By Jim Rutberg, CTS Pro Coach, co-author of “The Time-Crunched Cyclist” December presents many training and nutrition challenges for athletes, but with some planning you can hit January strong, fit, and ready to ramp up your performance. You don’t have to live like a monk for the six weeks between Thanksgiving and New Year’s. We …
By Adam Ferdinandson, CTS Expert Coach Reviewed by Stephanie Howe, PhD “But how do you get enough protein?” This is something all plant-based folks have heard from coworkers, relatives, and others who feel the need to add their two-cents about dietary choices. As annoying as it may seem, the concern is valid. Consuming adequate protein …
As athletes start new training programs, many focus on losing weight as well as achieving their best fitness. Over 20-plus years of coaching, I’ve found some common things that trip people up. Below, I’ll share 5 common mistakes I see athletes make when pursuing weight loss goals. Before I dive into those topics, a disclaimer. …
By Jim Rutberg, CTS Pro Coach, co-author of “The Time-Crunched Cyclist”, “Training Essentials for Ultrarunning”, and “Ride Inside“ What is a sports drink? A sports drink is essentially water with stuff dissolved in it. Some drinks have lots of different kinds of stuff dissolved in them, some of which just waste space. There is only so …
People have strong feelings about carbohydrate, despite the fact it is neither good nor bad. The positive and negative effects of carbohydrate on health, performance, and recovery come from when, why, and how much people consume. For endurance athletes, carbs are an essential fuel for performance and recovery. To understand this critical component of sports …
Ergogenic aids, or performance-enhancing substances, include any substances that enhance performance or recovery. The term encompasses legal substances like caffeine and prohibited substances like anabolic steroids. Interestingly, the research that determined just how ‘sports enhancing’ they could be, was done in controlled laboratory settings rather than real-world scenarios. While controlled settings leave less room for …
Indoor cycling is great for packing a lot of effective training into a short period of time. You don’t need to get dressed in multiple layers or navigate to safe roads for interval training. You can just get on, warm up, and open the throttle. But effective interval training requires fuel, and there are special …
Caffeine is one of the world’s most widely used stimulants, with the average caffeine consumption in the United States around two cups of coffee (200mg) per day. Most of us are familiar with our afternoon coffee’s ability to help us through the workday and how strongly ingrained coffee is in cycling culture, but does caffeine …
By Chris Carmichael, CEO/Head Coach of CTS The Pikes Peak APEX presented by RockShox covers just over 125 miles over 4 stages, features more than 14,000 feet of climbing, and showcases four iconic Colorado Springs-area trail systems. Mountain bike stage races and multi-day adventures present unique nutrition and hydration challenges, so whether you are …
By Chris Carmichael, Founder and Head Coach of CTS Races and events are back on the calendar and the weather is getting warmer, so weight loss is a trending topic in coaching conversations across my entire staff of 50+ endurance coaches. No two conversations with athletes about healthy weight loss are exactly the same. There …