training - I Love Bicycling

Ride All Year Round (Yes, even in the rain)

September 25, 2019 by Alison Jackson

The group ride starts at 8:00am but when you open your eyes in the morning it’s dark, cold and raining outside. The snooze button is a few feet from your head but that’s how far away you were from first place at last season’s key race. That’s why you pull yourself out of bed, make your coffee extra hot and get out in the rain to ride. Riding in the rain doesn’t have to be miserable, some of the best cycling is during the winter on the West Coast, also known as the Wet Coast for all the rain, and you don’t want to miss any training days this year. Here are a few tips for making riding in the rain a little more ‘fun’ so that you can ride all year round.

Safety First

The most important thing is to check your brakes. Rain will exaggerate the negative wear of brake pads, meaning if the pads are worn down and too far away from the rim of the tires, the braking reaction will be slower and less powerful.

Stopping control should not be compromised due to poor bike maintenance.

If you are going to be riding in the rain often you will need to replace your brake pads more often. Make sure that as your brake pads wear down you use your micro adjust on your cable to bring the pads in closer to the rim for optimal stopping action. Your rear brake pads should wear faster than the front so keep an eye on what is behind. Another thing to check is that there is an equal distance between right and left brake pad for simultaneous contact on the rim while braking.

Front and Rear Fenders

A lot of people when they start riding use only a rear fender for the rain (and to keep their friends riding behind them), but totally miss out on the benefits of a front fender. A rear fender is obvious to keep your back from getting the rooster tail spray and also helps the rain and mud the group that you’re pulling behind you (remember you’re training so you want to be in the front). However, what works for you might not work for the rider behind you. How long should your rear fender be?

Your rear fender should be as close to the ground as possible, try 4 inches from the pavement.

When buying fenders make sure they will fit your tire size. A skinny road tire fender will not suit a wider cyclocross or recreation road bike tire. Buy your fenders as long as possible, even then you might have to do your own modification to be suitable for your next rainy day group ride. Sometimes you can buy fender compatible extenders that you easily attach to reach the 4 inch rule. Other times, you can take an old water bottle, cut it in half, punch out two holes and zap strap it to the end of your fender. You can make this attachment as wide and sweeping as you want either to make more friends or add more resistance to your ride.

The same principles apply to your front fender. The front fender does miracles for delaying the wet penetration of road spray into your booties. The day after I got a front fender I came home after my rainy day ride and was surprised that I could actually feel my feet touch the floor when I took them out of my shoes!

Protect Your Head, Hands and Feet

You lose the most heat through your head so a rain hat with a brim not only keeps the water off your glasses, but also traps in some heat – unless it is made out of cotton, which soaks up the rain and stays cool. Choose a synthetic, quick-dry hat or better yet, a brimmed fleece cycling beanie that fits under your helmet and cuddles your ears to protect them from the cut of the wind.

The point to keeping your hands and feet warm is solely purposed for your riding comfort and greatly increases your happiness factor. If your hands or feet go numb it doesn’t matter how many times you stop for coffee, you will hate riding in the rain. Choose wool socks, maybe even two pairs! Even if they get wet they will stay warm. Buy a good pair of shoe covers, wind-proof is NOT rain-proof. A silicone or rubber pair will protect against the rain but have no additional thermal properties. A pair that is fleece lined and wind-proof will delay the wetness but can have enough of a barrier effect for your wool socks to maintain a warm enough temperature (and, if you’ve made it this far your front fender will help too!).

Wind-proof is NOT rainproof.

Use the double glove technique: a thin inner wool layer with a bulky winter snow glove on top. The lobster claw gloves came from the idea to have multiple fingers together in order to share body heat, but they don’t work for everyone because they feel different when shifting and braking. The outer glove layer needs to be a water-proof layer while the inner glove, as the insulated layer, than can be thicker or thinner depending on what weather you are expecting.

Layer-Up!

