Originally Posted by
jlvs2run
I just turned 75, and time trials are the only thing that I train for, which is all on my indoor trainer.
I averaged close to 2 hours a day this past year, including 20 plus online time trials with best times in 10 events from 200 meters to 40 kilometers compared to the previous year. I recently reduced to 100 minutes a day because that feels more productive, and I'm doing more sprints and shorter events through the summer.
The events I like most are from 4 to 10 kilometers and I do shorter events more often. When I'm not doing time trials, I am training for time trials. I know how to prepare and how to do them, but am always experimenting and am open to learn more.
I've seen some of your postings, know you're quite knowledgeable about racing, and appreciate your input.
I'm not a coach but I've paid a lot of them in multiple disciplines and I ride with several older than you. I know older experiance riders can be quite fast. Starting at an older age - I just have no experiance with that. One guy, now 85 when 75 would constantly hold over 20. In his 40s and 50s he'd hold 25 and put major hurt on the racers then. So I know that growing older an maintaining is much different than building. We know it takes longer to heal from a cut as you age, it takes longer to recover and build, so the idea of doing 3X a week tear down and recover is not realistic.
2 hours/day sounds like a lot to me. Your events are not an hour, are they?
Here is what I would do....
-Get to know your morning resting heart rate. When it is elevated much, take it easy or don't train. Find a training frequency that you can be back to your low in a couple days.
-Do some strength hi resistance thing in line with the above maybe 2X a week. This usually means weights. It mean the muscles burn and get fatigued < 1 min. There are lots of caveats that go with this - don't get injured.
-Intense times on the bike trainer should be significantly less than your event. 2 hours on a trainer is likely not making you faster at a 30 min TT. Take a time half you event length and go harder. If you are recovered the next day after going hard, add another hard session on the same day. You might be faster if you road less. The miles in legs matter a lot more when doing 5 hour road races which I assume you are not.
The good news is when you are older you are less likely to over develop muscles and fatigue tendons. [One of my pet peeves is junior gear mandates which I think tend to overuse of joints and tendons in kids. My kid's ligament problems went away as soon as he got off of junior gears.]
-Ignore any fads that suggest you have to have balance in pedaling L to R etc. Different systems, and muscles develop at different rates and unless you are a beginner most that stuff is locked into you by now.
-That said - here is a system to pedal a certain way for a shorter TT. Stomp on you pedals during the bottom of the stroke. More like a running in place motion. That will typically produce a faster TT time than smooth power.
-Use a PM to see how low you can go at the same speed. Speed matters. Power is a thing that makes you faster, but position, comfort etc. do too. You can ride in front of a mirror, have video, take pictures etc., but what really matters in a TT is speed. so use speed and then try to adjust to get the most for the least. I'm sure you know most TT positions for most people are not their max power positions.