do any of yall do alot of road biking for training ?

[slick trick]

got a new bike was wondering how much or how far iam going to have to ride to see any kind of benefit in lungs and legs ? I have some small hills around here, plan on hitting them in real low gears so should see heart rate and leg burn factor in on them.

 

[go4thegusto]

Yep, road, mountain, and tandem with my wife. great fitness activity without the joint harm. Love It!

 

[OHtard]

I bike a bunch as well. Built up a new road bike earlier this year.
The benefit will depend on how hard you ride. do a search on youtube for GCN tons of training, and general cycling info.

 

[muddydogs]

I find I get more benefit out of a mile biking then I do in 5 miles of hiking. I can hike all day with little leg burn or hard breathing but can get all wobbly legged and sucking air in a mile on my mountain bike. A little incline and a stiff gear really gives the legs a workout.

 

[slick trick]

10-4 on the leg burn went out on the new ALLEZ made it 1.33mile and blew out a back tire had to call the wife. She just laughed because of what I go through just to go chase Elk....

 

[jjjjeremy]

Going from zero miles/week to any miles a week is going to have you wheezing to start. The problem is that once you get past the initial break in, your gains drop significantly because your body gets really efficient. It quickly becomes an endurance game rather than straight aerobic exercise, and you have to be able to set aside large chunks of time to get the same workout.

The way I counteract that is riding a fixed gear road bike. You can't gear down so you have to power up hills as fast as possible to maintain momentum, and you have to spin going downhill because you can't coast.


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[Hoythews71]

Im deployed on a small Navy DDG, and running on a treadmill scares the hell out of me when the ship is rocking, so I stationary bike 30 minutes 3-5 times a week. The goal is 10 miles in 30 minutes for endurance, then for cardio I do HIIT sprints for 20 minutes with 5 minute warm up and 5 minute cool down. Also lift 4-6x a week, and that is a lot of high rep work.

 

[Poltax]

You can get some pretty good work outs with a road bike. I have been riding since the late 80's. Raced for about 15 years also. You can do some pretty intense short training rides if you do not have a lot of time. Do hill repeats. Start off in lower gears and then work you way up thru the gears as you feel stronger Some standing Hill sprints are killer are well. Make sure you let your heart rate return to normal between your hill repeats or sprints. Be careful at first and do not over do it. You can burn out if you over do it.

Find a hill that will take you 10 minutes to climb. Then start in a gear you think you can climb the hill. Get your heart rate up to about 80% max. Then repeat 2-5 times. Let that be your base then start working up from there. Larger gears & more repeats, longer sprints, longer hills. Stay seated for the first few repeats. That will build leg strength and will work on keeping your legs spining. Once you feel comfortable then do some standing/ sitting repeats. Then some standing repeats. Mix it up so you do not get bored and so your body does not get used to the same type of work out.

You can also do flat ground sprints in big chain ring gears. Start out easy then shift to your big chain ring and go as hard as you can for 30 seconds. Rest for 1 -2 minutes then go again. Do these 3- 5 times depending on how your feelilng. This will also build your leg strength and cardio.

Time frame you can do these type of work outs in an hour. Make sure your warm up for about 10 minutes of easy spining. Then cool down after with easy spining of about 10 min. If you do them right you will feel the burn and be sucking wind pretty good.

Do not do 2 hard days together. Do a hard day, then easy rest spining day or light hike day. Then a hard day. At first you may even need 2 rest days. Just depends on how your body reacts and what type of shape your in.

You can also find canyon climbs in which you have a climb that will take you 1-2 hours to do. Around my area we have several with grades from 4-12% These will build your endurance and cosistancy. Try a long climb once a week with 1 or 2 hill repeat days.

 

[lang]

Love it, did an Ironman journey that took a couple years to build up to and biking is my favorite. Running is therapy for me (I lost a son 7 years ago and need lots of therapy), but biking is my fun workout. Swimming is just total exhaustion quick thing when I don't have time for long other stuff. We have a great local bike club that pushes me more than any of the tri groups.

 

[Brendan]

Only way I can get a reasonable cardio workout on my road bike is doing hills. Otherwise it turns into a leg power/endurance workout (which is good too, arguably better than cardio for hunting...).

No hills around me that take more than a couple minutes unless I drive a couple hours, so I rely on intervals or pushing myself hard on the flats.

Keep in mind - it doesn't do anything for your feet and lower legs, so you have to find a way to get miles on your feet leading up to the season. That's always my limiting factor.

 

[elkguide]

I'm an over the top bicycle rider. Usually about 4500 miles a summer and summers tend to be pretty short here in Vermont. After you've ridden a while, you really have to push yourself to get much more than a slight cardio if you ride a lot. We have some pretty good hills here, including the steepest, paved mile in the US, @ 26%, and I have finally had to admit that it takes a much younger man than me to climb that! I try to ride 5 or 6 days a week and then fit in 2-3 miles of walking/running/hiking every third or fourth day. I really don't like walking/running but know that if I don't do some, even with all of the cycling that I do, I'll really be in a heap of trouble once I start up those nasty, western hills. In the winter I trade off between a bicycle on a trainer and an elliptical.

