# Winter Bike Training: The Key To Summer IRONMAN Success | Ep 514

An episode of [Oxygenaddict Triathlon Podcast](https://invisiblenetwork.ai/podcast/951501034), 6 Nov 2024, 22 min.

Audio: https://anchor.fm/s/ea99f7d8/podcast/play/94026613/https%3A%2F%2Fd3ctxlq1ktw2nl.cloudfront.net%2Fstaging%2F2024-10-5%2F389323982-44100-2-0436038c8a597.mp3

We kick off our Ironman Winter Training Mini-Series this week with a focus on bike training. Learn the essential bike training principles that will ensure you maximise your FTP, bike fitness and overall aerobic fitness fitness over winter while minimising risk of injury. Get actionable tips on establishing baseline fitness levels with FTP tests, structuring weekly interval sessions, and the benefits of training in the race-day position. Whether coached by Team Oxygen Addict or not, these strategies will help you see significant fitness gains and prepare you for race day success. * * * * * * * * SPONSORS * * * * * * * * Like what you heard in this show? Join hundreds of other age group triathletes making the most of their limited training time, training with Team OxygenAddict! http://team.oxygenaddict.com - The most comprehensive triathlon coaching program for busy age groupers. Book an application call to see if you'd be a good fit for Team Oxygenaddict for the coming 12 months here: https://team.oxygenaddict.com/consultation-call/ * * * * * * * * * * * * precisionfuelandhydration.com Precision Fuel & Hydration help athletes personalise their hydration and fuelling strategies for training and racing. Use the free Fuel & Hydration Planner to get a personalised race nutrition plan for your next event. And then book a free 20-minute video consultation with a member of the PF&H Athlete Support Team to refine your strategy. Listeners get 15% off their first order of fuel and electrolytes with Precision Fuel & Hydration. Simply use this link and the discount will be auto-applied at the checkout. * * * * * * * * * * * * Watch on youtube Listen on Spotify Listen on Apple Podcasts

## Transcript

[0:04] Hello, and welcome to another episode of the Oxygen Addict
[0:07] Triathlon Podcast. We're brought to you every week
[0:09] by our sponsors, Precision Fuel and hydration.com.
[0:12] You can personalise your fueling and hydration strategy so you
[0:15] perform your best with 15% off your first order of electrolytes
[0:19] and carbohydrate fuel with the code OXYGEN 24 at
[0:22] precisionfuelandhydration.com. Welcome to the show, everybody.
[0:26] I'm your host, coach Rob Wilby, and every week we bring you an
[0:28] episode of this podcast to help motivate and inspire you.
[0:31] Listen, before we kick this off, there's a couple of things you
[0:33] could do for us. Please, if you like and enjoy
[0:36] this episode, please consider following us on Spotify or Apple
[0:39] Podcasts or wherever you listen to podcasts.
[0:41] And if you're watching on YouTube, please click like and
[0:44] subscribe. It helps the growth of the show.
[0:47] It helps us get shown to more people, that helps us get more
[0:50] athletes into our coaching programme, that helps us keep
[0:52] bringing more content to you. And secondly, if you're looking
[0:55] for help and advice with your Iron Man or 70.3 training,
[0:58] please get in touch. We run our own coaching
[1:01] programme, Team Oxygen Addict. I think it is the most
[1:03] comprehensive programme for busy age groupers.
[1:07] We've helped thousands of athletes over the last 10 years
[1:10] achieve the 70.3 in Iron Man dreams and we'd love to help you
[1:12] too. So please get in touch.
[1:14] Send an e-mail to help@oxygenaddict.com or there's
[1:17] a link in the show notes to book a call with me or the team and
[1:21] we can see how we can best help you out to make next season be
[1:23] the best one ever. OK, so on this episode of our
[1:28] Iron Man Wins training series, we're going to be talking about
[1:31] bike training. We're going to be talking about
[1:33] the ways that you can use your bike training time really
[1:36] effectively during winter to help you to prepare for your
[1:40] spring or summer Iron Man race. I'm really excited about this
[1:45] Iron Man winter training series. We're going to jump into all the
[1:47] details of how we train athletes within Team Oxygen Addict to
[1:51] prepare for a spring or a summer Iron Man or 70.3.