Your base layer should not be a base layer cycling shirt but a thick layer of embrocation cream. This stuff is incredibly popular for Belgian cyclocross races and during the wet Spring Classics. At the moment of application the lotion doesn’t seem to do anything but once rain or wind reach the cream it gives off a delightful glow of warmth on your skin. If on a rainy day ride you get stopped by a train crossing, the emobrocation layer keeps you from shivering, instead you wait at the railway crossing feeling tingly and warm! Just remember to put your chamois cream on first, then embrocation, and wash your hands after so you don’t burn your eyes from touching your face.

Apply chamois cream BEFORE applying embrocation lotion.

The next layer is a merino long-sleeve undershirt, short-sleeved jersey and water repellent rain jacket. If you get too warm on the ride and take off the rain jacket the merino wool can get wet while staying warm. Finish layering with a jersey and a waterproof-breathable jacket and get out riding in the rain!

How To Get The Best Morning Ride In

June 20, 2018 by Josh Friedman

A great way to start your day is with a morning ride. It could change your perspective for the rest of the day and you will feel great while everyone else is slowly waking up at their jobs.

Benefits of the Morning Ride

Starting your day with exercise is a great practice. The easiest reason is that you get your ride in before you start the rest of your day. There will not be anything to sidetrack you from your ride later in the day: low energy, extra work, lack of motivation, enticing last minute plans. Life throws all sorts of roadblocks at you as your day progresses. It benefits you to get a jump on the day and avoid the roadblocks altogether.

Waking up early to exercise helps you sleep at night. Early morning exercise, when there is a rush of hormones from waking, lowers blood pressure. The lower blood pressure carries throughout the day, in turn resulting in better sleep (lower blood pressure and better sleep are linked). Once you get this cycle going, you will feel great.

Getting out before rush hour is the easiest way to have the roads mostly to yourself. Most people are still sleeping or getting ready for their day while you are in the thick of yours, doing something immensely enjoyable.

You will benefit longer from the release of hormones related to exercise. The “runner’s high” feeling will jump start your day. Even after the hormones have subsided, your mind will already be used to the good feelings that started your day, continuing on that trajectory. This, along with knowing that you are more in shape already is a great way to start a day.

Plan Ahead

Riding first thing requires planning. You have to have everything ready to go so you can maximize your time on the bike and minimize your time searching in the dark for everything you need while trying to stay quiet so you don’t wake anyone else up.

Lay Out Your Gear

Do this the night before you ride. You do not want to scramble in the dark, post sleep haze and forget something. Put all of the riding clothes you think you might need in one place. The bathroom is convenient so you can do your business, get dressed and brush your teeth all in one fell swoop. Have your food ready to go. Bottles should be full and on the bike. Make sure your bike is dialed and functioning perfectly with a fully charged light if you’re leaving in the dark.

Food

Figure out what you can stomach quickly and comfortably. On rides of an hour or less, you probably do not need anything unless your ride will be very intense. Another possibility is to prepare food that you can bring on the ride and eat it during the beginning of the ride. Some people need coffee to wake up. If that is the case, then have some coffee ready to go. An even better plan is to ween yourself off of coffee so your body can wake up naturally, removing another step in your wake up routine.

If one of your goals is to lose weight, then exercising before eating is most effective. This study shows that even with a terrible diet, participants gained no weight when they fasted before exercise. The other two groups gained significant weight and developed insulin resistance.

If you are looking to boost performance in your ride as opposed to losing weight, then eating is best. You will get the most out of each pedal stroke.

Sleep!

Ensure that you get enough sleep the night before. It is not worth compromising a good night’s sleep to get up early and ride. You will not feel great and it may dissuade you from trying more morning rides. A good tip to ensure good sleep is to turn off electronics about an hour before bed. The blue wavelength that their screens emit cause an alert state in the brain by suppressing melatonin production, a hormone that induces sleep.

Wake Up!

People have different amounts of time they need between waking up and being functional humans. Some can jump out of bed and straight onto the bike. Others need lots of time. Figure out what works for you so you can be fully awake and pedal effectively. You want to feel good on the bike so you can get used to getting the morning ride in.

