best use of 1hr turbo training time

gubber12345

how best can i put this hr to good use.i haven't been cycling long and as i work long hrs i can only really get in 1hr 3 nights a week and then out on a saturday morning for a cycle of about 30 miles.

i'm really only wanting to be able to get my avg speed up a bit,(avg about 16 mph at the min)lose a bit of weight and maybe be able to climb a bit better as i'm completely useless at it.

maybe an hr isn't enough to try an achieve this but any thots about what i could do to improve anything would be a help.

JamesFree

2 x 20 minutes at Threshold

Alex_Simmons/RST

There's a lot one can do with 3 x 1 hour turbo sessions per week. The challenge is to make them interesting enough to keep going over the longer haul, as fitness will improve with consistent training.

There is no such thing as one perfect workout, but in general (provided you are fit/healthy etc) then you will want to eventually* include efforts that are somewhat fatiguing once or twice per week, and have quality endurance pace work the rest of the time. That's a really broad description I know but hard to be more specific without specific knowledge of you.

It could be anything from a series of 30-sec on 30-sec off efforts 5-min at a time, through to the full hour ridden as hard as you can sustainably maintain, with a nearly infinite number of variations in "intervals" possible in between. Efforts could be more random or pseudo-randomly hard, such as simulation of hard outdoor riders (often using a form of external motivation such as training videos, software and music).

As a rule of thumb though, riding super hard too often can lead to a drop in motivation, so dose those high intensity efforts carefully, or on the harder ride days stick to moderate to hard aerobic work (an effort level you could maximally maintain for 20-60-minutes if your life depended on it), but broken into smaller chunks of time from 2 to 20-min.

Also suggest using a high power fan to maintain your cool, as keeping body temp regulated properly will enable higher power output and a greater training stimulus.


* I say eventually, as not everyone is quite ready to do such higher intensity work straight away.

gubber12345

Alex_Simmons/RST wrote:

There's a lot one can do with 3 x 1 hour turbo sessions per week. The challenge is to make them interesting enough to keep going over the longer haul, as fitness will improve with consistent training.

There is no such thing as one perfect workout, but in general (provided you are fit/healthy etc) then you will want to eventually* include efforts that are somewhat fatiguing once or twice per week, and have quality endurance pace work the rest of the time. That's a really broad description I know but hard to be more specific without specific knowledge of you.

It could be anything from a series of 30-sec on 30-sec off efforts 5-min at a time, through to the full hour ridden as hard as you can sustainably maintain, with a nearly infinite number of variations in "intervals" possible in between. Efforts could be more random or pseudo-randomly hard, such as simulation of hard outdoor riders (often using a form of external motivation such as training videos, software and music).

As a rule of thumb though, riding super hard too often can lead to a drop in motivation, so dose those high intensity efforts carefully, or on the harder ride days stick to moderate to hard aerobic work (an effort level you could maximally maintain for 20-60-minutes if your life depended on it), but broken into smaller chunks of time from 2 to 20-min.

Also suggest using a high power fan to maintain your cool, as keeping body temp regulated properly will enable higher power output and a greater training stimulus.


* I say eventually, as not everyone is quite ready to do such higher intensity work straight away.

thanks for that alex,i like the sound of the 30 sec on/off for the hr.but i get what your saying about mixing it up to stop it getting boring.i do use some dvd's that i bought..especially the carmichael training one i have which does a routine of 2 min intervals with a 1 min recovery period.but you have given me a few ideas so thank you for that.

i'm prob not the fittest guy that ever threw my leg over a bar but not the worst either :P but i want to improve just to try and make it easier to stay with the guys i cycle with....i always get left on the hills which is one area i would like to improve on.

i'l also try jamesfree's 2 x 20 min threshold and see how that works out as well.

i suppose if i keep doing a few hill repeats its bound to improve the climbing ability....seeing as i live in a small valley finding a hill aint gonna be a problem

danlikesbikes

This website is a pretty good source - http://www.turbotraining.co.uk

Basically free to sign up & people log your sessions, advantage being that lots of people make their workouts public so you can see what others are doing and borrow their sessions or adapt to your own needs.

petemadoc

Why has no-one mentioned sufferfest?

for your average Joe, this is most likely the best way to use an hour.

Tom Dean

PeteMadoc wrote:

Why has no-one mentioned sufferfest?