[1:55] Even if you're not coached by us, I want you to leave the
[1:58] episode with actionable ideas that you can take directly into
[2:02] your training and they'll make a massive difference into the way
[2:05] that you're training for your Iron Man or your 70.3 and a
[2:09] massive jump in your fitness in a way that traditional training
[2:13] just might not have that effect for you.
[2:15] So we've got a few things to cover.
[2:17] I'm going to give you some ideas on the basics of the the
[2:20] principles that underpin why we're going to train the way
[2:22] we're going to train. I'm going to give you some
[2:24] concrete ideas for how your sessions should actually look on
[2:28] a day by day basis. And I'm going to give you an
[2:30] idea about some of the other things that you need to consider
[2:33] around bike training for your winter bike training for a
[2:37] summer Iron Man. OK, so let's kick it off.
[2:39] The first thing that we're going to talk about is the training
[2:42] principles that is is going to lead towards your overall Iron
[2:46] Man success next summer. And really it's bigger than just
[2:50] considering bike training. It's the Halo effect of the way
[2:54] that bike training affects your overall cardiovascular fitness.
[2:59] And that in turn is going to have a knock on onto your run
[3:01] fitness, a knock on onto your swim fitness, and an overall
[3:05] massive knock on into your Iron Man or 70.3 race day
[3:09] performance. So that's the first thing to
[3:11] get. I think that bike training is
[3:13] the most important part of your training going forwards.
[3:17] It's by far the most amount of time you're going to spend on
[3:21] race day. It's going to be on the bike.
[3:23] And it's also the safest place to train compared to swimming,
[3:28] sorry, compared to running, certainly it's the safest place
[3:31] to put the volume and the intensity so that you can get
[3:35] those nice increases in aerobic fitness without any of the risk
[3:39] of illness or injury. So that's the first principle.
[3:42] It's this Halo effect that biking is going to affect all of
[3:45] your fitness and all of your performance in a positive way.
[3:49] The second principle I want you to remember is above all else,
[3:54] avoid picking up an injury and try and avoid picking up
[3:57] illnesses as well. But I don't think anyone's
[3:59] really in danger of training themselves into illness, but
[4:02] everybody is at danger of training themselves into injury.
[4:06] And typically that happens with hard or fast running during the
[4:10] winter time, especially for older age groupers and those who
[4:14] are working full time jobs. So the safest place to put your
[4:19] intensity and your hard work and if you like the the mental focus
[4:23] of where you're going to train is going to be on the bike.
[4:27] And that will bleed over into the run and bleed over into the
[4:29] swim as well, to a smaller extent, but still to an extent.
[4:32] So that's our basic principle. OK, So how are we going to train
[4:36] on the bike? Well, the first thing we need to
[4:38] know is we need to establish some baseline levels of your
[4:42] fitness. I am not a big, a big pusher of
[4:48] the idea that testing is in and of itself really, really
[4:52] important. And because it's, you know, it's
[4:55] nice to have a big number. I'm not a big advocate of that
[4:58] idea at all. It does not matter what your FTP
[5:02] number is on the bike, whether it's 400 watts or 200 watts,
[5:06] That isn't of any interest to me.
[5:08] I think people who want to brag about the numbers, fine.
[5:10] If that makes you feel better, do that.
[5:12] That's not what we're interested in.
[5:14] I'm not here to help you grow a big number so you can tell your
[5:16] training buddies about it. I'm here to help you work out
[5:20] accurately where your bike fitness is at right now.
[5:23] And so accurately, we can determine the training levels
[5:27] that are most effectively going to increase your bike training
[5:30] performance at the fastest possible rate.
[5:33] And ultimately, that's what we talk about when we say we're all
[5:36] about helping athletes use their limited training time most
[5:40] effectively. It means we don't do any
[5:43] sessions that are just there for ego.
[5:45] We don't do any sessions where we don't really know the purpose
[5:48] of what we're doing. We don't do any sessions where
[5:50] we just decide what we're going to do on the day.
