Training and intervals on a commute

[Twilkes]

I have a 5 mile each way commute, five days a week, the route and speed chart below gives a pretty good indication of where there is a good clear run and where there are traffic lights, so a mix of long and short sections. I’m looking to take more advantage of it in terms of interval training and improving strength and fitness but I’ve honestly never done anything like that before so looking for guidance on how I could introduce it onto this route.

How long should an interval be, and what kind of effort is involved to make it worthwhile? How many repetitions?

Should it cover both grinding and spinning or is it best to weight towards one of them? My usual cadence is 80-90 so somewhere in the middle, but I feel I could work on the lower end to improve my hill climbing a bit more, I tend to change down a gear as soon as there’s a bit of resistance on the pedals.

https://www.strava.com/activities/2921254056/analysis

 

[fossyant]

I'd use the traffic lights as a good interval - give it beans from the 'Go' light. It used to kill me when I got back into cycle commuting with all the stop/start of 'urban' commuting. Took a while to get used to it. Intervals can be as long or short as you like, but you can also use the terrain, like a short hill. PS usual caveat about being careful where you do an interval with traffic about.

 

[Milkfloat]

I would be wary about trying timed intervals in an urban area, you are far more likely to take silly risks and do damage to yourself. I would be tempted to try it purely on effort and not look at individual segments, save the really busy bits for recovery/col down.

 

[Twilkes]

So literally a period of intense activity, then one of rest activity, repeat, that's interval training?

 

[Stompier]

I have a 5 mile each way commute, five days a week, the route and speed chart below gives a pretty good indication of where there is a good clear run and where there are traffic lights, so a mix of long and short sections. I’m looking to take more advantage of it in terms of interval training and improving strength and fitness but I’ve honestly never done anything like that before so looking for guidance on how I could introduce it onto this route.

How long should an interval be, and what kind of effort is involved to make it worthwhile? How many repetitions?

Should it cover both grinding and spinning or is it best to weight towards one of them? My usual cadence is 80-90 so somewhere in the middle, but I feel I could work on the lower end to improve my hill climbing a bit more, I tend to change down a gear as soon as there’s a bit of resistance on the pedals.

https://www.strava.com/activities/2921254056/analysis

First question is always going to be - what objectives do you have that you want the 'training' to achieve for you?

 

[Twilkes]

I would be wary about trying timed intervals in an urban area, you are far more likely to take silly risks and do damage to yourself. I would be tempted to try it purely on effort and not look at individual segments, save the really busy bits for recovery/col down.

Yeah I'm careful, but I'm very familiar with the route and traffic, a lot of it I'm in the centre of the lane trying to keep up with the car in front anyway, where there is no opportunity to be overtaken due to road width, and half of it is the quiet road next to the expressway so very little traffic around. It's more looking out for junctions that I would need to be careful of, so there are some parts where I wouldn't go all out.

 

[Twilkes]

First question is always going to be - what objectives do you have that you want the 'training' to achieve for you?

Hmm, okay – probably a higher sustainable cruising gear. So if I’m currently pedalling at 50/16 as my standard go-to gearing on the flat with no wind (no idea if that’s actually what it is) then to be able to keep the cadence the same and move to 50/15 or higher and sustain it for longer rides.

 

[Sharky]

Five miles only might be a problem. It should only be taking 15 mins, give or take a couple. I would need 5 mins or so to warm up without any serious effort and than towards the end of the ride, you need to build in a wind down period to recover and not get to work in an exhausted state. This leaves about 5-8 mins in the middle to do some serious training?

Why don't you use the morning session as a recovery ride and get to the office feeling fresh, then in the evening find a slightly longer route to give you an hours training when you have time to warm up and do some constructive intervals.

Whatever you do though will sustain fitness - good luck

 

[Stompier]

Hmm, okay – probably a higher sustainable cruising gear. So if I’m currently pedalling at 50/16 as my standard go-to gearing on the flat with no wind (no idea if that’s actually what it is) then to be able to keep the cadence the same and move to 50/15 or higher and sustain it for longer rides.

Intervals on a five-mile ride probably aren't going to help you achieve that, as the route is simply not long enough - by the time you've warmed up sufficiently to conduct the interval, you'll already be where you want to be. I suppose you could always extend the route, but you'd probably need to double the distance for it to be worthwhile. However, if your aim is to be able to ride a bit faster (ie no racing, TTing aims for next season), then simply put the bike in your desired gear now and just pedal harder and work harder and the improved fitness will eventually emerge.

 

[Twilkes]

put the bike in your desired gear now and just pedal harder and work harder

I was worried someone would say that.

I’ll maybe just kick up a gear between a few of the lights and the long section in the middle, get my legs used to working a bit harder, I tend to be very quick to change down a gear. I can take a longer detour occasionally but usually have to get home for toddler dinner so will maybe try some more structured training over weekends.

 

[davidphilips]

Perhaps rather than intervals do cadence drills, plus you could do some big gear strength effords. Only my view but apart from not being long enough to build endurance you could really become very fast with 10 short training cycles a week.

 

[Twilkes]

Perhaps rather than intervals do cadence drills, plus you could do some big gear strength effords. Only my view but apart from not being long enough to build endurance you could really become very fast with 10 short training cycles a week.

What do you mean by cadence drills?

 

[Stompier]

What do you mean by cadence drills?

Probably means just spinning the pedals faster in a lower gear. It might incur a small increase in CV output, but the cadence work itself is unlikely to make make a significant difference.

 

[davidphilips]

What do you mean by cadence drills?

Just high speed spinning, a mater of using to lower a gear than you would normally use plus strength training on a bike is the opposite, using to high a gear to build strength, thats really base training, then when you combine both you can spin fast and put out a lot of power, you go faster.
Lots on utube and well worth training from A to B rather than just cycling A to B if you want to get faster and fitter.

 

[Sharky]

Just high speed spinning, a mater of using to lower a gear than you would normally use plus strength training on a bike is the opposite, using to high a gear to build strength, thats really base training, then when you combine both you can spin fast and put out a lot of power, you go faster.
Lots on utube and well worth training from A to B rather than just cycling A to B if you want to get faster and fitter.

Riding a lowish single speed, gives you just this. Strength training on the hills and rapid spinning on the descents.