By Cliff English
March 20, 2007 -- For most North American triathletes, who contend with the all four seasons, getting in your aerobic base bike training in the winter months can be challenging. Of course, there are many tools that can help get in the miles, such as trainers, rollers and computrainers, but they all seem to depend upon the selection of movies at the local video rental store to help you get through the session.
Traditional periodization of your year suggests that you take an off-period (at the end of the competitive phase) of at least 2-4 weeks. Only then would you start to re-build back into aerobic base training in the general preparatory phase, which could last anywhere from 12-24 weeks. Next, comes the specific prep phase which would include a lot of upper-end aerobic system development and then finally your pre-competition and competition phases.
It can definitely be challenging to follow this traditional periodization through our harsh winters. The following tips will help you understand why a base phase is important and what methods are most effective for this development.
What are we trying to achieve?
Aerobic base training will produce a wide range of positive adaptations that optimize your cardiovascular system and improve your ability to produce energy aerobically.
Aerobic base training will increase the number of capillaries. Capillaries transport oxygen and fuels to your muscles and move waste products (mainly carbon dioxide) out. By increasing the number of capillaries per muscle fibre, base training improves the ability to provide oxygen to the individual muscle fibres.
Aerobic base training will increase the ability of your muscle fibres to use oxygen and to produce energy aerobically. Base training increases the number and size of the mitochondria in your muscle fibres and also improves the efficiency of the mitochondria by increasing the activity of aerobic enzymes.
All these adaptations reduce your lactate levels and allow your muscles to use more fat and less carbohydrate to swim, bike or run at a given speed.
Lastly, a large aerobic base helps improve your ability to recover from training and enables you to handle more high-intensity training such as tempo runs, aerobic intervals and races.
Here are the options:
Thankfully, for those of us that reside in the northern hemisphere, much research has indicated that one can improve on all the above physiological adaptations through quality aerobic training. This includes aerobic intervals and tempo training that are all completed at intensities and workloads that are predominantly aerobic and sub-threshold.
For example, if your lactate threshold is around 175-180 bpm, doing tempo training or aerobic intervals just below this heart rate zone (about 10-20 bpm below) can be extremely beneficial for aerobic energy system development.
This type of training is great for those athletes that are in the thick of winter and can’t get outside to put in those big miles on the bike.
In addition to keeping the main content of your trainer sessions to your upper aerobic heart rate zones, one can develop some strength and leg speed components once to twice a week without risk of “peaking too early”. Big gear work on the trainer is fantastic for developing sport specific strength while also reinforcing a good pedal stroke. Cadence accelerations are great for imporving cycling efficiency, as well as keeping some leg speed during the base phase.
You could really optimize this with the addition of a mini training camp. With only 7-10 days, you can get in a good block of bike mileage down south that would not only be money in the bank for your aerobic base, but it can also be very mentally uplifting to be out on the roads while everyone else is back home freezing.
Finally, to mix up you bike aerobic base plan, try adding a little cross training. If you happen to be focusing on some early-season distance races like the 70.3 series or Ironman, you can achieve some great aerobic base training through sports such as cross-country skiing or snowshoe running. It may not be the five-hour bike session that you would have liked but the three-hour cross country skate session and the two-hour bike trainer session will do just fine. You are still working aerobically and also getting in the sport specific work on the bike so your muscles will still be used to that sport.
One of the most important things to do in the off-season is get a good idea of some of your heart rate training zones; whether it is through an exercise science lab or just a standard step test on the bike trainer at home. Quality aerobic base training on the trainer with intervals is very time efficient and a great way to get strong aerobically. Remember that you have to be realistic with your efforts and do not do all-out intervals, as you will become race ready a bit early. If you train with a group for your trainer session just remember the race season is still a few months away for the majority of us!
Cliff English is a graduate of the National Coaching Institute (NCI Victoria, Canada) High Performance Coaching Program and a USAT Level 1 coach.