Training advice?

Fat Bird

In a bid to lose weight I have entered myself into Race the Sun this September (total of 50 miles cycling, about 7 off road, climb of Helvellyn and a kyaking course on Thirlmere). I began training in February having done absolutely nothing for a long time. At the moment I'm cycling about 18 miles three or four times during in the week commuting to work and about 20 on either Saturdays or Sundays. I've also started doing weights twice a week. I'm hoping to up my weekend ride to around 30 miles starting tomorrow.
My question is am I doing enough? What kind of distance should I aim to be achieving in order to complete the event?
Any advice is greatfully received!

XxxBFGxxX

if you a tring to lose weight after not dong any thing at all you realy need to have rest days as you will burn ya self out. I know tis as i am trying to lose weight and often dont rest and suffer.

Fat Bird

Hi BFG,

I do have at least one rest day a week & sometimes two if I'm feeling really knackered. I'm just worried that I'm not doing enough. Do you think I need to be regularly completing 50 mile rides before the event??

XxxBFGxxX

that i cant comment on. but i am sure some one will pop along soon and help out

Klein XC

Fat Bird wrote:

Do you think I need to be regularly completing 50 mile rides before the event??

Personally, I would definitely complete a 50 mile ride before the event, and preferably quite a few times to get used to this distance, otherwise it might come as quite a shock on race day, which is not what you want.

However, the difficulty of all rides depends on the amount of hills in them. In terms of fitness and training, the more hills the better! But they can be sore sights on race day

In summary, train sensibly, don't burn yourself out and don't push yourself over the limit too often (e.g. to near collapsing point). I've recently started training again after some years out of racing, and I have to force myself to be sensible, as I have a habit of over-training.

punctureboy

try to add 10% to your weekend ride every week, time wise not distance. most weeks you should find that your distance will naturally increase too, but if your having an off day this will help avoid problems from pushing yourself too much.

if your training to finish rather than be competetive use the mantra train hard race easy. that doesnt mean push yourself to the limit every ride, it means train to cope with the worst the race could throw at you. so as klein xc says hit the hills. it doesnt have to be fast, so long as you build up your mileage on the worst terrain you can find.

if you build up to 1-2 50 milers fine. if you can build up to more than that great, so long as you keep within the 10%. the longer your long ride is before the race the easier the race will be. i always try to build my endurance up to double the race distance, but this is clearly unrealistic for your race distance and time limits!

Fat Bird

Thanks for all your advice guys - really apprieciate it! Looks like I need to find some hills!

Emma

mea00csf

I would also build in cut back weeks to give you body a chance to catch up. Build for 3 weeks, then cut back and take it easy for one. You'll find that the week after your rest week you'll be feeling fantastic and really able to push on with the training.

It feels like wasted time but trust me it isn't. You'll be able to train harder for 3 weeks with a rest week incorporated.