Disclaimer: The bulk of my bike workouts(85%) are of the long slow variety where my HR rarely gets over 140bpm. I have a good coach who basically sets these parameters for me. I feel like I have a pretty good idea of what I’m doing with regards to training, though I’m also the sort, who if not following a specific training plan, will tend to push things too hard just to see what happens….you know like the kid who wants to see what happens when you push a button.
2 workouts that are fun to try if you are looking to mix things up and slap you in the face.
- Spin-Ups
- 15 minute warm up
- 1 minute at 90 rpm
- 1 minute at 100 rpm
- 1 minute at 100+ rpm
- 30 seconds all out
- recover for 2 min
- Repeat 6,8,or 12 times
I did this workout several months back, and I loved it as soon as I read it. How can you resist the “all out” part? I started wondering, “how fast can I really spin”? To the Pain Cave we go:
During the 2 minute rest after each consecutive set I kept thinking, hmm “Can I go faster”. I was also thinking, “man, if my back wheel comes off the trainer, I’m going straight through the garage wall”. Turns out, ~160rpm is about as fast as I can spin….for now. Small doses though. I did this workout back in January, over 4 months ago. There’s probably no need to go over 120rpms.
- Bike Hill Repeats
- Total Duration 1:15 min
- 10 min warm up
- Find a hill .25 – .50 long. Maintain cadence of 90rpm, and keep HR no higher than mid MAF(for me 145bpm). Coast back down, and repeat.
- 10 min cool down
Somewhere between reading through the workout and getting set up on the trainer, I forgot about the “keep HR no higher than 145bpm”, and started thinking “how many watts can I push while still maintaining 90rpm”…
Since I was on the trainer, I decided my hill was 2 minutes in duration, followed by 2 minutes easy. I started my first hill at 220 watts and just decided to add 5 watts on every hill repeat. I was hoping to get to 300 watts and be able to hold it for 2 min, but I really had no idea where my limits were. As it turns out, my limit on that day was 275 watts on the 3rd to last hill. I tried to hit 275 watts again, and just couldn’t maintain, so I dropped it back to about 260 watts and could barely hold that. Mission accomplished…Legs were cooked and ready for a short 40 min run.
Good times!
Here’s a really good thread on Trifuel about improving your fitness on the bike. Good stuff here:
http://www.trifuel.com/forum/25819/18mph-to-24mph-how-i-did-it
Thanks for Reading!
–Jeff
