HR based indoor routines

raymond82

I signed up for a gym this year to complement riding outside on evenings during weekdays. I tried virtual spinning but the guy that makes you stand up and sit down all the time drives me nuts so I'm looking for HR based workouts that I can do on the spinning bike. I can't seem to find any, I've been doing 6 blocks of 2 minutes interval/2 minutes rest but I have no idea about whether this is effective. Also it would be nice to have workouts with a bit more variation. Does anyone have any advice on this?

Thanks!

bahzob

When getting back to fitness and as a break from from test based zone training I use a "bottom up" approach to training. It works especially well for indoor work. (because it uses distance travelled as your training measure, which should be pretty consistent between workouts).

This is pretty simple, requires no maths or equipment other than the distance measure and a clock. I find it quite motivating since, at first at least, you can see yourself improving every time you ride.

What you do is pick 3-5 time intervals,

- one "long" (30minutes plus)
- one/two "medium" (15-20 minutes)
- one/two "short" (1-5 minutes)

Training then consists of riding each interval at a moderate-hard pace and record the distance travelled in the time.

Important: You deliberately do not go balls out on the first time you do each one, the purpose of these is just to set a base line. Just go hard enough to ensure you are breathing quite hard.
- "long" - just do the one interval
- "medium" - do 2 repeats, 5-10 mins rest between each, aim that you go a bit further on the second repeat.
- "short"do 4-6 repeats, rest interval=work interval

Following these first runs you will have a "personal best" (PB) distance for each time interval. Training then simply consists of repeating the runs, each time trying to better your previous PB.

You can plan these in advance, e.g. if you have 5 PBS rotate in sequence, or just go for what you feel like.

On each run you don't need to bust a gut, just do enough to beat your previous PB. This is quite motivating and also gives you a chance to note other stuff like HR, relative effort, watts and the like if you want to.

Eventually you will hit a limit and be unable to improve a given interval. Once this happens you can do any or all of the below:
- Just do one repeat set a pace from the off that is quick enough to set a new PB and give it everything you have. Record the result and keep this as a reference point for your best ever fitness level. This can then be used calculate a "threshold" level should you want to swap to using training zones for a change of scene.
- Change the interval: do a bit longer at the same pace or a bit less time at a slightly faster pace, set a PB for this and then try to improve that one
- Skip the interval for a couple of weeks then try again
- Have a recovery week and try again.
- Choose a different music track/video and try again (seriously, I've improved all my PBs just by doing this)
- Change something like bike setup, training environment (especially ventilation), cadence, pacing and try again (again I've improved all my PBs by doing one or more of these)

raymond82

Thanks for your replies! I believe that HR is not a very good indicator of effort in the gym, however it's all I can go by as the spinning bikes in the gym don't show any data at all... Then in stead I guess what I need is just a workout schedule to go by, in the end the spinning classes are also built up like this.

bahzob, I quite like your training method, especially since it allows for checking any progress. I would really like to have a power meter for exactly that purpose but can't afford one right now. Using distance traveled as a readout for fitness is very useful, the problem again is that the spinning bike doesn't give this info. I could do trainings like this on the other bikes they have in the gym though, just to measure my fitness on a regular basis. It's just a shame that these fitness bikes have such horrible geometry and huge seats but I guess the distance traveled is a good relative measure to see if my fitness increases.

Alex_Simmons/RST

raymond82 wrote:

I signed up for a gym this year to complement riding outside on evenings during weekdays. I tried virtual spinning but the guy that makes you stand up and sit down all the time drives me nuts so I'm looking for HR based workouts that I can do on the spinning bike. I can't seem to find any, I've been doing 6 blocks of 2 minutes interval/2 minutes rest but I have no idea about whether this is effective. Also it would be nice to have workouts with a bit more variation. Does anyone have any advice on this?

Thanks!

Well there are many sources of indoor workouts. It depends on what it is you are trying to achieve. For many indoor workouts, HR is not a helpful guide. Better guides are perceived exertion, power or a proxy for power such as trainer speed. For spin bikes I think your own sense of effort is probably best, with perhaps some guide from HR when doing longer duration efforts.

