I want to go under the hour for 25 mile.

[willhub]

First of all, any members from BR, don't come in here moaning at me.

I am not going to be doing anymore official TT's this year, because of the following:

A: there is not that many in the region now (25 Mile) (Yorkshire)

B: The one I was going to attempt is up near Thirsk, I'm not riding there and my parents can't be taking me

C: I don't want to spend any more money.

Now I have some questions:

1: Is it really a bad idea for my to train, and aim for under the hour at 25 miles, and then fine a piece of road, and go at TT pace for 25 miles in the aim to PB and get under the hour, then aim to beat the PB?

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The training questions I want to ask are:

1: Why is riding 20 to 25 miles @ TT pace bad for aiming to get under the hour, why will I not achieve it by training like this?

2: There are some intervals I know of that I can use:

- 2x 20

- 2x 15

- 5 x 5

2a: How many interval sessions should I do a week?

3: Am I able to do other riding, I like riding my bicycle, so I might decide to go for a 30-50 mile ride just for the fun of it, I might sprint for a telephone pole, I might murder it up a hill, I might pedal flat out for abit, I just generally like to have fun, or I might pay some people a visit.

4: What is "tempo"?

I always thought it was sort of riding, not steady, but not hard, for example yesterday I had a "steady" ride after some "training", and I average around 20mph for 20 miles, I had my HR on, so I was aiming to keep it between 140-150 for the majority of the time, that was around 70% of my Max HR.

5: If one Wednesday I do a 2x 20min session, including the rest of 5 mins between, the warm up and warm down, I will probably do between 16 and 20 miles, if I feel strong and recovered the next day, is it bad to cycle that day?

6: If I want to do some normal riding after an interval session, is that ok? Will this actually take away from the potential gains of an interval session?

7: What would be the best things I could fit into a week to help me go under the hour?

8: Is perceived effort really better for training than HR?

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Finally, sorry for the way it's posted out, I'm not trying to be clever, I just want to make it clear in the aim of trying to get the answer I am looking for.




Cheers.

 

[e-rider]

What is your current PB? If it's 1:10:00 then you're not going under the hour anytime soon whatever you do!

 

[willhub]

What makes you think that?




Well I've never done a proper 25 mile, but the other week I TT'd it round my area and I did 1 hour 4 28 and that's with me going slow at one bit cause my right leg want all weird due to lack of circulation.

I did 23 miles yesterday @ 23.6mph average also.

I don't have a TT bike like, just standard road bike with some clip ons.




My best for a 10 is 23:41.

 

[screenman]

Does it say any where in your first post about your past times? The other poster like me did not see it and answered extremely well.

Ask the same question on a time trial forum, one that contains many of the countries top testers and see what they say. They may be able to point you in the direction of a local 25. www.timetriallingforum.co.uk

Can I suggest that you temper your responses slightly as this may be why you have had very few replies to your question.

 

[Will1985]

I'd be more concerned about your leg dying on you, especially if it is as you claim due to "lack of circulation."

There are so many ways to train for longer TTs, some of which involve intervals and others are just lots of miles.
If there are no official open/club 25s near you, are you going to use the course so you know it is measured?

Personally I would forget trying to go under the hour this year - you are still young and there are years ahead of you to achieve this benchmark. At this stage, why not focus on dropping your 10 time? With some structured training you are more likely to see speed gains at this distance.
A couple of years ago I had a similar PB on lumpy courses and then did a sports science study involving 4 weeks of 6x5mins intervals at increasing power three times a week - best bit of interval training I've ever done as I then knocked 40 seconds off my 10 time (I could do normal rides on top of the intervals as well).

 

[lukesdad]

Try Picturing a tt as an exam. How would you revise for it ? Would you just do mock exams only ? Or would you do intensive revision of the subjects different parts with some R&R to keep your mind fresh ? Now replace revision with training for your tt and youll get the idea.

 

[willhub]

First of all, Screenman I apologise I never realised I came across with a temper. I will add a post on that TT forum thanks.




Will, what I planned was to just to find a piece of road that I could get 25 miles in and then I'd use the Garmin GPS to know when I've done 25 miles. When I did the "training" the other day it was 23 miles bang on, out and back from Tadcaster to Ferrybridge, it was rolling in parts but had about 6 roundabouts in it, and I found I had to stop to give way at nearly every one, so that was not ideal, but I could just do some laps in my area.

After doing the 23 miles at TT pace, I found after I was able to do a further 20 mile ride, that was keeping the HR between 170-180, the other week, I did 2x 15 min, I was not using HR then, so I assumed I must have being pushing near 190, because after it, I found I did not want to continue and went home.

I have only one more 10, and that is tomorrow (if I'm not volunteering), that is a hilly 10, about 2 miles in there is a 17% climb, not very long, but I think compared to others I'm doing better on the hillier courses than the flatter ones, I've only done the 13 mile variant of it and was getting a time of 34:24, on another 13 mile loop, slightly less hillier last week I got a time of 32:54.

With intervals, and you mentioned power, I don't have access to any facilities round here that have power meter, so all I can go by is HR (apparently unreliable?), perceived effort and speed (useless?) How much recovery would I have between intervals?




Lukesdad, I'm finding that analogy hard to picture for TT.

Oh also regards to loss of circulation, it was a combination of the heat, wrong socks, shoes too tight.




Cheers.

 

[fossyant]

There is nothing to stop you riding an official tt course in your own time. For a tt time to count it needs to be out and back or a loop and needs to finish near the start. Why, well pick the right road, direction and a big tail wind, you will do it in minutes.

There is nothing like riding a real tt. The adrenaline flows.

 

[fossyant]

Try some club 10s - look on local club web sites. These are cheap, run mid week evenings, and its sign on the line, so no need to pre book

 

[montage]

23.41 for a 10 is more than a 25mph average right?.... so you should be pretty close to the hour mark surely?

