For a start i'd say to do most of your training on the bike and in the position you will be racing. A spin bike is not comparable, better than nothing but not specific enough to your needs.

Spending time getting aero.

For me it was consistency/volume in the training. I spent about a year cycling pretty much everyday before work with a power meter targeting a steady 200w for 1:45 each time. No 'special' workouts, just time in the saddle. I think for some people you need miles in the legs to improve a lot as the tempo sessions hit a plateaux after a while. I did 57:24 @320w after this training plus a few 10mile TTs.

You might be lucky and be able to improve a lot with a lot of tempo stuff, so probably worth trying this for a while first until you reach a limit.

1) keeping structure to training and most of all, consistency. I used a simple "6 sessions per week" format, 2 long, 2 short and hard (like 30sec on/off) and 2 @ race pace between 15-3mins (2 x 20mins or a set circuit etc). When that stops yielding gains, change.
2) training at least 50% of sessions on the race rig. Any changes I felt were needed were done one at a time, eg: saddle was put forward, 2 weeks later, bars down, two weeks later, then pads in, then saddle up etc etc.
3) "ritualise" the TT (if it's a TT you're doing). Same warm up, same music, same nutrition
4a) Don't start too hard
4b) Don't start too hard
4c) Don't start too hard

Click on the strava link in your signature.
Take a look at the yearly volume graph
Fill it up with those little blue bars

Legs are stupid.
They do what they are told, but
They must be reminded often.

Go.

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@christopher_borden •
Spinning Spoke • Dimond Bikes • Flo Cycling • Castelli Cycling

Most important for me was finally being consistent year round. Second, spending the winter in my basement doing hard intervals on the trainer significantly increased my FTP. Started with a series of 5 minute intervals and worked my way towards 2 X 20. I did this 3 X week (my only riding in the winter). Worked really well for me.

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Simplify, Train, Live

Lee - You have had some really good questions about training over the past few weeks. I think you might be looking for a shortcut or a quick way to improve on something here.

The thing about this (these) endurance sports is that there is no real quick way other than through being genetically gifted to make huge improvements very quickly. You need consistency and years of training and racing in order to make the gains that you might be capable of.

Keep at what you are doing now, and you will improve. More time and training will give you those improvements.

I have swam since age six, then started racing triathlon 12 years ago. Since starting tri, I have seen steady growth year in and year out. Experience and consistency.

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New Training/Racing Log - http://www.earthdaykid.com/blog --- Old Training/Racing Log - http://colinlaughery.blogspot.com

Picking my parents wisely was most important.

After that, progressive overload plus specificity.

About the same here, for my first two years of racing the coach I used only had me cycling 2 maybe 3 times a week. Broke an hour in all attempts after my IM earlier in the year.

For most you need to work on above threshold for a period of time to get used to the discomfort. Even better is work on going above for a few minutes and then dropping below for a few. Extend the intervals overtime and there you go.

What has helped me this year was not "wasting" any time on the bike. Longest I have ridden this year is 2 hours and with the exception of recovery weeks everything is in the higher zones. I can push hard cycling and swimming, if I did this running I would fall apart.

aerodynamics and rolling resistance - you'd be shocked how much good position, tires and tubes are worth

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Eric Reid AeroFit | Instagram Portfolio
Aerodynamic Retul Bike Fitting

“You are experiencing the criminal coverup of a foreign backed fascist hostile takeover of a mafia shakedown of an authoritarian religious slow motion coup. Persuade people to vote for Democracy.”

If I'm rested I split in the 57 range in a 40k triathlon split, haven't been over an hour in a few years. In 2011 I couldn't ride faster than 23mph in a sprint tri, now I do hard training rides faster than that. There were a couple things that I credit for my improvement, which came mostly in a single season. First, I stopped training for ironmans. The volume required to train for something like that severely limited the focus I could put into being fast. I focused my training on short course and spent the first season trying to become a monster on the bike. I have only ever ridden 3 times a week, occasionally 4 times but only if I had extra time to kill. The year I improved the most I spent my winter suffering on the trainer. I would literally just hammer out intervals, often times pyramids at max intensity for each step, gritting my teeth through the pain. It would be something like 3x1 minute, 3x2:00, 2x4:00, 2x5:00, 1x10:00, then back down the other side.
The other thing that was critical to my improvement, and probably the single most important factor, was doing a weekly Hammerfest with a local road racing team once the weather got nice in the spring. I would hang on for dear life, redlining the entire time, as they did loops on about a 4 or 5 mile course with plenty of sharp turns to make it hard. At first I couldn't even stay in the front group for a single lap, but every time I went out there I tried to go further and had to push through a lot of pain, but by the end of the year I could hang in the front group the entire ride, I would even go off the front sometimes if it wasn't hurting bad enough. Then next year the team got a bunch of young fast guys and I had to start all over again. I still consider those rides my most important workouts every week, even though I wreck myself for the next couple days it has been worth it.

Long story short: stop training for long and slow races, and get a road bike so you can ride with roadies.

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Powertap / Cycleops / Saris

+1

When (if) people finally understand this, there will not be much left to talk about on ST when it comes to training�.

