Australian Cycling Forums - Bicycles Network Australia

dedicate2 wrote:Then factor in genetics; for example if I so much as look at a weight a get bigger, but if I just look at a cake I get bigger.

. I am the same. I was actually doing ok with my cycling when I was doing long slow rides on the flats. I was wearing medium sized leg warmers which fit well. Then after 2 hill rides my calves exploded. They are huge now . (Mind you, the first hilly ride went for 11 hours!). My leg warmers are now very tight. I think my calves go bigger so quickly that it has caused problems with my legs. All year I have been riding around on flat ground for almost 3,000km with no noticeable increase in muscle size. A couple of hundred hilly km and my legs explode.

mikesbytes wrote:Yoga - dynamic hatha, or something similar.

I got a beginners yoga dvd out from my local public library to other day. I found it very difficult! I think I managed 3 or 4 poses before that was enough! One of the reasons I stopped was because of my knee (it has a broken bone inside ) and I figured poses like the Warrior Pose wasn't going to be good for my knee. Anyway, the point is that I felt amazing afterwards. Even though I only went for about 15 mins and managed 3 or 4 poses I really noticed the difference for about two days. Once my knee has healed properly I will definitely be taking up yoga.

I notice you guys are all talking about muscle and strength gain when determining your desired rep range.

The other, equally important, side of the equation is in the energy systems used to enable this exercise.

Shorter, more violent bursts of energy (like those used in the 1-5 rep range where you will lift your 1-5 rep max that many times then break to recover) tend to use different energy sources to your more sustained efforts (like any endurance sport). If training with weights - sets of reps on the 15-25 range tend to use these same energy sources as your sustained efforts.

However, I feel this mainly helps with things like hill climbing - enabling you to have more endurance as you push it up a hill. The impact on your routine cycling is less pronounced.

I have periodised my routines and have a build quarter of the year when I am not racing (foot or bike) whilst having other quarters where I focus more on running, more on cycling, or more on combining them (generally this last leads into the triathlon season - I am there now.

In brief - for 3 months I do 5x5 routines like Rippletoe with each session followed by sprint training - bike (25km) or run (5km). 1 endurance event per week (like a 150km ride or a long run - to keep up my endurance capability).

I spend 1 quarter where I did little to work my legs but really built on the endurance factor. I didn't lose anything off my legs but grew my upper body strength and kept training longer and longer runs\cycles inbetween gym sessions. (Was doing a 3 way split with endurance cardio on 3 others days with a rest day finishing the week) - in this quarter I did the GC half marathon and Brisbane to Noosa imperial for practice.

My third quarter I added my legs back into my routines, did 15-25 rep ranges, started doing circuits in my gym, supersets, etc - adding in exercises like hip flexors, etc and also focussing on more complex exercises.

My final quarter I am down to 1-2 full body sessions per week to maintain muscle mass while every other minute I spend running, cycling or swimming. We are in Triathlon season!

I have only done it for one year so far but spent alot of time tweeking it and am getting ready to start year 2 with this as a more formal routine. I have had craploads of gains in building this routine - can't wait to see where I am next year.

Training and diet have become my favourite topics.

Clownboy,

Haven't heard of Rippletoe 5x5. How does it differ from Bill Starr 5x5 ?

BTW you've hit the nail on the head, your got to keep changing your routine, otherwise it gets boring

To be honest - I threw in rippletoe because I have been reviewing it lately. It is a variation of Bill Starr.

The one I did was stronglifts 5x5 - the name just escaped me when I made the post.

The main idea is, 2-3 warm up sets then 5 hard sets. During the 5 hard, you don't increase weight but every session you add on another 2.5-5kg to the weight used for the hard set. Each one has 3-5 exercises using compound muscle groups.

stronglifts link here - http://stronglifts.com/stronglifts-5x5- ... g-program/

mikesbytes wrote:Clownboy,

Haven't heard of Rippletoe 5x5. How does it differ from Bill Starr 5x5 ?

BTW you've hit the nail on the head, your got to keep changing your routine, otherwise it gets boring

It's surprising how quickly my body adapts to a new routine. When I get back into in I will be mixing up resistance training with yoga and pilates. Not only does a routine get boring but it becomes less effective over time as your body adapts to it.