As Bahzob suggest, using speed as a proxy for power (or trainer wheel distance as a proxy for work done) can be guide if you use the same trainer set up the same way each time.

The latter is a bit tricky though on spin bikes that have a manual resistance control knob and may not have any form of computer readout in any case. IOW the effort required to pedal the bike at a certain rate can be quite variable depending on how the knob is tightened, let alone in a gym where you might be on different bikes. So even if it did have a readout, it still may not help you from session to session, but may help judge subsequent efforts in any one session.

So use similar principles to what's been suggested by Bahzob, you can parse shorter duration trainer efforts into 4 broad categories based on your own perception of effort, and not be concerned with HR:

- very easy, for recovery between efforts

- short and very hard efforts of 20-90 seconds with lots of rest in between, sometimes done as sets (e.g. 20-sec on / 20-sec off for a few minutes before an extended break). HR is of no use to guide such efforts.

- hard efforts of 2-6 minutes which induce heavy breathing towards the latter stages of the interval, with similar duration of recovery in between, paced such that you don't "crack" until you've done at least 3-4 efforts, but not so easy that you could do more than about 6-7. HR is of no use to guide such efforts.

- very solid longer efforts totalling 30-90 minutes at a pace sustainable for the total duration, and either ridden in one contiguous effort or broken into intervals of 10-30-minutes, with a few minutes of recovery in between. HR will take a few minutes to rise up towards level and then gradually rise through the entire effort. It may rise a little more quickly and further in subsequent efforts. If HR shoots up quickly and then stays flat, then you started too hard and are probably fading as you go.

Most interval training is a variation on those basic themes, sometimes with a mix of more than one interval type in a session. But don't be all that worried if you are not executing a session perfectly, it'll still have training value.

As always, usual caveats apply about this being general and not specific advice, and only suitable for those healthy enough to do such strenuous efforts.

bahzob

raymond82 wrote:

Thanks for your replies! I believe that HR is not a very good indicator of effort in the gym, however it's all I can go by as the spinning bikes in the gym don't show any data at all... Then in stead I guess what I need is just a workout schedule to go by, in the end the spinning classes are also built up like this.

bahzob, I quite like your training method, especially since it allows for checking any progress. I would really like to have a power meter for exactly that purpose but can't afford one right now. Using distance traveled as a readout for fitness is very useful, the problem again is that the spinning bike doesn't give this info. I could do trainings like this on the other bikes they have in the gym though, just to measure my fitness on a regular basis. It's just a shame that these fitness bikes have such horrible geometry and huge seats but I guess the distance traveled is a good relative measure to see if my fitness increases.

Strange that the bikes don't show any data at all. If cycling is your main sport I may be inclined to suggest that you get yourself a turbo and use that. Especially if you only use the gym for its spinning classes, in this case it will work out cheaper in the long run.

In the absence of anything on the bike I guess you have to use HR but I'd use it with some effort measure. There is an RPE scale that goes from 1-10 or 1-20 depending on who's you use but I find this pretty useless tbh.

My preferred effort measure is to monitor breathing. This makes sense because your breathing is determined,in part, by the load you are putting on your body.

The best way to get a sense for this is to do a ramp test, start very very easy then ever 2 minutes or so increase your effort by a small amount until you are utterly utterly knackered and cant turn the pedals any more. Pay attention to your breathing (don't force it, if anything try to breathe as easily as possible, let your body force a change of how it wants to breathe). You should notice some break points when an increase in effort forces a change (it will take 30s-90s at the new effort before the effect happens)
A - At very low efforts you will barely notice breathing
B - As effort increases you will notice having to breathe through the nose, but can keep your mouth closed
C - Next point is when you have to start breathing through the mouth. <<< This is a key point. As a very rough rule of thumb efforts below this are long distance endurance. In the gym workouts should be at least of this level to be worth doing.
D - At first you will have control over your breathing. You have to breathe through the mouth but have control over this and can skip a few breaths if you want. You can talk though it may be hard. This next key point is when you have to take every single breath you can, you are sucking in air in big lungfuls and you can't talk (grunt maybe)
E- Right at the end you will find you cant even breathe but can still turn the pedals for a few more seconds gritting your teeth and giving it everything you have. All forms of verbal communication are impossible though you may scream.