[5:53] We don't go out for a ride and decide to Sprint for Rd signs or
[5:57] go as hard as we possibly can up a hill.
[5:59] We're going to have a really specific idea of what the
[6:02] session is there for, have it really clearly defined, have the
[6:06] power numbers or heart rate numbers really clear in our mind
[6:08] what we're going for. And once the session is done, we
[6:11] finish, we go and recover. It's not about trying to get as
[6:15] many hours in as possible in our particular training methodology.
[6:19] OK, so that's the first thing to talk about the baseline tests
[6:24] there, to set the baseline so that you're training accurately.
[6:27] So let's talk about what the test is.
[6:29] The FTP test is essentially a test of how much power an
[6:34] athlete can put out for 60 minutes at a sustainable level
[6:38] rate. It's not about going up and
[6:40] down. It's not about what happens if
[6:42] you spike your power over hills. The definition is 60 minutes at
[6:46] a steady state. So you could do the test and not
[6:50] many people choose to do this. You could do a 60 minute time
[6:54] trial. You could do that in the
[6:56] position that you're going to be doing your training in on the
[6:58] equipment you're going to be doing the training in and you
[7:01] could get your number from that. That that's a perfectly valid
[7:05] and in fact it's the most accurate way of doing it.
[7:07] The challenge with it is it's really, really hard to do a 60
[7:10] minute all out time trial. It's really hard to do it on
[7:13] your own, especially most of us have got indoor training setups.
[7:17] We're training in our own. We're not in a race environment.
[7:20] And So what we found over time or what science has shown over
[7:23] time is we can do this in a 20 minute test.
[7:25] If you do a 20 minute test on your own indoors and then you
[7:30] take 95% of the power number, what you'll find is that is
[7:34] pretty close to or as close as makes any difference for the
[7:38] normal working age grouper what that our power number is going
[7:42] to be. So let's put some numbers on
[7:43] this. If you do 200 watts for 20
[7:47] minutes, we take 95% of that number.
[7:49] So 10% of 200 will be 25% would be 10.
[7:53] So 190 watts would be your FTP number.
[7:56] And then we know exactly the numbers that we need to be
[7:59] training at or around in training to get the biggest
[8:02] return on your training investment.
[8:04] It's as simple as that. The test isn't there.
[8:07] So you can put a massive number out and celebrate the massive
[8:09] number, although you'd be free to do that if you want.
[8:12] It's not even there. So you can log the massive
[8:15] improvement that you're going to make across the winter, although
[8:18] you will make those massive improvements.
[8:20] It's simply there so that your training efforts are accurate
[8:24] relative to where your fitness is AT.
[8:27] And then as we move forward into race day next spring and summer,
[8:30] you know that the clearly defined percentages we're going
[8:34] to be having our athletes work out for race day are relative to
[8:37] a recent and accurate FTP number.
[8:40] And it's really important that we have these things that
[8:42] they're recent and that they're accurate.
[8:44] So we can then do the analysis. We can accurately tell people
[8:48] what percentages to ride on race day and we can do the analysis
[8:51] afterwards, confident that the the levels are relative to
[8:54] something that's accurate. Because without the accuracy, we
[8:58] may as well not be doing this at all.
[9:00] OK, so we're going to use the 20 minute test.
[9:04] You can use the test that's in Zwift, the 20 minute FTP test.
[9:08] But my advice is not to use any test that's there any shorter
[9:12] than 20 minutes. Don't use any of the ramp tests.
[9:15] They tend. They tend to be popular because
[9:19] they're shorter. They also tend to be popular
[9:22] because they skew the numbers bigger, especially for bigger
[9:25] and more powerful athletes who are not from a cycling
[9:27] background. So let's take a typical rugby
[9:30] player or American football player.
[9:32] It's not unusual for them to put out very big numbers on a ramp
[9:35] test or a shortened FTP test because they're extremely
[9:38] powerful. That's not what we're trying to
[9:40] measure. What we're trying to measure is
[9:42] how much power you can sustain for 60 minutes.
