Make goals sustainable and achievable

There’s nothing wrong with setting a goal of a dry January. Ultimately, however, if you’re only setting short-term goals, you’re more likely to binge and revert to old habits afterwards. So aim for habits that are sustainable in the long-term: a New Year’s resolution should be something you think you can do for the entire year. Dry January is a great starting point, but at the end of January, then what? Most people end up spending February indulging on Belgian quads to make up for the few weeks off booze.

Achievable goals also make for sustainable goals. "If a goal is sustainable and can be worked into your daily routine, it will work better than setting something that would be an insane increase in your usual behaviour, like going from two hours a week of riding to 20. Going too quickly sets you up for failure,” Marshall says. If your goals are wattage-related, as many cyclists’ will be, plan to only increase by 2.5 per cent over the course of a four to six week training cycle. If your functional threshold power is 200 watts, it will get to 205 by the end of the first month of training.