Ride Out The Storm: A One-Hour Indoor Cycling Workout

Published October 30, 2012 09:41AM

Our thoughts are with everyone in the Northeastern United States battling the effects of Hurricane Sandy. Because several endurance enthusiasts are stuck indoors and many gyms are closed, we thought we’d bring back an indoor cycling workout to help you ride out the storm. This indoor trainer workout comes from the Book “One-Hour Workouts: 50 Swim, Bike, and Run Workouts for Busy Athletes.”

This is an idea I got from Ironman legend Dave Scott when I was a pro, and it helped make my winter indoor cycling much more tolerable. I’m very reluctant to train indoors, which is why my skin looks like a lizard’s! There are several reasons to do this type of session indoors:

• The variety will give you something to think about (other than how much you’re hurting).
• It’s good to train at various intensities at various cadences so that in a race you can change cadence if the one you’re using doesn’t feel great.
• You will be a better cyclist if you extend the range of cadence at which you’re comfortable and proficient.

20 min. Easy warm-up; vary cadence and include a little time out of the saddle RPE 1

6 × 3 min. Continuous 18-min. effort at steady pace RPE 2:
– 3 min. high cadence,100–120 rpm, Go as high as you can smoothly go, but keep the effort in your steady zone.
– 3 min. normal time trial cadence
– 3 min. low cadence, 60–70 rpm; stand for the last half of each rep
– Repeat

6 × 2 min. Continuous 12-min. effort, alternating 1 min. moderately hard RPE 3:
– 1 min. easy RPE 1
– 2 min. high cadence
– 2 min. normal time trial cadence
– 2 min. big gear, Stand for the last half of each rep.
Repeat

This workout republished with permission from “One-Hour Workouts: 50 Swim, Bike, and Run Workouts for Busy Athletes” by Scott Molina, Mark Newton, and Michael Jacques. The book is available in bookstores, tri shops, and online.