[9:45] And as you can see, the further away from the 60 minutes you
[9:48] get, if you get to AA12 minute ramp test or an 8 minute ramp
[9:52] test or a 5 minute ramp test, the further away from the 60
[9:56] minutes, the less accurate it's going to be.
[9:58] All right, So use the 20 minute steady state test.
[10:01] We've got one we use with our athletes.
[10:02] The 20 minute test that's in Swift is absolutely fine as
[10:05] well. And don't overthink it.
[10:08] It's not the end of the world. You don't need to psych yourself
[10:11] up for this. Just treat it as another
[10:13] workout. OK, so at the end of this, we
[10:16] have now got an accurately, an accurately set FTP test number
[10:21] that we're going to work from. Now caveat here for those of you
[10:23] who are heart rate users, if you haven't got a power metre yet,
[10:27] my advice is is get one as soon as you possibly can.
[10:30] Power metres are like the cheat code for Iron Man.
[10:32] If you haven't got 1 yet, that's OK.
[10:35] You can go to a local gym and you can use a Watt bike there.
[10:37] It's really common to find those there and they've got power
[10:40] metres built into them. If you absolutely have to, you
[10:43] can do this based on heart rate. You can do the 20 minute test
[10:47] and use your heart rate monitor and take the average reading of
[10:50] the 20 minutes and use that as a rough proxy for your FTP heart
[10:54] rate. But just be aware that heart
[10:57] rate is affected by dehydration, by excitement, by how fatigued
[11:02] you are, by whether you're getting sick or not.
[11:04] There's lots of variables that come into play with that that
[11:07] aren't the same with a power metre.
[11:08] So power metres are more accurate.
[11:10] Get yourself on to 1 if you possibly can, as soon as
[11:13] possible. OK, Now let's move on to talking
[11:16] about training sessions, your key training sessions during the
[11:20] winter for our athletes, we'll give them two key training
[11:23] sessions, two key bike sessions and these sessions are going to
[11:27] be an intervals set at or around 100% of your FTP.
[11:34] So the full details of this obviously the the only for the
[11:37] athletes that we coach, but suffice to say if you're working
[11:41] on a kind of five to one ratio of work to rest and you're doing
[11:46] somewhere in the region of 30 to 40 minutes worth of hard work
[11:50] within an interval session, you are on the right track.
[11:53] Now with the athletes I coach, they'll have a structured set of
[11:56] intervals that build from week to week and they'll start at 5
[12:00] minutes and then build and they'll go all the way up to
[12:02] eventually up to 20 minute intervals.
[12:05] The way those intervals increase across time on whether we
[12:08] increase or not is really important and it's only able to
[12:12] be done in a coaching environment.
[12:14] Essentially. I've got to see the athletes
[12:15] data. So for you guys listening who
[12:18] are not coached by us, pay attention to how your body feels
[12:21] as you go along. As I said that five and one
[12:23] ratio is is a really good ratio. The session I would start with
[12:29] with athletes would be 4 reps of 5 minutes with a minute's
[12:32] recovery. If you do well with that, go to
[12:34] five reps and go to six reps, it's then going to be it's going
[12:39] to be personal as to whether you do more reps than than the 30
[12:43] minutes worth of hard work. Some stronger athletes can
[12:46] extend up to 40 minutes, but I would keep it at a maximum of 40
[12:49] minutes of hard work. Within that session, we're going
[12:52] to have a 10 or 15 minute warm up and a 5 or 10 minute cool
[12:55] down. It's going to wrap up into about
[12:57] an hour for that session. If you get two of those interval
[13:00] sessions a week done, if you separate them by at least a day,
[13:05] I can guarantee that your FTP will increase across an 8 week
[13:08] block. Can't guarantee it's going to
[13:10] increase as much as my athletes that I coach who I have control
[13:13] of what their exact interval lengths are.
[13:15] Obviously that goes without saying, but honestly, even if
[13:18] you just repeated that 5 by 6 minutes or 6 by 5 minutes twice
[13:23] a week for an 8 week block, I think you'd see some really,
[13:26] really well. I know you would see some
[13:27] really, really good gains there. So that's the key bike session
[13:32] things to think about. I want to see our athletes doing
[13:35] this session ideally on their own bike, on the bike they're
[13:40] going to race in next summer, in the position they're going to
[13:43] race in next summer. So for most people that's going
[13:45] to involve their Tri bike set up on an indoor trainer like a
[13:49] Wahoo Kicker and in the Arrow position.
