How to Train Like A Pro Cyclist
When a lot of amateur cyclists start to take their training more seriously, the first place they look to is the professional ranks. What training do professional cyclists do day-in day-out to get faster? Now more than ever, itâs easier to get a peek behind the curtain due to social media and platforms like Strava, where you can literally follow every training ride that gets logged.
While there are some huge benefits to this, there are also things that can be forgotten. Most pro cyclists have been riding for a very long time and training at a high level for many years. Just because a rider gets their Cat 1, it doesnât mean they are ready for consecutive 20-hour weeks, especially if they have a full-time job (it literally may not even be possible to get those hours in).
Letâs take a look at what it takes to train like a pro cyclist, and then see if this could be applicable to your cycling training plan.
See Also: Pro Cyclist Power Output: Train Like a Tour de France Rider and Get Faster
How to Train Like A Pro Cyclist
Simply put, if you want to train like a pro cyclist, your life must revolve around cycling 24/7. For professional cyclists, it is their obligation to treat their bodies like fine-tuned machines. Whether itâs training, nutrition, or recovery, every little detail matter. Thatâs what we will cover here.
Training Frequency and Cycling Recovery
Make Cycling Training Sessions Hard
Strength Training For Cyclists
Get In The Gym
Personalized Training
Keep yourself accountable
Taking A Break
Micro and Macro
Big Volume - Pro Cyclist Training Hours
The Magical 20 Hour Weeks
Be In It For The Long Haul
Watts Are Made In The Kitchen
Sleep
Consistent Training
Pro Cycling Training Plan?
Training Frequency and Cycling Recovery
Letâs start here with two main points:
The amount of training that a professional cyclist undertakes in their training plan.
The amount of cycling recovery that they focus on.
Just how do pro cyclists get so fast? Lots of time on the bike, proper cycling nutrition and prioritizing recovery. The â20-hour weekâ is this mystical number that has always been thrown around when looking at professional cyclistsâ training hours. Some weeks they train less, sometimes more, but 20 hours of training time is a good benchmark for a productive week by many athleteâs standards.
That being said, if you are currently training 12 hours a week, you shouldnât jump to 20. It takes many years of serious cycling training to get your body to be able to absorb the training stimulus. Even an elite cyclist training program may not have consistent 20-hour weeks, but more like 13-15 hour weeks.
Said differently, youâll reap the most benefit from the correct dose of training for your body based on your training age; so more training is not always better.
If you are time-crunched and only training 8 hours per week, consider increasing your weekly hours by just 1 hour, to 9. That is a 12.5% increase in training time. That is huge!
If you are trying to squeeze in the big hours but then have an extremely busy life schedule, you are probably not recovering enough, and down the road, this can lead to burnout or even worse, injury.
Cyclists want to ensure that you are making time for core workouts, stretching, massage, and all of the small things that keep the body running like a well-oiled machine. It would be much wiser to reduce the 20-hour week to 18 hours if this allows for you to have better self-care after the rides.
If youâre not sure how to recover after big rides, check out our post on how the pros do it!
Keep in mind that most athletes are not overtrained, they are under-recovered.
Make Cycling Training Sessions Hard
What is a good cycling training plan? A big misstep in training is not training hard enough. Hard enough does not mean doing an all-out sprint for the town line every Tuesday and Friday at the local group ride.
Hard training often includes VO2Max intervals or specific sets to help increase your FTP.
You need to come into your training sessions fresh, so you can elicit enough of a training stimulus to improve your cycling. That doesnât mean you want to rest a lot beforehand, but it does mean that you donât want to be hammering 4x a week.
Thatâs right: 2 group rides during the week and 2 races or hard rides on the weekend are too much if you want to improve. Your body might handle that stress, but you wonât get much faster after a while.
If you are new to training, it will make you faster in the short run. But eventually, youâll plateau or burn out from all of the intensity. Cycling is an aerobic sport, so you want to increase your aerobic threshold as much as possible. That means only 2 hard workouts per week are really needed.
The easy recovery days need to be incredibly easy, where you would get passed by someone on a hybrid bicycle. The endurance days need to be kept to endurance, and maybe some tempo. Then, the hard days can truly be hard enough!
Train hard enough to elicit a stimulus that will create a response, and ride easy enough that you are recovering.
