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Start Up Advice
This article is designed for all riders, athletes, and
people who want to exercise and need to know how to either
start an exercise or training program or make a come back in racing.
It addresses the most common mistakes that doctors, coaches,
athletes, and people wanting to just exercise make in starting a
program. It teaches a technique I developed to solve this very
common mistake.
The Most Common Mistake
The most common mistake people make in starting
a training or exercise program is to start at point A, travel out
until they get tired, then turn around and struggle home. This
always causes the return trip to be an agonizing hell, becomes what
they remember about training or exercising, and causes people to not
want to workout again.
Because of this, I developed a start up system
which keeps people enjoying their training and workouts and,
therefore, keeps them training and working out longer. This system
is very simple and effective.
You find a circular or closed course. The size
of the course depends on how out of shape you are. A person just
wanting to start exercising can use the block around his house while
a racer who has been off from training for a few years might want to
use a five to ten mile course. For this example, we will use the
city block.
The first thing you have to do is measure the
distance of your course with either your car odometer or the
computer on your bicycle. Then you warm up or stretch and begin
your first workout. As you progress, you count the laps until you
BEGIN to get tired.
The most important thing about this is that,
when you begin to get tired, you are no more than half a lap from
home in at least one direction. If you did not choose a course that
is too large, you will get home before your return trip becomes a
horrible death march discouraging your from further outings.
Then you take the number of laps you did up to
the beginning of the lap you started to get tired on, multiply it
times the distance for each lap, subtract 20% from that distance,
cut the remainder in half, and that is the distance you will travel
out for the beginning of your exercise program.
For example, let's say Fred measured his block
at four tenths of a mile and did five complete laps before the lap
where he began to get tired. We multiply the four-tenths times the
five laps to give Fred 2 miles. We subtract 20% or .4 miles from
this to get 1.6 miles and divide it in half, which will be .8
miles. This is the distance Fred will travel out from his home and
where he turns around when he begins his workout program.
The idea here is to make sure that Fred gets a
good workout but is still fresh enough to be enjoying his workout
when gets home so he will want to do it again. It needs to be fun
and not a living hell or he won?t do it again.
Fred should stick to this distance for the
first two to three weeks in order for his body to condition to
exercising before he begins increasing his distances.
Rules of Thumb
I have learned that there are certain rules of
thumb for different distances and progressions in fitness
development which have proved to be 100% effective as a guideline.
I will start with Fred's extremely poor fitness
level and work up to a returning road racer who still has a
reasonable fitness level. That way, you can find where you are,
start there, and use the rest as a guide to future development. This
system is based on your aerobic fitness level for one ride. For
example, the distance Fred did in his test workout.
It should also be noted that we will base this
on my system using three days of intense work and four days easy to
moderate.
10 miles or less - This is an extremely
low level of conditioning. You have to understand that, at this
level of fitness, your basic body structures such as bones, tendons,
and ligaments will be too weak for heavy exercise and the
probability for injury from anaerobic work will be great.
With this kind of aerobic base, a person should
start out just exercising three days per week and keep it there for
three weeks. This will cause his body to begin building not only
muscles and his cardiovascular and cardio respiratory systems but
also his bones, tendons, and ligaments. At this point and until I
say other wise, his workouts should remain purely aerobic in nature
with no sprints or attacks. Just base miles. For an example, we will
start Fred out on Sundays, Tuesdays, and Thursdays.
At the beginning of his fourth week, Fred
should begin increasing his distance every two weeks by half a mile
per workout until he is doing about 3 miles three times per week.
When he reaches this point, he should wait two weeks and add 3 mile
workouts on Mondays and Fridays. Note that he will do three days
on, one day off, two days on, and one day off for each week for two
weeks. Two weeks after Fred adds in Monday and Friday, he should
add in 3 mile workouts for Wednesdays and Saturdays. He will now be
working out seven days per week.
After two weeks at this level, Fred can resume
adding half a mile to each workout for Sunday, Tuesday, and Thursday
until he reaches 10 miles for those days. Note that his Monday,
Wednesday, Friday, and Saturday miles will stay at 3 miles.
10 ? 20 miles - At the 10 ? 20 mile
level, I like to start an athlete out with the following program:
Sunday - 10 miles
Monday - 3-5 miles
Tuesday - 10 miles
Wednesday - 3-5 miles
Thursday - 10 miles
Friday - 3-5 miles
Saturday - 3-5 miles
Note that this is about 42 ? 50 miles per week
and 1% to 3% is .5 to 1.5 miles.