[13:51] And they're going to train in that position as much of the
[13:54] winter as they possibly can. Now, if you're relatively new to
[13:57] the sport, if you don't have a TT bike yet, it's fine to do it
[14:01] on your road bike for now. We can transition to that across
[14:04] the winter. But bear in mind and have it in
[14:07] your head every week that goes by that you're not training in
[14:10] your arrow position, that you're not training on ATT bike is time
[14:14] that you've not got to adjust to the position and you've not got
[14:17] to adjust to the the way your body will put power out
[14:20] differently because numbers will be different for most athletes
[14:23] between the arrow position and the sitting up on a road bike
[14:26] position. So as much as you possibly can
[14:29] be on your own equipment, be in the aero position, get as comfy
[14:34] as you can in those positions. And obviously, it goes without
[14:36] saying, you need to be doing the initial test in your aero
[14:39] position as well because that number is going to vary.
[14:41] So get yourself as prepared as you can for that winter block.
[14:45] And ideally when it's set up, you leave that Tri bike set up
[14:48] on the trainer for the whole winter and you get on it twice a
[14:51] week or three times a week. Fantastic.
[14:53] And that's job done. OK.
[14:55] So that's the key things to think about there, I think is
[14:59] getting those key interval sessions done every week on the
[15:03] bike you're going to race in and the position that you're going
[15:05] to race in. Now, supporting sessions, the
[15:08] supporting sessions for the bike is going to be a third ride
[15:12] every week and it's ideally going to be a longer lower
[15:16] intensity ride and it's going to be ideally done outside.
[15:20] Now, the caveats here is, does it matter to your Physiology
[15:23] whether you're indoors or outdoors?
[15:25] No, it doesn't. Your heart and your lungs don't
[15:27] know the difference, but your body knows the difference.
[15:30] The muscles in your neck and your shoulders will find it much
[15:32] easier sitting on the indoor trainer than they do outdoors.
[15:36] And if you don't do an outdoor ride between the start of
[15:38] November and the end of February, well, you can
[15:41] transition in the springtime. And we have lots of athletes who
[15:44] do that. But you have to be prepared that
[15:47] you're going to feel it in your neck, your shoulders, your arms.
[15:49] It's not just about putting power out in your cycling
[15:52] muscles. OK.
[15:53] So we're going to try and do a longer outdoor ride or a longer
[15:57] indoor ride. This is going to be in the
[15:59] region of starting at about 90 minutes, building to possibly 3
[16:03] hours. It's OK if that's not a seamless
[16:07] progression. It's quite natural, I think, for
[16:09] athletes to have waxing and waning enthusiasm for the long
[16:12] ride. But goes without saying, the
[16:16] more long rides you get done across the winter, the fitter
[16:19] you're going to get Now. It's not the end of the world if
[16:21] you don't get one done every week.
[16:23] It isn't actually the end of the world if you don't get one done
[16:25] every other week. But if you are an athlete who's
[16:28] really serious about putting out a performance next summer, you
[16:31] need to know that there is a difference to your body between
[16:34] a 90 minute ride and a three hour ride.
[16:36] So bear that in mind, and that's the kind of duration I would go
[16:40] up to. Even for athletes who are racing
[16:41] Iron Man next year, I would hold your enthusiasm at three hours
[16:44] during the winter. You don't need to go any further
[16:46] than that because although there's a benefit to your
[16:49] fitness for doing the longer rides, what we tend to find is
[16:54] athletes who do lots of long rides during the winter often
[16:57] kind of burn out some of the motivation to do those long
[17:00] rides. And you're going to need that in
[17:01] the last 8 to 12 weeks before you're Iron Man.
[17:05] OK? So bear that in mind as well.
[17:07] And finally, some other things for you to consider when you're
[17:10] thinking about your bike training for Iron Man winter
[17:13] training. So first thing, it does matter
[17:17] what position you train in. So try and train in the position
[17:20] you're going to race in as much as you possibly can.
