3: Incorporate Strength Training
Plenty of cyclists have chosen to avoid strength training for the fear of getting too bulky.
However, it’s important to note that those are professional bodybuilders who have been training and eating a fixed mass diet for years. If you are only performing 2-3 strength training sessions per week, it will help you to transform into a fitter athlete.
Focus your training on your leg muscles by doing squats and lunges while sticking to free weights. As the squats is a compound movement, it would activate multiple leg muscles such as the quadriceps, hamstrings, calves, and glutes, all of which would help in cycling.
Here are some of our recommended exercises to perform in the gym:
- Barbell Squats (front squat and back squat)
- Walking Lunges
- Hamstring curl
- Calves Raise
- Barbell Bicep Curls
- Close-Grip Bench Press
- Shoulder Press
- Plank
Perform light stretching after every strength training sessions to improve your flexibility and avoid muscle stiffness. Hold each stretch for 20 seconds.
Comments
Mary Ann said:
I’m getting back into riding and although I don’t intend to do long distance riding and so far find myself doing rides of a mile, 2-3 miles, taking a few different routes to increase my time on the bike, I appreciate the instructions of base training and interval training (with strength training, too) to help me gain power and ability for the rides I want to do, such as a 14-15 mile round trip but uphill one way and a very steep uphill for the last 2 miles or so of my destination. It would be amazing to feel capable the whole way through that ride and maybe creating a training program that incorporates your suggestions will work. But if I only intend the length of ride I’m saying here as my first goal, how long do you feel I should be riding and how often per week to get ready to do such a ride in 2 weeks’ time?