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Will Dickeson: Cycling Tribe Blog: Training hard or hardly training
After spending a week on the tools at the Tour of Geelong and having another couple of days R&R, I was ready to refocus on the bike and hit up some serious training. I had 5 weeks before the start of Tour of Hainan which is my last race of the season with team Jellybelly.In previous years, I have usually relied on racing to get fitness and therefore haven’t really had to train too much. This year has been a bit different however, with my days spent racing going from 90-100 to about 40-50. With this in mind, I got some help from Tim Roe who spends a lot of his time ripping into the Ergo. (a wind-braked indoor trainer that is really good for hard efforts) and put together a program.
When I say that I am full-time on the bike, people are always asking how much training I do. I think they are a bit surprised when I don’t say something like 700k a week, but I think for me, it’s definitely a case of quality over quantity. To give you an idea, this is a rough outline of what I followed in the lead up to Tour of Hainan:
6-12th
Monday- day off
Tuesday-3hours, ergo or road 3x8min SE
Wednesday- 4hours e1. lobethal
Thursday- 2-3hours, 5x5 SE ergo
Friday- recovery
Saturday-ONCE efforts
Sunday-Northern Expressway race
13th-19th
Monday-4-5hrs tapping
Tuesday-recovery or day off
Wednesday-3hours am, pm erg. 3x3min, 3x2min, 4x1min. cadence 100rpm or whatever feels powerful
Thursday- 2-3hours easy,
Friday- 3hours e1, Afternoon 6x5min ergo. cadence 100ish
Saturday- 2hours easy
Sunday- A Hill climb TT plus ride out and back
20th-26th
Monday-day off
Tuesday- 3hours
Wednesday-4 hours, 2xgreenhill road climb, 1st within yourself, 2nd TT
Thursday- 1hr brew ride
Friday- 3-4 hours, 1 summit SE, rest e1
Saturday-1h then ergo (20sec on 10sec off x 4 – 3 sets)
Sunday- Pacc Time trial, arvo 5x5min ergo
27th-3rd
Monday- 2hour recovery
Tuesday- recovery
Wednesday- 3hour recovery
Thursday- 4hours, 3hours the ergo (20sec on 10sec off x 4 – 3 sets)
Friday- Recovery
Saturday- 3-4hours e1!
Sunday- e1 bunch, 4hours
Oct 4th- 10th
Monday- 2hours e1, erg 20sec efforts
Tuesday-4hrs, 2hours then 2xONCE efforts
Wednesday- 2-3hours recovery
Thursday- easy roll then travel to China
Friday-1h ride
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So for 5 weeks, it’s just been training, training, training, feeling the form coming up and getting keener and keener to pin a number on again. One of the biggest things about training properly is recovering fully, otherwise it is harder and harder to complete the efforts and get the full benefit from them. For me, a big part of this is getting enough sleep – I find that my body works best when it tells me when to get up, not some alarm. However, this means that by the time I am keen to ride at about 10am, most people are off to work and training partners are a bit harder to find.
This is when the intervals on the ergo are good - you don’t need anyone to motivate you to get out and the hardest part is just hooking the bike up to the machine. Once I climb on, an attitude of ‘well I’m here now, let’s make the most of it’ takes over and the next hour just takes care of itself.
When it comes to training out on the road, I like to try and keep it fresh by a number of ways. Dirt roads are great fun, going up or down, and I run the heaviest, sturdiest training wheels and tyres that I can find and haven’t had a flat on the dirt yet. I also do ‘exploration’ rides – either going out with the purpose of finding out where a road goes, or just riding with no destination in mind and just taking any road that I happen to see. A lot of the time it results in doing a u-bolt, but I have come across 3 or 4 really good roads that I had no idea about until now.
Anyway I’ve made it through the training now, I feel fit and it’s just a matter of putting it all together out on the road.
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