Standardize Routes

Settle on a route before going to bed. The routes you choose should be familiar; limited duration morning rides are generally not for exploring. You should also know how long you will be out on each one. If you have an hour to ride on a given morning, you take your hour long route. An additional thought is to have a route that has a few escape paths in case you have a flat or other mechanical. It will allow you to fix the mechanical and still get to your first morning destination on time.

Morning Rides are the Best

There are a few challenges to getting out for a morning ride, but they are easy to overcome. A little planning and preparation goes a long way to starting a successful morning ride routine. Once you get the ball rolling it becomes easy, sometimes even necessary when your body is accustomed to the the morning ride.

Training With Power

December 10, 2017 by Aaron Robson

One of the biggest revolutions in cycling training has been the introduction of the power meter as a training tool. It has rapidly thrown cycling into the highly technical world of sports science, and the benefits can be enormous – Chris Froome’s win in the 2013 Tour de France was aided greatly by Team Sky’s extensive use of power meters in both their training and racing plans. So what is power training, and more importantly, can it benefit you?

What is Power?

Everyone has heard of power, but unless you have a particularly good memory of high school physics, you may not be familiar with what it means in a technical sense. Power is defined as the rate of work; how much ‘work’ is done in a certain interval of time. Work is defined as a force applied over a distance. So power is essentially a measure of how hard you can push on the pedals (the force) and for how long (time). The harder you can push, and the longer you can maintain a certain level of ‘push’, the faster you go! And going faster is what bike racing is all about.

Why Should I Use it?

Now, you might be saying to yourself ‘OK, that’s nice. So what?’ Well, the ‘so what’ is that cyclists can use power to train and race much more effectively. Power is ultimately a measure of how hard you are working, and by using a power meter on your bike, you can more precisely monitor your effort. Other ways of monitoring effort do exist – rate of perceived exertion (a subjective assessment of how hard you feel you are working) and heart rate are the two most common methods, but neither comes close to the precision you get from a power meter.

This precision can be extremely beneficial to cyclists. By using a power meter on a climb, for example, you can ride the entire climb at precisely your optimal power output – never going too hard and pushing yourself into the ‘red zone’, but also not being too conservative and leaving too much in the tank at the end. You can also train more effectively, doing intervals at an exact percentage of your maximum output, or riding a tempo ride right at your lactate threshold to name a few possible applications.

How to Integrate Power into your Training

Hopefully you’re convinced that using a power meter can make you a better cyclist. The obvious question is how? First things first, you need a power meter. Debating the merits of the many options available on the market will be the subject of another article, but in short – invest in a good one. You might be tempted by the low cost of some models, but these are no where near as accurate as the better ones, and accuracy is the whole point of using a power meter. The cheapest worthwhile option I know of is the Stages Power meter, which retails for $700.

After you have your new power meter ready to go on your bike, the next step is to do some baseline tests to determine your power profile. Ideally, you will want to determine the maximum power you can produce for 5 seconds, 1 minute, 5 minutes and 30+ minutes (this last one is referred to a Functional Threshold Power). All-out 5 second effort is easy enough, and even a 1 minute maximum effort isn’t too daunting. The 5 minute and 30 minute efforts take a bit more planning to execute properly, but when you know all these numbers you will have a much better idea of your strengths and weaknesses as a rider. There are tables available online that provide approximate equivalent levels of power for each duration. If your values for 5 second and 1 minute power rate higher than your 5 minute and 30 min values, then you know you are relatively weaker aerobically, and can emphasize aerobic training.

Power meters also help you to gauge efforts better. If, for example, you know that your FTP is 300 Watts (watts are the standard unit of power), then you know that in a time trial that will take you about 45 minutes to complete, you shouldn’t be riding above 300 Watts at any time. Riding with the most even power output over the course of your effort will give you the best results.

It is impossible to cover every aspect of power training in a single article – there are entire books written about it. If you are an aspiring racer, or even just someone who loves to track progress, a power meter will be your best friend. Now that you are familiar with the basics, you can start your journey into training with power!

5 Of The Best Cycling Power Meters

December 6, 2017 by Corey Davis

What is a Cycling Power Meter?