See Also: Cycling Power Zones Explained
Strength Training for Cyclists
It has become more and more common to see athletes posting on social media about their strength training. Some are lifting all year round, and most are lifting in their non-competition phase.
If youâre not exactly sure why you should lift heavy weights or how it can improve your cycling, check out this post.
The biggest benefits that Iâve personally seen are quite varied. First off, the hormonal benefit from lifting is huge. You will produce more growth hormone and become a stronger overall athlete, without becoming big and bulky.
Youâll also produce more power from heavy strength training. While everyone equates lifting with sprinting, Iâve noticed that it has helped me in VO2Max intervals and long FTP intervals. You almost seem to have another gear or overdrive. I love that!
Lastly, itâs nice to do something besides ride a bike when the weather gets cold outside. When itâs December and itâs 30 degrees outside, and you just canât muster up getting all the layers on, skip the ride, go to the gym, and in 60-120 minutes you can have a killer workout.
You still need to ride during the winter, but lifting is a great alternative, and I lift 2-3x a week during this time.
I then taper off to 2x a week, and then 1x a week. As the cycling volume increases, I highly recommend you reduce the lifting volume. I didnât do this, and ended up overdoing it.
What exercises do professional cyclists do? The primary emphasis for a pro cyclistsâ gym training in lower body and core strength. Think squats, deadlifts, and core exercises. To be good at cycling, you need a strong core foundation to keep your pelvis stable and allow you to push all the power into the bike through your legs.
Professional cyclists will also incorporate some auxiliary upper body lifts as well. This can improve bike handling, grip strength, posture, and reduce risk of injury in the event of a crash.
Personalize Your Training Calendar
Templates stink.
Not trying to poo poo on other services that offer them, but a template knows nothing about you: your strengths, weaknesses, goals, event specific details, competition, etc.
You are much better off sitting down and thinking about your training for just 30 minutes than follow a template of random workouts such as an FTP builder or Sweet Spot Plan.
How do you train like a pro cyclist? You need to go beyond the basics of just knowing your training zones, so figure out what youâre good at, what youâre bad at, and what workouts you should do in order to get better at these. Start planning how you want your season to look!
We put together the Five Blocks To Racing, not as a template, but a framework that sparks questions that you can ask yourself and guide you in your planning. Planning backwards from an event date is a great way to ensure you leave enough time to prepare, and can get as aerobically fit as possible, before your big day.
If you really want to get personalized, pick another friend that is training and look over each otherâs calendar. Hold each other accountable. Donât let each other fall into the group ride routine. Plug: Get a cycling coach for more personalization. Not only will a coach keep you accountable like your friend, but they should know when to do which workouts, based on your experience, rider type and goals ahead.
Itâs also a huge benefit to have someone there to tell us what not to do...when we are feeling good, we pour on more and more, until we are fizzled and donât feel great. The biggest thing that my coach does for me is pull me back a bit when I get close to an event and want to train too much.
Take A Break
Starting my racing life up in the Northeast, the season used to be March through September, or Labor Day. It was almost unheard of for anyone to try and throw a race beyond Green Mountain Stage Race.
That left 5 months to get ready for the next season. Late September and October were great months to âjust rideâ. In reality though, thatâs building the aerobic foundation. November, December and January were where Iâd slowly add in tempo through threshold work, so that I could have a solid build block in February before hitting the training races in March.
Now, with things like Zwift, some athletes are trying to race year round, which I think is a big mistake.
Youâre going to hear Dr. San Milan talk about this in a previous Velonews podcast, which I highlighted some really important points in this overview blog.
Itâs a great idea to take a break, not only on the micro scale of a rest week every month, but on the macro: hop off the bike and go on a vacation for a week with no riding. Now, this assumes that you are a consistent athlete. If not, you can still take vacation of course, but itâs not needed.
I personally take about 1-3 weeks completely off the bike. Why? I really love traveling, and I donât always want to bring a bike! Itâs best not to do this before a big race, so schedule this wisely.
Professional cyclists take breaks from the bike, whether itâs due to weather, or just to keep their mind fresh and hungry for training.
How Much Do Pro Cyclists Train?
How many hours does a pro cyclist train? Professionals train a lot, with most rides being in the 3-6 hour range, and a quick recovery ride or two. We talked briefly above about the pro cyclist training hours at 20 hours per week, but some train even more than that. With social media giving us a closer look into their training, you can see upwards of 30-hour weeks at time, especially if you add in the gym work.
