Feature

Mon 4 Aug, 4:00 pm UTC

Technique: Get faster by riding slowly

By Joe Beer

Are you a pupil of the ‘no pain, no gain’ school of training? New research says you’ll get fitter faster if you take it easy.

Sounds good doesn't it? But we're not quite saying you can get fitter by sitting on the sofa. The trick is to ride in the least taxing of your training zones, the levels of effort that actually have an effect on your fitness. Let's kick off by taking a look at them.

What are training zones?

Training zones are different levels of exertion designed to improve your fitness. What you might not realise is that it’s Zone 1, the easiest level, and not flat-out Zone 3 where you should be spending most of your ride time.

How are the training zones defined?

Zone 1:  This is the endurance base from 60% of your maximum heart rate to around 78-80%. This zone builds endurance, the economical use of fats and carbohydrates for fuel and allows good technique to be practised. You'll want to spend up to 80% of your time here.

 Zone 2:  Where pace is moderately hard, where lactate is created from an increased use of carbohydrate but it is not hard enough to cause fatigue suddenly. This zone occurs around 79-89% of your maximum heart rate and it helps athletes judge pace, convert lactate and move at higher velocities. Aim for around 10-12% of your weekly workouts here.

 Zone 3:  The high intensity lactate accumulation zone is above 89-90% of your maximum heart rate. This is peak effort stuff that hurts. It provides a maximal stimulus that is, or simulates, competition or above competition pace. Spend no more than 10% of your training time here.

How to work out your maximum heart rate

To make sure you ride in the right zone, you’ll need to work out your max heart rate.

Time trial effort varies between riders but it is approximately 88-91% of your maximum heart rate for a 10-mile tiem trial, and 85-88% for a 25-miler.

To get an estimate of your maximum heart rate, you need to divide your average heart rate over 10 miles, eg 165, by 0.88 and 0.91 (187.5 and 181) and do the same for your 25-mile tiem trial average, eg 160, using 0.85 and 0.88 (188 and 181).

The average maximum heart rate of all four figures is 184, and this can then be used to calculate your three training zones:

  • Zone 1: less than 78-80% of your maximum heart rate (<147)
  • Zone 2: 80-88% of your maximum heart rate (149-160).
  • Zone 3: above 88-90% of your maximum heart rate (>161)

How does this apply to me? I’m not a time trial specialist!

Yes, it sounds too good to be true: ride slowly to go faster. But a recent study has added support to sports scientists’ claims that spending more time exercising comfortably, rather than eyeballs-out, delivers the best results.

Researchers at The European University in Madrid spent five months studying endurance athletes and found that those who did 80% of their training in Zone 1 and only 10% in Zone 2 improved times over a set distance by 36 seconds more than those spending 65% of their training time in Zone 1 and 24% in Zone 2. Both groups did around 8% of their weekly time in the top end Zone 3.

All the athletes, whatever their Z1, 2 or 3 proportions, got faster over the five months, but the group training smarter (less effort with more precise Z1 work) got 6.9% better, while the overzealous athletes got 5.3% better. Would you not like to get 1.6% faster but do fewer work wasted sessions?

Why excessive high intensity miles should be avoided

The scientists behind this study also think that their findings turn on its head the age old theory of junk miles – that lots of low intensity training is, basically, a waste of time. Instead, it could be an excess of the harder stuff that should be avoided.

“Our data suggest that an older concept of ‘junk miles’ applies not to relatively low-intensity training but to moderately high-intensity training,” said the researchers. It makes sense: moderately hard training is difficult to recover from, but not hard enough to stimulate further adaptation.

Of course, the study isn’t saying that simply pootling about will turn you into Mark Cavendish. You will still need to push yourself well out of your comfort zone from time to time and you can’t wave goodbye to hill reps and sprints just yet. But if you’re serious about improving your time-trial best or bagging a sportive personal best, make sure that you’re spending enough time in Zone 1 between the harder sessions.  ...

All you need to do now is to strap on a heart rate monitor and find your comfort zone!

User Comments

There are 9 comments on this post

Showing 1 - 9 of 9 comments

  • This article highlights the absurdity of some research and the media that report it as gospel. Surely these science boffins would learn a lot more about cycling if they were to get out of their labs and ride their bikes a bit more. Slow miles will not make you faster! Period.

  • You should try it. It works extremely well. It used to be called "active rest". You just have to go insanely hard on those interval days. Kinda like body building on your bike, which WILL make you ridiculously fast. By actively resting on your bike you'll teach the body to ride for long times, and by pushing your limits on interval days you'll build a BIG engine, and improve lactate threshold, and HR recovery times. CSC trains exactly like this. Check their results on the latest TDF if you're unsure if it works...

    THe WORST thing you can do for youself is riding hard often. EVERY coach I know will tell you stories about disciples over-training, and actually decreasing performance over time.

  • Great article. I like the comments by Graphite Rocket as well and think the points made are excellent.

  • mmmmmm.

    It is interpretation of results that is vital!

