Training benefits of a Club Run

Anonymous

Just wondering people's opinions on this topic. I recently joined a club, they have a good hard Saturday run out usually 40m ish around 20-22mph. They also have a longer run out on the Sunday usually 55-60m at 15-16mph avg. I am yet to go to a Sunday run for two reasons... They happen at 930 when I'm hungover but also, I'm not sure how much use 15mph group cycling would be to my goals.
Instead I'll go out in the afternoon for an hr or two at a more exertive pace on my own. Is there much benefit other than 'time in the saddle'? I doubt that pace would even reach zone 2 for most folks in training. This is obviously approaching the club run from a sociopath training view point rather than the friendly, let's go out for fun, make friends and have a bun aim.

smidsy

More beneficial than your Saturday night binge drinking.

If its easy, use it as your recovery ride.

Herbsman

At this time of year the roads are spilling over with large groups of riders in their club colours benefiting from increased motivation by riding in a group on cold and damp days. This notoriously signals the traditional start to winter preparation for many athletes, emphasising building ‘base’ or ‘endurance’, which is perceived by many as the benefits gained from such training rides.

What actual training stimulus will these rides provide and how effective are they when increasing performance?

How to maximise training stimulus on the weekend group rides.

Anonymous

Too right, that wouldn't be hard. Not much point in using it as a recovery ride at the minute for me though, I'm not getting enough hard miles to needs one.

Anonymous

Herbsman wrote:

At this time of year the roads are spilling over with large groups of riders in their club colours benefiting from increased motivation by riding in a group on cold and damp days. This notoriously signals the traditional start to winter preparation for many athletes, emphasising building ‘base’ or ‘endurance’, which is perceived by many as the benefits gained from such training rides.

What actual training stimulus will these rides provide and how effective are they when increasing performance?

How to maximise training stimulus on the weekend group rides.

Thanks for that, it supports my theory that my time could be better spent knocking my pan in solo for a couple of hours even if my total miles suffer. I try to get in 4 turbo sessions and a couple of 20 m commutes during the week but I can't face more than an hour on the turbo and it's not even close to a high enough load to warrant recovery miles!

poynedexter

join another club? my last club run with ndcc was 84 mile door to door with plenty of opportunities to tow the group along for lots of training benefit.

this time of year is usually a slightly lower pace i'd say (tho still more than enough for me)

alihisgreat

My local club run ends with a 4 mile 'race' and sprint

Not exactly good for training.. especially when your legs go and you still have 10 miles to get home! but my competitive streak means its too hard to resist unfortunately!

Anonymous

poynedexter wrote:

join another club? my last club run with ndcc was 84 mile door to door with plenty of opportunities to tow the group along for lots of training benefit.

this time of year is usually a slightly lower pace i'd say (tho still more than enough for me)

Happy enough with the club, friendly and local and the Saturday run out is a good one. I'm not the fastest there and still have lots to learn. I'm not sure they would appreciate me trying to tow anyone along any faster on the Sunday though, it seems like more of a friendly social run. Was just wondering whether or not I should feel guilty for ducking out of 60 gentle miles in exchange for 30 hard ones.

cyco2

If you want to get something out of that Sunday social ride do it on a heavier bike. Set out to be the slowest bike in the group by getting it to weigh say 35lbs +. Putting heavier tyres (not tires) also helps with reducing punctures. Use an MTB with slicks. When I only had one bike I put lead rods down the seat tube or carried 4 litres of water in a rucksack. Fit shorter cranks. Riding fast on a light bike is not the only way to make it hard.

Herbsman

cyco2 wrote:

If you want to get something out of that Sunday social ride do it on a heavier bike. Set out to be the slowest bike in the group by getting it to weigh say 35lbs +. Putting heavier tyres (not tires) also helps with reducing punctures. Use an MTB with slicks. When I only had one bike I put lead rods down the seat tube or carried 4 litres of water in a rucksack. Fit shorter cranks. Riding fast on a light bike is not the only way to make it hard.

...although increasing the weight of the bike only makes it harder to accelerate and ride up hills (and to slow down). Once you are up to speed it makes little difference.

Best thing to do is put putty in your wheel & BB bearings and allow your chain to rust. This increases resistance on all types of terrain and will increase the required effort by 20-40%, thus negating any drafting benefits.

Trev The Rev

Herbsman wrote:

Although increasing the weight of the bike only makes it harder to accelerate and ride up hills (and to slow down).

Best thing to do is put putty in your wheel & BB bearings and allow your chain to rust. This increases resistance on all types of terrain and will increase the required effort by 20-40%, thus negating any drafting benefits.

Attach fins to the spokes to increase drag.

chrisaonabike

Pedal with only one leg at a time.

cyco2

Herbsman wrote:

cyco2 wrote:

Once you are up to speed it makes little difference.