Cycling power meters have been a common tool used to gauge training amongst professional cyclists for years, but really only within the last decade have they become affordable for the everyday cycling enthusiast. So what exactly is a power meter? Cycling power meters are strain gauges that measure the amount of displacement of an object, say your crank, which is imputed into an equation that gives you the amount of work done which when combined with time gives you power measured in joules/second or watts. This work energy expressed in watts determines how much power a rider produces at any given second within a ride.

Why are Power Meters Good to Ride With?

The benefit of training with a power meter is that it can show how much power the rider is putting down to help track progress. It is a better measurement than heart rate to track training. Heart rate fluctuates a lot, whereas power is always consistent, but they are really best used together. Cycling power meters can help you also ride a much smoother pace throughout an entire ride, climb, or interval. You can pick a number and stick to it, whereas heart rate will creep up throughout the ride, hill, or interval. Cycling power meters are such a great training tool; soon you can expect to see them coming standard on bikes straight from the manufacture. Below is a list of 5 of the best cycling power meters and what makes them different.

5 of the Best Cycling Power Meters

PowerTap

PowerTap is one of the only companies that offer three positions for power to be read. Originally, PowerTap sold the rear hub power meter and now they offer chainrings and pedals to read power. All three are useful in their own way. The rear wheel is great because you can transfer it from bike to bike easily, but when race day comes, the race wheels replace the power meter.

SRM

SRM cycling power meters are certainly the most common amongst top professionals. The SRM is crank based and has its own head unit compared to most other brands that rely on Garmin head units. SRM claims to have a margin of error of less than 1%. SRM is the original power meter and focuses on quality; the price is certainly reflective of that.

Stages

Stages cycling power meters are in the left crank arm, and dependent on what drivetrain a rider is using. For instance, if a rider uses Shimano Ultegra and purchases a Stages, they would receive an Ultegra left crank arm to replace their original one. The only difference is that there would be a small black piece attached to the inside of the crank arm. Stages is certainly one of the more affordable power meters out there, and installation and setup is a breeze.

Pioneer

Pioneer power meters are crank based and have dual strain gauges to measure both left and ride side power. Pioneer offers complete cranksets and installation kits for user supplied cranks, i.e. you already have a DURA-ACE crankset and don’t want to buy another.

Garmin Vector

Garmin Vector pedal pods fit on your crank, taking only 15 minutes to install and calibrate. The pods do left/right pedal analysis, along with a feature called Pedal smoothness, to see where there are soft spots in your pedal stroke. These pedals are run on a simple CR 2032 battery, and the new Vector 2 design makes replacing the batteries much easier.

Cross Training For Cyclists

November 12, 2017 by Josh Friedman

With the weather turning cooler, spending less time on the bike might be appealing. There is more adverse weather to deal with, along with waning daylight. Riding indoors on a trainer or rollers is a good way to maintain cycling form despite being a bit on the boring side. Cross training for cyclists on the other hand can keep up some of your fitness while being fun, exciting, and simply different.

There are additional benefits to cross training for cycling besides maintaining hard-fought fitness gains you made when the weather was nice and the days were long:

Workouts in cross training disciplines can be shorter, while making similar fitness impacts.
Cycling is a low impact sport; you need to do other work to boost bone density. Cycling alone can lead to bone mass loss. Many cross training activities have some impact, increasing bone density as your body responds to the training. (this is particularly important for woman)
Cross training can be a great mental break. After all of the hours you spend on the bike, sometimes a change is nice, especially if it is going back to an activity you love.
Hiding from the bad weather is not always a bad thing. Too many wet and cold rides can take away some love for cycling.

Cross Training for Cycling

There are lots of ways you can spend your time cross training. If you are excited about it and it will keep you fit and moving, go for it. Below are five activities that are common and will have a few of the benefits mentioned above.

Running

The benefits of running when it is cold and the days are short are easy, it takes less time to get a workout in and because you are going slower, there is less wind, thus it’s easier to stay warm. With the impact of each stride, you make your bones stronger. You may see less of the world on the bike, but you can see it in greater detail – it will give you a different perspective of your local training grounds.

