Cheese Head

I went to the gym this morning to start my off season gym workouts. I'm a goal driven kind of person. So I set a goal to not only improve my overall fitness but to increase my avg. mph for next season. This season I have gone from 5.5 mile with a average speed of 10.2 mph in March to my century ride at 13.2 mph. I have had shorter rides (20-30 miles) that I have averaged 14 mph. So my goal for the off season is to improve my avg. mph to 18 mph this spring.

Is this a realistic goal? I have researched a ton of information and am working on tweaking my gym and trainer workouts to help improve my cadence and speed.


I'm hoping this thread can be an ongoing place where people can post there goals, discuss them and share their accomplishments.

So let me know. Do you think my goal is attainable? How much have you improved your avg. speed in the off season?

bassjones

18MPH is pushing it on a hybrid...

bassjones

I'm going to spend a lot of time cross-training - weights and swimming - and then as we get 4-6 weeks away from warm weather, I'll ramp up the trainer rides. I'll still do 2-3 trainer rides a week through winter and right now I'm still able to ride outdoors.

Cheese Head

The Jamis is a cyclecross. But by spring I hope to be riding on a new road specific bike. I'm leaning towards the Gunnar Sport or Lynskey Sportive at the moment.

Cheese Head

Any plans to do biathlon/triathlons?

I'm considering a couple of indoor triathlons this winter. And if all goes well a biathlon on half triathlon next summer.

Black wallnut 

Average speed is a poor metric to track IMHO. It depends too much on terrain, weather, and the human factors. If you are averaging 13.2 now 18 seems a huge jump and frankly I'm not thinking off season indoor training is going to add to your base enough to reach it. Core work and swimming will help with overall fitness but hours on the bike plus focused speed work is needed to improve to where you are shooting for. 6 plus hours a week on a trainer might get you there if you can stand the trainer for that long.

A better metric is a goal on a specific route or segment (if you Strava) or even a specific time for a century.

My goals for winter are not very specific at this point but then I still have a month worth of CX racing left.

dagray

My goal for the off season will still be a mileage goal as I will be riding the trainer/simulator like I did from late October-February of last off season. Right now my mileage goal is 30 miles per week which is tough due to constraints on my time (commute, kids school functions, church obligations, kids sports).

I love the trainer as I can start a route and give myself a quit time so that at say 19:00 (7:00pm) no matter what I am off the bike to get ready for the next activity (even if that activity is getting my boys to bed and spending family time with them so that they know I am invested in them. My boys are five and 15).

My ultimate goal is to get a 50mile ride completed as I have signed up for the 2016 Spokane, WA Tour de Cure (last year I completed the 25 mile route).

MikeRides

I'm cross training this winter as well. My new job involves a lot of heavy lifting (read: weight training), plus I hope to ride the stationary bike(read: Cardio) nightly to prepare for the ultimate goal - not only my first imperial century but my first group/charity ride in April.