Many riders spend too much time on recovery training because they keep telling themselves (and everyone else) how important their recovery training is. They believe that recovery rides are just as important as regular training. I don’t agree. These riders are not aware of the difference between recovery rides and simply just recovery.
Recovery rides are not as important as regular training. Recovery rides don’t improve your endurance significantly and they only slightly accelerate the recovery process. Regular training has a much higher, positive impact on your cycling performance.
What do you think will have the greatest impact on your performance: Adding 1 hr extra recovery training or 1 hr extra endurance training?
If you had to reduce your training time with 1hr per week which training session would be the most critical to miss? Probably not the recovery ride…
Thus, my conclusion is that recovery rides are NOT as important as regular training. Though, I must emphasize that the recovery process (not recovery rides) is a cornerstone in high quality training principles.
How can you optimize your recovery rides?
Reduce training time
Most cyclists spend too much time on their recovery rides. I believe a single recovery ride should never last more than 10% of your weekly training amount. Thus if you train app. 10 hrs per week, your recovery rides should never last longer than 1 hour.
It does not makes sense to spend more time on recovery rides since these rides reflect the previous training you are recovering from. If you want to get the most out the time you train, you should consider to simply eliminate your recovery training. It’s very likely much better for you to ride an extra hour another day.
In 2007 one of my riders made it to the national team with only 9hrs super effective training per week. He would never have been able to that if he did recovery rides of 1-2hrs.
Due to limited time, we decided to skip every single recovery ride. Instead he had two or three days per week without training. These days without training he recovered from highly effective interval training (and took care of his education…)
That’s just one example and proof that even elite athletes can perform great without recovery training. If you are limited in time, it’s worth considering whether you should change your strategy.
Wear a heart rate monitor
The best way to make sure the intensity doesn’t get too high, is to wear a heart rate monitor. Keep your target heart rate around 60% of your maximum heart rate. That should do the job. Light exercise increases circulation and helps you to speed up the recovery process. There will not happen a miracle overnight, but it’s probably better than nothing. I know that many of you already use a heart rate monitor, so take this tip as a reminder.
Train other skills
Since training time and intensity is reduced, recovery training is an opportunity to train other skills. You could easily add some technical training to your recovery ride without reducing the quality of your recovery training.
It’s free, extra training that will boost your overall performance and it’s fun. If you have a mountain bike, you can learn several technical tricks while you are performing your recovery training.
I hope you can see my points and if you are one the riders I mention in this post, feel free to defend your opinions.
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{ 1 comment… read it below or add one }
I also believe that recovery rides are quite pointless for the “recreational” cyclist, training 6-9 h a week. It is much better to recover by doing e.g. core work or flexibility training. Junk miles are not time effective when balancing work, family and training…