Australian Cycling Forums - Bicycles Network Australia

Unlock the safe, what's your training plan?

Average A grader here, I do about 10 hours/week, 3 short (1-2 hours) higher intensity rides a week, 1 easy ride, then race or longer ride on the weekend. Bit of commuting thrown in there too.

The main answer for me here is really it depends. Usually somewhere from 10-15. Mostly endurance at the moment, generally only 2-3 hours (AT) or above threshold throughout the week (total for the week).

I managed to race A grade for years on 4 x 2hour rides per week plus the race day .... that was bare minimum and while I got results in races up to 60k I was useless at anything longer than that.
My son, nephew, brothers and all my mates do a minimum of 10-12 hours and its quality stuff. Depending on the time of the year and upcoming races, the training is different. Training for State Opens of 100+ km, or Tours, is different to just training for a 30k club race each week.

Derny Driver wrote:I managed to race A grade for years on 4 x 2hour rides per week plus the race day .... that was bare minimum and while I got results in races up to 60k I was useless at anything longer than that.
My son, nephew, brothers and all my mates do a minimum of 10-12 hours and its quality stuff. Depending on the time of the year and upcoming races, the training is different. Training for State Opens of 100+ km, or Tours, is different to just training for a 30k club race each week.

Then in A grade there is a big difference between the club A graders and the Open A graders than there is the NRS guys another level again.

There's a few guys at NRS level that are on strava.. Check them out

If there is no open racing on the weekend I will normally do around 550km a week. I squeeze this in around a 'long' job and wife / kids. Lucky for me I am an extremely early riser.

2 x easy days.
2 x 4 - 6 hour endurance days with climbing.
1 x 2-3 hour day with specific intervals.
2 x 2 hour days on TT bike, doing TT stuff.

I'm nowhere near the top of Elite A in Qld but can hold my own.

I'm not sure what grade my speeds puts me in but I am sure it is not A grade. But for what it is worth here is my contribution.

I put in more than 800 hrs a year and I still can't manage any faster than 15kph.

I think more importantly, it's how much weekly volume you can maintain around FTP, is what makes an A grader. If you can put away 3-4hrs in and around FTP each week within consistent 14-16hr training weeks, you'll be there.

Hunter Allen's "The Next Level" article gives a good outline of this sort of protocol.

3-4hrs doesn't sound like much, but it is..



Paul

fluro2au wrote:I think more importantly, it's how much weekly volume you can maintain around FTP, is what makes an A grader. If you can put away 3-4hrs in and around FTP each week within consistent 14-16hr training weeks, you'll be there.

Hunter Allen's "The Next Level" article gives a good outline of this sort of protocol.

3-4hrs doesn't sound like much, but it is..



Paul

Supercoach is with Cipolla now?

You guys are legends, thanks everyone for your contributions, I was interested to see the contrast of training hours. Time to step up my base training for the moment I think. cheers guys.

ColinOldnCranky wrote:I'm not sure what grade my speeds puts me in but I am sure it is not A grade. But for what it is worth here is my contribution.

I put in more than 800 hrs a year and I still can't manage any faster than 15kph.

Lol

Nice article. Hunter is a true acolyte of Rule number 5!

Used too do 40Klm of a morning before starting work at 6.30am and then another 1.5hrs roughly on the track of an afternoon and then 1-1.5hrs at the gym.

Race on Friday nights if no Saturday and Sunday carnival racing but Saturday nearly always raced and then do a 60-70Klm ride Sunday. (this was for track)

Foo

Xplora wrote:Nice article. Hunter is a true acolyte of Rule number 5!

That's a serious amount of load, not just the 14-16 hours per week, but the recovery needed from the intensity.
I am wondering from what level he is talking about stepping up from and to.

I think he's talking about stepping up from 15 bucks for Training with Power to 125 for WKO+ and Training with Power

Seriously though, the article is clear. It doesn't matter what the level is, FTP intervals are hard for everyone and getting those hard hours in will help destroy the competition.

10 hrs is a big week for me sometimes I only get 1 or 2 rides in that total about 3 hrs. I think this year I have ave 180km a week.

I have won a couple of A grade races in my time.

Xplora wrote:I think he's talking about stepping up from 15 bucks for Training with Power to 125 for WKO+ and Training with power.

Golden cheetah is free and I find it is a much nicer interface too


Sent from my GT-I9505 using Tapatalk 4

Derny Driver wrote:

fluro2au wrote:I think more importantly, it's how much weekly volume you can maintain around FTP, is what makes an A grader. If you can put away 3-4hrs in and around FTP each week within consistent 14-16hr training weeks, you'll be there.

Hunter Allen's "The Next Level" article gives a good outline of this sort of protocol.

3-4hrs doesn't sound like much, but it is..



Paul

Supercoach is with Cipolla now?

Yes DD,

Oyto and I have hooked up. Spreading our wings across two states now

Paul

skull wrote:

Xplora wrote:I think he's talking about stepping up from 15 bucks for Training with Power to 125 for WKO+ and Training with power.

Golden cheetah is free and I find it is a much nicer interface too


Sent from my GT-I9505 using Tapatalk 4

The book is only so you know what you're reading, the comment about Allen and Coggan wanting people to spend money on WKO+ was humour. I clearly have no wit without a emoticon.

I have found Golden Cheetah to be an absolute pain in the butt; however I agree that 120 bucks for software analysis is a bit much considering I am mostly looking at xPower, TSS and the PMC. CP plot as well to stroke my ego

LOL. Yeah I am a big fan of the PMC table. I don't understand the CP plot, so I don't look at that tab all that much.

Do you need to know anything more than "this is your best power for this period of time"? If you've got the power meter, it can help you work out what are your expected timeframes for 150W, 200W, 500W so you can pace better... also can be worth it for working out if you've benefitted from a gel or creatine or less water or some other regime change over the longer timeframes like an hour or two; the proof has to be in performance and you can't really work out how much better you've done any other way reliably.

I don't think I can call myself an A grader as I haven't raced RR's or crits for years. I have only done TT's over the past several years with some reasonable results. I average around 11 hours PW. At least half of that would be high tempo or above. Around 50% of my time is on the trainer.

thearthurdog wrote:If there is no open racing on the weekend I will normally do around 550km a week. I squeeze this in around a 'long' job and wife / kids. Lucky for me I am an extremely early riser.

2 x easy days.
2 x 4 - 6 hour endurance days with climbing.
1 x 2-3 hour day with specific intervals.
2 x 2 hour days on TT bike, doing TT stuff.

I'm nowhere near the top of Elite A in Qld but can hold my own.

Can I ask how you schedule those rides into a week? 4-6 hours Saturday and Sunday?

Toolish wrote:Can I ask how you schedule those rides into a week? 4-6 hours Saturday and Sunday?

Sure.
Mon 5am - 6am
Tue 4.30am - 7.30am
Wed 5am - 7am or 4.15pm - 6.15pm (depending on PM work committments)
Thu is same as Wed
Fri 5am - 6am
Sat 4.30am - 8.30am
Sun 4.30am - 8.30am / 9.30am / 10.30am

This is how I arrange things from April through to about October.

I'm lucky because the early starts don't bother me and my wife and kids tend to be busy doing lessons, classes, sport, whatever on Wed and Thu arvo.