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Although not everyone has a velodrome located nearby, almost every cyclist can benefit from the skills that are gained from racing and training on the track. Track racing is a unique sport in which the bikes are different and each type of event requires certain technical skills. For those who are focused on the road or mountain bike, a track oriented approach to cycling can be a great benefit.

Many factors will affect the effectiveness of your relationship with your coach and your success in reaching your fitness goals. While natural talent and the training itself play important roles in athletic success, many other details can impact how your coach is able to help you.

Endurance athletes have four fueling regimens, each necessary for success and each appropriate for a certain time in the yearly and weekly training cycles.

The Main Fueling plan, eaten on a daily basis in the off-season, and all the time in season except event day and a day or two before event day, keeps an athlete lean and healthy. (See the Leaning Out and Generally Healthy Plan).

You have followed all the suggested post ride recovery procedures such as stretching, glycogen restoration, hydration, and more but your legs still feel tired and heavy post training. As a result of intense exercise, there is an accumulation of fluids caused by microscopic tearing of the muscles.

Professional bike racing is a big business where money considerations often trump athletic ones, but we fans maintain the fiction of the purity of sport. We get to believe that bike racing identifies riders who are somehow superior. A race is supposed to be a crucible in which riders are tested, with the “best” riders ending up on the podium. Different races test different things.

The lactate threshold heart rate is the central datum when setting up heart rate training zones. There’s no magic required to determine the LT heart rate though. Below you will find two different test instructions for measuring ventilatory or lactate threshold. One is higher-tech, based on the test originally developed by Dr Conconi and used by Francesco Moser before his hour record rides.

Hello,

I have been cycling seriously for a little over a year now. My racing goals focus mainly around triathlons (Olympic distance) but I would like to give straight cycling races a try. As a result of the time commitment involved in the multisport training regime and life in general, I get a large portion of my cycling miles in on my commute to and from work (I do this once or twice a week).

Updated for 2013 by Kendra Wenzel, with contributions by Jeremy Nelson.

Because the gains from stretching aren’t always immediately obvious, it’s easy to put off stretching or forget it altogether. But before you put off reading this article, consider this: Stretching can help prevent injury and improve flexibility. For healthy riders, it’s about getting ahead in the game.

Wenzel Coaching offers responses to interesting questions submitted in the comment space below. We don’t promise to answer every question, but if the answer to your question is likely to be interesting or useful to a lot of people, we’ll publish it.

Racing cyclists often want to know what their optimal weight range is for their height. The below are taken from height and weight data of professional cyclists with national or international wins. Keep in mind that these are goal weight ranges for elite cyclists. 

Data for heights lacking sufficient data samples are extrapolated from Body Mass Indexes (BMI) of other climbers and sprinters.