ClownBoy wrote:Shorter, more violent bursts of energy (like those used in the 1-5 rep range where you will lift your 1-5 rep max that many times then break to recover) tend to use different energy sources to your more sustained efforts (like any endurance sport). If training with weights - sets of reps on the 15-25 range tend to use these same energy sources as your sustained efforts.

However, I feel this mainly helps with things like hill climbing - enabling you to have more endurance as you push it up a hill. The impact on your routine cycling is less pronounced.

Strength is not a limiter in cycling, even for hill climbing. The forces involved in even hill climbing on a bike are still very low compared to weightlifting.

Weight work will not improve sustainable aerobic power, which is what helps you get up hills.

Alex Simmons/RST wrote: Weight work will not improve sustainable aerobic power, which is what helps you get up hills.

However - weight work in the higher rep ranges dpoes increase your ability to utilise those different energy systems.

ClownBoy wrote:

Alex Simmons/RST wrote: Weight work will not improve sustainable aerobic power, which is what helps you get up hills.

However - weight work in the higher rep ranges dpoes increase your ability to utilise those different energy systems.

so?
if it doesn't enable you to improve sustainable aerobic power, then it's basically a waste of good training time.

Alex Simmons/RST wrote:

ClownBoy wrote:

Alex Simmons/RST wrote: Weight work will not improve sustainable aerobic power, which is what helps you get up hills.

However - weight work in the higher rep ranges dpoes increase your ability to utilise those different energy systems.

so?
if it doesn't enable you to improve sustainable aerobic power, then it's basically a waste of good training time.

i wouldnt say its a waste

there are many benifits to a good weight training plan and although they may not make you a faster cyclist they can give you good core strength which will help keep your body in tip top shape

USM TOM wrote:i wouldnt say its a waste

there are many benifits to a good weight training plan and although they may not make you a faster cyclist they can give you good core strength which will help keep your body in tip top shape

no denying that there are benefits (for those sedentary types in particular that could use that sort of workout, or for rehab but for many it's just vanity) - just that this is a cycling forum so I'm looking at it from the perspective of cycling performance.

[quote="Alex Simmons/RST]no denying that there are benefits (for those sedentary types in particular that could use that sort of workout, or for rehab but for many it's just vanity) - just that this is a cycling forum so I'm looking at it from the perspective of cycling performance.[/quote]


Your entitled to your opinion - however a quick google is all it takes to discover how many experts debate this regularly. People who know way more than either of us. If you think you are smarter than them to an extent that you know the unifying answer - more power to you.

In the meantime - I will continue to follow a more complete training plan.

ClownBoy wrote:

Alex Simmons/RST wrote:no denying that there are benefits (for those sedentary types in particular that could use that sort of workout, or for rehab but for many it's just vanity) - just that this is a cycling forum so I'm looking at it from the perspective of cycling performance.

Your entitled to your opinion - however a quick google is all it takes to discover how many experts debate this regularly. People who know way more than either of us. If you think you are smarter than them to an extent that you know the unifying answer - more power to you.

In the meantime - I will continue to follow a more complete training plan.

I'm not particularly interested in google searches, rather I prefer to read the published scientific research and there is none that supports the use of weights for improving endurance cycling performance and some that demonstrates it can be detrimental.

PubMed is more your friend than google.

google is a shortcut.

I have a wife with a degree in biomedical science, half a dozen other people to draw on and while my degrees are not in medicine - I enjoy researching this stuff at the university. I am an amateur but am learning fast and the only thing I know for sure is that both weight and cardio training are conducive to athletic performance.

The degree that each helps for different sports (such as cardio contributing to lifting and body building or resistance training contributing to cycling or running) is always in debate. You only show your own ignorance when you say weight lifting is only

for those sedentary types in particular that could use that sort of workout, or for rehab but for many it's just vanity

Even Lance Armstrong incorporates strength work in his training.

ClownBoy wrote:google is a shortcut.

I have a wife with a degree in biomedical science, half a dozen other people to draw on and while my degrees are not in medicine - I enjoy researching this stuff at the university. I am an amateur but am learning fast and the only thing I know for sure is that both weight and cardio training are conducive to athletic performance.

