Best Training Book

[jagler]

not for a beginner, not for the overweight 50 year old cyclist with a $10,000 bike.... what is the best training book for a cyclist who wants to compete at a high level?

I was searching around on Amazon.com and it seems that the "Cyclist's Training Bible" is the best training book around. Any other suggestions? Thanks.

 

[rt1965]

Well, I am a 50 pound overweight beginner, but I do know a good book when I see one! I would check out Chris Carmichael's books. Very detailed and advanced stuff. And, I for one wouldn't rely on one book as the best, but a few different books in which you could take information from each and design a personal training plan that works for you.

Actually I'm not a beginner, just starting over after a quite a few years off.

 

[dkrenik]

not for a beginner, not for the overweight 50 year old cyclist with a $10,000 bike.... what is the best training book for a cyclist who wants to compete at a high level?

I was searching around on Amazon.com and it seems that the "Cyclist's Training Bible" is the best training book around. Any other suggestions? Thanks.

Wow. There are lots of them. Joe Friel's books are good. David Morris also has a training book out for more advanced riders. The before mentioned Chris Charmichael books have good content as well as Arnie Baker.

I wouldn't recommend any one of them over another. I'd recommend getting as many as possible and take the parts that work for you and your circumstances. Either that or just get a coach and a power meter.

 

[MY02_STi]

Joe Friel's 'Training Bible' and Andy Coggan's 'Training and Racing with a Power Meter'.

Get both and you can't go wrong

 

[jagler]

a power meter? Does that tell you how many watts you're producing? What's the point of that? Another device to waste your money on so you can feel special? Same goes for a HR monitor... what's the point in them? As long as you feel like you're working hard that's all that matters.

 

[Spunout]

a power meter? Does that tell you how many watts you're producing? What's the point of that? Another device to waste your money on so you can feel special? Same goes for a HR monitor... what's the point in them? As long as you feel like you're working hard that's all that matters.

Read. You will understand.

 

[dkrenik]

a power meter? Does that tell you how many watts you're producing? What's the point of that? Another device to waste your money on so you can feel special? Same goes for a HR monitor... what's the point in them? As long as you feel like you're working hard that's all that matters.

Oh yeah. They said the same about cars, cell phones, computers, and calculators

 

[ToffoIsMe]

a power meter? Does that tell you how many watts you're producing? What's the point of that? Another device to waste your money on so you can feel special? Same goes for a HR monitor... what's the point in them? As long as you feel like you're working hard that's all that matters.

You have put yourself beyond being helped...

 

[zaskar]

a power meter? Does that tell you how many watts you're producing? What's the point of that? Another device to waste your money on so you can feel special? Same goes for a HR monitor... what's the point in them? As long as you feel like you're working hard that's all that matters.

Read the book and get over your ignorance.

 

[zaskar]

not for a beginner, not for the overweight 50 year old cyclist with a $10,000 bike.... what is the best training book for a cyclist who wants to compete at a high level?

Thanks.

Are you going to compete at a high level on your Walmart bike

 

[Duffy Pratt]

If your goal is to compete (at any level, forget a high level for now), you really should use a heart rate monitor, or a wattage meter, or something else that accurately guages the intensity of your workouts. If you go just by your subjective feeling that you are working hard, you will almost inevitably overtrain, subject yourself to unnecessary injuries and illnesses, and progress less quickly.

People are notoriously bad at judging their own efforts. Competitive and ambitious people are even worse at this. Alot of training for cycling is low intensity, and increasing the intensity actually ends up being counter-productive.

In general, the more information you can gather and analyze, the better. The minimum amount of information I would want to have available to me at any time is the time, my cadence, and my heart rate. Terrain conditions would also be nice, but I live in Houston, so its largely irrelevant (the only question being whether you are with or against the wind.)

BTW, if you are right, and the only thing that matters is that it feels like you are working hard, then there is no need to buy any training book at all. Just go out and ride til it feels like you are working hard. When you burn out, or get a low grade summer cold, you can come back and ask why you don't seem to be making any progress.

Duffy

 

[frenchyge]

If you go just by your subjective feeling that you are working hard, you will almost inevitably overtrain, subject yourself to unnecessary injuries and illnesses, and progress less quickly.

If he reads Friel, as was suggested, I don't think there's any chance of him overtraining. In addition to expounding the evils of overtraining in nearly every section of the training chapters, Friel has also included a whole separate chapter devoted to overtraining. You know..... in case the reader missed it.

