Prioritise consistency. Consistency beats intensity every time and the path to making genuine improvements to your ability is to be found here. Understand your available time to train and apply a consistent, progressive approach in order to transform your performance over time. Your body will adapt to the environment you expose it to, so establish a sustainable balance and allow those adaptation to begin.
Get more sleep. Increasing your training load and not appreciating the importance of recovery and sleep in the equation is a recipe for injury, illness and ultimately failing to achieve you goals. There’s no magic number of hours, different people need different amounts but one thing’s for sure, almost everybody needs more. Energy production, weight management, hormone balance, immune strength, heart health, the list goes on and all are directly impacted by the duration and quality of your sleep. Sleep apps can help, if you can measure it you can manage and start improving.
Discover off the bike exercises. Strength and conditioning work, yoga or pilates will benefit your performance by creating a stronger core, improved flexibility and increased stability. In turn, you will see improvements in bike handling and higher resistance to injury. Your off the bike exercises should be specific to you and start by addressing areas of obvious weakness that can become limiting factors as your fitness grows. Off season is a great time to establish your strength and condition program and have you ready to handle an increased level of training in the season ahead.
Nutrition. First and foremost you need to be well fuelled for the demands of your ride or training session. It might sound like a cliché but you really are what you eat. Away from actual training times I would avoid added sugar at all costs and stay away from overly processed foods that look more like they have come from a laboratory than a farm yard. When it comes to performance at an event or even in a training session, sports focused products can have a place but do not confuse them with healthy eating and where possible always opt for unprocessed, real food. Understand the concept that improved health will lead to better performance whereas improved performance can often lead to poorer health.
Set goals. Take time, be honest and dream a little when it comes to setting your goals. As adults we learn so many limitations that we often hold ourselves back from setting true goals and set our goals relatively low and short term. This is a great time to speak with a coach who will have more balanced opinion of your potential and who will at the same time be able to discuss the requirements to achieve those goals. Somewhere in the process is the correct balance of challenge and reality that will result in well defined, short, medium and long term goals, creating the best environment for your success.
Join group rides. These can be great fun, and can provide motivation on a soggy (or scorching) early morning. They’re also an opportunity to learn new skills and meet like minded people. Choose a group that suits your abilities and get out there enjoying yourself.
Invest in appropriate kit. Hint ….the most expensive is not necessarily the best. Consider your environment, the types of rides your are going to be doing and your individual size and shape to make sure your kit is going to be helping not hindering.
Make friends with your local bike shop. A good shop will become an invaluable resource for riders of all abilities. Not only will they be able to advise on bike set up, kit, maintenance etc., but they will be able to open the door to your local cycling community in a way that online shops simply can’t.
Learn some basic bike maintenance skills. Nobody wants their ride or race cut short by a mechanical issue, they certainly don’t want their group ride cut short by someone else’s mechanical issue. Most problems that will occur while on a ride can be fixed quite simply with basic tools and knowledge, so invest a little time and equip yourself with the skills to take care of your own, and I can guarantee someone else’, bike in the future. This will also stop you having to take your bike into the workshop on such a regular basis, saving you some money.
Talk to a coach. A good coach will be happy to talk to you about your goals and help you plan your best route to success. They should be willing to answer your initial questions and provide you with the information you require to make a decision on how to progress.
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