Victoria Pendleton is encouraging us to make the most of International Fitness Week
It is Day Three of Fitness First’s International Fitness Week with double Olympic Gold medallist and 9 x World Champion cyclist Victoria Pendleton.
Here we have what today entails, as well as some tips from Fitness First’s personal trainer AJ Perera on the benefits of indoor cycling, as well as some cycling challenges to try today.
Self confessed training fanatic Victoria Pendleton is supporting the campaign, encouraging both members and non-members to come down and give exercise a go, whatever their ability.
Victoria Pendleton: “People need to get moving, be it cycling or any other exercise. This is a great chance for people to try out all fitness activities for free.”
The surprising benefits of indoor cycling
While some might complain that indoor cycling is a boring alternative to "real" cycling, there are many specific benefits, namely that the controlled environment of a trainer allows you to isolate and concentrate on specific areas of cycling fitness and technique.
- Surprisingly, working on an indoor trainer can lead to rapid improvements in riding technique. The isolated environment allows you to concentrate on specific skills without distraction. Spinning, the ability to maintain a high cadence with a continuous application of power, can be improved simply by listening to the trainer’s noise. If you hear a steady "whoosh" on the downstroke, you are not pedaling properly. Concentrate on pedaling in circles. This will help you begin the power stroke earlier at the top and pull your foot across the bottom of the stroke. After a while, you will develop a longer and smoother delivery of power to the pedals.
- Another exercise on a trainer that has dramatic results is one-legged cycling. Most cyclists are not symmetrical in the application of power to the pedals, favoring one leg over the other, and exert more force on the pedal with this leg. The result is asymmetrical pedaling, which leads to loss of power.
To alleviate this problem, try this exercise: Place one foot on a 16 to 18 inch box. With the other leg, force yourself to pedal smooth circles for 5 to 10 minutes.
This technique will improve your ability to apply power over a longer portion of the crank circle because you do not have the inertial support of the other leg. After several weeks of alternating work with both legs, slip the trainer into a very low gear and, using both legs, attempt to pedal with a smooth application of power. This is what professional cyclists refer to as pedaling with suppleness.
- As with any workout, spend a few minutes warming up and cooling down before and after each session on the bicycle. Cycling indoors is quite different from cycling outdoors. Indoors if you don’t have a cooling system, you will be overheated within five minutes. It is easy to forget how the wind keeps us cool. Use a fan or ride in the coolest part of the gym. Remember to fill your water bottle before you start your workout.
Here’s an indoor cycling challenge for Challenge Day
Each workout is designed to provide variety, build the cycling muscles, and train your body’s different energy systems. Challenge your friends or gym buddies to see who can perform better in each work out! If you want to Challenge you heart rate, you want to work out between 75 and 80 percent of your maximum heart rate. Most indoor bikes will have sensors for you to track this.
Hard to Easy intervals.Start with a 10-minute hard effort followed by 2 minutes of easy spinning for recovery. The next interval should be 8 minutes hard, 2 minutes easy. Each hard interval decreases by 2 minutes but increases slightly in intensity. The easy 2-minute interval remains the same. The workout ends when you reach 2 minutes hard and 2 minutes easy.
Ladder drill.Ride progressively harder gears. Start in a relatively low gear and ride for one to two minutes (keeping the same RPM), then shift to the next-higher gear, and to the next, and so forth. When you’re finished with the highest gear you plan to ride, ride back "down the ladder." Usually, riding up four or five gears is sufficient for a good workout.
Ladder drill variations.There are dozens of variations for the ladder drill (e.g., hard gear, easy gear, back to hard, up two gears, down one). You also can vary the RPM, increasing it to 110 or 120 rpm, but always keep it above 80.
Speed intervals. To develop speed, throw in some intervals: 10 to 12 all-out, 15-second pedalling sprints, alternating with 45 seconds of easy pedalling.
Power intervals.To develop power, try three to six repetitions of three minutes at 90 rpm in a big gear, with three minutes of low-gear spinning between efforts.
Tagged in Cycling fitness tips Workout