Weight Training

Weight training can give you great benefits on the bike by developing both muscular endurance through high repetitions and low weight exercises and neuromuscular explosiveness with high weight maximal exercises. It is very easy to stay warm when you are working out indoors, while benefiting your bone density greatly by putting strain on your skeleton. It might not be the most mentally uplifting activity, but staying focused on the benefits can get you through a winter’s worth of workouts and stronger on the bike.

Other Sports

Was there a sport that you enjoyed before cycling? Now is the time to do it. Lots of sports that are traditionally outdoor sports have some indoor version – soccer, rock climbing, basketball, etc. It can be an enjoyable mental break that will keep you fit and healthy through the cooler days of the year.

Yoga

Core strength is quite trendy right now. Yoga is an activity that can boost core strength, along with all-around strength and flexibility. It can also be a time to get your mind focused and settle your thoughts unlike many other competitive disciplines.

Skating

The first few times you run after exclusively riding, you will be sore (but your lungs will work great). But there is an activity that does use roughly the same muscles and movement as cycling – skating. If you know how to skate, you can jump right in and show off your fitness immediately. If not, go learn and you will be skating well relatively quickly. There are even skating clubs that offer competition and the group environment that cycling offers during the fair weather. (And if you were wondering which type of skating was being referred to… well all three: skate skiing (traditional cross country skiing in skating form), ice skating, and roller skating which can be a great activity when it’s cold out but not cold enough for snow and ice.)

Do not let the word training fool you; cross training for cycling should be a fun and beneficial distraction through the fall and winter. Find and activity that suits you and enjoy yourself while keeping up your fitness.

How To Ride Long Climbs Faster

April 30, 2017 by Andrew Funamoto

In part two of his climbing series, Travis explains how to ride long climbs. From reaping the rewards of endorphin highs on the top of the hill, to the best pacing strategy, Travis gives us some tips on how to tackle long climbs. If you missed his previous video on gearing and cadence, check it out here.

Why Do We Ride Long Climbs

Uninterrupted riding
Sustaining heart rate
Reward of accomplishing something huge!

How To Ride Long Climbs

Pace yourself (don’t go too hard in the first five minutes)
Vary your position by standing every once in awhile
Relax. Relaxing will allow you to breathe properly on the bike

We would like to thank Jody, one of our readers who inspired us to get this video online. Jody just turned 50 and asked us if we had any tips on tackling Mauna Kea, so if you are in the same boat of ambition stay tuned for more videos. Also, check out Joe Friel’s book Cycling Past 50.

Why Fall Bike Rides Are Some of The Best of The Year

October 16, 2016 by Emma Lujan

It’s that time of year again when the weather cools down, the hours of daylight decrease, and maybe the idea of watching Netflix seems better than getting on a bicycle; however don’t let the conditions fool you. Fall bike rides can be some of the best of the year!

Gear for Fall Bike Rides

Getting outside for fall bike rides is much easier and more enjoyable when you have the right gear. Investing in a good pair of gloves, booties (shoe covers) and a riding jacket will help keep you warm and dry. Having a set of fenders and some lights will allow you to ride when it is wet, or before or after the sun is up.

Goal Setting

Set a goal to ride on one new road each time you get outside. This will bring out your inner child (because as if wanting to ride your bike a lot doesn’t make you a kid enough) and will allow you to discover more of your surroundings. It will also open up new routes or hills to incorporate into workouts in the spring.

Fall bike rides can also be the best for goal-setting for the next season. You have time to leisurely reflect on how the spring and summer unfolded and now you can pedal through fall leaves and decide on which races, events, and rides you want to attack for next year.

Coffee

Plan stops at different bakeries and cafes! Fall bike riding is the best time of year for the token ‘coffee-shop-rides’. After ripping around in the cold for an hour or two, nothing feels quite as satisfying as coming inside to a delicious-smelling cafe and sitting down to rest with a hot cup of coffee and a strudel, cinnamon bun or doughnut. Fall is the time of year to gain back some of the calories burnt off in the summer. Lots of bike riders put on body weight in the fall; this is the time to rebuild and recover from some epic summer rides, so go enjoy a doughnut or two!