The degree that each helps for different sports (such as cardio contributing to lifting and body building or resistance training contributing to cycling or running) is always in debate. You only show your own ignorance when you say weight lifting is only

for those sedentary types in particular that could use that sort of workout, or for rehab but for many it's just vanity

Even Lance Armstrong incorporates strength work in his training.

You misquote me.

I am talking about endurance cycling performance. Not other benefits such as an ambiguous "athletic performance".

Just because Lance does it, doesn't mean it is improving his endurance cycling performance.

Do you make cycling equipment choices as well based on what the Pros ride? (even though they are often an inferior choice - from a performance perspective).

Alex Simmons/RST wrote:Just because Lance does it, doesn't mean it is improving his endurance cycling performance.

Do you make cycling equipment choices as well based on what the Pros ride? (even though they are often an inferior choice - from a performance perspective).

That is a totally different discussion. Pros don't choose cycling equipment for the same reasons I do. They don't care about cost or longevity. It is all about going faster.

When it comes to training - we all care about going faster and going longer. Theo nly thing the pro's don't care about but I do is allowing time for my regular job.

And I fail to see how I misquoted you - I copy and pasted the text.

I am not going to spend my day arguiing on here (and am making no more posts) but to the OP - at the very least - weight training will help to gain back the muscle that can be lost during endurance cycling events. At best, it may help performance but this is a contentious pont to make so best to give it a try and see if it helps you personally or not. It is also fun.

Everyone calm down, or I'll have to lock the thread.

And we have gone completely off topic, the thread was about mixing weight training and cardio to loose weight

peter wrote:I was wondering for the purpose of losing weight is it a good thing to mix weight training into daily cardio exercise? I try to make it to the gym 5 days a week, I usually do 40 minutes of cardio and 40 minutes of weight on Mon/Wed/Fri, 60 minutes cardio only on Tue/Thu. I might skip weight training if it's not helping. Cheers!

mikesbytes wrote:Everyone calm down, or I'll have to lock the thread.

And we have gone completely off topic, the thread was about mixing weight training and cardio to loose weight

peter wrote:I was wondering for the purpose of losing weight is it a good thing to mix weight training into daily cardio exercise? I try to make it to the gym 5 days a week, I usually do 40 minutes of cardio and 40 minutes of weight on Mon/Wed/Fri, 60 minutes cardio only on Tue/Thu. I might skip weight training if it's not helping. Cheers!

I'm calm.

ClownBoy wrote:

Alex Simmons/RST wrote:Just because Lance does it, doesn't mean it is improving his endurance cycling performance.

Do you make cycling equipment choices as well based on what the Pros ride? (even though they are often an inferior choice - from a performance perspective).

That is a totally different discussion. Pros don't choose cycling equipment for the same reasons I do. They don't care about cost or longevity. It is all about going faster.

Wrong. It's about riding what the sponsor(s) makes them ride. But I agree, that was a digression.

ClownBoy wrote:And I fail to see how I misquoted you - I copy and pasted the text.

You cut and pasted a part of my text and prefaced it with your own words changing the implied meaning. That is misquoting.

ClownBoy wrote:I am not going to spend my day arguiing on here (and am making no more posts) but to the OP - at the very least - weight training will help to gain back the muscle that can be lost during endurance cycling events. At best, it may help performance but this is a contentious pont to make so best to give it a try and see if it helps you personally or not. It is also fun.

I have no problems with people doing all sorts of other exercise. It's just the claims that it will aid endurance cycling performance that am pointing out are fallacious. Riding a bike (if you do it sufficiently and in a progressive overload manner) will replace "lost" muscle in a manner that's specific to bike riding.

Hi guys
Im new to this site and riding. More on that later.
You are on the right track for losing weight. With doing resistance training you will increase your metabolic rate and allow your body to burn fat all day. With the cardio your doing train between 60 - 80% of your HR zone. This allows maximum weight loss. Never train at 100%. Also watch your diet which goes hand in hand with weight loss. Try to eat every 3hrs. I know this seems alot but you will actually eat less over the whole day and keep your body nourished constantly. You wont feel hungry. Eat a well balanced diet, not the fads of low carb etc as your body needs everything to function properly.
Hope this helps.

See here - - for info on personal success. It works.

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