The layout of training varies from rider to rider when we look at how much pro cyclists train. Depending on when their races fall, their role within the team, and their season goals, you wonât see one training calendar exactly match another.
At the end of the day, their training is a huge part of their lifestyle, as racing is their job. Training might not all be on the bike, as many athletes talk about the hours they put into stretching, massage, core work, and other off the bike responsibilities that take up much of their time.
What training do professional cyclists do? Logging big miles at endurance pace is a very popular method that takes up a lot of pro cyclistâs training time. They are on a long distance cycling training plan! This then allows them to have a few, very key sessions, at high intensity.
Youâll hear many proâs talk about not needing too many of these high intensity sessions, especially when there is racing going on. In our podcast series, James Piccoli and Serge Pauwels gave some great explanations about how they approached these sessions. The entire series can be found here.
See Also: How to Train For a Cycling Stage Race
How Many Rest Days Do Pro Cyclists Take?
If we take a look at Strava, almost every pro is taking 2-3 rest days per week. The typical scheme during a normal training week is 2 or 3 consecutive days of training followed by one rest day (then repeat).
If itâs one thing the pros are good at, itâs knowing when to hold back. Their easy recovery rides are EASY. You would likely have no trouble keeping up with them. If you want to train like a pro, you also need to recover between hard sessions like a pro and that means either a day off or very, very easy pedaling <50% of FTP.
Itâs A Marathon, Not A Sprint
If you want to train like a professional cyclist, you need to have the mindset that you are in this for the long haul. And sadly, no: three years is not the long haul in endurance sports.
When do pro cyclists start training? Many of them have a lifetime of endurance sports in the background. So if you are young, start pedaling, or running, or rowing! I wish I had more of an endurance background, but hey, better to find it one day rather than never find it at all!
Even though Iâm not a pro cyclist, I want to train to become my very best, until there is no way to get faster!!
You can do the same thing. Train with purpose, and play the long game!!
Most new cyclists that start training get all of the ânewbie gainsâ very quickly, within a season or two. These are the gains that you get from training consistently, and with some structure.
Once you dial in what you are good at and not so good at, you will lay out a game plan. It is good to improve on those strengths, because you will have motivation for them. If you are good at a particular side of cycling, it will be fun to try to get even stronger.
That said, it is just as important to reduce any weaknesses, and these will not be as fun to work on, because they are the ones you already perform poorly at.
My personal example stems from the fact that when I first started, I developed a relatively high FTP for an amateur cyclist around 380W. I am a bigger rider at 82kg, so the w/kg arenât that impressive, but living in the USA, with more rolling courses and power climbs, I could perform well.
That being said, I hated going hard. VO2Max training was the worst. For one, I wasnât used to pushing myself that hard, having no endurance sports background. Second, I naturally wasnât good at putting out watts above 450W.
I leaned into the FTP work, and soon saw it bloom towards 420W. This won even more races. However, when I raced Conti Proâs in some races, the surges destroyed me.
I dedicated a lot of time to working on going hard. It sounds dumb, but I played the long game and thought: I need to improve my VO2Max, and then Iâll work on 30-90s power.
I can honestly say, itâs probably been a 3-4 year process of working that alone. Iâm now comfortable hitting 550W for a couple of minutes, just under 500W for 5 minute repeats, and can recover from very intense 30-60s surges much better than before. This isnât about boasting about watt numbers, but to show you that it might take a few seasons to truly reap the big gains!
Had I just been in this for 3 or even 5 years, I never would have seen myself grow so much.
Cycling Nutrition
Part of training like a pro is following a nutrition plan for cyclists! You want to eat clean foods and limit junk food. Just because you went out for a four hour ride, it doesnât mean that you can always eat a whole pizza and 2 liters of coke.
Pro cyclists train their body, and recover with proper nutrition. Many will simply talk about eating clean and whole foods, taking some supplements to round out the diet, and keeping the sweets and alcohol in moderation.
Training like a professional cyclist means doing the little things on and off the bike, and in the kitchen! The pro cyclist diet is one that we can all follow with a little bit of discipline and a desire to get better.
