Does training hills make one slower or?

[FirstV8]

Does training on hills make one slower , or is it that i am anticipating the climb and subconsciously ride easier to be able to tackle  the climb coming up . I ride a 10km  X4 circuit with 4 climbs on giving me 500 m of accent on the 40km ride ..Ten kilometers of the ride is climbing  , the steepest and longest being 1.5km at about 4% . The rest of the circuit is flat with about the same 10 km as decent . I ride all the climbs and flat sections on the pavement (Mtb ) so as not to become a statistic of a hit and run . The fastest i've done this circuit is  1hr 43min giving me an average of 23kph . I have been training this circuit for about 25 days this month and am now averaging below 20kph my slowest being 19.5kph . My question being will riding hills only affect my speed on flat road and long distance stamina . Im an old school bikie ( 67 years young now ) and not into high tech training just enjoy my cycling .. 

 

[Help.Me.]

Fatigue....25 days training is a lot with barely any rest/recovery.

[Reme Le Hane]

Training hills makes you faster/stronger, never resting and overt raining makes you slower.

 

What you appear to be doing is training at balls to the wall mode and then almost never resting in between. You should actually be doing most of your training at more chilla pace.

 

Assuming you are training 5 days a week, at most 1 should be balls to the wall, the rest should be done at a pace at which you can easily maintain a conversation, so somewhere in the 60 to 70% max hr zone and maybe find a more level route as well.

 

Cross training is also a good option swap out a day or 2 with running or body weight training, swimming even to work different muscles and train while still resting them cycling muscles.

 

I ride 4 days and run 2 days a week but out of a month 2 of those rides I take balls to the wall, the rest I go out, have fun, ignore the clock and basically put all my "effort" into not putting in any effort.

 

Like you I have a route that I know exceptionally well and I do a sort of personal time trial on that one everytime I ride it I finish it quicker, but that's like twice a month.

 

I found since I dropped vitality and no longer aim for that 80% avg they want, like as in ever, I have gotten faster, can ride further and lost weight all because I am actually finally training correctly.

[Dexter-morgan]

I agree with them but when you do your route again, ride the climbs hard, then rest/recover the rest, very good interval, similar to when we could train at Kyalami, I started off at 21km/h ave eventually ended up doing 28km/h average, sadly we can not train there anymore.

[Mamil]

Echoing all this advice from people who know more than I do and having gradually adopted stuff from podcasts and articles -

 

1. Rest is vital. 25 days of 40k at fast pace is waay too much. 

2. Varying intensity is vital - long aerobic rides essential and shorter high intensity rides also. Riding at one intensity forces the body to make adaptations to that intensity and then adaptations stop - flattening off of fitness gains is the result. Your decreasing speed is fatigue for sure but you won't get fitter if you just rest more - you must vary intensity to go beyond doing your 40k loop at 23kmph.

3. HIIT - varying intensity whithin a ride - used to be called fartlek or interval sessions. One that hurts a lot is 40/20's or over unders. - eg, warm up - 5 minutes where you ride flat out for 40 seconds - noodle for 20 seconds. Repeat that 5 times with a 3 minute noodle between each repeat - cool down afterwards and then go to work buzzing with the endorphin kick. 

 

Now if I can just work out how to co-ordinate all of this so that I end up peaking at race time instead of 3 weeks before .....

[The Ouzo]

I've seen you riding (at least I think its you), even had a brief chat with you once. You always look like you are going balls to the wall.

As others have said, easy days are good days.

 

Also, you body and mind get used to teh same route all teh time. You know the hill is coming, the body goes into protection mode and you just slog up the hill at the same pace.

Mix it up a little. ride your loop in the other direction, try a different route.

 

Its been mentioned above, but to re-iterate. Take the slow days, then on the hard days attack those climbs.

[Mamil]

I overlooked this line which is maybe the most important one -- 

 

If you don't want to do all the "high tech" try this ...

 

Take a few days off and then ...

 

Ride 5 days a week 

for 3 weeks only do the full 4 laps on a Sunday and aim to do it at 18kmph average keeping your heart rate well below max - you should be able to talk easily while doing this ride. You might even consider adding another lap to one of those rides.

On 2 other days of the week only do 1 to 1.5 laps but ride the hills at your 23kmph pace and coast, noodle, ride at conversational pace for the rest of the loop.

On the other 2 days do 2 laps at 20kmph pace.

 

In the fourth week of this - cut one of the 2 lap days and one of the 1 lap days and then on Sunday ride the full 4 laps aiming for a personal best. 

 

Pretty sure you'll hit your 23kmph best time and probably exceed it. 

 

Also bear in mind, and this coming from a 50 year old, ex marathon plodder who 5 years ago became bikesexual - age makes a difference. Yes we can still ride and maybe even ride far and fairly fast but recovery is DEFINITELY slower. 

 

 

....... Im an old school bikie ( 67 years young now ) and not into high tech training just enjoy my cycling .. 

[Duane_Bosch]

I agree with the fatigue assessment of others

 

We all watch youtubes of the pro teams doing off season training camps of 6*200km days in a row and we think that's what me must try to do. But the reality is.

 

They a physiological phenoms

They are mostly in their 20's

They get the best nutrition

They get massages

It's their job and that's ALL they do

More than a few are doping.

 

@ the OP. I've read your posts with a lot of admiration. Your journey to fitness has been inspirational. But. Your reluctance to get into "high tech" training is now probably the very thing holding you back. You aren't a youngster anymore where you can "just ride" and stay fit. And adding volume will possibly have a negative effect. Us older okes need to be a little clever. This is where the tech comes in. For a small investment you can buy a heart rate monitor and with a little planning you can set up a neat training plan and track your progress.

