FanPost

I HATE turbo training

Turbo training isn't a pleasurable way to train. You go out for a short amount of time prepared for suffering and by the end you are often close to dying. Adding to that by the time you have finished you are so sweaty that if you had just got out of the shower you would be drier. So why do we subject ourselves to this sort of punishment? One simple answer; a better result on race day. Cyclists become obsessive over training Michael Hutchinson a multiple English time trial champion said that instead of racing motivates his training, he got to a point where his training motivated his racing. After my last post about Indoor training on Podiumcafe.com I got a flood of responses with many recommending sufferfest videos for indoor training. I took the community's advice and by chance Cycling tips had 10 free copies to give away I leaped on the offer and this morning I downloaded Fight club. This afternoon I completed the Training session for the fight club. Let me just say it was the most enjoyable (in other words painful) session ever. The video was based around the 2009 World Championships in Mendrisio with five sets of intervals. The hour length session was amazingly difficult however that hour flew past, this was thanks to the amazing and inspiring imagery as well as the suffering and will for it to be over. The video contained footage from the world champs. Here is the session taken from the sufferfest website:

  • 5 minutes warm-up featuring video footage from a ride along the Yarra river in Melbourne, Australia from Ride By Shooting.
  • Five ‘laps’ of racing, featuring footage from the UCI 2009 World Championship Time Trial and Road Race:
    • 1st lap:
      • 6:00 of tempo riding, with a few attacks to break up the field
      • 1:00 recovery
    • 2nd – 5th lap:
      • 4:00 time trial effort (with more ttacks!)
      • 2:30 climbing (with even more surprise attacks!)
      3:00 recovery (no attacks – we’re cruel, but not that cruel), featuring footage from Cyclefilm’s descent of the Col du Glandon
After 20 minutes of the workout I was swearing at the TV screen whenever ATTACK came up on the screen. While I will never enjoy the pain turbo training inflicts that is as close as I will ever get to it. For training for racing the Fight Club is the ultimate workout as it has tempo efforts, climbing and attacks. Thanks to Wade Wallace of cycling tips for the awesome freebie. I will finish here but here is the trailer for the Fight Club. James