Monday 12 December 2011

Winter Cycling - Beating the Indoor Monotony

Here in Southern Ontario, winter riding is for the most part do-able providing the roads are clear of snow and ice. The real issue is temperature as it can drop as low as -15 to -20 degrees Celsius. The coldest temperature I have ridden in while still remaining somewhat comfortable is -2 degrees Celsius without wind-chill. Those were in my younger days… these days my preference is riding inside.

Riding inside isn’t for everyone. It can be boring and monotonous, riding miles nowhere on a stationary trainer reading a book, watching television or day dreaming. To keep myself alert, to challenge my bike handling skills and to perfect my pedaling technique, I prefer to ride inside on rollers rather than a stationary trainer.

Cycling Rollers consist of 3 cylinders affixed to a frame. The bike sits on top of the rollers with the rear wheel sitting on top of two rear cylinders and the front wheel sitting on top of the front cylinder. When the bike is ridden, a cable attached to both the inside rear cylinder and the front cylinder turns turning the front cylinder and as a result turns the front wheel of the bike. This allows the bike to be balanced while ridden resulting in a near road like riding feeling. The only caveat is balancing the bike on the 12” long rollers… a skill in itself which is easily obtained with some practice.

Some dismiss the use of rollers as an effective training device due to their limited resistance capabilities. In my experience, I find the rollers provide an adequate amount of resistance for recovery rides, endurance rides, steady state intervals, lactate threshold intervals and in the saddle sprints. The resistance can be adjusted through the choice gearing and/or tire pressure or alternatively, through the use of a different cylinder circumference. The smaller the cylinder’s circumference, the more resistance will be felt.  It is possible to spin out on rollers and exceed speeds in excess of 100km/h, but I challenge anyone to attempt to do this for any duration longer than a minute!



Riding the rollers and the resulting alertness required to maintain your balance is generally enough to pass the time. However, I find adding a series of intervals passes the time quickly and provides an adequate workout.

In my current base preparation, I am mixing between muscle tension and steady state intervals while also completing muscle and strength development in the gym. For muscle tension intervals, I choose the largest gear and ride at a low cadence such as 50rpm for the desired interval duration. I do not worry about heart rate zone for muscle tension intervals. For steady state intervals, I choose a gearing that I can maintain a cadence of 90 to 95rpm for the desired interval duration and maintain my heart rate in my preferred workout zone.

My preferred workout zone is derived as a percentage of my anaerobic threshold (ATHR). I obtained my anaerobic threshold by completing two 8 minute efforts as hard as possible. For this, again I choose a gear I believe I can maintain a cadence of 90-95rpm for the full 8 minutes. At the end of each 8 minute effort, I recorded my average heart rate. After the second 8 minute effort, I recorded highest average heart rate as my anaerobic threshold heart rate. For me, this is 180bpm.

My Heart Rate Zones:

Z1 ( < 80% ATHR ): < 144bpm
Z2 ( 80% - 89% ATHR ): 144 – 162bpm
Z3 ( 90% - 93% ATHR ): 162 – 169bpm
Z4 ( 94% - 100% ATHR ): 169 – 180bpm
Z5 ( > 100% ATHR ): > 180bpm

The following is a sample of a steady state (SS) workout I performed recently. My HR hovers in the upper bounds of Z2 between 155 and 162bpm:

Warm-up ( 20 minutes )

4 minutes ( Z1 )
2 minutes ( Z2 )
1 minute ( Z1 )
2 minutes ( Z2 )
1 minute ( Z1 )
1 minute ( Z3 )
1 minute ( Z1 )
2 minutes ( Z3 )
6 minutes ( Z1 )

Intervals ( 70 minutes )

5 x 10 min Z2 w/ 5 min rest Z1

Cool-down ( 20 minutes )

20 minutes Z1

Total Workout Time: 110 minutes

Over the course of my base period, I will adjust both the interval duration ( Z2 ) and rest ( Z1 ) to continue to challenge myself. I will not adjust the intensity (increase my heart rate zone target) or cadence. Cadence will always remain within the 90-95rpm so gearing may be adjusted accordingly.

2 comments:

  1. Killian, I'm no expert but it appears that your anaerobic threshold HR is really high, and as a result your zone estimates are really high as well. This obviously must make a huge difference in your training?


    My best estimate of my own anarobic HR is around 158-160. My Z2 is 132 bpm, Z3 at around 142 (from memory)

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  2. Killian, could you drop me an e-mail at dpeplinski(@at)gmail(dot)com? Can't seem to find your e-mail address on here.

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