Training/Racing Advice Needed

Originally Posted by jsirabella

...He advised to start with the Prospect Park race which is shorter and less hilly but most people describe as a crit than a race. Well anyway I got my doors blown off twice at this race, not even being able to keep up for half a lap. I just do not get it, ...

Originally Posted by likes to ride

Has your coach prescribed specific training intervals for high AT work needed? When riding in a group I await at the front or near the front for someone to take a flyer at 28 plus, then I jump hard to get on his wheel. After catching my breath I help to stay away. Another good drill is to do some motor pacing. Have a buddy pace you on a scooter that can go 25-30 mph. As for racing, try to get comfortable in the pack and not at the back. When I first started I was intimidated and stayed at the back. It is an accordian, that has you jumping hard to stay in contact with the pack. In the pack the speed and effort is more constant. Hang in there, it will get easier but keep trying and remember that it takes time to improve. Racing much like training can be very humbling.

Originally Posted by jsirabella

.... Does training really make you better at races or just simply doing more races?

Originally Posted by daveryanwyoming

Training really does help, you need the engine in order to race effectively and you have much more control over how you build that engine during training. As a newcomer, racing and group riding is really important to teach you to ride efficiently, to teach you how to stay on a wheel and to help you get comfortable going fast in the thick of things. But for the most part racing is not the best training. especially not until you can hang with the group. Do races for the fast group riding experience, but don't neglect your other training. Don't fall into the trap of continually trying to taper or be fresh for training races, neglecting that engine building you need to do and just suffering at speeds beyond your comfort zone.

Be careful with this line of reasoning. Sure a fast crit with lots of corners(only one type of bike race) requires a lot of fast accelerations, especially if you're not powerful enough to ride it near the front. But the fastest riders will still have very well trained aerobic fitness and the top finishers will be aerobic for the vast majority of the race. These may seem like a series of anaerobic intervals to you, but as your fitness and speed increase the efforts won't seem so bad.

A rider's ability to perform many rapid accelerations with quick recovery is limited by their long term aerobic fitness. So if you ignore your aerobic fitness and start doing anaerobic interval work you'll increase your top speed and your ability to handle a few short hard efforts but you'll still have trouble completing crits and stifle your longer term progress. I made that mistake for years and suffered accordingly. These days I focus on aerobic work with longer repeats(like 20 minute Threshold efforts or hard 5 minute VO2 max efforts) and my racing including my performance in crits has improved dramatically. Sure some gut busting anaerobic intervals are useful for racing but only on top of well tuned aerobic fitness. If you don't have your basic aerobic engine working well it won't matter what you can do anaerobically for a minute or two.

You did make a very good observation about just putting in miles. I hope your coach is recommending more than just accumulating miles. Big miles without focus or purpose won't make you fast. Moderate weekly mileage at intensities targeting specific fitness adaptations can work wonders. Too many riders think in terms of weekly mileage and don't focus their efforts. If your coach isn't talking to you in terms of 10 to 30 minute steady efforts or 3 to 5 minute repeats with deep near maximal breathing then I'd surf these forums and do some research. Search these forums for info on Sweet Spot Training(SST), FTP, 2x20 interval training, V02 Max intervals(5x5s). Read Hunter and Coggan's book: http://www.amazon.com/Training-Raci...r/dp/1931382794 even if you don't anticipate buying a power meter. There's a lot of really important concepts in that book, especially those related to training specific energy delivery systems. It helps explain why a series of one to two minute make ya puke intervals won't do much for your ability to go fast for an hour or help you climb fast with the race leaders.

I hope you're talking to your coach about this stuff and hope he or she keeps you on a good long term track to improve overall fitness and speed. You're right mileage alone won't get the job done, but don't fall into the other trap of killing yourself with short hard efforts while neglecting your core aerobic fitness.

Good luck,
Dave

Originally Posted by jsirabella

...On the weekdays they are usually 1 to 1.5 hour tempo rides with intervals of 5 X 5 or 8 X 3 in harder gears which he calls VO2 intervals. On the weekends, since the race season began, he would like me to race on Saturday and than a 4 hour endurance ride on Sunday. ...

Originally Posted by daveryanwyoming

That all sounds good. Read up on SST, and L4(Coggan's training levels) work, you might start with these threads: http://www.cyclingforums.com/t397725.html
http://www.cyclingforums.com/t401662.html
http://www.cyclingforums.com/t314849.html
http://www.cyclingforums.com/t397979.html

Then talk to your coach about longer SST or Threshold repeats in your weekly schedule. Some folks go with the "pull up" approach where you work the very top end of aerobic fitness(VO2 max or L5) and hope to pull up your threshold fitness. I've had much better luck with a "push up" approach where you work a lot of L4(threshold), SST and L3(tempo) to increase your core aerobic fitness or sustainable power(FTP) and only focus on L5 a few times a season to periodically raise my aerobic ceiling. Your coach may have very good reasons for not scheduling L4 or SST work in your weekly schedule but I'd definitely take the time to educate yourself and have the discussion.

