When fitness goals are balanced with family and work priorities, social eating around the holidays can be a challenge to your ideal training plan. Having well-defined, motivating goals can help avoid excess and junk food, but even with the best …
Get Stacked: Correct the Cyclist Posture to Get the Most from Strength Training
Cyclists tend to develop certain postural abnormalities that can cause problems both on and off the bike: Slumped shoulders, head dropped forward on the neck and the classic upper-back hump are common and often become painful if they are not …
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How to Avoid the Post-Illness Over-Training Death Spiral
You’re just getting over an illness, feeling maybe 80% healthy, but you are more than desperate to start training again. You fear losing fitness and you want to make up for lost time, so you head out for your first …
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How to Pack for a Cyclocross Race [The Ready-to-Race Packing Checklist]
Race day can be stressful. Be prepared. Having a cyclocross packing list means you don’t have to rely on your memory to prepare. Cut your stress level in half by following these steps. First, start by packing the night before …
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Diet Tips for Cyclists & Endurance Athletes [Four Complete Fueling Plans for Success]
Nutrition can make or break an athlete’s performance. For the best chance of success in cycling and other endurance activities, different eating regimens are appropriate at different times. Athletes will utilize the following four basic eating plans: Different foods and …
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The Complete Pre-Race Checklist for a Competition-Ready Bicycle
Races can be decided by a dropped chain. Just ask Andy Schleck after the 2010 Tour de France. Some folks are more excited about the mechanical aspect of bicycle racing than others, but the fact is that maintenance is part …
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Overreaching During a Peak and Taper May Make It Worthless
Cyclists and triathletes want to be ready for a peak performance at their ‘A’ race. It’s common practice to attempt that by doing a period of “overload” or extra hard training ending 1-3 weeks before the race, and then a period of …
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The Power of Group Training
Take Advantage of Group Dynamics to Better Your Strength Workouts It’s 6:45 AM on November 21st several years ago. Snow and ice blow over the sidewalks as early-risers pour their first cup of coffee. Most people will be on their …
Notes for the Gravel-Curious Cyclist
This year, admittedly bored with a Virginia/Maryland road racing calendar featuring a dozen races I had done at least a dozen times already, I decided to focus on a gravel grinder. The 72-mile Gravel Race Up Spruce Knob (GRUSK) over …
How to Avoid Dead Legs on Race Day Forever
“My legs felt like lead!” I told my dad. It didn’t make any sense at all. I had been training for a full year for the Junior National Cycling Championships. I hadn’t missed a single day of training and had …
Opener & Tune-up Rides for Cycling
Opener/Tune-up rides are essential preparation for race days. There are many possible Opener/Tune-up exercises. Not everyone needs quite as much intensity as some athletes may. Either way, this method will provide an adequate challenge to prepare anyone: You will need …
Coach Meredith Nielsen Talks the History of Women’s Road Racing in Northern California
Coach Meredith Nielsen isn’t just a great skills and beginning racing instructor, she’s also a wealth of information on getting started in women’s cycling in Northern California. She was interviewed by the Our Work Works podcast about beginning racing. Have …
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Improve Your Cadence for Faster Gran Fondo Finishes
Whether you have a lot of time to train on the bike or just a little, optimizing your pedaling cadence1 will help you to finish gran gondos both faster and stronger. This is because the main moment-by-moment determinant of fatigue …
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Surgery and Recovery Around Training – A Coach’s Experience and Analysis
Competitive cyclists are constantly making risk versus reward calculations. Often, these are momentary decisions that have immediate near-term consequences such as making a move in a race or choosing to eat or not eat before a workout. Other times, the …
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The Myth of FTP
It’s pretty hard these days to escape the concept of Functional Threshold Power, or FTP. A quick Google search will produce statements such as: “FTP is the single most important physiological determinant of performance in events” “FTP has become the …