intervals.

One of my 40 minute sessions is the same as a 6 hour ride, given that it takes the same amount of time for my legs to recover!

Originally posted by kiwiboy
What are some of your efforts that you do on the trainer?
I used to do mainly efforts for TT but currently riding for stage races only, the weather here has been very bad with allot of snow and rain.
Love to here some ideas

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I posted this on the Tacx thread:

Turbos are generally not advocated for rides in excess of 1 hour, so I generally find mine good for 5 things:
1/ Warm up before a race
2/ Recovery spins
3/ Interval training
4/ Short time-trial racing against other 'web-riders' on the Tacx i-magic.
5/ Isolated Leg training

In terms of intervals, there is a great discussion which you should read in the thread entitled: "Volume / Sessions per week needed for some success"

Originally posted by Shibumi
I posted this on the Tacx thread:

Turbos are generally not advocated for rides in excess of 1 hour, so I generally find mine good for 5 things:
1/ Warm up before a race
2/ Recovery spins
3/ Interval training
4/ Short time-trial racing against other 'web-riders' on the Tacx i-magic.
5/ Isolated Leg training

In terms of intervals, there is a great discussion which you should read in the thread entitled: "Volume / Sessions per week needed for some success"

Click to expand...

I see no reason why turbos/wind trainers can't be used in excess of 1-hr. Many times during the winter, when the weather has been dire, i've done long steady sessions on the trainer, anything up to 3-hrs at a constant load. It's good, quality training, if mind numbingly boring (you need music or TV on!).

As there's generally no freewheeling on a turbo, riding on them is much more time efficient. Roughly, 30% of all outdoor rides (with the exception of flat TTs) are freewheeling. Thus, 1-hr ride is approximately equivalent to a 90-min ride.

Sometimes, when training indoors, i'll reduce the duration by one third, while others time i'll keep it as.

Ric

All the intervals that can be done out on the road, can virtually always be replicated indoors on the trainer. The only exception i can currently think of is that of sprinting.

Most commercial trainers, cannot replicate the resistances required for sprinting, even at my dire sprint level. So, if your session requires sprints, then don't do them on the trainer!

Ric

Trainers are one of the best ways to get fit. You can do your workout without the typical distractions/obstacles found on the road. Many top riders use trainers to do their most intese work.

You can go as long or short as you like, but by far the best way to ride a trainer is to know ahead of time exactly what you are going to do.
If you have a plan and break the ride up into sections, it will be much easier mentally to deal with staring at the wall. Continuous rides over an hour are fine if you can stand them, but I would rather do 60-90 minutes of intervals and be done with it.

Let's say you have an hour to ride indoors. First, you should warm up and cool down for at least 15 minutes, so that's 30 minutes right there. That leaves 30 minutes for "work." Of course, you will need recovery between intervals so that will eat into the 30 minute work period as well. 3x5 minutes of hard "work" is 15 minutes and 3x5 minutes of recovery pedalling easy (5 min after the warmup and 2x5 min between intervals) is another 15 minutes.

That makes for a solid 60 minute workout. Only having to think for 5 minutes at a time (in this case) keeps your mind fresh instead of just pedalling for an hour without a plan. You will get fitter and faster by going harder for 5 minutes than if you rode for an hour continously also, since you can go faster for 5 minutes than you can for 60 minutes.

Trainers are best for warmups at races and for doing high-intensity interval training. They are so important, especially for racers. Even more importantly, it is not enough to simply own one.
You must know how to use a trainer to extract the full benefits they can provide. It is also extremely important to have at least one very powerful fan to cool you. If you sweat a lot with a fan on, it is not powerful enough.

Enjoy your intervals!!!