Personally I find I can maintain a higher training load (CTL in power terms) and avoid burnout with an SST/L4 based push up approach. I still do higher level workouts, but they're not the core of my training week. SST in particular is really good for increasing both FTP and CTL and has been key to coming back from the brink of overtraining after hard periods of racing. You're paying a coach, so don't take my advice, talk to your coach but at least take the time to understand the different approaches.

Good luck and congrats on hanging tough in your race, they will get easier ... and then you'll upgrade

-Dave

Originally Posted by daveryanwyoming

That all sounds good. Read up on SST, and L4(Coggan's training levels) work, you might start with these threads: http://www.cyclingforums.com/t397725.html
http://www.cyclingforums.com/t401662.html
http://www.cyclingforums.com/t314849.html
http://www.cyclingforums.com/t397979.html

Then talk to your coach about longer SST or Threshold repeats in your weekly schedule. Some folks go with the "pull up" approach where you work the very top end of aerobic fitness(VO2 max or L5) and hope to pull up your threshold fitness. I've had much better luck with a "push up" approach where you work a lot of L4(threshold), SST and L3(tempo) to increase your core aerobic fitness or sustainable power(FTP) and only focus on L5 a few times a season to periodically raise my aerobic ceiling. Your coach may have very good reasons for not scheduling L4 or SST work in your weekly schedule but I'd definitely take the time to educate yourself and have the discussion.

Personally I find I can maintain a higher training load (CTL in power terms) and avoid burnout with an SST/L4 based push up approach. I still do higher level workouts, but they're not the core of my training week. SST in particular is really good for increasing both FTP and CTL and has been key to coming back from the brink of overtraining after hard periods of racing. You're paying a coach, so don't take my advice, talk to your coach but at least take the time to understand the different approaches.

Good luck and congrats on hanging tough in your race, they will get easier ... and then you'll upgrade

-Dave

Originally Posted by jsirabella

..So if you are adhering to a training program as you explained with not much endurance riding...how many miles should a person be clocking per wekk or year?...

Originally Posted by daveryanwyoming

It depends upon your goals and your available time to train as well as time to recover. If you've got a whole lot of time on your hands to both train and recover well you can work up to longer rides on a quality over quantity plan but you need to ride them with sufficient intensity. Most amateur cyclists have jobs, families, school or other obligations which limit both training and recovery time. Even full time pros have limits on training and recovery time. If you had the time to work up to a whole lot of quality miles and you had the time and lifestyle to actually recover from that training load then that would be the best of both worlds. In that case your sustainable power (FTP) would go up and your total training load (CTL or Chronic Training Load) would also get quite high which is a real good indicator of how well you'll do in longer races or stage races or as Andy Coggan says the more you train, the more you can train.

Problem is, no one can infinitely pile on both training intensity and training volume. One or the other generally has to give or we burnout and over train. A lot of folks focus on the mileage or training volume side of the equation. If you ignore the training intensity and just accumulate miles you tend to get real good at covering miles but don't necessarily get much faster. There are a ton of weekend century riders who can ride 100 or 200 miles in a day no problem but would have trouble in those fast crits you describe.

So the trick is to spend enough time training on the bike to build a deep enough training base (CTL) while riding with enough intensity to encourage the desired fitness adaptations (increased power over desired durations, VO2 Max, FTP, etc.). And you need to allow enough time for your body to recover and to get stronger between these workouts as well.

Anyway, to answer your question, back in the day I typically rode 250 to 300 miles per week and 400+ mile weeks weren't uncommon. This year I only have a handful of weeks over 200 miles and those were weeks that ended with weekend stage races. I only have a few rides over 100 miles this year including the Markleeville Death Ride which felt great even without a lot of big training miles beforehand. I typically train 10 to 12 hours per week and most of that is Tempo riding or harder. I race masters these days so my road races are typically 50 to 80 miles long and crits are less than an hour.

100 to 150 a week could be enough if you ride those with sufficient intensity and have them spread out throughout the week. If you do that all in just a couple of days or spend a lot of them riding easily then no, it's not enough. More is better if you can sustain the appropriate intensity, but again that depends on your goals and your available time to train and to recover.

Hope that helps,
-Dave
P.S. While you're waiting for Andy and Hunter's book you might check the power training acronym stickies: http://www.cyclingforums.com/t386984.html
It doesn't explain it all, but might help with some of the alphabet soup

Originally Posted by YMCA

Bike handling is about experience and relaxation. Give yourself time. Ride with others, as often a possible. Don't overanalyze any one situation. If it's crashing you are worried about, then your disadvantage is that you are not letting your reflexes, or brain work naturally.

Tense = bad
Carefree, but aware = good

Some things that may help:
-loose grip on the bar
-riding position neutral
-sit up no handed and feel the bike move back and forth under you (try in tennis shoes first)
-learn to hop curbs, jump potholes, etc (sometimes you don't have an out and need these capabilities)
-breathe, don't panic

Don't forget, the more you ride, the more you become one with that bike. Kind of corny, but very true.