If you have time to increase your weekly training further, this next plan will take you up to 12 hours a week, allowing you to have a very solid endurance base and plenty of time for higher-quality work.
Use blue/green sessions to practise your skills: cornering confidently, pedalling smoothly, changing gear effectively, or even your track stands. If you ride off-road, take time to study trails, how best to ride them, and practise, practise, practise. Learn to focus on your breathing and your pedalling, so that you’re completely aware of all the processes and are cycling as efficiently as possible. Also concentrate on your thought processes and visualise your performance in your target events, especially if you intend to compete.
You may also wish to experiment and add variety to your sessions. For instance, replace intervals with one-legged riding (best done indoors, or on quiet, flat roads).
Focus on using only your left leg for one minute, and then repeat with the right leg. This is not primarily aimed at improving the strength of your legs, but improving your pedalling technique. Rather than pushing down on the pedals you should spin – trying to complete perfect circles. In theory, if you can pull up on the pedal on the opposite side to the downstroke this should markedly improve the force you can apply through the chain to the rear wheel. In practice this isn’t very easy, and the best you can do is un-weight the leg on the upstroke so that it detracts as little as possible from the push down on the opposite side.
Where you can improve significantly is to extend the force of the push on the pedals further through the stroke. This will eliminate the dead spot at the top and bottom of the stroke. For most people, improvements in efficiency can also be found by increasing the cadence to above 90, or even to more than 100 revolutions a minute. This is another technique you should try to incorporate into your training plans.
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