Increments

Once you feel like you're properly set up on your bike, (fit is very important) you can start mixing up your rides a bit.

I'm a big proponent of interval training. To give you a rough idea of what that entails, if you're going to be out for an hour, you could try a variation of this: Give yourself a warm-up, then go flat out for maybe a minute, followed by about eight minutes of recovery. Repeat this a few times, then cool down for the remainder of your ride. Your current level of fitness will dictate the interval. When you first do it, that minute may seem really long. If you're young and really fit, it might not be so much, and you can do one in five.

Another option is to take your current distance, such as a 30 mile loop for a two hour ride, and try to cut your time by sustaining a slightly higher speed for the duration. Either way, you want to raise your intensity every other day, or every third day, depending on how hard you ride. And you absolutely must give your body at least a day of rest, maybe two, otherwise you'll get burned out, and it won't be fun.

 

I don't see why not. But you may want to share your goals first, otherwise what's the point? Is your goal cycling-oriented, or just general fitness? Do you want to be able to ride long distances effortlessly? Just want to be fast? Or are you trying to lose weight? You'll need to take your health and fitness level into consideration too.

 

A lot will depend on your fitness base. If you're already pretty active, you'll do fine. Pay attention to proper nutrition and hydration too. Your body needs the right fuel as well.

 

A couple of things to consider:

Without a plan/way to measure improvement, you'll probably end up wasting your time by either advancing slower than necessary, or not at all.

Yes, you can hurt yourself, and no, riding every day is not necessarily counter productive. Hard efforts without rest and recovery will lead to injury, and slower gains. The key is to make the most of each ride. A high intensity ride is going to build up lactic acid in your leg muscles. For those of us lacking a personal masseuse, the best way to get rid of that lactic acid (which is what makes your legs sore) is to get some blood flowing into those muscles so it can transport the acid out. There are plenty of ways to exercise your legs that will accomplish that, but a casual recovery ride is what I suggest. Just get out and do some light spinning. Take in the scenery. Enjoy the ride for the views. Mixing up your rides allows recovery and keeps things fun and interesting. If you ride hard every day, you're not going to end up faster.

Hills? That's an easy one. Do more of them. There are seven days in a week. You could do sprint intervals Monday, recovery Tuesday, hills Wednesday, recovery Thursday, take Friday off, do your long group ride Saturday, and your short recovery ride to anyplace serving beer and tacos on Sunday. That's just an example, but you get the idea. Just have a plan, and have a way to measure results. Oh, for your first week or two of hill efforts, don't worry about time. Concentrate on breathing and cadence. I suspect a lot of people use too much leg and not enough lungs on hills when they first start out.

That's my two cents for today.