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http://cyclussports.com/ - #ZeroPositive #CyclusSports
http://app.strava.com/athletes/355549
https://twitter.com/ryanAjoyce

finding a good saddle that let me stay aero without pain, tweaking my position a bit, holding my head lower, and riding my bike more.

there is no magic workout. just more. consistently more.
unless you are already doing more, but you probably aren't doing more or you would have done 40k in under an hour.

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Kat Hunter reports on the San Dimas Stage Race from inside the GC winning team
Aeroweenie.com -Compendium of Aero Data and Knowledge
Freelance sports & outdoors writer Kathryn Hunter

"For example, how would you rank the following?

- Consistency/frequency, i.e. biking nearly every day consistently week after week?
- Some magic workout like sweet spot intervals or something else?
- Large volume?
- etc "

1. magic workout - really just 8X5' 4X10' 3X15' and 2X20' twice a week
2. Large volume? - in addition to the weekly intervals a longer ride on the weekend to get me up near 10 hours a week
3. Consistency/frequency - after 4 rides a week I really don't have much more time for riding unless it's with the GF

I went from 1:08 to 1:02 in the first year. It was 2 years later until I went under an hour. I wasn't really trying, I did it during an Olympic distance triathlon.

jaretj

true, true

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Kat Hunter reports on the San Dimas Stage Race from inside the GC winning team
Aeroweenie.com -Compendium of Aero Data and Knowledge
Freelance sports & outdoors writer Kathryn Hunter

for what it is worth UK time trialists do basically the opposite of this, with a big focus of their training being on trainers, often time of spin bike-ish variety, and they perform amazing.

One must ride their TT bike outdoors enough to figure out a sustainable and fast position though, of course. If you are new to this, that may be the more important focus.

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Kat Hunter reports on the San Dimas Stage Race from inside the GC winning team
Aeroweenie.com -Compendium of Aero Data and Knowledge
Freelance sports & outdoors writer Kathryn Hunter

40-km/hr 100% flat??? 90% flat??? or stop and go, a few lights, stops signs, a few rollers, three hills, glass dodging, railroad track crossing, road kill bunny hops, etc?

"stop training for long and slow races, and get a road bike so you can ride with roadies."

Heresy. You are hereby sentenced to eternal damnation in the ST fires of hell for your treasonous words.

I would tend to agree that the running and swimming involved for ironman training would cause most average joes to have a hard time going sub hour for 40k

then there are talented people who can do that and go 53 riding their bike once a week.

such is life

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Kat Hunter reports on the San Dimas Stage Race from inside the GC winning team
Aeroweenie.com -Compendium of Aero Data and Knowledge
Freelance sports & outdoors writer Kathryn Hunter

Interesting enough I changed my training this winter to more road bike style riding instead of interval training.

In the past, for winter training, I just cranked out threshold intervals for 30 to 40 minutes a few times a week and then rode moderate a few more times a week.

This winter I have been riding TourdeGiro rides with friends and most of my rides have been HOP rides (hour of pain). There have been a few exceptions where I've done laps on a race track but most of them are just hard riding.

I'm heading to Georgia next week for some early season training and will see how I do compared to previous years. So far at home I've felt stronger on outdoor rides and have been riding more frequently.

jaretj

Step 1) Lots and lots of tempo/SS riding and a little bit of anerobic/nuromuscular (low cadence for 20 seconds all out) riding. Don't need much recovery if you are doing these right, that can all be zone 2 miles.
Step 2) 1-2 days of shorter threshold stuff (10-15 minutes, building up to an hour total) and some VO2 stuff like 1X 20 all out or 5X4:00 at 106-112%. Still lots of tempo. Don't waste time on 4 hour rides on the weekends, do a 2 hr tempo ride with bursts instead.
Step 3) Lots of time right at TT (or slightly above) pace, in your TT setup. Take 1-2 days super easy between, perhaps even off.
Step 4) Rest, peak, crush it. Don't try to lose 8 lbs the week before the event :)...

The breakthrough for me was lots of time doing SST, with surges into VO2 or above and coming right back to SST. I had my second highest ever FTP test doing just those workouts, and only 2-3 sessions of normal 2X20's or 3X15's. Plus, those sessions are much easier to get through for several weeks vs. endless strings of 2-3X20 sessions, which are horrible. Unless you are willing/able to get 14+ hours of Z2 riding, the better bet is tempo or SST stuff.

There are 2 parts to the equation, "supply" and "demand"... and it's foolish to ignore one over the other.

There's no sense in doing all the hard training work if you're just going to "waste" those hard earned watts...and, as Eric implies, you may be VERY surprised at how few watts can be necessary to average 40k/hr. Win/win.

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http://bikeblather.blogspot.com/

I don't think there is a magic formula to be able to do it. Riding a lot helps. Riding hard helps. Optimizing equipment and position helps. I like the 60 minutes of 5 minutes as hard as possible, 5 minutes recover, repeat workout. Sweet spot intervals of 15-20 minutes at 87-93% are good as well. I know a lot of people don't care for zone 2, but getting some good miles in the legs on the days you don't ride hard can be beneficial for your vascular system. It probably won't happen over a four week period, but rather months or years of consistent riding.

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