ZERO TO G2C HERO TRAINING PROGRAMME - Week 4

ZERO TO G2C HERO TRAINING PROGRAMME

Week 4

6-hour week aimed at building strength. You may switch days around to suit you. Make sure you have adequate recovery between each sessions. For these strength workouts, use your bike’s gearing and steeper terrain to help.Remember to warm up before and cool down after your rides to reduce injury

MONDAY

Rest

TUESDAY (Ride time 1 hour)

Stay seated for most of the ride. Aim to ride in zone 3 on the climbs and use a hard gear going up. Recover on the down hills

WEDNESDAY (Ride time 2 hours)

Over varied terrain ride at 50-60% of your max heart rate (Zone 2) most of the ride.

THURSDAY

Get in some core work: planking, sit-ups, pull-ups, pushups, squats Stretch and recover.

FRIDAY

Rest

SATURDAY (2 hours riding time)

Easy ride - no planned training. Keep your gearing light during most of the ride.

SUNDAY (1 hour on a steep hill) Plan to repeat this hill 5 times. It should take you less than 2 minutes to climb. Give yourself 510 minutes recovery between each effort (i.e. easy pedaling on a flat stretch).

On the hill you should be in zone 4 (your maximum).

Week 1 of the 6-week programme in the 15 September edition of Talk of the Town included important information about general training principles and terminology.

If you missed it, fill yourself in here: https://bit.ly/G2Ctraining The Zero to G2C Hero training programme comes from the team at Cycle Asylum in Port Alfred. Every week, find your programme for the coming week’s training in Talk of the Town.

It’s based on a rider aiming to complete the 75km race in three and a half hours. . You may adapt it for the shorter 53km route (adjust your riding time to match your intended finishing time). The BUCOG2C mountain bike race from Makhanda to Port Alfred takes place on 6 November 2022. If you have questions about your bike or your G2C training, stop by at Cycle Asylum at 88 Albany Road in Port Alfred.

Have fun!

PERCEIVED EFFORT AND TRAINING ZONES

You don’t have to use a heart-rate monitor to estimate what training zone you’re in. Here are some guidelines based on how each zone feels. ZONE 1 (easy): Feels like getting up to make tea when you’ve been sitting on the couch. ZONE 2 (moderate): Easy to ride, slight exertion, all-day pace riding and able to hold a conversation. ZONE 3 (hard): You can only talk in short sentences and are breathing heavily, but not going flat-out. Not able to maintain this pace for long periods. ZONE 4:(difficult): As hard as you can turn your pedals around: this is allout effort, where you are giving everything.

* Warm up for 10 minutes before you increase the intensity of your ride.