This spring, two different friends asked me how - with very limited time - each should train for an ultra event. One friend, a woman mountain biker, plans to ride the Denver-Aspen double century. She has children and very limited time during the week, but can ride on the weekend. The man, a retired RAAM veteran, wants to turn in a good performance at the RSD 24 Hour in Ontario. He commutes to work and can fit in the occasional moderate weekend ride, but family commitments don't allow time for long rides. Both are in their early 40s.

First, I asked each to be clear about the goal, given the available time. Did the RAAM vet want to break 300 miles? That's probably realistic. Win his age division? Unlikely. The mountain biker has a good chance of finishing D-A, but finishing by dark would be a push.

Then I suggested that each rider think about his or her riding history and what each rider needed to work on in training. With limited time, neither rider could address all of the training issues in the sidebar.

Sue, the mountain biker, has only ridden a couple of centuries and is a novice ultra cyclist. She has good power, from mountain biking, but has to learn skills for long rides: nutrition, pacing, etc.

Andy, the RAAM vet, has been riding distance for about 20 years and is mature as an ultra cyclist. He has his equipment, clothing and nutrition dialed in. He needs to concentrate on speed and race-pace training.

When training with limited time, the key is to select the right mix of duration (longest ride), frequency (of rides per week) and intensity of rides. In determining the mix, the considerations are the relative athletic maturity of the rider and specificity for the target event.

Novice Ultra Cyclist
In the article on Endurance Training, Pete Penseyres wrote, "Since we're training for endurance and not speed, the most important ride of the week is the weekly long ride." For a rider trying significantly to increase the length of the goal ride, this is exactly right.

Denver-Aspen should take Sue 18-20 hours. According to Pete, she should build up to 75% that duration, or a 13-15 hour long ride, ramping up by 10% a week. That takes a lot of time! If she builds up to half the duration, say 10 hours, she could probably survive D-A, although she wouldn't have as much fun.

We laid out a program that included a long ride every other weekend, ramping up to a 10 hour ride two weeks before D-A. These rides would be done at 75 - 90% of her lactate threshold. On these rides, the primary goals would be

• learn pacing
• perfect her nutrition
• test her equipment.

Before each ride, we would set specific objectives, such as eating 300 calories every hour. After each ride, we would make notes about what worked and what didn't, so she could make the necessary changes before the next ride. Since she would only do a half-dozen long rides, she needed to learn as much as possible from each ride.

Specificity is important, so each long ride would include several sustained climbs in the Front Range, to simulate the D-A terrain.

The alternate weekends she would do a hard, fast tempo workout, hopefully building up to a five-hour ride. She would push on these rides, trying to keep her heart rate at 85-95% of lactate threshold. These tempo rides, staying at least 5% below her threshold, would be the key to building aerobic endurance. During the week, she would try to get out once or twice either to mountain bike or to do one of the local steep road climbs. Since she doesn't have much time, intensity would be the key to maintaining fitness from weekend to weekend.

Sue has read Lulu Weschler's articles and understands the importance of core strength. But she's a mother, and just fitting in the rides would be a challenge. We talked about practicing standing and sitting tall - she could remember to do that. I also showed her how to do the cat stretch on the bike, arching her back and tucking her pelvis in, and then letting her abdomen sink and rotating her pelvis back. This would relieve the almost inevitable low back pain from all the climbing on Denver-Aspen.

Experienced Ultra Cyclist
Andy wants to ride 300 - 350 miles at the RSD 24 in Ontario. But he couldn't ramp up to 75% of that duration, an 18-hour training ride. At most, he could ride a half-day every other weekend.

Andy commutes regularly to work, so he has some aerobic base conditioning. We decided to skip any endurance training. He would concentrate on training above his target race pace. To do 350 miles in 24 hours, he'd need to average 14.6 mph, including stops. We laid out a program of bi-weekly tempo rides of three hours, four hours, five hours, six hours, and then repeated six-hour rides. His goal would be to maintain a pace of at least 16.7 mph, including off the bike time, and to try to get down to a five-hour century two weeks before the RSD 24.

The weekends when Andy wouldn't be doing a tempo ride, he decided to do a 20-mile time trial. This would help him gauge progress, keep him motivated, and give him a hard speed workout.

Two nights a week, he would go out with the local racers for a very fast ride. Andy refuses to use a heart rate monitor - riding in a fast pace-line would drive his heart rate up and improve his power and speed.

At the RSD, Andy would be riding in the non-RAAM qualifier division, so drafting would be allowed. Riding with the racers would help him sharpen his pace-line skills.

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When I mentioned stretching and core strength, he said "Yeah, when?" I didn't argue.

The keys to effective training, especially with limited time, are focus and specificity. Each rider's program focuses on individual needs. Sue is focusing on

1. building skills for long rides, and
2. developing aerobic endurance.

Andy is focusing on

1. developing race-pace power, and
2. perfecting pace-line riding.

Each is training on terrain and in conditions similar to the target event. Their target rides won't be as easy or as much fun if more training were possible, but Sue and Andy will be able to do their respective rides. And each has a good chance at meeting their individual goals!