4 Cycling Training Misconceptions We Need to Clear Up

I have always enjoyed getting to know people and hearing their cycling stories during group rides, and it’s also interesting to listen to the advice riders give to each other in the pace line or at the coffee stop. Most of the time it’s good advice but there are several cycling training misconceptions I commonly hear repeated at ride after ride. So, when the rider next to you gives you the advice below, just smile, nod your head and take it with a grain of salt.

Riding more is the best/only way to get faster

With the popularity and widespread usage of training tools like TrainingPeaks and Strava, cyclists have grown familiar with the concept of Chronic Training Load (CTL), which is also displayed as “Fitness” in Strava’s “Fitness and Freshness” graphs. TrainingPeaks’ CTL represents a weighted average of daily Training Stress Score over the past 42 days. Athletes have adopted this value as a measure of current fitness, with a higher number meaning greater fitness.

The problem with giving CTL too much importance is that keeping CTL high over a long period of time means keeping daily TSS high, and the higher your CTL the more dramatically it will drop after just a few extra rest or low-TSS rides. This drop is natural, and necessary for improving actual performance, because rest allows time for adaptation and supercompensation, leading to higher power outputs and speed on the bike. CTS Coach Adam Pulford illustrated this from his own power data in this Instagram post. After months of maintaining a high CTL, he had a period of increased travel and less training, and his CTL dropped significantly. Upon returning to training he set his highest 20-minute power of the year.

So, yes, riding more (creating a higher Chronic Training Load) will make you faster, to a point. But riding too much – in an effort to keep the line on a graph from dipping – will make you slower. To incrementally get faster over time, you have to allow for periods when you rest long enough for “fitness” to decay a bit.

A high VO_{2 max} is most important predictor of performance

VO_{2 max} is your maximum aerobic capacity, or the maximum amount of oxygen your body can take in and process per minute (it can also be expressed relative to bodyweight as milliliters of oxygen per kilogram of bodyweight per minute). It represents your maximum potential as an endurance athlete, or the “size of your aerobic engine”. To be a top professional athlete you need to have a high VO_{2 max} just to get in the club, but even for the pros, the biggest engine doesn’t guarantee the highest performance. For amateur and age-group cyclists on the group ride, VO_{2 max} may be even less of factor for differentiating athletes.

For amateur and age-group cyclists, a more important factor for actual performance is lactate threshold power (or Functional Threshold Power) as a percentage of power at VO_{2 max}. Power at lactate threshold is more responsive to training than VO_{2 max}, which is trainable but largely limited by genetics. This means that even though you may have a good-but-not-great VO_{2 max}, or a VO_{2 max} that is gradually declining due to age, you may be able to dramatically improve your sustainable power output at a higher percentage of VO_{2 max.} So, even if you can’t raise your performance ceiling, you can still go faster with the potential you already have.

Lighter is always better

Although there has definitely been a move toward de-emphasizing bodyweight or body shape in cycling culture, some group rides have gotten the message more than others. I still hear a lot of comments and conversations about who has put on weight, who has lost weight, and who has purchased lighter components and wheels. Cycling is a sport that generally rewards lightness, but lighter is not always better and an excessive focus on reducing bodyweight can contribute to the development of eating disorders and a negative body image.

As an athlete you will perform best within a bodyweight range that is specific to you. For some athletes, this means you will be stronger, faster, recover more quickly, be more resilient against injury, and stay healthier with a few more pounds on your body. Other athletes may be able to maintain a much lighter weight while retaining power output and staying healthy. Focusing on training quality and supporting your training and recovery with adequate energy intake is more important than bodyweight. Focus on fitness and performance, and let bodyweight follow.

You shouldn’t eat anything for the first 90 minutes

I overheard this piece of advice several times in the past year and I think it comes from a misunderstanding of sports nutrition guidance meant for rides that are only 60-90 minutes long. During rides lasting 60 to 75 minutes (and perhaps up to 90 minutes) you have enough stored muscle glycogen to complete a high-quality workout. As a result, consuming exogenous carbohydrate may not be necessary during short workouts. However, that should not be confused with the need to consume exogenous carbohydrate within the first hour during rides that last longer than 90 minutes. So, when you’re heading out for a two- to 4-hour group ride, you should start eating within the 30-60 minutes, particularly if it’s a group ride that features intermittent high-intensity efforts.

What if you’re trying to improve your ability to oxidize fat for fuel? Well, for most amateur and age-group athletes, improving aerobic endurance through high-quality workouts will do more for improving fat oxidation than manipulating carbohydrate availability. Training with low carbohydrate availability has its place, for some athletes in some circumstances, but being a fat-adapted endurance athlete may not a high priority and training strategies that manipulate fuel availability are best used once you have already maximized aerobic endurance through fundamental training.

By Chris Carmichael,
Founder and Chief Endurance Officer of CTS

Some terms in this blog post including Training Stress Score (TSS), Chronic Training Load (CTL), and Functional Threshold Power (FTP) are registered trademark terms owned by TrainingPeaks.