Training up to do double centuries

[janus77]

So reading some ride reports, people doing over 200k's is pretty impressive.
Myself and a mate who ride together regularly would like to train up to do Sydney to Canberra in a day.
At the moment i reckon i can do 120-150k's in a day if there are some hills thrown in (which there will always be unless you're in central QLD or something crazy).

What sort of training do people do to ride further and faster, apart from time on the bike (which i guess is the best training)?
As far as gym work, is there anything you can do that's going to help if you only have an hour in the gym each day?
Is running a 39/53 crank, 11-23 cassette, is it a bit under geared for regular climbing? I find i really need to get out of the saddle even in the easiest gear once the gradient pitches up, and there's no way i can maintain my normal cadence.

[ni78ck]

there is no easy! just get out there and keep doing longer and longer rides. work your way to 200kms.
i did a 150km ride with hills on the weekend, which was one of my longest and i felt good. next time ill try 180kms and so on.

[janus77]

roids

[beanspropulsion]

roids

Yeah I get Hemorrhoids too.....

Better knicks might help

[janus77]

hehe, he's got im!

[janus77]

My mate's made the call to ride to Newcastle this weekend, to be honest i'm a little scared, it's a hell of a long way, and probably a couple of hills thrown in... plus an epic amount of motorcycles riding mega fast. Have to do some research on the best route to take.

[HappyHumber]

+1 for researching a preferable route. Less traffic... some/less hills can make any ride less unpleasant. Especially if you're testing other personal limits at the same time.

I have been using ridewithgps.com lately to plot a few routes here in Perth - and I don't even own a GPS It gives a good indication of climbs & gradients, once you figure out a few of the site's plotting quirks.

Hoping to break the 200km mark myself soon. PB to date is just shy of 180km. Only thing is it really starts chewing up the time! you're basically looking at the better part of 10 hours allowing for breaks and such.

[grantw]

200s are very doable and if you are confident you can do 150km, you're not all that far away.

My longest ride before tackling my first 200 was 140km but I was managing to ride about 250-300km a week made up of 3-4 shorter rides during the week with a couple of longer ones on the weekend. Just keep building up your weekly mileage and you won't have many problems (well nothing that chamois cream can't fix).

[gabrielle260]

If you read the ultra distance coaches like John Hughes on the UMCA (Ultra Marathon Cycling Association) website, if you can comfortably do two thirds of the distance, you can do the full distance.
Good luck! Your first 200km ride is a big achievement,
Andrew

[Nikolai]

At the moment i reckon i can do 120-150k's in a day if there are some hills thrown in

Any reasonably fit/trained cyclist can do 200 and more in one shot as long as he's got food and paces himself properly. You can never exceed 100k or so in your training and still will be able to ride 200+ Perhaps for psychological reasons you might want to do a few long rides before, other than that, you can build your endurance with shorter rides and still do fine on a 6-7hr ride.

As far as gym work, is there anything you can do that's going to help if you only have an hour in the gym each day?

As far as cycling performance is concerned, gym contributes close to zero to it.

Is running a 39/53 crank, 11-23 cassette, is it a bit under geared for regular climbing? I find i really need to get out of the saddle even in the easiest gear once the gradient pitches up, and there's no way i can maintain my normal cadence.

Keep your cranks and get a different cassette, there are 12-25 and other options available. You probably don't really need an 11 cog anyway so anything from 12 or even 13 up should be OK.

[simonn]

What sort of training do people do to ride further and faster, apart from time on the bike (which i guess is the best training)?

Training? I just ride. The last 30km on my first 200km ride was hell. Now I just ride. So time to step up the distance. On Saturday I did my first 255km ride, solo, with an average rolling speed of 26.7km/h (24.4 elapsed) which I was pretty happy with. Not a great deal of climbing by Sydney standards though at ~2500M over the whole distance .

It depends on what sort of cyclist you want to be though. I like audax because it is no really about the speed. Sure, you can go as fast as you want (well, almost), but it is about completing the distance in a (fairly easy) time limit, rather than having a high average speed.