 

[whoawhoa]

If he reads Friel, as was suggested, I don't think there's any chance of him overtraining. In addition to expounding the evils of overtraining in nearly every section of the training chapters, Friel has also included a whole separate chapter devoted to overtraining. You know..... in case the reader missed it.

On a more note, I think that the emphasis on avoiding overtraining is one of the reasons that the Friel method/book is so popular. Because, after months of cross-training, weight lifting, and riding easy on the bike, when you finally do add in quality efforts fitness comes fast, and it's easy to believe the whole yearly plan set you up for that "peak."

 

[kmavm]

On a more note, I think that the emphasis on avoiding overtraining is one of the reasons that the Friel method/book is so popular. Because, after months of cross-training, weight lifting, and riding easy on the bike, when you finally do add in quality efforts fitness comes fast, and it's easy to believe the whole yearly plan set you up for that "peak."

Yes. What's more, I think this can be a perfectly legitimate, if unintentional, benefit of the folkloric "lotsa-base, weights-in-the-winter," approach.

I was thinking about this on the ride in this AM. Realistically, for most "trained" cyclists who've been at it for more than a few seasons, you can get into a "trained" state (say, ~95% of peak condition) relatively quickly; a couple months really ought to do it. The benefit of all those weights and cross-training and whatnot is simply keeping you healthy, active, and somewhat mentally fresh for the real work of training for the year. So, maybe "weights" don't help, per se, but perhaps they help avoid long-term burnout by providing a distraction that keeps the rider off the bike for at least a month or two out of the year. Anything would do: kickball, pilates, judo, etc., as long as it kept you from riding the damned bike. Weights may have the additional benefit of placebo, since so many riders swear by them.

One major, major downside of the emphasis on avoiding overtraining is the "institutionalized overtraining" phenomenon: http://www-rohan.sdsu.edu/dept/coachsci/csa/vol13/rushall7.htm
Keep in mind that there are no surefire physiological markers for overtraining; as near as anyone can tell, the simplest explanation for it is that it is psychogenic. By worrying about overtraining, you might set unintentionally foster a fragile, delicate self-image, and end up interpreting any little twinge of fatigue or a few bad workouts as "overtraining." Ironically, your best bet to avoid overtraining might be to not worry about it.

 

[acoggan]

Ironically, your best bet to avoid overtraining might be to not worry about it.

...which is a nice segue to what I see as the real advantage of "block" training: you rely on quantitative feedback (i.e., inability to perform the prescribed training at the planned intensity/for the planned duration) to determine when you have overreached, and thus take some R&R before you can overtrain. At least in theory, over time this means that you've trained hard just as often as you can possibly can, but not more.

 

[whoawhoa]

I was thinking about this on the ride in this AM. Realistically, for most "trained" cyclists who've been at it for more than a few seasons, you can get into a "trained" state (say, ~95% of peak condition) relatively quickly; a couple months really ought to do it.

What makes you think this? I can't imagine many cyclists get near their potential without many years of training or relatively poor genetics.

 

[whoawhoa]

...which is a nice segue to what I see as the real advantage of "block" training: you rely on quantitative feedback (i.e., inability to perform the prescribed training at the planned intensity/for the planned duration) to determine when you have overreached, and thus take some R&R before you can overtrain. At least in theory, over time this means that you've trained hard just as often as you can possibly can, but not more.

which is a perfect lead in to a question I have (somewhat rhetorical): What is the benefit of a day-by-day or week-by-week plan nailing down the microstructure of training, when you can use quantitative measures (power meters) to continuously evaluate progress, training load, and their relationship and use that information to influence your training?

 

[dkrenik]

which is a perfect lead in to a question I have (somewhat rhetorical): What is the benefit of a day-by-day or week-by-week plan nailing down the microstructure of training, when you can use quantitative measures (power meters) to continuously evaluate progress, training load, and their relationship and use that information to influence your training?

My guess is that a good coach will take those "quantitative measures" to create a plan that incorporates the appropriate load & stress. I'd think that they would also adjust the plan for when life doesn't go as planned.

 

[snaps10]

a power meter? Does that tell you how many watts you're producing? What's the point of that? Another device to waste your money on so you can feel special? Same goes for a HR monitor... what's the point in them? As long as you feel like you're working hard that's all that matters.

a. than why do you need a book if you can just feel like your working hard and get the same results

b. wanna race for $100? read and ye shall learn

 

[whoawhoa]

My guess is that a good coach will take those "quantitative measures" to create a plan that incorporates the appropriate load & stress. I'd think that they would also adjust the plan for when life doesn't go as planned.

But most plans are at least fairly long term, meaning the information you used to create it could be out-of-date for an athlete fairly quickly.