Sleep For Cycling Recovery
Recovery, as discussed above, is a big part of this equation! Sleep is the best recovery tool. There is nothing better, and sleep will help athletes come back stronger after hard workout sessions even stronger than before.
Human growth hormone gets released during sleep, and your body recovers with solid REM sleep. You will ride harder, and be a stronger athlete, with 8-10 hours of sleep.
Iâve encouraged the 5-6 hour per night sleepers to try to increase that to 7-8 hours, and theyâll oftentimes mention how much their rate of perceived exertion on cycling intervals decreases when their sleep increases.
Consistency In Your Cycling Training Plan
The number one tip that almost every athlete told us in their podcast interview was to stay consistent.
Most of us canât train 20 hours a week, and training that much right out of the gate would be more detrimental than helpful.
But what we can do is slowly increase our volume and stay consistent. If you are training about 8 hours a week, see how many weeks in a row youâve done that.
Have you trained consistently for 3 months? 6 months? A year?
On the weeks when the hours fell to a low, ask yourself why. What happened, and how can it be avoided? Many times, itâs just that the athlete did not plan the week out, and ran out of time to train amongst all of the other responsibilities that we have.
Consider this: if you are training 8 hours a week, and can find just one more hour to make it 9, your total training for the year would increase 12.5%! That is a massive increase!!
Now if you are training for 12 hours, can you make it 13?
Stay consistent, and slowly build up your volume.
Is It Hard to Become A Professional Cyclist?
Yes. It is extremely hard to become a professional cyclist, for a myriad of reasons beyond the training like a professional cyclist.
First things first, you need to love riding a bike. The athletes that only train because they want to win a race and upgrade to Cat 1 usually are not in the sport for the long haul. They have a 3-5 year racing career and move on to something else; they would never make it as a professional.
Second, you need to be willing to put in the hours, getting towards those 20 hour training weeks. This can be difficult if you are in college or university and trying to manage a school career. Or, you may only be able to take on a part-time job if your time management skills are not fantastic.
I believe that you can train like a pro cyclist with a 40 hour a week job (heck, Iâve done it, Iâm just not fast enough to be a pro), but you may have a tough time getting to all of the races. That is another blog post in itself.
You need some good genes, also. While we can train things like VO2Max, there is a genetic ceiling, and if yours isnât high enough, no matter how much you train, you just wonât be good enough. Hey, we all canât be Lebron James either.
If you have the power, then there is the actual race craft. Power is only a small piece of it! There are so many small aspects to racing and getting results that make it so hard to become a successful pro cyclist. You can have the best cycling training plan, the best coach, the best genetics, but if you canât get in the right position and have a keen sense of when to use the watts, you may never win.
How Do I Make A Pro Cycling Training Plan?
I wouldnât. Huh?
Thatâs right, I wouldnât make a pro cycling training plan, unless you have reached the pro ranks. A pro cycling training plan will include massive volume that you may not be able to handle.
Professional cyclists race way more often than us amateurs, so youâre going to be missing some key sessions if you followed the layout of a pro as opposed to someone racing a similar calendar to yourself.
What I would do though is create a framework from a pro cycling training plan and apply it to yourself.
How can I increase my cycling training volume while managing races?
How can I optimize my recovery, including my sleep and cycling nutrition?
When should I get in the gym to increase my strength on the bike, but also my mobility and flexibility for aerodynamic gains?
Where can I functionally overreach without overtraining?
Is my calendar personalized enough, or am I just doing random workouts?
Are my hard sessions really hard, or just kind of hard?
Are my easy sessions easy enough, so that the aforementioned hard ones are really at my maximum wattage?
Where is my midseason and post season break?
Where have I lacked consistency in my training, and how can I improve this moving forward?
What am I doing to improve my race craft? Consider race positioning, bike handling, reading the race, team tactics, aspects of a race that may make you nervous, etc.
See Also: Polarized Cycling Training Plan
Conclusion
There are a lot of ways to optimize your training, and we can look to professional cyclists for their tips and tricks that have gotten them there. Just be careful that you are applying these in a smart way to your own training. If you need some help, our team of coaches can help create a custom cycling training plan for you!
Most of us will never get to reach the pro peloton, but that said, we should be aiming to become the best cyclists we can become! Take your training seriously, bring your A Game to the hard sessions, and have fun along the way. You will surprise yourself with how much you can accomplish!