Because it's the actual training that matters, not what video you watch while doing it.

sancho_panza

Got to second the sufferfest suggestion. I've managed to take what was three hours maximum a week of boredom and struggle to five hours a week of structured, entertaining and damn hard training. The vids are marvellous and I can't wait for the new one which is promised to be 110 minutes long! I'm managing up to 90 minutes a session, which would have been quite frankly unthinkable before I got these videos.

I'm not a coach or sports scientist but I'd be confident assuming they're pretty useful from a serious training point of view. Intervals and variety etc. I just used to grind out at sub threshold for 60 minutes; whereas now my average power will be the same as before but with much more variety in there ("power" measured by a Tacx Flow, most likely inaccurate but also consistent).

Have fun!

Sancho P

petemadoc

Tom Dean wrote:

PeteMadoc wrote:

Why has no-one mentioned sufferfest?

Because it's the actual training that matters, not what video you watch while doing it.

Sufferfest not serious enough for you?

Herbsman

Tom Dean wrote:

PeteMadoc wrote:

Why has no-one mentioned sufferfest?

Because it's the actual training that matters, not what video you watch while doing it.

Exactly... Some people seem to hold Sufferfest up as the holy grail of turbo training. As if it's the best thing on earth since sliced bread and deep section carbon rims. Why is that?

It's all well and good having something to make training less tedious and provide external motivation to train, but that's not going to help you win races.

napoleond

Best use of a turbo trainer for an hour is to hide away on it, spinning very lightly whilst playing black ops 2 drinking coffee or wine.

twotyred

Alex' advice IMHO to mix things up is spot on and happens to be what I do. Use DVDs, Trainerroad, anything to keep boredom at bay.

Beware of doing too much Sufferfest. If done properly these are damn hard sessions and you could easily end up overdoing things and losing motivation. Personally I'd keep Sufferfest to one a week maximum.

petemadoc

Herbsman wrote:

Tom Dean wrote:

PeteMadoc wrote:

Why has no-one mentioned sufferfest?

Because it's the actual training that matters, not what video you watch while doing it.

Exactly... Some people seem to hold Sufferfest up as the holy grail of turbo training. As if it's the best thing on earth since sliced bread and deep section carbon rims. Why is that?

It's all well and good having something to make training less tedious and provide external motivation to train, but that's not going to help you win races.

Where does the OP mention wanting to win races?

Sufferfest makes things interesting and will give you a good interval based workout. People make training way more complicated than it needs to be for the average person.

I'd agree that 3 sufferfest sessions a week is too much. 1 or 2 with some steady rides or rest days in between.

Tom Butcher

Each to their own - I bought a couple of sufferfests but I don't get on with them - for me having to look at a screen and check if I'm actually at effort level 7 or 8 or my cadence is what it's telling me it should be is a distraction to actually working hard.

Maybe in a spin class type environment they would work better for me but in my garage on the turbo I prefer to keep it simple - a set of work and recovery intervals and a watch to tell me when to start and stop. When a session is really hard I'd struggle to actually concentrate on anything but working hard anyway. Sufferfest is just a way of motivating yourself - if they work for you great but they're not for everyone.

phreak

Re Sufferfest, surely it's important to train according to what it is you want to achieve or improve? If a Sufferfest video matches up with that then fine, but don't lose track of your end goal.

If you want to complete sportives for instance doing short, sprint type intervals won't be much help, but if criteriums are your thing then it might well be useful.

Whether something is entertaining or even hard should be of secondary concern to whether it's actually useful for your personal goals.

stueys

Trainer road.com and follow the plans. Well structured and trainerroad keeps you entertained. Sufferfest is good but agree with previous posts, 1 or 2 a week is plenty. I also like the Carmichael TCC plans.

I'd try to ride more regularly, I found going from 3/4 rides a week to 5/6 made a noticeable difference.

cocksey

If you're doing the hurtbox sufferfest stuff for a maximum of 1/2 times a week, if you can't get out due to the weather e.g. snow do you just do steady state stuff on the turbo?

Obvious suggestion is mtb, but I don't have one!

Wrath Rob

Stueys wrote:

Trainer road.com and follow the plans. Well structured and trainerroad keeps you entertained. Sufferfest is good but agree with previous posts, 1 or 2 a week is plenty. I also like the Carmichael TCC plans.

I'd try to ride more regularly, I found going from 3/4 rides a week to 5/6 made a noticeable difference.

Whether you use TR or not (I do) is by the by. Having a plan of what you're going to do for those 3 sessions is key. Write it down in a plan and you're much more likely to do it. And by consciously making a plan you'll be thinking of what you want to improve and therefore the kind of sessions you want to do to stimulate the right response.