Training while fasted in the morning, leisure riding on evenings and weekends

I’m looking to restart my training programme “again” … living in scotland, weather is changeable to say the least… I don’t have a power meter so don’t intend to do my workouts out doors… but I also don’t want to spend my evenings on the trainer when the weather is great for outdoor riding.
My question is, if I did my workouts first thing in the morning, say 30-60 mins after getting up , and using a couple of gels, ? I do 1hr mon and Friday and 90 mins on a wed… but also try to get some 20 mile rides in evenings and some 3-4 hour rides at weekends? I’m not a competitive cyclist, just looking to improve on every aspect, Weight,power,speed…
would this be to much??

Hi

As a fellow Scot, especially today, in door training is great. The Gels are okay, why not just grab a banana with a cup of coffee and do the ride with a bottle of water. You can pick a TR Low volume plan it will give you 3 indoor rides. I do the same when the weather is good, i like to head outside. You can pick one of the Mid volume plans and substitute the outdoor ride for one of the indoor plans when you need too.

Depends on how you recover. Sounds like a 10h week (ish)? Have you done that sort of volume before and how did you get on?

Personally, I’m on the bike within 10-20min after waking up on Mondays → Fridays and doing TR workouts. No issues with doing the 60-120min rides off of stored muscle glycogen. I believe the literature shows people usually have 400-500g of muscle glycogen storage, so 1600-2000 kcalories. I will sometimes pop a banana as I hop on the bike but I think that mostly effects RPE, but for 60min rides I’m not sure how much is even digested before I’m off the bike. Those rides are a mix of recovery, endurance, sweet spot, threshold, superthreshold and VO2. Though this week I wasn’t feeling great doing VO2 intervals at 5am. :sob:

On weekends I try to be out the door in 45-60min and have a more substantial breakfast that is probably still digesting during the first 1-2hours of the ride.

I don’t do ‘depleted’ rides, on the previous day or after the previous workout I try to have enough food / carbs to top off muscle glycogen. If you are doing 2x days, I would think about tracking calories in / out at the beginning to make sure you are eating enough / not too much. If I wasn’t tracking I would have been way under consuming. And you can also make sure you’re getting in enough carbs throughout the day to refuel prior to the next ride.

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This is my dilemma. I tend to usually only use indoor trainer over the winter… but due to illness / pandemic etc I’m miles behind where I should be… normally summer time consists of maybe a 60ish mile sat ride and a couple of 25-40 weekday rides. But rides are just social rides, not workouts… I suppose what I’m asking, if I do my workouts first thing, and do easy social rides in evenings on unscheduled days… if they are easy rides, I should be ok?

Hard session in the morning, followed by easy ride in the afternoon would probably work. What would be important would be recovery from evening rides (if you have a hard ride the following morning).

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My experiences are similar to others. I have a terrible stomach first thing in the morning, which limits my options. I typically throw down a cup of coffee and a gel upon waking, then am on the trainer or outside within 20 minutes. I usually perform 2 hour workouts (sweet spot, threshold, Vo2 Max) with a couple of gels and drink mix in the morning with no problem (typically taking in around 100 grams during these workouts). If it’s just an endurance ride, I usually only sip on water and BCAA mix.

Hi @Flo55y0 - To your question, “would this be too much?” The best way to find out is to try it and listen to your body. I think you’ll know when it’s too much.

My motivations (no races but looking for overall improved fitness on the bike) and routine have been very similar to what you’re contemplating. This is my first season using TR and I’m mixing a LV TR plan with 1-3 outdoor rides, weather permitting (I live in Maine). Overall, it’s been great. FTP up 18 pts since January, weight down 6lbs, a few PRs on favorite climbs. Where things fall apart is when I go too hard outdoors and then need an additional rest day to recover or dial down, fail or skip my following TR workout.

Not knowing your bike fitness, I can’t say how you’ll really feel. But SSBLV1 was a wake up call for me. Harder than I thought it would be. So while your plan sounds very reasonable (and familiar) to me, I do suggest you ease into it, listen to your body, and have fun.

As for nutrition, I’ll go w some HEED in my bottle for the longer and harder workouts, and occasionally reach for a gel, but generally for anything around an hour I find I have plenty of fuel in the tank.

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I’ve been doing SSB2 HV and am in the middle of week 5 and doing my workouts first thing in the morning after a coffee. The hardest part are the indoor temps. On some days I’m also doing 1-2hr z1 rides with my 9 year old, the extra easy volume definitely doesn’t hurt, not sure if it helps but I like being out with him so whenever I can convince him to go (he’s not a cycling fanatic like me) I’m always happy to roll around

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I have done ssb a few times but never progressed any further, my ftp was 266 but is now at 228… I just don’t want to be training hard and not being able to enjoy my normal riding I suppose… but trainer workouts are only really readable in mornings if I want to ride outdoors in evenings

Regarding schedule and overall load, after more thought I don’t think you’ll get firm answers as they will be specific to your situation and ability to recovery. But some things I thought about while mapping out my plan and schedule:

  • What is the priority of each ride / day? I found it helpful to think about while rides / workouts were high priority and I wanted to be most rested for so I could smash them. This ended up being the Tuesday TR workout the Saturday TR workout (which I usually do on Thursday) and my free ride on Saturday. Lower priority rides are okay to go into fatigued and I know I’m not going to smash them (Wed/Sun). Not every ride can be high priority.
  • How can you arrange your schedule to ensure you are sufficiently recovered for the high-priority rides? This means Mon/Fri are recovery days. During SSBI LV I can do the normal Thursday TR workout (60min) on Wednesday. In late SSBII / SusPB that workout becomes optional on Friday and might become recovery or endurance if I’m not up to it.
  • What is the purpose of each ride? Knowing the purpose of each ride helps with prioritization, fit it in the schedule, and helps me keep things in the right zones. The purpose might be ‘ride and smell the roses in z2’, ‘group ride smash fest’, ‘long tempo climbs’.
  • How can you balance structured training with the the things you love about cycilng? I think scheduling can solve a lot of this by incorporating group or solo rides you like into your plan / schedule, allowing yourself flexibility to reschedule / reorder rides based on how you feel and pushing your schedule out to add more recovery time if you’re feeling cooked.

I would also recommend giving something like Sustained Power Build a shot, even if just for the experience. I don’t race but it has really helped across the board. I was not used to the intensity and while I found it quite uncomfortable I believe I got a lot of out if in terms of extending TTE, tolerating discomfort and a feeling of accomplishment for working through something difficult that is not in my wheelhouse. I might consider adding an extra recovery week (so 2on/1off pattern) to ensure adequate recovery with all the other riding going on.

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