Originally Posted by fergie
In terms of substituting a short gym session for more time on the bike it doesn't take into account travel to gym or logistics of having a suitable gym or what happens when travelling.
Good thing about training on the bike or on a trainer is you incorporate the intensity within a session.
If I was going to hand my riders over it would be to someone who could get them into better shape. I do a pretty good job of this so they would have to present some pretty good evidence and it would have to be waaaay more than I got em stronger.
Linking these two highlighted statements together you make some more good thoughts.
To add to the logistics of travel and suitability and also make sure that when they do get to the gym they are using good technique so that they do not get injured.
Since I have been in strength and lifting culture for over 30 years I have seen a lot of trends. The hottest current day trend is Cross Fit, which makes some lofty claims and yet I have seen a lot of injuries in the past few years. My chiropractor is big on Cross Fit and yet I have seen his arm in a sling on several occasions due to a shoulder injury. I saw my gym's cross fit coach limping into the gym this morning as I was leaving. I have seen more injured people in the past couple of years than I remember in the past where we took time to learn proper lifting techniques.
I would not go on a crusade against Cross Fit for many reasons, but they train fast and sloppy. From that I believe there will be a rise in injury and from my limited view it seems to be occurring. Not to mention that another money making scheme is to hold a one day certification class for cross fit where anyone willing to pay $$$$ and at the end of they day they walk away with a certificate that allows them to be hired as a CF coach. Most of them don't even know how to lift correctly for themselves, much less, guide someone else to do it in a manner to stimulate adaptation with a lowered risk of injury.
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I also agree with you on the statement of evidence. To me I think the burden is on finding evidence that strength training is applicable or can be transferred somehow to the competitive endurance athlete than it is to prove that it is not beneficial. I am grateful for those like Ronnestad and other who are looking into these issues with studies, but so far I still have questions about those studies that leave me unconvinced.
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To Colnago, I am very open minded about this subject. It would be one thing for me to a pure endurance athlete throwing out statements against strength training for endurance athletes, but I am a former competitive strength athlete. There is nothing I would love more than to think that my 30 plus years of strength training had some sort of transfer to my progress and performance on the bike, but the truth is I have seen absolutely
ZERO sign of the use of strength on the bike since I started cycling in 2004. I like lifting weights, not for cycling, but for general fitness and since I am not an aspiring competitor in endurance sport than it doesn't bother me too much that lifting is distracting to cycling and cycling is distracting to lifting. I accept the fact that me taking a non-specific path toward one or the other will keep me potentially stagnant in both.
Well maybe the one time I was mt biking years ago and from my lack of handling skills I got my front wheel hung on a log crossing. I got really frustrated and used enough force to literally rip the rear derailleur hanger off the bike. Would have been much better to had used finesse to lightly cross over the log than to have used strength that had me walking out of the woods that day.