That is a ridiculous statement to make. Have a really good think about it. The tiny accelerations that take place when pedalling a bike are all effected by the weight of the bike. Even taking all other factors in to account the weight is a significant factor. It doesn't go away once your up to speed.

Your other suggestions are equally just as wonderful. :roll:

Herbsman

cyco2 wrote:

Herbsman wrote:

cyco2 wrote:

Once you are up to speed it makes little difference.

That is a ridiculous statement to make. Have a really good think about it. The tiny accelerations that take place when pedalling a bike are all effected by the weight of the bike. Even taking all other factors in to account the weight is a significant factor. It doesn't go away once your up to speed.

Your other suggestions are equally just as wonderful. :roll:

When riding at a steady speed on flat ground the main form of resistance that you are working against is air resistance. The effect of weight is barely significant in comparison.

Increasing the weight of the bike only makes it harder to work against gravity, for example overcoming the initial rolling resistance when accelerating from low speed, and when riding up hills.

Trev The Rev

Most parts of the UK are never flat though.

Even doing 20mph up only 1% gradient needs approx 76 watts to overcome gravity alone before friction and drag for a 75 kilo rider. At 15 mph up a 2% gradient you would need 114 watts before accounting for friction plus drag.

Small weight savings over even flatish terrain do make a difference but it is only a handful of watts. Once you crank up the gradient though it can become significant. The same 75 kilo rider would need approx 190 watts to do 10mph up a 5% gradient to overcome gravity alone.

Seeing as you spend so much more time going up hill weight savings make a considerable difference on a club run.

Above figures are based on a total weight of a 75 kilo rider plus clothing & bike.

Herbsman

Right. But you are taling about varying gradients, keeping the weight the same at 75kg. We're talking about changing the weight.

Trev The Rev

Herbsman wrote:

Right. But you are taling about varying gradients, keeping the weight the same at 75kg. We're talking about changing the weight.

Yes, but it is easy enough to work out percentage weight savings and percentage savings in watts in your head.........
unless you grew up using calculators and computers to do simple maths.

It makes it more interesting if you do the calculations in nautical miles per hour and use lbs & ozs and horse power then convert to watts but that is best saved for really boring sessions on the turbo.

Generally speaking I would say that if you look at the power meter data from a good long club ride you could brake it down into all sorts of segments and intervals and zones, throw in some jargon, poke it all up a golden cheetah's anus and call it a damn good structured training ride, particularly if you were riding with stronger riders.

themekon

Getting back to the OP. Why can't you just enjoy a clubrun for the pleasure of the ride and the company. Not every ride has to be a training ride and certainly not at this time of year. A lot of people just forget why they started riding a bike in the first place, for the pleasure of it. Don't get hung up on having every ride as a training ride.

Trev The Rev

themekon wrote:

Getting back to the OP. Why can't you just enjoy a clubrun for the pleasure of the ride and the company. Not every ride has to be a training ride and certainly not at this time of year. A lot of people just forget why they started riding a bike in the first place, for the pleasure of it. Don't get hung up on having every ride as a training ride.

What and ride without recording the power data? Wouldn't that mess up your Training Stress Score?

Herbsman

Trev The Rev wrote:

Herbsman wrote:

Right. But you are taling about varying gradients, keeping the weight the same at 75kg. We're talking about changing the weight.

Yes, but it is easy enough to work out percentage weight savings and percentage savings in watts in your head.........
unless you grew up using calculators and computers to do simple maths.

It makes it more interesting if you do the calculations in nautical miles per hour and use lbs & ozs and horse power then convert to watts but that is best saved for really boring sessions on the turbo.

Generally speaking I would say that if you look at the power meter data from a good long club ride you could brake it down into all sorts of segments and intervals and zones, throw in some jargon, poke it all up a golden cheetah's anus and call it a damn good structured training ride, particularly if you were riding with stronger riders.

So at 20mph how many more watts would I, a 75kg rider have to produce up a 1% gradient if I increased the weight of my bike by 10kg? Without using a calculator, please.

Tom Dean

Trev The Rev wrote:

themekon wrote:

Getting back to the OP. Why can't you just enjoy a clubrun for the pleasure of the ride and the company. Not every ride has to be a training ride and certainly not at this time of year. A lot of people just forget why they started riding a bike in the first place, for the pleasure of it. Don't get hung up on having every ride as a training ride.

What and ride without recording the power data? Wouldn't that mess up your Training Stress Score?

You are the only one talking about power meter data in this thread. :roll:

Trev The Rev

10 kilos more weight at 20 mph on a 1% gradient = 8.8 watts more for climbing the gradient, plus up to about 4 watts max rolling resistance & friction (very rough guess).