Relax

Don’t worry about keeping a strict schedule. It can feel very liberating to go for rides without the bike-computer, power meter and heart rate monitor in the fall. Ride by feel and listen to your body for how hard and far you wish to ride. Look at your surroundings and take in all the colorful leaves, the crisp smells, and the chill in the air.

Experiment

Fall bike rides are a great time to try new types of riding such as cyclocross, gravel road riding and mountain biking. All of these have lower average speeds than road cycling and thus you often won’t feel as cold since you don’t have much of a wind chill.

So don’t let the cooler darker days of fall turn you off of bike riding. Make sure you have some good gloves and lights, and go explore and have fun!

How To Improve Your Fitness Without Training More

August 1, 2016 by Josh Friedman

Achieving better fitness with a limited schedule can be difficult. To get stronger within your time constraints, you must be exacting in your methods of both training and recovery. This is the best way to make the most of your time and effort.

Riding Hard

There is no sense in riding easy if you have only a few days per week to ride to improve your fitness. Three very hard days on the bike should get you passable fitness to get you through your local group rides. More than three very hard days on the bike could burn you out if you do not get a week of recovery every four weeks or so. A very hard day means blindingly hard, so hard that you probably want to quit, have tunnel vision or maybe even release your bowels in your chamois. If you have never tested this dark, dark place, now is the time to try it.

Specific Intervals

Set out with a plan of specific intervals for your extra hard days. This way you cannot cheat or have the power fall off by the end of the ride, or if you do cheat, you will know it was blatant. High intensity interval training has proven to be quite effective in increasing fitness with short workouts. Remember the last paragraph; you must be prepared to really slay it on the bike to make the most of these workouts. Start with small sessions once or twice a week and build up.

Sleep

Without sleep, all of your hard training, all of the hours you suffered on the bike are for nought. Sleep is when you make your real gains. It is when your body compensates for the training stress you put it through and adapts to the load. It is always incredibly important, but if you are burning the candle at both ends with work, family and other obligations on top of training, quality (and large quantities) of sleep will keep you afloat in all aspects of life and let you make fitness gains.

Nutrition

Again, with the focused approach that is necessary when you are short on hours, your nutrition needs to be completely dialed too. You will not be doing huge volume, so you do not need large quantities of food, but you need to make sure you are getting the highest quality food. Good nutrition will fuel your workouts to the best of your ability along with fueling proper recovery.

When you are pulled in many directions, it is easy to fall into a routine of quick and dirty food. If you want those fitness gains bad enough, you will need to figure out a way to get the best nutrition possible. It will make every pedal stroke that much better and mean that much more in the long run.

Drink lots of water (with electrolytes, not purified water, whether it is distilled or reverse osmosis) to keep your blood viscous and flowing. It will deliver nutrients to your muscles more freely and keep your heart’s work to a minimum.

Cross Training

With limited time, sometimes a full training ride is difficult to squeeze in. On those days, cross training may be a quick way to maintain fitness that you are trying to hold onto or increase. If you can keep it cycling specific, whether it is in the weight room, skating or nordic skiing, that is great. If you have other activities that fit into your schedule, like running, that is fine too, although it will not have as much of a positive impact on your cycling musculature.

Recover Hard

Recovery should be happening whenever you are not training, although that is probably a stretch when you have a busy life. When you are recovering, do it full on. Get your feet up, keep hydrated, eat well and keep the external stress down. An additional recovery tactic is compression gear. You can wear it when you are at work under your normal work clothes.

Do it Full-on

If your time is limited and you want to make fitness gains, everything you do has to be full-on: your riding, your sleep, your nutrition and your recovery. Make it a routine that works and you will make the most of your time.

Cycling Versus Running – Which Should You Do?

