Hey

i'm planning my training plan for the next season with the help of Joe Friel's book. I set up my hours, A B and C races. Put the peak at the right place. Now he tells me I need to get big hours on the bike in February! (and less crosstraining) Problem is, where I am you can't bike outside in Feb.

How do you guys who live in northern climates deal with the periodization and big hours on the bike?

MORE trainer??? Less hours in the winter, and much more in the summer? Shorter base or build periods?

I cannot move my peak, that is for sure.

Thanks

Personally I ignore the concept of a base. Winter I program a lot of very intense efforts with a lot of recovery. When it's warm enough then introduce longer kms.

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"Physiology is all just propaganda and lies... all waiting to be disproven by the next study."
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XC skiing if possible

People here are quite excessive about ski mountaineering / "rando racing". Think matches even better than (skating) XC.

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Lots of rollers for this northerner with intervals on the trainer to keep the intensity up. If you can, get into skate skiing. You can easily, and I do mean easily, hit your threshold heart rate in a hurry on skate skis. Very tough stuff especially for someone like me that doesn't ski as a focus but just to get away from indoor trainer intervals. You really need the right place and/or access though.

I have access to a ski trail here in the city that could work, but I never did learn how to do it. I am mostly relying on swimming for crosstraining here. Might try to get into it... How hard is it to learn? (I really am no skier, more of a snowboarder!)

Being in Canada, the winter is long. Probably be too much intensity I think.

If you don't have to cross train then don't. Cross training is detraining. If you WANT to ski, skate, lift, surf, glide etc then fill your boots, but to set yourself up for the season then riding should be number 1.

_________________
"Physiology is all just propaganda and lies... all waiting to be disproven by the next study."
"I'm not a real doctor; But I am a real worm; I am an actual worm." - TMBG

+1 on ski skating (and speed skating).

How northern?

Are we talking just cold, wet and generaly miserable through the winter north (England north of the Pennines), or roads impassable due to snow northern?

If it's the former with just a few weeks of snow then get a singlespeed mountainbike with disk brakes, all the benifits of mountainbiking (bike handling, intervals, etc) but elevated another level, all hills become lung bursting intervals as you try to stay on top of the gear, flats become an exercise in pedaling smoothly, and as you can't shift down a gear all corners have to be taken with momentum so you soon learn to corner quickly even in crappy conditions. Buy a cheep bike (on-one inbred 29er?), buy a helmet light (magicshine mj-872?) join a group and get out. Other essentials are roubaix bib-longs, warm jerseys, northwave artic gtx boots. Can you tell I really try and avoid the turbo at all costs?

If it's snowing then get a singlespeed fat-bike, all the advantages outlined above, but they also float over snow and tyres are expensive!

I put on clothing and ride outdoors on studded tires.

And I go cross country skiing and speedskating.

And if the weather is just plain horrible.. Hm.. I try to harden up. And then fly south

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This is going to be my 3rd winter in a northern climate and as mentioned before its possible to ride. I ride up to anything down to -10C. Warm clothes and studded tires on a cross bike and your off Most important thing is to keep your head, hands and feet warm. You dont need an amazing-super-dooper 600£ ASSOS jacket (even though I have one), just a lot of the layers.

Im not sure how it is over in Canada but after a big snow storm here the roads a cleared pretty much in the next few hours. Only a blizzard will make the roads un-rideable. Anything bellow that and its ok. Having good lighting is important too of course but more so to be seen then to see.

Only problem with snow and ice is that its harder to do the harder intervals due to the lower friction (unless you have amazing bike skills which I dont). So what I do is long miles outside, harder ones inside on the trainer.

PS: I dont XC ski but a lot of my norwegian friends swear by it and it seems to work as come February they kick my ass big time on the bike. For them Its more like their summer cycling season is to prepare for the winter skiiing and not vice versa

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I shovel snow and

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XC skiing realy looks like its the bomb. More and more people tell me its the case. Riding outside in the the winter is possible, but it means quite a lot of sacrifice and prep.

Thanks for the answers.

Do all these measures allow you to do the hours prescribed by a classical periodization plan? Friel talks about less crosstraining in base 3 also...

Another solution to the hours would be to plan based on less hours for the winter and ramp it up as the weather gets good.

Or move to Australia!

Another solution would be to stop reading Friel.

_________________
"Physiology is all just propaganda and lies... all waiting to be disproven by the next study."
"I'm not a real doctor; But I am a real worm; I am an actual worm." - TMBG

Rollers/trainer and SST/threshold workouts.

I used to live in the city that has the worst weather in the entire US. We didn't see sun for 4 months and they would just give up on clearing the roads out. I was on the trainer 6-7 days a week with 3 threshold sessions a week and the rest was tempo. Almost zero L2. I got 2 weeks on the road before my first races and did just fine against guys that had been training on the road since November.

I'd say it can often depend on your limiter and will power. I've done a 4 hour trainer rider before, but not often. Aerobic endurance is not my limiter and never has been so my focus is always sub threshold/threshold and I have a pretty good FTP at that.

I don't give a shit about what people say about the specificity of cross training. I don't think it makes people faster, but I'd take hours of XC skiing over some half assed sufferfest trainer sessions. There are still a lot of cardiovascular adaptations and benefits that I think are more positive then doing a very low volume of cycling just to be on the bike.