Herbsman

Wow. A huge 12.8 watts.

Show your working.

Anonymous

themekon wrote:

Getting back to the OP. Why can't you just enjoy a clubrun for the pleasure of the ride and the company. Not every ride has to be a training ride and certainly not at this time of year. A lot of people just forget why they started riding a bike in the first place, for the pleasure of it. Don't get hung up on having every ride as a training ride.

It's exactly because of the time of year that I need to use Saturday and Sunday as training runs. I work a lot of hours and they are the only two days I can ride outside with some sort of light about. I use the turbo during the week but to me it's not the same. I want to get faster more than I want to make friends.

jgsi

if you are stacking your hard training sessions then not a problem as such but maybe learn how to use the turbo more effectively?
if the hardware is letting you down then consider one of the fluid type trainers to give you better ride feel.

Anonymous

Yeh essentially I am stacking them one day to the next at the weekends. Can go pretty hard on the turbo which is a fluid crono, using intervals etc. A few times I've needed scraped off the floor afterwards but can only really manage an hour to an hour 10 then I lose the will/ start getting sore. I feel like I need more base work which I'm much better at outside. Thanks for the advice.

Setarkos

What are your faster club mates (from the Saturday ride) do on Sundays? The least complicated thing to do is just to learn from better riders, if there are any in your club (if possible).

We have a similar ride on the weekends with our uni club and I use them as a L1 ride to train my lipometabolism. I have a non-carb breakfast with focus on protein and unsaturated fat (eggs, yoghurt, quark, avocado, nuts...) and then only have water (with a pinch of salt) during the ~4-5 hour ride. It's very old school training and it's quite controversial but I found it beneficial in the past. Although I focus on endurance and long-distance events in the summer where a good lipometabolism is essential whereas that might not apply to you.

However assuming your turbo sessions are fairly intense already (?) the question is, do you really want to have that much intensity in your training at this time a year?

Anonymous

Turbo sessions are varied between a sweet spot ramp, 2 x 20 , interval training pyramids and occasionally a steady 60mins. Usually get pretty close to max hr on the interval attempts and push myself pretty hard.
The two guys who are significantly faster than me that I have identified, seem to have significantly different working patterns than me one in particular averaging 300m pw from October to now. I simply will never be able to do that so can't really copy him lol!
I'm a newbie, only at cycling 6 months but I'm getting faster week in week and have signed up to race cat 4 next season and hope to be competitive hence me planning to train hard all winter!

Alex_Simmons/RST

Setarkos wrote:

We have a similar ride on the weekends with our uni club and I use them as a L1 ride to train my lipometabolism.

The best training for that is training that improves your threshold power.

Setarkos

Alex_Simmons/RST wrote:

Setarkos wrote:

We have a similar ride on the weekends with our uni club and I use them as a L1 ride to train my lipometabolism.

The best training for that is training that improves your threshold power.

Yes, I've heard that a lot and don't believe that do be wrong. But I have made bad experiencing with focusing on FTP early in the year so I'm limiting specific training for that at the moment. The L1 training does not interfere with my annual FTP plan and FTP remains top priority so the no-carb steady effort stuff is just a plus and it has worked for me quite well in the past. If it wasn't for the club ride I would do 3h @ 190W-200W which is my "lipo threshold" (highest ratio burned fat/burned carbs) but it works in the club ride too.
I'm only focusing on a few events in the summer so I try to peak for those rather than maintaining a high FTP for an entire race season (which might otherwise be sensible for an amateur) to have those few extra Watts when it counts.

Alex_Simmons/RST

Setarkos wrote:

Alex_Simmons/RST wrote:

Setarkos wrote:

We have a similar ride on the weekends with our uni club and I use them as a L1 ride to train my lipometabolism.

The best training for that is training that improves your threshold power.

Yes, I've heard that a lot and don't believe that do be wrong. But I have made bad experiencing with focusing on FTP early in the year so I'm limiting specific training for that at the moment. The L1 training does not interfere with my annual FTP plan and FTP remains top priority so the no-carb steady effort stuff is just a plus and it has worked for me quite well in the past. If it wasn't for the club ride I would do 3h @ 190W-200W which is my "lipo threshold" (highest ratio burned fat/burned carbs) but it works in the club ride too.
I'm only focusing on a few events in the summer so I try to peak for those rather than maintaining a high FTP for an entire race season (which might otherwise be sensible for an amateur) to have those few extra Watts when it counts.

I suspect people sometimes mistakenly equate training that improves threshold as only to mean training with hard aerobic intervals (and sometimes beyond, even though they may not realise it at the time). I'm not saying you are, but that's why I phrase my statement intentionally the way I have.

IOW - one can do quite a lot of training to improve threshold power without ever actually riding at threshold (or beyond).