 

[lang]

elkguide-screw going up 26%, get a ride to the top and go down that thing!

 

[Desk Jockey]

I switched to biking to save wear and tear on knees.

A couple of thoughts to add to what’s been posted

1 - switch up the intensity and speeds. Intervals are good and get out of the saddle some. It works the same muscles as hiking up hill.

2 - long, medium intensity rides like 30 miles at 14-15 mph is going to be a low impact way to simulate 4-5 miles of moderate hiking. Use a heart rate monitor to keep in a target zone and cruise. Apart from walking a treadmill for a couple of hours it is the best way for me to get long duration cardio sessions.

I would say that the next day I don’t have any painful soreness and can ride back to back days if I like. If I run for 4-5 miles my legs want a day to recover.

 

[ndbuck09]

Try to get into some criteriums and you'll get a great workout in a 45 minute to an hour time frame. Crits go from the start whistle to 26-27mph instantly. Then you have all the corners that you have to sprint out of to stay on pace...check out the accordion effect. When you have this much speed and explosive riding, you'll definitely improve your cardio and your leg strength.

 

[whereisfredbeckey]

A number of years ago I did a 2400 mile ride through the Rockies. I lost a lot of weight and got into fairly good shape. Then I immediately went on a trek to Machu Picchu. I'm sure the riding helped some but I was trashed on the hike (we did the longer route via Choqequirao). So, while I was in great biking shape it didn't really transfer to lots of vertical gain hiking. If cycling is your most accessible exercise then go with it. But, don't be surprised when you wonder if all the time in the saddle has been the most effective use of your training time. Then again, if you plan to hunt from the bike (e.g. elk hunting logging roads in WA and OR) then it might be just the ticket.

 

[Coach Chris]

got a new bike was wondering how much or how far iam going to have to ride to see any kind of benefit in lungs and legs ? I have some small hills around here, plan on hitting them in real low gears so should see heart rate and leg burn factor in on them.

The SAID Principle dictates that the body Specifically Adapts to Demands Imposed upon it
The body does not generally adapt to stress. Your lungs are just bags and your "legs" (actually your CNS) are adapting to cycling.

The SAID Principle — Training Optimally for Sport

We as strength coaches have a way of screwing training up even with this ancient, written-in-stone principle.

www.elitefts.com

No body is special.

 

[Dirty-D]

I used to cycle alot... too many people getting run over these days, and the local DA likes to let the drunk ass murder drivers off...

Anyway read "the time crunched cyclist" by Chris Carmichael, it's old but still a great book for training for maximum FTP (Functional Threshold Power) and endurance without putting on 3-400 miles per week.

I take a little bit of exception to the above post:

If you can raise your FTP on a bike, you are going to get up a mountain faster than if you did nothing. Period, your body will be more efficient at converting Oxygen to energy and you will be able to hike longer, and at a higher intensity.

Now if you can make the same FTP gains doing a stair climber with a pack... you will get up the mountain faster than you would if you just trained on a bike. Thats the SAID principle.

If you make the same FTP gains hiking mountains with your pack. you will do the better than either of the previous examples.

That being said, the bike is a great way to learn how to feel your FTP, you can get all the gizmos in the world, heart rate monitors, power meters, blah blah blah, but learning how to feel your body and breathing and knowing "I can hold this exertion level for 20 minutes before I blow up" or "I'm at a pace that I can hold for multiple hours if I eat and hydrate properly" and also learning to eat and hydrate properly while in the middle of exertion, as well as what foods/ bars/ gels you can digest cleanly and which ones screw you up... thats also a great benefit of long road rides. the ability to experiment and compare how you did on a 20mile (or whatever distance you can do) ride today vs. a week ago or a month ago.

 

[sodaksooner]

Elkguide. I got suckered into doing mount Washington in August with a buddy. Then doing a 50 mile mountain bike race two weeks later, then into the elk woods two weeks after that. Also doing a century and a metric century next weekend on consecutive days. I am going to be tired of the bike by the time the summer is over.

I have a hill locally that is about a 5% grade and a mile long. Takes 4.5 to 5 min to climb. All I have but did 7 repeats last night bit ran out of daylight. I usually do a lot of weighted pack hiking hill repeats but doing it a bit differently this summer with all the bike events I am doing. Will try and squeeze those in and still have to remember to shoot my bow some...lol.

Currently doing about 100 miles per week. but I can only squeeze about 3 workouts in with my schedule.

 

[Catahoula]

Mountain bike mostly, but I do get on my road bike occasionally. I think the road bike is certainly more consistent but I just like off road riding better.

 

[sgnading]

I've always done some form of weight training. Right now I've been doing crossfit for about 2 years and love that but also wanted to up my cardio with a road bike. I've been liking the results just biking in the mornings and doing crossfit in the evenings. Biking doesn't stress my joints as much and still works the legs/lungs. I'd say it's an excellent option but I wouldn't just bike in preparation for a hunt.