Commuting and training

Training
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Hi All,

Looking for a bit advice. New to smart training/wahoo systm but would like to know how I can balance the a structured training plan with my daily commute.

My commute is around 8 miles each way and can be done sometimes twice per day (i.e. 32 miles)

I would like to build my endurance for a few 100 mile rides in the summer plus maybe coast to coast in a day.

How I am best managing the training taking into account my very variable commuting schedule (on call 24 hours a day so can be anytime or not at all).

Thanks for the advice,

Richard

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Ride your commute very slowly, use a HR monitor to make sure you stay in Z1/Z2.

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I work at home so not an issue for me. But what @JGreengrass said is what my wife does when sheā€™s training for a marathon. Two way commute followed by an hour doing intervals on the track (or whatever her coach called for). Only at the very end as she was ramping her long runs to their max did she reduce bike commute days.

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Welcome to the forums @Richard_Davies. Youā€™l likely find a lot of useful info in here by searching 100 mile rides, or Century rides etc. WIth commuting as much as you already do, Iā€™m betting you are likely capable of doing a 100 mile ride right now. If you donā€™t have any specific goals for how quickly you do it, your average speed or power, it really is just time in the saddle and what will be most important there is pacing (not starting out so hard that youā€™re dying after an hour or two), hydration, fuel and a comfortable saddle and bike shorts.

Itā€™s going to be very hard for you to follow a stock plan with such a variable schedule so it might be worth it for you to start developing a bit of a plan of your own. What I mean is, when are you thinking youā€™d do your first 100 mile ride? How many of these do you think you would do and when? How far is a coast to coast ride for you and how much elevation gain would you get in that ride? When are you thinking you might do that coast to coast ride (I assume youā€™d be using the 100 mile rides as a lead up to that big ride)? What is your plan for hydration on the 100 mile ride, what is your plan on the coast to coast? What is your plan for fuel (common recommendations are 30-60 grams of carbohydrate per hour of activity).

With some of these things written down and thought about, you can then look through the plan selector tool in SYSTM and see if some of those fit the bill for you, however loosely. You may want to turn some of your commute rides into interval sessions or, as noted above you may just want to use them as slow, base miles, and save the interval sessions for when you are home.

Once you have a better sense of where and when you are looking to reach the 100 mile marker and the coast to coast ride, if the stock plans donā€™t look workable, you may want to take advantage of the wahoo Call with a Coach option.

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Welcome to the forum, I trust you will find all sorts of interesting reading here.

Does one assume you are on a current plan? Or looking to add a plan? What plan did you select?

Wrt your 8 mile commute, it could be used as a warm-up when returning home, or as an active recovery ride should you keep it Z2 max. Keeping your commute will just add TITS (been waiting to use these term and see if it is accepted by the administrators) but you can include it to add either recovery of short endurance depending upon when you ride wrt to your training sessions.

Adding your commutes will definitely assist in this regard. You will likely not need to do any Inspiration rides which would likely feel like a commute ride for you.

Practically I would suggest initiating a plan as if you are not impacted and train when you can according to work demands. Dont forget to work those rest muscles and be ideally fueled for your training sessions to avoid you not completing a workout or feeling uninspired to suffer. Only you will be best to know how to manage (fit, squeeze a training plan) this juggling act.

I trust you will find a way :fist_right:

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Hi All,
Thanks for the reply and info.

Ive been commuting for a couple of years now but not really followed any structured plan
ā€¦just got on the bike a rode. Now i have the kickr and wahoo systm I thought now would be a good time to start building my endurance and possibly push up the speed a bit.
As for fueling ill have to look into it a bit as not really thought too much about it. I will take the advice and write this and hydration strategy down and have a look to see what plans may suit.
Ill be doing a couple of 60 or so mile rides aroind jersey next month and plan the 100 mile rides july/august with the coast to coast september. It will be 140ish miles with 12000 feet of climbing so a long day to be had.

My problem is (maybe in my head)ā€¦i work week on week off so do a lot of commuting cycling when on my ā€˜onā€™ week then no commuting for a week. This is when I possibly need to plan some more structure to my training.

Thanks again, appreciate time and info.

