Gym Session

Sounds good, what do you want to achieve though?

if your going to ride 50 miles a week i would leave the bike intervals and look to do a full body weight sesion instead.look to hit all the muscle groups by doing squats, deadlifts,bench press overhead press and pull up's.
i do this type of gym work 3 times a week and just have my biking for cardio and im dropping pounds aswel.
check you tube for how to vids go easy and look to increase the weight on the bar each week.

Why are you suggesting this? The OP hasnt stated what he wants to achieve? Where has he said he wants to lose weight?

If he wants to get quicker on the bike then intervals would be a mucher better idea than pissing about lifting weights.

why would he need to go the gym to do intervals on the bike he could just use his own?

Of course he could use his own, but he said he wants to go to the gym to do intervals? Doing intervals indoors on a turbo or gym bike with a HRM makes more sense than attempting to do intervals whilst riding your mtb.

afterall i suppose mark cavendish, danny hart and chris hoy dont bother with it either

I dont know, maybe they do, maybe they dont. Doesnt matter either way, one is a track cyclist, one a dher and the other a road racer. The OP sounds like he just rides his bike. Therefore, intervals make more sense to increase your cycling speed/fitness than adding muscle and weight.

Of course, theres nothing wrong with building muscle, it has its benefits. But given the choice, interval sessions will make you faster (assuming thats hat he wants)

Recovery Drink - Torq, it's the best in terms of content IMO and far cheaper than maximuscle for example, also tastes really nice IME.

Examplar pyramid session: 1x4min, 2x2min, 3x1min 4x30sec, 3x1 min, 2x2min, 1x4min. This is a very hard session and changing it to 1x3min, 2x1min, 4x30sec and back down would still have a good training adaptations. This is a more rounded session with less specific adaptations.

Peak Power: 40secs flat out, 20 secs rest, repeat 8 or so times. This will make you sprint faster, go up hills faster (well the kind we have in the east) and recover quicker after hard efforts.

Threshold intervals: 4-5 reps at 3-5 minutes long with equal rest. This will hopefully raise your threshold and therefore mean you can ride faster overall in races, particularly useful if you race lots at thetford as it's flat. Also helps with lactate tolerance.

Start with the threshold intervals now, then move onto one of the others depending on your weakness around march time. Just go as hard as you can for the length of the interval and make sure you've had at least a days rest prior to doing the session.

Don't do any of this gym stuff, it will be make you less efficient and heavier and is only worth doing if you can commit lots of time to riding to counter this effect, don't try and train like the pros, it just won't work.

i love the fact that peole think when you mention doing weights your going to end up like arnie maybe after eating 5000 kcals a day for two three years yes, but using it for a few sessions a week will improve any rider.
i have really started hitting what i listed above really hard and im losing weight and flying up hills and my balance and posture on the bike has improved. try it OP you might like it, try my protein for recovery drinks really cheap and the taste is not bad.

in regards to interval training it is a very hard way to train but very effective and will improve yor stamina, i use it on the treadmil for 20 mins i will do a one min flat out sprint fast as i can then slow down for two min jog and vice versa until the time runs out. but mix it up with steady state cardio to keep your body guessing. you dont have to do bike specific intervals to improve your riding.
i hope you get something sorted.

Interesting little discussion this one, weight training always gets people debating. For the OP more time on the bike is what's needed to improved. If he's only getting 3 sessions done a week they all need to be on the bike, preferably outdoors and not in the gym. The basics are to build a base of endurance fitness with steady/tempo rides then once this is developed move onto more intense sessions like the ones mentioned already to develop race specific fitness. Intervals on the MTB are essential, it's hard, it's technical, exactly what a race is like.......specific!! To be honest, you may struggle to achieve a lot in the sport working 2 jobs, not wanting to be negative, just realistic.

For what it's worth, strength training can really help but it all depends on a riders specific weaknesses and time availability. Riding needs to be the focus and strength work needs to compliment it not detract from it. Strength work can also be done on the bike, big gear climbs etc.

If you want to be faster for longer during a race you'll need to train for power-endurance. For any level of racing the general idea is the same but has different levels of intensity etc. I recommend core strength training too as it makes quite a difference on the trails. But that's only one aspect to the training. The more you ride the fitter and faster you'll get but to cross train is vital if you want to maximise your performance in a race. I'm sure the on-site trainer in the gym will be able to give you a good program that suits your schedule and goals. It's important to have a date for when you need to be at your peak and set-up a program to that end date to maximise your chances of a podium finish. Whether you're a pro or not the science is basically the same but can be used to each individuals specific goals.

What I am about to suggest worked for me, everybody is different and the body tends to adapt to training slighty different for everyone too. I was focusing on strength, power and endurance. Break your training up into phases (periodization) so that you're performace peaks when you want to race.

So lets say weeks 1 - 4 you focus on strength, dont neglect your cycles though, count this as active recovery or something. You want to be looking at exercises such as squats, deadlifts, barbell lunges, cleans etc basically most compound lifts, generally stay away from benching, complete waste of time for cycling IMO. Aim for 2-8 sets and 3-5 repetitions in your gym session lifting 75-90% of your 1rep max. Try to perform strength sessions twice a week with a few good days recovery inbetween atleast 48hours. Eat around 1.5gm of protein per lb of bodyweight, just a little rule to kind of help out. No rule for carbs though so just eat enough haha.

Weeks 5-8 you want to start power training (plyometrics) So things like depth jumps, tuck jumps, single leg bounds, box jumps, burpee tuck jumps etc. (as with most things if you are unsure of any of these exercises you can get a pretty good explanation through google or youtube.) Aim for 5-10reps and usually a single set will suffice but you could do them as a circuit. Make sure when doing plyometrics that you are fully recovered after your set before starting the next, this type of training has nothing to do with dealing with Lactic Acid, it is about getting your muscles to generate power.

Moving onto weeks 9-12, the endurance phase. I found bodyweight exercises along with putting in the miles worked great! Things like press ups, pull ups, sit ups, squats, lunges etc 3-5 sets of about 12-20 reps. Now, there is no greater endurance training than GOING CYCLING. Put the miles in is all you have to do haha simple. Someone said above about the people beating you, if it's the decents that your slower on, im afraid it's all about going out and getting used to riding quicker, learn to choose lines, session sections when your out on the trail all these kinds of things help. I hope this helps, if you have any questions or would like a programme written up feel free to email. I study this stuff and also doing an instructor course so would be good practice for me