This topic will cover the points that i feel need to be addressed clearly in your mind if you are about to embark on a long term (10 to 16 week) cycling plan

Time, Patience, Structure

The first three we will cover are Time, Patience and Structure.
Most coaches these days will structure training plans around 16 weeks, this gives you time for 2 solid rest periods somewhere in the middle and 3 or 4 series performance tests along the way. 16 weeks gives you a good measure of how well you have handled the plan and how much you have improved in each category in particular the area that you targeted. So with this in mind you need to have the time and confidence that you can stick to the plan and see it through. There are going to be days that you might miss, but if you are serious about becoming a better stronger faster cyclist you need to have time and patience. If you are structuring your own plan then you should have a look at examples on the internet. I have a plan that can be downloaded here. This should give you a good starting point. Remember its not uncommon to set three year time frames for you to be strong enough to ride Regional A grade. Set yourself realistic goals, this will help keep you motivated along the way

Frequent Intense Training

You are not going to get better if you just do 30 miles a day at the same pace. Your plan will need to ramp up slowly every week, with a rest week every 6 weeks, but even on that rest week you will still be on the bike. Its not going to be easy, you will be stressing your body past its normal limits. This is the theory of training – Work hard recover, work harder, recover. Your body adapts during the recovery period to the new level of intensity, that’s why the next hard session needs to be harder than the previous one. Coaches will structure your plan accordingly. If you find you fall behind and cant maintain the levels required i suggest you go back a week or so in the plan so that you can reach the levels required. Again your coach would be able to assist here. If you don’t have a coach and you find you cant motivate yourself enough to push yourself then i suggest you get a coach. choose wisely thought, there are lots of “coaches” out there that will take your money and give you a “one size fits all 16 week plan”.
Back to the training, as you ramp up the intensity you should also be ramping up the duration. this enables you to score the stress score required to improve fitness. If you don’t have the time to do 3 or 4 hours rides on the weekends, then you should look at doing 2 to 3 hour rides at a higher intensity. problem with this is that you may be hitting it too hard and this will affect the next 5 to 7 days worth of workouts. Again a coach will assist here. He will check out your ability and design a plan that suites you. One shoe DOES NOT FIT ALL and the boot camp approach is often more harm than good

Food

You get out what you put in. My brother rides… sometimes… slowly most of the time. he wants to be better, he tries, he trains when he can and he asks me for advice. But he still eats crap junk food all the time and then wonders why he is not getting better and why he feels tired after 10 miles on the bike. If you are going to embark on a serious training plan, embark on a serious diet and lifestyle change (if yours is currently bad). you don’t need a dietitian to tell you what to eat, if you can afford one then great, that will be a great edition to your training plan. Just eat good healthy home cooked food, remembering carbs and proteins.
Smokers….. good luck. You guys will have to work harder than us “clean folk”
These lifestyle choices you make will affect the end result of your training plan

Reward

Your hours on the bike will pay off, you will find yourself beating the guys that used to beat you. you will find that you can knock out big long group rides at the front of the pack whereas in the passed you may have been hanging on the rear. Unfortunately or fortunately (what ever way you want to look at it) cycling is an endurance sport. you cant get good over night. your natural ability will put you in a good starting position and maybe speed up your growth, but at the end of the day its the long hard miles on the bike that get you somewhere (no pun intended)

This post is tagged Training, Workouts