    Most of these comparative research studies, such as this, use simple statistical hypothesis testing - e.g. is ther a difference between group a and b at the 5% or 1% level. People then read the conclusions without understanding the statistics relationship to predictive value.

    Regarding these hypothesis tests, the major factor is they are NOT predictive. Especially when it comes to low power medical and physiological studies i.e. just a few people in each arm of the study. The following article highlights that the predictive value of such tests can be as low a 50% e.g. the same as the toss of a coin.

    BMJ Article - Sifting the evidencewhat's wrong with significance tests? Jonathan A C Sterne, senior lecturer in medical statistics, George Davey Smith, professor of clinical epidemiology. It can be downloaded free

    http://www.bmj.com/cgi/reprint/322/7280/226?maxtoshow=&HITS=10&hits=10&RESULTFORMAT=1&andorexacttitle=and&andorexacttitleabs=and&fulltext=statistics+hypothesis&andorexactfulltext=and&searchid=1&FIRSTINDEX=0&sortspec=relevance&resourcetype=HWCIT

    Two good books I can recommend are:

    Stiglers –Statistics on the table

    http://www.amazon.co.uk/Statistics-Table-History-Statistical-Concepts/dp/0674009797/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1209144713&sr=1-2

    Also at P=0.05 the chance of a statistical significant result being random is 1 in 20 – This level has been used since Pearson used it in the early in the 20th century to suggest 'significance'. With over 800,000 papers published each year in medicine and physiology (including exercise & cycling physiology etc) a large number of the results are based on ‘significance – null hypothesis tests’ using the P

  • Whoops didn't realise there was word limit! Sorry for the missing text! It should just say that there will be a lot of statistical errors.

    But the message is treat such studies with caution.

    Tom

  • I'm agree and disagree with this studies.

    If you are not racer and ride for pleasure you sure get more endurance and muscles by riding slow. But if you have already trained well and you can cycle like 100 miles a day on a moderate pace and you are not getting any muscle cramps i palpitations and so on, you are probably wasting your time by cycling slow.

    On the other hand riding slow keeps your muscles in a good condition. So riding slow with your friends is beneficial but it will not get you faster if you are not training in zone 2 and 3.

    To get progressive training you should start in zone 1 then zone2 and 3 and the percentage of those training is actually the important one. Exactly this is the meaning of this article just some people didn't understand it. So percentage in zone 1 more then zone 2 and 3 is what makes you faster not the way "zestpt" understand it. Read the article carefully.

  • While the percentages may work for someone doing say 15 to 20 hours a week, do they alsio work for someone who does only 7 to 10 hours a week?

    I would have thought that then the percentages are not as relevant as actual time. To get better, wouldn't you have to spend a minnimum amount of time in Z2 and Z3? If so, the percentage of time you spent in those zopnes is going to be a lot higher than if you manage more hours on the bike.

    You then have to question how much rdinig in Z1 you actually need to do. If they'er slow miles are they actually doing you any good or would you be better off not doing so many miles and concentratinginstead on the quality of the Z2 and Z3 workouts?

    Wayne

  • But it will help you recover quicker than sitting around or training in z2, z3 all the time...

    I think it promotes both fast and slow twitch muscle, both good for speed and strength, also a more officiant rider.

    I trained with weights years ago and would go for my personal best lift, next day i would have off, followed by a low weight training session.. The same applies in this case i think!.

  • Regarding Joe Beer's Get Faster by Riding Slower...

    This is as neat a summary of the whole debate about base training versus eyeballs-out training as I've read. I hope a lot of "performance" fitness coaches memorise it, if only for the sake of their athletes. The article makes it very clear that the real skill in coaching applies to the last 20 per cent of the training and especially to the 8 per cent of time spent in Z3. Although 1.6 per cent faster (for the athletes who get it right) may not sound a lot, it's plenty enough over the bike leg in a standard-distance triathlon, for example. All things being equal, it would get the athlete out on the run roughly a minute ahead of the over-trained athlete.

    Joe quotes a recent (and apparently very thorough) study, although this debate was basically settled half a century ago through the training methods of the late, great New Zealand coach Arthur Lydiard. A milkman by trade, he sent his middle-distance runners out with his marathon runners on weekend 20-mile runs to build up their aerobic power. The result was world records -- 1.54 for the 800m and 3.54 for the mile. And this in the 1960s on slow tracks! Just as Joe suggests, Lydiard used to make his runners slow down for most of their training. As it happens, the great Kenyan runner Paul Tergat advises the same thing.

    It certainly works in cycling too, as I can vouch. After my partner and I spent 4-6 hours a day for a month riding all over France in Z1 as we tried to retrace the original, 1903 route of the Tour de France for a book (Chasing the Chimney Sweep), our triathlon, Z3 cycling times plummeted.

    I do suspect though that some "performance" coaches have forgotten the basics and are thrashing their athletes. Joe's article should be compulsory reading for them.

    Selwyn Parker -- journalist and author

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