 

[willhub]

My last 10 I did was 24:24, I've only done two 10's in the 23 area. I can't hold it for an hour also yet. Yes it's 25.3mph, I was surprised, I did not think I was going that fast.

Try some club 10s - look on local club web sites. These are cheap, run mid week evenings, and its sign on the line, so no need to pre book

I do Clifton CC York club 10's at the moment, I'm usually in the top 10, I came 1st on one and 2nd last week so I'm not doing too badly, but it's a different story if you get some of the proper TTers in, but I really want to do better in longer distances.

 

[Arsen Gere]

Willhub,
As pointed out you have the potential to go sub hour if you can knock out a 23, thats about the time when I did it.
My advice would be to look at 4 types of endurance that you need and work on each one.

You need to have the base aerobic endurance, this does not have to be developed in isolation one or two long rides a week will take care of this, go as long as time allows and don't try and push it, the pace should be easy. If you fancy racing up a hill fine, it will not do any harm over a long ride, look at around 4-5 hours. I go out with my wife and we might only average around 12-14 mph, it has no percievable impact on my body and leaves me ready to do intervals later that week.

You need muscular endurance, leading up to your anaerobic threshold. You can feel your muscles starting to ache but its something you can begin to hold, you can maintain it. A turbo trainer session can be used to provide a constant load that is repeatable and measurable. These are longer interval sessions, not flat out sprints. Your anearobic threshold can be moved up with practice.

You need what I would call neurological endurance, fast pedalling for longer periods of time, 100-110 rpm for an hour or more. There is no point in having muscle and oxygen capacity if you can't tell your legs to fire.

Lastly you need the mental endurance to keep this going without slacking off, listen to your body, feel when its starting to get too tough and ease back, change gear or whatever it takes to get to a sustainable power that you can optimally produce. Longer interval sessions are good for this.

I would not advise doing hard interval sessions more than twice possibly three times a week and not back to back. Recovery is part of your training. You can ride in between interval sessions but you won't be able to reproduce the same effects day after day. An easy ride after an interval session is better than a massage, there is a paper to show this too.

If you do long hard sessions you end up knackered and you can't deliver the power you would in an interval session, you won't be able to deliver a high cadence session and it will take you longer to recover slowing down progress. Long hard sessions take me up to two weeks to recover.

Don't forget about the biggest factor, aerodynamics, your position on the bike.

Write everything you can measure down, wind speed direction, temperature, distance, perceived exersion, avg speed, max speed, avg heart rate, max heart rate, power if you have it, it all comes in usefull later so you know what works for you. We are all different, only you will know what works so start collecting data now. You can't have too much.

The Sky team have been working on aerobic endurance and speed in the same cycles, they don't have to be split in to winter long rides followed by speed in the summer. You can maintain the speed in the winter on a turbo trainer. There are papers around that show this.

I build these in to my ride to work, different stuff on different days. Some days I get passed and someday's I do the passing. It's not about the race to work its the race on Sunday that matters.

HTH

 

[willhub]

If I did a week like this:




Monday: Rest

Tuesday: 2x 20min

Wednesday: ?x5min

Thursday: 2-4 hours @ tempo

Friday: Rest

Saturday: Training ride or TT

Sunday: Rest




Is that a good week? I feel I could do 5min intervals the day after 2x20 as they'd be less tiring than if I did 2-4 hour tempo then the intervals as I'd recover from intervals quicker than the tempo ride.




I think saturdays ride is the one I take the longest to recover from so thought I should have 2 days off, I'm taking 3-4 days off from yesterday as I feel I was not at good performance yesterday and maybe I've not let myself fully recover from last Saturday, only had 1 day off, and kept it like that so I end up buggering the whole week up.




Should I do my intervals on the bike in TT position? Or does it not matter as long as I'm pushing hard? I presume without looking at HR, as long as I'm doing over 175-180 for the intervals I'm working myself out enough to eventually get potential gains from the intervals?




I could try the 5min intervals at 100-110rpm, I struggle a lot with high cadence, infact, I can't get my HR up on my turbo trainer, despite being on the hardest resistance and in 52/11 because I am just spinning too fast and at that cadence I can't push, it's still tiring, but I'm only doing 160-170 at best, I'd have to somehow mod the turbo trainer to up the resistance to get my HR up.

 

[gds58]

What is your current PB? If it's 1:10:00 then you're not going under the hour anytime soon whatever you do!

With the greatest of respect your comment is rubbish!! His current PB may be a 1:10:00 but you won't know the type of course (may be he's only ridden hard courses) the weather conditions (he may not have had a 'float' day yet) and what kind of bike etc he's riding.

When I first started to do Time Trials which was a good few years ago, in my first ever proper TT (a 25) I did 1:08:52. By the end of that same season and with some hard training and a new bike etc I did a 57:42 on the old E72 dual carriageway course on the A12 in Essex. By the time I decided to pack up racing completely I had got down to a 49:04. Admittedly this was on the H25/13 which is the Comp' record course and in the same event Chris Boardman beat me by not far short of two minutes!! But I had taken nearly 20 minutes off my very first '25'

I'm not trying to show off with this but merely to show that fantastic results are very achievable with various things in place i.e. The right mental attitude (looks like he's got some of this and wants to learn more), the right training and guidance with training (looks like he wants to learn this too) and some decent equipment. The last one though will only give you very small gains compared to the first two!!

I will have a look at all your questions and see if I can help with any of them. Out of interest how old are you?

Graham

 

[willhub]

I'm 22.




My PB is 1 hour 4, 28.

The course was crap, some good parts on it though, quite a windy day also, was fairly flat with some lumpy bits in it.