July 9, 2016 by Josh Friedman

Everyone knows exercise is important. How you exercise is up to you. There are many, many choices, some of which have proven benefits and some of which are dubious. This article will pit two tried and true exercises against each other: cycling versus running.

Overall Energy in Cycling versus Running

In the debate of cycling versus running, running comes out on top for energy expenditure for a given period of time and exertion level. This is because you support all of your weight when running. When cycling, the bicycle supports much of your weight via the saddle while your legs pedal and propel you forwards.

If you are looking for the quickest way to burn calories, running is it. Remember that calorie consumption is not an overall marker of fitness (or enjoyment).

Intervals

Recent research shows that interval training is the quickest way to overall fitness. It is a bit easier to do interval training on a bike because you can coast between efforts. That coasting or light effort will allow you to do higher quality efforts because you get better rest intervals.

Musculature

Running and cycling use muscles differently. Much of both exercise uses the same muscles but have different impacts on the muscles. That is why a runner that jumps on a bike and goes for a big ride will have sore legs, as will a cyclist that goes for a run and has sore legs. Which exercise is better for your musculature? It is hard to say. Enough of either will result in great muscle tone and strength as long as you are doing the exercise right. If you get the idea that you would like to venture into competitive cycling, you will want to cut out all running to focus on developing the best cycling fitness and musculature that you can.

Bone Density

Running is the winner here, unless the runner goes over the edge and gets stress fractures. Impact exercises are necessary for bones to maintain their density. Cycling is a low impact exercise; cyclists should keep this in mind and supplement their riding with some impact so their bones do not become brittle particularly in the off-season when your rides become few and far between.

Joints

Lots of runners resort to cycling after their joints have seen enough impact. Cycling is much more gentle on ankles, knees, hips, and backs. Runners often end up with problems at these high impact areas. You are more likely to see an old cyclist than an old runner for this reason.

Time

Again, running is the winner here. You can get a quicker workout in because of the higher energy expenditure along with the overall impact of the exercise. These are the factors that determine the upper limits of duration for either exercise. Runners usually top out at a marathon. Cyclists usually top out at a century, which is a much longer duration.

See the Sights

This one goes to cycling, by a long shot. On a bike you travel fast enough to cover great distances but slow enough that you can take almost all of it in. And you can stop to check out the scenery easily without a parking spot. You can stop running to see things up close, but you will not be that far from where you started; running covers far less ground. Cycling tourism is a popular mode of seeing new places. Running tourism is much less so.

Your Bank Account

Running is far cheaper. If you run a lot, you will go through a lot of shoes, but even then it probably will not stack up to an investment in cycling. If you are serious, both are more enjoyable with technical clothing, so that comes out even. Sometimes gear is the draw for an activity, so cycling has that covered – less money in your bank account, but more gear to play with.

Overall Fun

This is an important topic. If you are having fun exercising, you will keep coming back for more. Cycling covers more scenery, is more exhilarating with fast descents and challenging climbs and has many more skills to learn. Learning a new skill is one of the markers of an activity that keeps the mind fresh and staves off aging.

The Bottom Line

Getting exercise is critical to a healthy life. In the end it does not matter whether you choose cycling versus running; get out there and exercise. There is no requirement to chose one activity and stick to it. If you are a runner, you can mix in some cycling and vice versa.

Rollers vs. Trainer – Which Should You Choose?

June 9, 2016 by Josh Friedman

Sometimes conditions are not optimal for training outdoors whether it is the weather, time constraints, or suitable roads. There are ways to cheat what life and mother nature throw at you and train indoors. The two main devices for indoor training have devout supporters based on what each device provides. This is your introduction to the debate: rollers vs. trainer.

Why Ride Inside?

It is raining/snowing/freezing/scorching/hailing and you still need to ride. Maybe you had to work longer than you planned and your window to ride is small. Perhaps you had to spend the day with your family and it is dark out now. Or you have certain intervals and you cannot think of a road with a long enough of an uninterrupted section to do them.

All of these factors are possible and you still want to be in top form for an upcoming event and you feel that if you miss a day, you will fall behind. This is when you ride indoors. It lets you do a focused workout without interruption. Riding inside also allows you to keep your equipment cleaner and protects you from any weather related discomfort – both hypo- and hyperthermia mostly.

