How useful a workout is this?

smoo

I've never really got into serious training in the sense of monitoring the amount of time I spend in various HR zones; to be honest I just like to do what feels good, I think I'd get really bored doing lots of low-intensity stuff. In the winter I have to rely on the indoor trainer (Tacx Fortius), so if anything I do more high-intensity, short duration cycling in the winter and more long rides in the summer, which I know is the opposite of what you're supposed to do...

Anyway, I was wondering if I could tweak or supplement what I currently do to get more benefit from it. I know I'm going to be advised to do more long distance, low intensity stuff, but that's just not going to happen in the winter I'm afraid, it's just TOO boring on the trainer and there's snow & ice outside (Finland)... maybe in the spring / early summer.

One of the sessions I do most often is the Colma di Sormano route in the Tour of Lombardy RLV (Ghisallo-Nesso); it has a little downhill to warm up, a big climb, and then a long descent to recover, with a little flat bit just after the summit to push the pace up again briefly after the initial recovery (I also try to up the pace a bit just before the finish).

If I do sessions like this regularly, what sort of benefits will it have? How could I best supplement this to get greater all-round benefits, without getting into really long sessions? (this takes just under an hour). I'm guessing some sort of intervals, but what type? Here's the profile from the Fortius (red=HR, green=power, pink=cadence, blue=kmh). The watts are probably not very accurate, cadence and HR should be. I'm 64kg, maximum HR about 195, resting 50-55. Thanks for any help.

willbevan

Can't give any real technical feedback, but i would say if it keeps you riding its better than doing LSD and giving up!!!

like you i hate doing miles on the turbo, currently only doing MAP tests on my iMagic, only thing that keeps me going when I do is knowing that I will be one training session up for next session on the guys i want to beat lol, but then i have beeb bitten by the tt bug, and this is my first proper wnter training (started biking last winter to loose weight)

Alex_Simmons/RST

smoo wrote:

I've never really got into serious training in the sense of monitoring the amount of time I spend in various HR zones; to be honest I just like to do what feels good, I think I'd get really bored doing lots of low-intensity stuff. In the winter I have to rely on the indoor trainer (Tacx Fortius), so if anything I do more high-intensity, short duration cycling in the winter and more long rides in the summer, which I know is the opposite of what you're supposed to do...

It is?

smoo wrote:

Anyway, I was wondering if I could tweak or supplement what I currently do to get more benefit from it. I know I'm going to be advised to do more long distance, low intensity stuff, but that's just not going to happen in the winter I'm afraid, it's just TOO boring on the trainer and there's snow & ice outside (Finland)... maybe in the spring / early summer.

Well LSD will make you good at going slow. Intervals and courses that provide a range of High(er) Intensity Training (HIT) are good for winter work. Keeps the length of efforts short but quality high.

smoo wrote:

If I do sessions like this regularly, what sort of benefits will it have? How could I best supplement this to get greater all-round benefits, without getting into really long sessions? (this takes just under an hour). I'm guessing some sort of intervals, but what type? Here's the profile from the Fortius (red=HR, green=power, pink=cadence, blue=kmh). The watts are probably not very accurate, cadence and HR should be. I'm 64kg, maximum HR about 195, resting 50-55. Thanks for any help.

See here for a few thoughts:
http://www.cyclecoach.com/index.php?opt ... Itemid=113

celbianchi

I agree with Alex. I am not a coach but as preparation for the race season I do a number of short 90 min to 2 hour sessions throughout the winter where I will do hill reps in both big and small gears, interval sessions on the turbo.

In my opinion, riding for 6 hours on a Sunday at 16mph does not help me much when it comes to race time. I certainly believe in the theory that if you do a lot of low intensity riding all through the winter, then you will become good at slow steady riding.

fuzzynavel

celbianchi wrote:

In my opinion, riding for 6 hours on a Sunday at 16mph does not help me much when it comes to race time. I certainly believe in the theory that if you do a lot of low intensity riding all through the winter, then you will become good at slow steady riding.

Mid intensity rides are decent fat burners (correct me if I am wrong). If you are a little overweight like me and need to lose the pounds before starting proper training then these are pretty useful.
You are right about it not being too useful for racing though and is probably the wrong thing to keep doing if you are already down at your ideal weight.
Heart rate zones are said to be slightly inaccurate too compared to power measurements. Maybe you should train using that feature of the Fortius. It may not be the most accurate measurement but it should be out by the same amount consistently so should be a decent training aid to let you see any improvement.

smoo

Thanks everyone, yeah, I'd heard conflicting advice about the benefits of "getting the miles in" during the winter (as opposed to shorter, high intensity sessions) and read things in magazines suggesting that this was no longer thought to be as beneficial. Certainly I feel better doing higher intensity stuff, it feels like it's doing something

I pretty much use the power readings (and time over a certain course) on the Fortius to measure improvement, as long as tyre pressure etc. is the same each time it is quite consistent I think, whether or not it's accurate.

fuzzynavel

It doesn't matter if it is accurate as long as it is out by the same margin all the time. you are only racing against yourself so it will be more than good enough to show if you have improved or not.