From this point, Fred would begin working on
the training system I teach where he would start adding 1% to 3%
every week to his Sundays, Tuesdays, and Thursdays. He would start
by adding that increase to Sunday the first week, adding half that
increase to both Tuesday and Thursday the next week, and then add
that increase to Sunday the following week until he has reached 20
mile rides on Sunday. Here again, I would want him to remain on
purely aerobic workouts while developing his entire body.
If your aerobic distance is determined to be 10
to 20 miles, you can start with this program and keep your miles
without change for the first two to three weeks before starting to
increase miles as stated above.
20 ? 40 miles - At the 20 ? 40 mile
level, I like to start an athlete out with the following program:
Sunday - 20 miles
Monday - 5 miles
Tuesday - 15 miles
Wednesday - 5 miles
Thursday - 15 miles
Friday - 5 miles
Saturday - 5 miles
Note that this is almost where Fred would be on
my program as he developed. All I did was change his 3-5 miles to 5
miles. From here, Fred would continue adding his 1% to 3% increases
in the above manner until he reached the 40 mile Sunday rides. I
would also permit him to begin doing some fun jumps and jams or
sprinting for signs and trees to help him begin developing some
strength as long as he has been riding at least three weeks.
40 ? 50 miles - At the 40 ? 50 mile
level, I like to start an athlete out with the following program:
Sunday - 40 miles
Monday - 5-10 miles
Tuesday - 20 miles
Wednesday - 5-10 miles
Thursday - 20 miles
Friday - 5-10 miles
Saturday - 5-10 miles
Note that, at this point, I increase the
distances allowed for the shorter days.
From here Fred will continue increasing his
miles on Sundays, Tuesdays, and Thursdays by the 1% to 3% per week
as above until he has reached 50 miles on Sunday. During this time,
if Fred has been riding for at least three weeks, he can start doing
some light speed work and hill sprints or short intervals to help
him learn how to perform these exercises and gain strength.
50 ? 75 miles - At the 50 ? 75 mile
level, I like to start an athlete out with the following program:
Sunday - 50 miles
Monday - 10-20 miles
Tuesday - 25 miles
Wednesday - 10-20 miles
Thursday - 25 miles
Friday - 10-20 miles
Saturday - 10-20 miles
Once again, Fred will continue increasing his
miles towards the goals I have outlined. Please note that I show
Tuesday and Thursday to be the same miles at this time. I normally
do this at this level for weekend warriors or riders just starting
out. For more experienced or serious competitors starting up or in
training, I will begin flexing those distances based on other things
I see in that person and their daily schedule.
You have to understand that coaching is as much
an art as it is a science. I will actually flex this program all
along this line of progression based on things I see in the rider,
his goals, his priorities, and experience. I don't think I have ever
given any two riders exactly the same program because I have not
found any two people who were exactly the same person.
The most important thing is that these rules of
thumb are good starting points or gauges with which to judge your
program structure and development.
Endocrine Hypothesis
We have known that cells other than just the
muscles, cardiovascular, and cardio respiratory system atrophy when
we quit exercising or don't exercise. Everything we have considered
important to exercising such as bones, tendons, and ligaments also
atrophy. We also know that your motor skills drop off if you don't
work or exercise them telling that nerve and brain cells atrophy if
you don't work on your motor skills. We know that the pain threshold
returns to normal when you stop training also telling us that nerve
and brain cells atrophy.
Surprisingly, I have never heard anyone even
mention the idea that cells in the endocrine system also atrophy and
this is very important because these cells control the major actions
in the body.
In my own training and coaching, I have noticed
that the hunger sensations change with exercise and this is
important because these sensations are controlled by part of the
endocrine system. When you have been out of shape for a while, I
have noticed that you get hungry very easily with almost any
stimulus. Even being bored will make you hungry.
I have noticed that, when a person starts
exercising, they get very hungry for the first two to three weeks
and increase their food consumption. They will even feel as if they
are starving to death when their body really doesn?t need food. But
at about two to three weeks after they begin exercising, their
hunger sensations become much more controlled and normal in that the
person only becomes hungry when they actually need food.
Based on my studies in exercise physiology,
endocrinology, and my coaching experiences, I hypothesize that the
cells in the endocrine systems also atrophy with a lack of exercise
and condition with exercise. Therefore, it is very possible that we
will find from scientific research that a good exercise program will
diminish or resolve many or most of the hormonal problems currently
being treated by drugs.
They have been finding that exercise is more
important than the medical field thought. If this eventually proves
to be true, it will be a significant medical discovery and will help
millions of people.
Whether you are just starting out or want to
take your cycling to a higher level, my book, A Better Way
to Train will help you reach the fitness goals you are looking
for.
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