Keep Cool Inside!

When training inside, set up a powerful fan to blow on you. While riding outside, even on hot days, there is a lot air flow to cool your body down. The fan will mimic this airflow. Without the fan, you will get hot very, very quickly, to the point that you will compromise the benefit of your training. The only time it is OK to forego the fan is if you are getting ready for an event in a location that is far warmer than where you live. You are then training your body to cool itself. You MUST be prepared to drink two to three times the water you normally would for the duration of your ride.

Rollers

Rollers come first in the rollers vs. trainer debate because they have been around far longer. They are a simple device that allow you to ride inside; a cylinder, often referred to as drums, under the front wheel and two under the rear wheel inside of a frame. The front and middle drums connect with a belt. When you pedal, the rear wheel rotates the two rear drums. The belt moves the front drum, rotating the front wheel. The physics of keeping the bike upright are the same as on the road – spinning wheels and the centrifugal motion keeps you upright. It has a different feeling on the rollers because you are not going anywhere.

While riding rollers, you must maintain focus or you can come off. It is not very dramatic however like you would probably imagine. It is more of a flop over to the side or off the back. When starting out, try it in a door frame, next to a wall, or next to a sturdy table. It will allow you to get on the bike and get the wheels spinning with support. Once you have mastered that, you can jump on the rollers anywhere. On rollers, you are building your bike handling skills along with your fitness.

The differences in rollers comes in the diameter of the drums. The larger the drum, the less resistance for a given set of rollers. There is a limit of how hard you can go on rollers. You will not be able to do short, all-out efforts on rollers because they do not provide enough resistance.

The other factor, that mostly determines quality but can also affect noise while riding along with a small component of resistance, is the material of the drums. Higher quality rollers have alloy drums, while lower quality have plastic drums. Alloy drums will last far longer and should be quieter. And quality matters with rollers. These rollers have been the gold standard for years.

Trainer

A trainer holds the bike stationary by elevating the rear wheel off the ground and has a very stable base to keep you from tipping over. The front wheel is also stationary (and should be elevated to the same level as the rear wheel with a block, phone book, or some other stable object). The trainer has a resistance unit that the rear wheel spins when you pedal. A good trainer’s resistance unit will mimic the resistance you feel on the road – the harder you go, the harder the trainer resists your effort.

While riding a trainer, you do not need to keep focus on your handling; the bike is static, except for the pedals and rear wheel. For the majority of cyclists, resistance on a trainer is impossible to run out of. You can go as hard as you want and still have a challenge from the trainer. Your body is the limiting factor.

The main differences in trainers is the type of resistance unit:

Wind – The most primitive form of trainer resistance and also the noisiest. It does provide progressively harder resistance. This trainer provides a solid starting point.
Magnets – Quiet, although less progressive resistance than the road and other options. This trainer is a quality, economical option.
Fluid – The quietest and most engineered resistance. It is supposed to mimic road feel as closely as you can on a trainer. This trainer has been a very solid option for a long time.

The size of the flywheel on the trainer also helps dictate the feel of the trainer; the bigger the flywheel, the less it feels like you are pedaling through mud.

There is a new category of trainer – direct drive trainers. You remove the rear wheel and mount the rest of the bike on the trainer with the chain of your bike driving a cassette on the trainer. These are supposed to provide the closest feel to the road. They are also the most expensive.

Rollers vs. Trainer

Now that you know what goes into rollers and trainers, here is the showdown: rollers vs. trainer. If you need to put down serious power when training indoors, a trainer is for you. If you would like to work on your handling while getting your workout, use rollers. Rollers also give you the benefit of being slightly more interesting as you have to pay a little bit of attention to keep from falling over, but you are still riding inside. You might need some supplemental entertainment with either to keep you from boredom.

The best of both worlds would be to have both a trainer and rollers. If you are diligent in your search, you could find a used quality trainer and rollers. It gives you options and versatility in your training.

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