Dear Red Rockettes:

You are nearing the end of your 12 weeks of base training and should have achieved your goal: completing a double century. Now it's time to start building speed for racing as a team at the Furnace Creek 508.

Endurance Training is Essential
According to Dr. Ed Burke "[e]ndurance training is a must for all cyclists because it:

• improves your respiratory system, bringing more oxygen to the circulatory system;
• increases the pumping efficiency of your heart, so you can pump more blood per minute to the working muscles;
• helps your thermoregulatory system by increasing blood flow to the skin while cycling;
• brings about increased neuromuscular efficiency of pedaling technique."

But Riding Slowly Doesn't Build Speed
In the November, 1998 UltraCycling Dave Tanner described the different types of muscle fibers.

Slow twitch (Type I) muscle fibers are the best for endurance riding. They have a rich supply of blood vessels and can be suffused with oxygen, allowing them to burn fat for energy. Slow twitch are slow to fatigue; however, they can't produce much power.

Fast twitch (Type IIa and IIb) muscle fibers don't have as many capillaries and burn primarily glycogen for energy. Fast twitch fibers can even burn glycogen without oxygen (anaerobically). They produce more power than slow twitch fibers, but also fatigue more quickly.

When the workload on your legs is fairly low, the slow twitch fibers are recruited. As the workload increases, then the fast twitch fibers kick in. If you only do endurance rides, you'll only train the slow twitch fibers and never will develop much power and speed.

The fast twitch IIa fibers respond "in specific ways to specific types of training. If you do a lot of endurance work, the IIa fiber will become more oxidative and less fatiguable - it behaves more like a Type I fiber. If you train sprints like a track racer, it becomes more glycolytic, but more fatiguable - it behaves more like a Type IIb fiber. Note that you cannot train for optimal oxidative and optimal glycolytic capacity at the same time. You can't have the best of both. The biochemistry of the IIa fiber shifts one way or the other depending on the type of training. Therefore, if you want optimal endurance you must sacrifice speed and if you want optimal speed you must sacrifice endurance. The key is to train according to the demands of your event." (Tanner, D. Muscles: Why Ultra Marathoners Can't Sprint, UltraCycling, Vol. 7, No. 6, p. 29.)

Training Implications
Now it's time to shift gears and start training those fast twitch IIa fibers! The Pacific Crest Tour (PCT) will be perfect for building power - climbing Sonora Pass you'll recruit fast twitch fibers you didn't even know you had!

Your goal for the next six weeks of training - the Build phase - is to complete a very fast century. To do so, you need to maintain your endurance while building your speed. Training for a fast century includes different types of workouts:

Intensity: The key workouts are the speed workouts. Twice a week, go out for a hard ride totaling 90 minutes or more (at least 25 miles). Intensity rides will increase your anaerobic threshold and your capacity to produce power without going anaerobic - allowing you to ride faster! Warm-up for at least 30 minutes. Then do the intensity portion of the workout. The intensity riding is a combination of hard efforts and recovery. The hard efforts should be done at 95 - 100% of your lactate threshold. (LT) and total at least 30 minutes per session.

You each have different opportunities to do Intensity workouts. Edy can ride hard into the wind, spin back with a tailwind to recover, and then push back into the wind. Anne can do farm road intervals: hammer from road 96 to 98, putt to road 99, and then hammer for two more miles. Lulu can attack Charlie and bound over the New Jersey hills. Susan can do hill repeats in the mountains while dodging raindrops. Muffy can do hill repeats to Galena summit or mountain bike. The specific mode doesn't matter; what counts is getting out twice a week and going hard!

At the end, cool down for at least 15 minutes.

Tempo rides: You also need to build specific muscle endurance. Every other week, do a brisk long ride. Warm-up for 30 minutes, ride tempo at a sustained effort of 85 - 95% of LT, and then cool-down for 15 minutes. During your Base training, you built up to a tempo ride of about three hours (50 miles or so). Over the next six weeks, increase the duration until you can ride a very fast century at the end of the Build phase.

Endurance rides: To maintain your endurance and to prepare for PCT, ride back-to-back centuries on the weekends when you don't do a tempo ride. Ride these centuries at 75 - 90% of your LT.

Recovery rides: Once or twice a week, go out for easy recovery rides for an hour or two. The purpose is to stimulate the metabolism to remove waste products and to loosen stiff muscles, not to train hard.

Abs, back and stretching: At least four days a week, continue the abs, back and stretching exercises described in Training for the Busy Ultracyclist.

Weekly Program
Each week, write down in your calendar when you'll do the workouts. One possible plan for early July might be:

Hard Week (300 miles)

Saturday

100 mile hilly ride

abs, back and stretching

Sunday

100 mile hilly ride

Monday

15 mile recovery ride

abs, back and stretching

Tuesday

35 mile intensity ride

Wednesday

15 mile recovery ride

abs, back and stretching

Thursday

35 mile intensity ride

Friday

abs, back and stretching

Easy Week (200 miles)

Saturday

75 - 100 mile tempo ride

abs, back and stretching

Sunday

50 or 25 mile recovery ride

Monday

abs, back and stretching

Tuesday

25 mile intensity ride

Wednesday

25 mile recovery ride

abs, back and stretching

Thursday

25 mile intensity ride

Friday

abs, back and stretching

Remember Muffy's maxim that it's better to underbake your cookies than to overbake! During the Build phase, you are increasing the demands on your body, so you also need to increase the amount and quality of recovery. You get stronger and faster during the recovery periods, not during the hard workouts! Tips for recovery