[17:23] If you're training indoors, you are going to get extremely hot.
[17:27] So have a fan in front of you on the indoor trainer.
[17:30] That will make a massive, massive difference to how cool
[17:33] and how bearable it is that indoor hard FTP sessions are
[17:37] almost unbearable without a fan blown over because your body
[17:40] will generate so much heat and you'd be so hot and sweaty the
[17:43] sweat will tend to just run off you and not evaporate when
[17:46] you're hot in still conditions. Whereas the fan blown over you
[17:50] will help the the water evaporate and I think you lose
[17:53] something like 3 or 4 times less water when it evaporates to take
[17:57] the same heat away as it does when it just runs off you.
[18:00] So the fan will really, really help you ride the real bike as
[18:05] much as you possibly can. Use the Watt bike if you
[18:08] absolutely have to because it's much better than nothing, but be
[18:11] on your real equipment as much as you possibly can.
[18:14] And then the last thing is about cadence.
[18:17] We, we often get the, the question, you know, what is the
[18:19] correct cadence need to be riding at?
[18:21] And the answer is always, it varies from athlete to athlete.
[18:23] You're going to have a a cadence that you're comfortable at, but
[18:26] we can put some kind of numbers around this.
[18:29] For bigger athletes and more powerful athletes, you'll tend
[18:32] to be more efficient at a lower cadence pushing a bigger gear.
[18:36] And for smaller athletes, less muscled athletes and less fit
[18:40] athletes, you'll tend to become more comfortable at a slightly
[18:43] higher cadence pushing a slightly easier gear.
[18:47] And so from that we can work in the range of somewhere from 75
[18:52] to 90 Revs a minute. That's where most people are
[18:55] going to sit our our stronger athletes at the lower end
[18:59] towards 75, Our bigger, more powerful athletes are more
[19:03] experienced athletes pushing those sort of bigger gears at
[19:07] lower cadences. Our newer athletes are less
[19:10] stronger athletes and our smaller, less powerful athletes
[19:14] will tend to be more comfortable pushing cadences up around 90.
[19:18] So the legs are going round faster in a smaller gear.
[19:21] You're not having to produce as much muscular force.
[19:23] And the reality here to think about is if you watch the Tour
[19:27] de French riders, the smaller, skinnier riders, you're you.
[19:32] Chris Froome is a great example for someone who peddled at
[19:34] extremely high RPMS and was very, very skinny compared to.
[19:38] If you go way back in the day and think about some of the
[19:41] really more muscular athletes, we might have seen Jan Ulrich
[19:43] pushing 50-60 refs a minute going up the hill.
[19:47] We want to try and be somewhere in the middle ground.
[19:50] Even if you're a more powerful athlete for triathlon purposes,
[19:54] you want to try and gradually raise that that band that you're
[19:58] comfortable in up, up over 75 because you're going to have to
[20:02] run off the bike and pushing a massive force at a low cadence
[20:06] is going to produce significant muscular fatigue that's going to
[20:08] make running really, really hard of the bike.
[20:11] All right, I hope you enjoyed that episode of the show.
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[20:50] and they'll be happy to help you nail your race nutrition plan,
[20:53] helping you perform your best on race day.
[20:56] And also, if you're looking for help and advice with your
[20:58] triathlon training, please head over to teamoxygenaddict.com.
[21:01] I think we've got the most comprehensive triathlon coaching
[21:04] programme for busy age groupers. Please check us out.
[21:07] There's a link in the show notes to book a call with us.
[21:11] We can have a chat about you, find out all about your
[21:13] background and what you want to achieve.
[21:15] And I'm really confident we can help you get where you want to
[21:18] be. Dead easy link in the show notes
[21:20] or under this video here. You can book straight to our
[21:23] calendar and we can have a chat here.
[21:25] We can best help you out. So remember links in the show
[21:28] notes so you don't have to remember them.
[21:30] Until next week. Have a great safe training and
[21:32] racing week. I'm coach Rob Wilby, and you've
[21:35] been listening to the Oxygen Addict podcast.

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