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Happy to help. If youā€™re not doing your 100 milers until July and august youā€™ve got plenty of time. A lot of the ā€œeventā€ plans are 12 weeks long.

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12 week plan looks like a good idea :grin:
As a quick sideā€¦i use the Garmin 1030 for my outdoor riding. Do you happen to know if this will this sync with Wahoo Systm to keep track of my total training load so to speak (i.e. my ourdoor commuting plus indoor ā€˜structuredā€™ training)
Ive connected garmin in the systm app but not sure if the activities load both ways.
All the best
Richard

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I have a 9 mile commute. Last year, I rode three centuries and a 200 miler. A typical week was 18 miles twice a week, a midweek 32 mile ride and 60+ miles on Saturday. 3 days off each week. When I feel fatigue building, I take an extra day off. Most of those rides are at tempo, with some short intervals thrown in.

While a structured plan would be better, this fits into my schedule, and I enjoy it. That said, I do monitor my TSS and adapt accordingly to build weekly TSS gradually as my event approaches.

My commutes as just enough with the off days to maintain my fitness and the two longer rides is where I gain CTL.

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At present itā€™s a one way street so SYSTM activities can be shared to Garmin but outdoor activities are not currently shared to SYSTM. Weā€™ve been told It is on their roadmap but we donā€™t have any sense of the timing. FYI and afaik, it has been one of the most requested features.

I use a combination of Strava and intervals.icu to track my training load (intervals.icu is free and has a bunch of other cool features too).

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It will not. SYSTM canā€™t keep track of training load really at all and canā€™t record non-SYSTM rides. Maybe in some future update, but not now. The most common solution is to use Strava to keep track of all riding (indoors and outdoors), although there are several products that can do that (Training Peaks, intervals.icu, etc). All of these can synch to both SYSTM and any cycling computer you use outside.

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According to cyclinglevel, the average 100-mile time for men is 6 hours, 24 minutes, and 43 seconds. Start slow, gradually increase your pace, and take breaks if needed for recovery.

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I kinda concur with this statement. You just simply canā€™t have too much Z1/Z2 in your training and commuting is a great way to get some more in. That said, I like to push it every once in a while on the commute (i.e. if Iā€™m running a touch late, or I want to attack a hill, or just felling like it).

What I did to balance things out and keep track of my load, I invested in an armband-style HRM and committed to wearing for all commutes. I have both a Polar model and Scosche model. They are both good. Why the arm-band? Sealed, rechargeable and you can slide it on at the last minute no matter what clothes you are wearing! No disrobing fro the chest strap HRM.

Alas, getting outside date into SYSTM is not a thing, so I have linked my Strava to intervals.icu and track my training load there. Or, if you have a paid Strava account, you can use their " Fitness & Freshness" page, but intervals.icu is better IMHO. At the moment, I just use a non-paid account there, but I would like to throw them some money. I wish they would just take tips.

By tracking my training load there, I use the Form section of the Fitness graph to know if I am Fresh, or if I am in the High-risk realm. If Iā€™m in the red or approaching it, I will move hard workouts around until I am out of the red.

Hereā€™s my graph for the last 6 monthsā€¦ try to spot when I broke my collarbone. Ha! :xray::bone::rofl:

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last 6 months

And hereā€™s a section when I was doing a really good job of keeping it in the Optimal or Green zone. Try to spot when I met my new girlfriend. :wink::heart_eyes:

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trying to keep it in the Optimal green zone

EDIT - I hope to be cleared to ride outdoors again after a doctor visit tomorrow, which will hopefully get me back on the commuter and more!

EDIT 2 - I have also been walking a lot since the collarbone break (to get some outdoors time) and I am recording those via Apple Watch so that training load gets into my data as well. If I was riding like I normally do, I would not typically bother to record a walk unless it was a significant hike or similar.

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One of the things I started doing with my Roam2 is to load up a training plan and do my workouts during my commute to work (9 miles one way). The return trip in the evening I would do in zone 2, or low 3.

I find it difficult to commute slowly to work, since I do need to get there on time.

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Pro tip: just ride GAWI. Thank GvA, as I havenā€™t needed to get to work since :pray:

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