Very roughly these correspond to the intervals in mine and Alex's posts

"Long" intervals 30-90 minutes should be done between points C and D. A good routine is warm up to point C ride there for a few minutes then push to point D, hold it for a short while, come back to C then back to D and repeat for the interval duration, finishing on point D.
"Medium" intervals 15-20 minutes should be done on point D, just at the tipping point between it and C.
"Short" intervals 2-6 minutes should be done well into D, just before you hit point E. Last few seconds can be at E
"Very short intervals" ,measured in seconds, should be done at E.

One benefit of the above is that having a sense of breathing vs effort is useful even if you have all the gizmos in the world. I have a power meter but still pace many of my efforts primarily through breathing, I just use the power meter as a check. I find it especially useful on "long" efforts, I set a tempo that links breathing, cadence and music, which gets me into a zone I feel I can keep up forever.



Like I said if you are training indoors you don't really need a powermeter just to get fitter. Distance is an OK alternative. The main issue is that it depends on getting set-up consistent, but this comes with experience. Once you have done the same interval a few times you get the feel for how it will be and if the setup is wrong enough to make a big difference you will recognise it as an outlier and discard it.

That's not to say a power meter won't be better, it will be. But the really big difference with a power meter is that you can use it to measure outdoor rides when conditions have a much bigger impact and ofc it can be used to compare indoor with out.

raymond82

Thanks again for your extensive replies!

I used to have a trainer, one that showed HR cadence and power but I never used it which is why I sold it in the end. I'm regretting that now, although having to carry the bike up three floors every time I wanted to train indoors kept me from using it anyway. Now I already paid for the gym for a whole year, next year I think I'll by a trainer again instead.

I think I'll use breathing rate in addition to HR, then I can still use HR zones to base the interval program on but then focus more on breathing rate. I've actually experience the difference now that I think about it, the previous time I did the intervals with a crappy HR watch that kept losing signal, I noticed I had difficulty finishing the last 1 minute interval (out of 6). The last time I went I made 2 minute intervals and used a more reliably HR strap and then it didn't hurt that much at all, even though the intervals were twice as long.

From now on I'll use your different zones to make a couple of different workouts that alternate between different zones, that way I think the training becomes more interesting. I'll use HR as a target but I think using your descriptions I can pace myself very well during the intervals en recovery in between.

A powermeter is high on my whish list because I would really like to measure progress in the outside world where it matters most. Yesterday I decided to do a ride at ~70% of MHR and it was quite annoying. With the strong wind your average speed goes down so much as the wind affects you almost 75% of the time. It's quite hard to keep doing these rides as their are hardly rewarding. These are the rides where I wish I had a powermeter...

bahzob

raymond82 wrote:

..
A powermeter is high on my whish list because I would really like to measure progress in the outside world where it matters most. Yesterday I decided to do a ride at ~70% of MHR and it was quite annoying. With the strong wind your average speed goes down so much as the wind affects you almost 75% of the time. It's quite hard to keep doing these rides as their are hardly rewarding. These are the rides where I wish I had a powermeter...

Yes that's big plus of a powermeter. Crap conditions don't make any difference in terms of monitoring progress. It's an especial plus at this time of year as it also means you can make your bike as bomb proof as possible in terms of tyres, mudguards,clothing worn, spares carried etc and still get useful training information.

There's a lot happening in terms of power meters atm so hopefully this will mean they come down in price.