 

I only got a heart rate monitor last year and my only regret is not getting one 20 years ago.

Edited January 31, 2020 by Duane_Bosch

[dave303e]

Periodization and polarization go do some reading...

 

Also for us that are happy to run ourselves into the ground some tech is sometimes all we need to monitor things like fatigue, body stress and performance.

 

 

 

Edited January 31, 2020 by dave303e

[Duane_Bosch]

My "training plan" if you want to call it that looks like this. I sometimes miss my Tuesday evening session and Saturday MTB ride but the idea is 4 active days and 3 proper rest days where I do ZERO exercise. I didn't start out with this plan it just sort of evolved to where it is now

 

Monday: Rest day.

Tuesday: 1hr Spining Class HR is kept at 80-93% for 1 hour

Tuesday: I try to do an evening interval session or do some climbing work

Wednesday: Rest Day

Thursday: 45 mins Spinning. I try to do on/off intervals in this class

Friday: Rest Day

Saturday: 5km run and Low intensity MTB

Sunday: Easy 4hr roadie ride at 20kph we usually do 60-80km

Edited January 31, 2020 by Duane_Bosch

[Chris_]

I agree with the fatigue assessment of others

 

We all watch youtubes of the pro teams doing off season training camps of 6*200km days in a row and we think that's what me must try to do. But the reality is.

 

They a physiological phenoms

They are mostly in their 20's

They get the best nutrition

They get massages

It's their job and that's ALL they do

More than a few are doping.

 

....

 

I like this. I too often find myself comparing my training, races and results to people whom I definitely shouldn't be. 

[NickGM]

I read a book a few years back that was focused on becoming a faster runner and it really helped me to do just that, and it also helped with riding a lot too. The Author said that he could never fathom how people would go out each day and do the same 10km run, and wonder why they were not getting any faster or better at running.  What inevitably ends up happening is that every day you do a run at 60-70% - which does not "grow you engine" in any way. It quickly becomes a "nothing" run. I see so many runners doing this; going for a "nothing" run. The runner is basically teaching himself to run slowly.

 

You'd be better off to doing your ride one day at 80% the whole way through, and then another day at 10% (recovery, and avoid the hills if you can), and then one day where you just hit the hills as hard as you can, and then a day when you rest. Your body will respond to variety and rest, if you're looking for improvement.

 

And while I'm harping on about this; recovery runs/rides (high cadence, low effort, not far)... it's there to make your legs feel better. Once it's done it's job, go home. Don't do what so many of us do: once the ride has done it's job you say "Actually my legs feel pretty good now, lets pick up the tempo!" You will basically end up doing another 60-70% ride, which is what?...a nothing ride. Go home, and then then go big the next day. Your legs will thank you.

 

Riding the same route every day might make you happy and will burn calories. Those are both good things obviously, so do whatever is going to make you happy. But you've noted that you're not getting any faster (and may even be getting slower). As others have said: lack of rest and lack of variety.

[Quagga]

Does training on hills make one slower , or is it that i am anticipating the climb and subconsciously ride easier to be able to tackle  the climb coming up . I ride a 10km  X4 circuit with 4 climbs on giving me 500 m of accent on the 40km ride ..Ten kilometers of the ride is climbing  , the steepest and longest being 1.5km at about 4% . The rest of the circuit is flat with about the same 10 km as decent . I ride all the climbs and flat sections on the pavement (Mtb ) so as not to become a statistic of a hit and run . The fastest i've done this circuit is  1hr 43min giving me an average of 23kph . I have been training this circuit for about 25 days this month and am now averaging below 20kph my slowest being 19.5kph . My question being will riding hills only affect my speed on flat road and long distance stamina . Im an old school bikie ( 67 years young now ) and not into high tech training just enjoy my cycling .. 

Your circut seems to mimic interval training. 

 

As in go hard(climb) recover (flat) and then go hard again.

 

If you do interval training they recommend only 2-3 sessions per week and the rest are longer rides in zone 2-low3 

 

Doing intervals or hard rides every day will make slower overall

[Chingy182]

While we are on the topic of HIIT.

 

Can anyone post a link or something to a program we can follow?

 

I think I have also fallen into the trap of these "nothing rides" and could do with a bit of shaking things up.

[Blokman]

Hi First V8 . My advice as an almost 62 year old. Most of us have a circuit near the house that we love doing.

You need to mix it up a bit. Twenty five days of four times the same circuit, means you've done the same thing a hundred times.

Some ideas.

 

Day 1 . Your normal circuit . 

Day 2. Ride shorter cut out some hills , go a bit faster.

Day 3 . Rest

Day 4. Cut out some flats do the hills . Recover between them.

Day 5. Normal circuit . A bit faster or a bit slower than usual . Depends on your legs

Day 6 . Rest.

Just an example . Nothing written in stone. Rest is important. Don't always try and beat your best time.

 

 

Also vary what you do . On the hills for example. Drop a gear now and then , see how you feel .

The variations are endless. I play gear and speed games all the time.

Try the heart rate monitor and or just rate your rides on a scale from one to ten.

You work it out in your head and you feel the 'good' day coming and you bring that time down.

I hope this makes sense. 

 

 

[stefmeister]

Along with periodization in your training, progression is also just as important. Increase the load, intensity, volume and frequency as you go along. If you start off on your current capacity/form with maxing out any of the latter you'll burn-out or hit plateaus.