Cycling

[Smiles]

Is anyone on this board into cycling? It's a new thing I'm playing with, and I need to get a real bike. Anyway, just wondering if ya'll have any recommendations about what kind of bike I should get for a road trip.

[LonestarROB]

I would be if there was someone else around that would be interested aswell. It's so boring going by yourself.

[MFFL]

smile - I remember that of the German posters was huge into cycling but I don't remember which one.

[djb]

I wish you would had posted this earlier smile_at_me. I just quit my job a day ago, but one of the therapists there is huge into cycling and has even been riding with Lance Armstrong for a number of years. If he's there Friday (when I go to pick up my last paycheck) I'll be sure to ask him for you.

[Smiles]

I'm an absolute HUGE Lance Armstrong fan!! That is so cool, and if you get to ask him I'd so appreciate it. Have you read his book "It's Not About The Bike"? Lance's experience has given me a lot of hope, and I am less afraid of Dad's cancer because Lance gave me a small idea what to expect and some good questions to ask. I feel really challenged in my own life too. What in my life, is my "Tour de France"? I don't even have nearly the odds to surpass...
Also, I may go back to Texas for a couple/few months to support my parents. They're against it at this point, but now that I know how important it is to have the support and encouragement of people close to you...

[Fidel]

<< I remember that of the German posters was huge into cycling but I don't remember which one >>


That´s probably me MFFL. I did it for a long time (mostly mountainbike), and two years ago I bought myself a race bike. I´m not training that much now, since my TKD training takes most of the time I have for sports.

Smile_at_me,
which kind of bike you should buy depends on which kind of terrain you want to use it on. If you want to go all country and still travel long distances I´d recommend a trecking bike (it´s like a mountainbike but with thinner tires and a thinner frame). If you want to travel on paved streets mostly a race bike is the real deal. I have a pinnarello frame (same brand as team telekom and other teams use during tour de france), with campagnolo (spell?) gear. I´m pretty happy with that bike. If you have any specific questions just ask [img]i/expressions/face-icon-small-smile.gif[/img].

And good luck to you and your father. I wish you and your family all the best.

[Smiles]

Originally, I was more interested in all terrain, but I want to do some multi-day road trips in the fall. Would a trekking bike work well for that? What you wrote leads me to think that a race bike might be the right thing since my primary desire is to train for the road trips. I'm open to that. My thinking and perspective have had to change since the position is so different on the racing bikes.

Q: I understand that it is good to get pedals that let you &quot;clip&quot; your shoes to them. Are there any with a quick release, or will I need to suck it up and just fall over a few times before I figure it out? [img]i/expressions/face-icon-small-smile.gif[/img]

Q: What kind of a cadence (RPMs) should I being shooting for? I've just learned this term.

[Fidel]

Smile_at_me,
I think you should go for a race bike, cause it seems like you want to do some serious workouts.
The clip pedals are pretty easy to adjust. You can change the strenght with which your shoes are hold into place. So you need to find a setting which lets you bring some power to the pedals without your shoes flipping out all the time, but still loose enough that it doesn´t take a gigantic effort to release your foot. Clip pedals will need some time to get accustomed to, but I don´t think you will fall over that often while getting used to them.

I can´t really give you an advise about the cadence you should be going for. That is because the cadence depends on a lot of factors like your size, your strenght, the terrain you are riding on (flat or hills), and most important the purpose of your training. As you seem to be just starting to train I would strongly suggest you to do nothing else than foundation training the first 2-3 months.

It will improve your cardiovascular system, mainly the capillarity (number of cappilaires) in your muscles. It will also reflate your metabolism, most important your fat metabolism (you can only go for 1-2 hours on carbohydrates, anything beyond that and your body will start to burn fat). When he starts burning fat your heart rate will increase and you won´t have an easy going at first. So you need to train your fat metabolism. Actually there are good and bad sorts of fat. A normal person mostly has &quot;bad Fat&quot; (I don´t know the exact term for that), which is not easy to burn. As you continue with your training your body will reduce bad fat and build more and more good fat resources wich can be burnt much easier during long trips of 4-5 hours.

So what you really need to do is buy a heart rate monitor (a basic one should fit your needs). Then you must find out what is your max heart rate (there are several tests to find out, a good one is to run 3000 meters with average speed and then finishing with 600 meters at highest speed. Look what your heart rate is after finish, it should be the Max).
What you need to do then is general aerobic endurance training. It means training with a heart rate that allows your body to burn carbohydrates or fat with oxcygen. When he burns them without oxcygen that´s called anaerobic training and you should save that one for later (hypertrophy or power phase).

The endurance training you should start with basicly is about riding slow speed over a long time (at least three hours per session). Slow speed is 60% of your max heart. If you have a max heart rate of 200bpm, you should start your training with not going higher than 120bpm. Your speed may seem very slow at that heart rate at first, but it is very important not to overpower during endurance training. Last but not least: you should go for at least 3 sessions per week if you really want to get any good results.
But also: give your body some rest! Working out like a pro when you are just beginning won´t do any good either.

Now just do it! Get yourself a bike and start training. It´s really fun and you will get some good results pretty soon if you take it serious.
I hope all of that helps you a little bit. Have fun [img]i/expressions/face-icon-small-smile.gif[/img].
And don´t hesitate to ask any more questions. I will be away from the board for a few days, but I will check back for this thread asap. As you can see above I just love talking about cycling [img]i/expressions/face-icon-small-smile.gif[/img].