I would suggest giving audax a go because the personal threat of cheating or DNFing gives you an extra push to complete the ride. On my first 200km the route came out onto the Old Pacific Hwy at Berowra Waters and turned left to go to Pie and then back tracked to Hornsby. I could have so easily turned right and gone to Hornsby.

As far as gearing goes, I have just got myself a compact crankset, but have ridden up a lot of the big steep climbs in Northern Sydney/Central Coast with 39/29 lowest gear, so get a 12-28 or whatever cassette and he'll probably be alright (or maybe the rear der will work with one of the new 12-30 tiagra cassettes? Let us know ). However, if you do get into long distance riding you'll probably want a compact for when you are really tired .

[Ken Ho]

I did a 200 km ride back in late spring. Coming off a good base of fitness, I did 5 rides in the preceding 2 weeks, all of which were 70-90 km, with a lot of hill climbing thrown in. I did a 90 km as fast as I could. I had previously done a 150.
I finished the 200km, though with 2 big hill climbs, I would not say "comfortably" or "easily".
If you can do 150, you will get through 200, even if your body hates you.

[boyracer]

At the moment i reckon i can do 120-150k's in a day if there are some hills thrown in

Any reasonably fit/trained cyclist can do 200 and more in one shot as long as he's got food and paces himself properly. You can never exceed 100k or so in your training and still will be able to ride 200+ Perhaps for psychological reasons you might want to do a few long rides before, other than that, you can build your endurance with shorter rides and still do fine on a 6-7hr ride.

What he said. I busted out a near 300 (1100m climbing) at xmas because i had to. Longest before that 120ish! I really didn't want to spend a lot of time with in laws at holiday house and said I would ride there later in week.
I got the town wrong...not 170 as i first thought but 292 door to door. No biggie really. Fastest hour was 2nd last one after 10- 11 hours in saddle,160k's of headwind. Rode last 5 mile on a flat rear cause i ran out of tubes!
Only prep was 25mm tyres (biggest that would clear....last 40k's dirt) (AT) 90psi f&r on my look roadie, a quick checkover, I keep bike tip top. Spare cleat,3 tubes,gaff tape,4-5-6 allen keys and a screw driver... and spare bib shorts. I changed 1/2 way for comfort. 2 bakery stops, lolly snakes and nuts/raisins were consumed. A red bull at 200 (AT) 2nd stop.
Only prob was a blister from rubbing seam. Felt fine..stayed up drinking.

I'm hooked. Audax starting to sound interesting.
Looking to better 300 some time this year, but need to fit it in around young family/study.

[Nikolai]

Sounds like an epic ride

[liquor box]

roids

thats cheating, just ask for the Spanish Steak at a restaurant. Look what steak did for Contador

[toolonglegs]

Mmm lolly snakes ... The sweets here really suck!... Haribo really is no match for Allen's & Natural confectionery company!.

[boyracer]

Mmm lolly snakes ... The sweets here really suck!... Haribo really is no match for Allen's & Natural confectionery company!.

I'm happy to send some over..... pm me your postal address TLL. Used to send boxes of cherry ripes and tim tams to a mate in France.

[toolonglegs]

Mmm lolly snakes ... The sweets here really suck!... Haribo really is no match for Allen's & Natural confectionery company!.

I'm happy to send some over..... pm me your postal address TLL. Used to send boxes of cherry ripes and tim tams to a mate in France.

Thats very kind of you!... but I know the postage prices to send sweeties over .
I get a few goodie boxes every so often..my waist line is probably glad that the sweets isle at the supermarket is so easy to walk though without temptation here!.
I do know which boloungeries sell the biggest pain-aux-raisins or croissants though .

[grantw]

I'm hooked. Audax starting to sound interesting.
Looking to better 300 some time this year, but need to fit it in around young family/study.

Go on, you know you want to. http://www.audax.org.au