Which is Best (Not a new bike thread!)
Campy King
Posts: 201
For fitness and a bit of weight loss......
A 30 mile ride each evening or a 15 mile ride in the morning and another 15 miles in the envening?
A 30 mile ride each evening or a 15 mile ride in the morning and another 15 miles in the envening?
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They would be more intense (the 15 milers) slightly. Can a mod move this to training please?0
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Because you would recover between the 2, in theory you would do them at a slightly higher intensity (therefore getting better training).
But, you also have to warm up/down twice.0 -
and wash/dry 2 sets of gear I suppose..0
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i don't think you will get a definitive answer to this - and in may ways thats possibly good as mixing up the training (i.e. split sessions one week - 30 milers the next) would probably be best - keep the body guessing and adapting - i.e. changing and getting fitter - is probably for the best.
That said - If I had to pick between one or the other - i'd go for the two 15's
the morning ride is short enough to be done after fasting and may help your body adapt to using fat as an energy source - helping towards your weight loss ambitions,
the second ride - you will have recovered from the morning so can do this at higher intesity - so all 30miles are done at a higher intensity.0 -
Not a simple question to answer. In principle, if you do exercise at the same power for the same amount of time, keeping all other things equal, you'll get exactly the same benefit however the time is broken up.
In practice, you won't exercise at the same power and you won't keep all other things equal
My gut feeling is that if you mostly interested in straightforward cardiovascular fitness + weight loss, _on balance_ you'd probably benefit more from two shorter sessions. That's because I think that you'd exercise more intensively in the second session than you would at the end of a longer session.
I think you'd also end up spending less time on the two shorter sessions than on the one longer session, which may be an advantage if you have other commitments.
The tricky part is figuring out what effect there would be on your eating. If your concerned about weight loss, you don't want to do something that going to encourage you do overeat.
Another problem with cycling in 15-mile bursts, which is what my own circumstances pretty much constrain me to do, is that you become quite good at cycling 15 miles It's not very good practice for longer distances, where the physiological stresses are rather different. 0
