TRAINING PROGRAM for a 20 MINUTE CLIMBING RACE in



AlexKrill

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Feb 25, 2012
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Hi.

Every year a race is held the 15 june in my home town of Trondheim, where the goal is to climb
7,5 km from the city to the top of the highest local mountain.

The gradient is between 5-10%. http://www.strava.com/rides/ila-skistua-733593

I did a lot of training two years ago, and placed 12 out of around 100 racers.
The time was 21,55.

Now I would like to try it again, but want to cut my time down to under 20 minutes,

______

1) The main question:

Should ALL my workouts be ONLY 20 MINUTES of max output?

OR

Should I START by SPINNING FOR SEVERAL HOURS AT A TIME, and GRADUALLY SHORTEN THE WORKOUTS TO 20 minutes of max output as the race draws closer?

_____

2) I am practicing high cadence, is this useful in such a short race where recovery is not needed?

3) I also plan to drop 5 kg before the race, I am now 77 kg and would like to be 72 kg to ascend faster.
What is the best way and time to do this without loosing strength?


This thread is very specific, but I hope it can also help others who have similar ambitions.

Looking forward to hear feedback from you,

Alex
 
Originally Posted by yishunbicycle .

If you want to drop 5 kg, you must begin now, running is a best way, drop weight but training strength

LOOOOL why would running be better than cycling
 
YMMV but I find it much easier to lose weight doing lots of long but hard miles - upper L2 / L3 work. I haven't been able to find the right balance between dealing with the stress on L4/L5 work and diet to lose weight that way.

I'd definitely give 8 weeks to intervals featuring VO2 max efforts and anaerobic work - much fun can be had with sets of 5 min, 1 min and even 30 second efforts but don't do those exclusively - also add in some long fair hard efforts in too. 1 minute and 30 second efforts in the hills are pure leg killers. Mix it up with in and out of the saddle efforts.

Do a search for "Andy Coggan pursuit training powerpoint" and download the presentation. Heed the notes on aerobic training and pacing. Also note how the training blocks towards the goal event bring up power nicely.

Cadence - whatever gets you up the hill faster is best. Gearing is important too. If you have a powermeter, keep an eye on your power as gradient changes. Subtle changes in gradient can lead to big difference in power output if you keep the speed similar. If you see the gradient ease follow the visual clues as your legs will complain regardless.

But for a 20 minute hill climb I'd treat it just like a regular 20 minute effort except I'd do most of my training in the hills. Make sure that you're always ontop of the gear but never really going too far past threshold. One key area is pacing - do not, under any circumstance, start off too hard. You'll need to find a way to pace the first few minutes to perfection as this will set the pace for the rest of the ride. Go too hard there and you'll lose a lot of time during the remainder of the race. Don't think of it as losing a few seconds at the start because you're not blasting out of the gates at full race effort - think of it as saving a minute or three at the end of the race because you didn't blow up. You can lose a minute in a flat 16km TT by pacing badly at the start - you can lose much much more than that during a long uphill time trial.

Part of your "training" for this event should also include figuring out what you need to do during your warm up in order to be ready to go fairly hard from the start. You can tell this from how you deal with efforts during training. Typically, the shorter the event - the longer the warm up. When you get to the start of the event - if it's a mass start/road race event - being at the front at the start is key. You can either set a pace that suits you, if others are keen to follow, or you can allow yourself to drop back slightly as you transition from the starting effort to race pace. Don't go balls out in the first 2 minutes. If it's a time trial - ramp the effort up from fairly hard to race pace during the first 90 to 120 seconds and ride at threshold until the last few minutes. Saving the "hero" effort for the last 5 to 8 minutes generally gives a higher chance of smiles when looking at the result sheet afterwards.
 
Originally Posted by AlexKrill .

Hi.

Every year a race is held the 15 june in my home town of Trondheim, where the goal is to climb
7,5 km from the city to the top of the highest local mountain.

The gradient is between 5-10%. http://www.strava.com/rides/ila-skistua-733593

I did a lot of training two years ago, and placed 12 out of around 100 racers.
The time was 21,55.

Now I would like to try it again, but want to cut my time down to under 20 minutes,
You need to be 10% stronger than you were last time you did the race. Where are you now?

The best training is to ride the climb as much as possible. Once a day every day looks like an hour or so. That should be doable. Do multiple climbs on days when you have time. Do a hard climb followed by an easy climb on days you feel good.

You don't need to go all out every time. But you do need to learn something every time. Most important is selecting gearing so you can get the most out of the steep sections.
 
I've never trained for something so short so I'm not sure what the right thing is. I'd guess that doing lots of reps of the actual course would be good. You could easily do 2 laps per workout at close to all out I would think. Besides that you probably want to throw in a bunch of 5 minute intervals, especially in the last 5-6 weeks. One other thing: for something so short you want a really good taper at the end.