Winter Training Newbie...

KappaTango

Hi, A quick introduction.

I only started Road Cycling in January at 17.5 stone (110kg). I am now, 4500km later, 13.5 stone (88kg) and looking forward to a winter of indoor and outdoor training, I ride a Felt F95.

I have owned a Tacx Satori Turbo for about 3 months, using TrainerRoad as my stat central. I use Strava to collate all of my ride stats, indoors and out.

I have just bought a set of Elite Arion Rollers, to add to my winter training plan and work on technique.

Any suggestions for how to get the most out of the winter months? I will hit the road when the weather allows, but happy to bulk out the time on the bike with a mix of turbo and rollers, so looking for a plan/guide that fits this setup?

Finally, have to ay I have the bug, just love being on the bike.

BeaconRuth

Congratulations on the weight loss - I bet you feel sooooo much better than at this time last year!

Are you in a cycling club? Most clubs will have a coach who will give good advice and you will also pick up good tips from clubmates, perhaps even join a weekly turbo training class.

Ruth

KappaTango

Thanks Ruth, I feel so much better! I will be on the road as much as possible. I like the idea of rollers for improving technique and varying the indoor work. I find TrainerRoad great for focussing on a training goal and as they fully support the Satori and also the Arion rollers in Beta, seems like a good compromise.

I am actually help set up a local club, which I went along to a meeting of and ended up being part of the steering group! Looking forward to that and looks like we will have some great people there who have training expertise that we can all tap into.

Thanks for the input!

Bordersroadie

Well done to you!

In my experience training on a turbo is mind numbing and I do almost anything to avoid it.

Also it gives you no bike handling experience nor other real life stuff like hill climbing or riding in headwinds.

Strategies that work for me include:

Winter clothing.
Mudguards, essential for misery minimising.
Lights. Most of my training in winter is at night time on back roads.
Regular routes to gauge progress.
Strava, for motivation.

Good luck with it!

diy

There is so much great stuff on youtube from free spinning class workouts to on board camera bike races to be part of. I'd mix it up with some of that. I also build in a bit of Tabata whenever I can as well, even if its just 2 sets of 4 minutes in the middle of a workout. Sprinting on a turbo is hard, but it does hone your pedal technique and get you focused on smooth strokes.

One of the hardest things to do on a turbo or roller is a rapidly varied workout, which is often helpful if you want to pre-fatigue yourself before a squirt of effort. Also there are some good non-bike based work-outs that can be complementary.

Global Cycle Network and FitnessBlender do some basic stuff worth a look. Interestingly (PLUG:)I'm finally getting round to launching some more of my own stuff which I have been working on with some fitness/spin class instructors. Its just a bit of fun for me and a chance for the girls to raise their profile a bit.