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I thought I’d add to the frequently asked questions about how to get faster. I’ll confine my comments to training for short distance TTs as that’s all I know anything about. You have three chief weapons, 1. Overload, 2. Specificity, 3. Recovery, 4. Aerodynamics. FOUR chief weapons. Amongst your weaponry are: 1. Overload. This means Interval training. By definition the effort is above 10 mile pace. Duration ? I found 3-5 minutes got the best results. Effort should be perhaps fractionally less than you can sustain for the time of the interval. Hard enough that you really, really want to stop by the end. But not so you fall off…or cant do another 5 or 6 of them. If you can’t judge the effort, just do flat out for the last minute or so. If its not painfully hard your not trying hard enough. Rest for about the same time by soft pedalling. Try finding a road circuit with flat, smooth roads (!) with few junctions on the interval sections. Mark out the intervals by road signs or other landmarks. Accurate timing doesn’t matter. The A4 out as far as Woodley isn’t bad for this sort of thing. The Fifield circuit is perhaps a little hilly for sustained effort. Ultimately you’re aiming to “interval” at the speed you want to race at when you’ve “improved”. Quite what the point of 1 or 2 minute intervals are I don’t understand. They are too far removed from what you’re trying to achieve. You’ll get good at half mile TTs, that’s all. I did try this for a while and got very knackered and actually got slower in the TTs ! 2. Specificity. Once you’re up to a decent standard, the smaller improvements come through neuromuscular efficiency. This means honing your pedalling stroke at a very specific power output and speed, i.e. racing pace. This is also position dependent. You can’t do this on your roadbike if you TT on a lo-pro with tri-bars. Its best to do your speed training in the racing position. This means either your TT bike or a bike set up with an identical position. Remember how painful your first TT of the year is after riding your roadbike all winter ? You’re using a completely different set of muscular contractions. You don’t have to think about this aspect too much. Racing and Training in the TT position will see to it. One more aspect to specificity is cadence. You must use a similar gearing in speed training and racing. Training at 120prm and racing at 90rpm doesn’t work. You actual cadence is nearly irrelevant. Anything from 85 – 110 will do. Ride what feels right. If you feel les than 85 feels right its worth getting it up just a touch if only to reduce muscle soreness. This doesn’t seem to bother Nick Bowdler – he uses a 77T ring and seems to go quite well…. 3. Recovery. You get faster while you’re resting – not while you’re on the bike ! have a day off a couple of times a week at least. You don’t have to ride 250miles a week if you’re doing 10s and 25s. In fact you’ll just waste your energies which would be better spent on “quality” work. Riding 4 hours at 18-20mph only makes you better at riding at 18-20mph ! It will do precisely NOTHING for your ability to ride at 25mph. (see specificity). Diet is an important part of recovery. You need a high carb diet, and need to systematically refuel after an interval session. Immediate high carb drink afterwards and more at 2 hours, then at 4 hours. If you’re getting overtired on this programme its possible you’re not getting enough carb. In your general diet. 4. Aero. You can get obsessed with this quite easily and spend a LOT of cash. Compared to pre 1990, ALL the aero kit is worth about 60 seconds over 10miles and perhaps 150s over 25miles. Most of this comes from the position on your Tri-bars. The next most important is your front wheel. The rest is all small-print including the rear disk. Having said that its worth making sure you do have a good position. This is too complicated for me to comment on here…get someone to take a look at you when you’re at the evening 10s… Don’t neglect the advantage light wheels and light tyres can give you. In the pre aero –era, great wheels were a major speed advantage. I found 18mm rims (non-aero) and track tubular tyres were worth easily a minute over 10 miles. HPs just don’t cut it for TTs in my view, and I’ve tried a few I can tell you ! Just possibly Veloflex Records come close, but be prepared to DNF occasionally. For all the guff talked about aero kit, great tyres are an area well worth looking into still. Also – skinsuit a very good idea. These were in use pre-aero so not included really in this discussion. Your programme ? you can get great results by doing two sessions of intervals 6 to 8 reps 4 minutes each, twice a week, perhaps 30-40 miles each ride. A club 10 on the Thursday, and an event at the weekend. If you want to ride other days, take it easy, enjoy the scenery !. If you have the energy, you could do three sessions a week, but I found this a push with two events as well. Start from base fitness in March, and by 6 weeks in you should be reaching your first peak. Then you can take a fortnight’s break from speed work before starting again. You’ll get your second peak about 4 weeks in, and rest again. You probably won’t get any faster than that all year unless you started from a poor base. Repeat your 4 week cycle until you’ve had enough ! Winter base ? – Club run on Sunday, do some hard efforts up the hills and on the front (but don’t be too antisocial…) Get out at least twice more in the week, aim for 150-200miles per week, October – February/March. Plenty of hills ! Have the patience to wait till April to start your speed work. Its not nice doing it in cold winds and on wet roads ! Oh bugger that’s about 10 chief weapons…. I’ll come in again.. No I won’t I’m sure you’re bored. Have fun !