Good luck with the training

raymond82

Yes that's big plus of a powermeter. Crap conditions don't make any difference in terms of monitoring progress. It's an especial plus at this time of year as it also means you can make your bike as bomb proof as possible in terms of tyres, mudguards,clothing worn, spares carried etc and still get useful training information.

There's a lot happening in terms of power meters atm so hopefully this will mean they come down in price.

Good luck with the training

thanks! That's exactly my reasoning, tracking progress through t he winter is quite difficult I think because average speed is very much affected by conditions. Last year was the first year I did at least one ride a week throughout the winter but I had the feeling I had lost all the fitness that I had build up over the summer before. That's why now I'm adding gym sessions to the outdoor rides.

I'm keeping my eye open for a powermeter, if I find a nice deal second hand I might go for it. Spending around 500 euro I might be able to justify but much more than that I can't...

izza

I use 4iiii's Sportiiiis for indoor training in conjunction with Sufferfest videos. Adds one level above 'perceived effort' yet much cheaper than power meters.

Plus it is based on iphone and sunglasses so can be switched to outdoor riding as well.

raymond82

I use 4iiii's Sportiiiis for indoor training in conjunction with Sufferfest videos. Adds one level above 'perceived effort' yet much cheaper than power meters.

Interesting the Sportiiiis, I had never seen that. Bit too pricey for me though. I also have been looking into the Sufferfest videos, especially since some of them are available in Strava premium now. I also like the idea that you can buy a complete training program of them but if you want to buy all the videos that are used it's again quite expensive...

BrandonA

madasahattersley wrote:

On an indoor trainer HR is as good as useless IMO - the effects of the heat and cardiac drift etc make it a very bad gauge of effort. Better to use just cadence or perceived exertion

Agreed.

I did a tough session two weeks ago. I repeated the same session last week after a rest day. My cadence was higher which meant I in more effort but my heart rate on average was 5 bpm lower on the second go and on max heart rate achieved was 6 bpm lower.

I tried doing HR based training when I first got my turbo trainer and soon gave up on this type of activity as it was impossible to keep the HR in the required zones, particularly at the start of a rest interval following a tough interval which raised my HR to the max.

bahzob

raymond82 wrote:

... Last year was the first year I did at least one ride a week throughout the winter but I had the feeling I had lost all the fitness that I had build up over the summer before. That's why now I'm adding gym sessions to the outdoor rides.

.

This is certainly worth doing.

I think (others I am sure will comment if they disagree) that it now generally accepted that it is best to mix in some higher intensity sessions with the long steady rides traditionally done over winter. Otherwise you will too much of the hard earned fitness from summer.

raymond82

I did a tough session two weeks ago. I repeated the same session last week after a rest day. My cadence was higher which meant I in more effort but my heart rate on average was 5 bpm lower on the second go and on max heart rate achieved was 6 bpm lower.

I tried doing HR based training when I first got my turbo trainer and soon gave up on this type of activity as it was impossible to keep the HR in the required zones, particularly at the start of a rest interval following a tough interval which raised my HR to the max.

It's just a shame that the spinning bikes don't give any information at all, there's just a knob but it doesn't even have a scale I think. I guess I'll be relying on a combination of HR and the criteria mentioned before.

I think (others I am sure will comment if they disagree) that it now generally accepted that it is best to mix in some higher intensity sessions with the long steady rides traditionally done over winter. Otherwise you will too much of the hard earned fitness from summer.

This is my idea, a weekly 2-3 hour low intensity ride and two more intense indoor workouts. Hopefully it works and I'll be a bit fitter next year!

raymond82

I just came back from the gym, noticed like suggested that HR is unreliable. Basically what I experienced is that HR rises much faster towards the end of the workout. So instead of relying on it I tried pushing a little extra and it felt good. During the final 30 second push my HR reached 200!

I will continue finding out what the appropriate intensity is, also I need to balance the exercises a little bit in terms of how much time I spend in each zone.

raymond82

This is why power is good - with HR, efforts get easier towards the end. With power, they usually get harder!

I know I know, it's very high on the list! Need to first get the money from somewhere though...