Cycling Goals: 7 Keys to Effective Goal Setting for Cyclists

“If you don’t know where you are going, you’ll end up someplace else.” Yogi Berra.

We often set goals for the year ahead at New Year’s. However, only about 10% of the people who make New Year’s resolutions actually keep them! Here are seven tips on how to get to where you want to go instead of ending up somewhere else.

My 2018 Goals and Successes Reaching Them

Last January 26th I fell off a ladder while putting chairs in the rafters of our garage. I only fell about five feet but it was enough to fracture my ankle. The surgeon put in four screws to stabilize it. Then they strapped my foot into a surgical boot and told me I shouldn’t put any weight on it for six long weeks.

To keep from sinking into a funk I decided my goal would be to ride up to Jamestown, CO (6,926 ft.) by the end of 2018. The climb isn’t tough – 1,342 ft. in 8.4 miles – but it is continuous. The goal was very effective. Here’s why:

1. High priority motivating goal: I thought about many possible goals and picked just one high priority goal for my comeback. My goal was very important to me. Achieving it would signify my comeback from my injury. Focusing on one personally important goal would motivate me for the months ahead.

My goal was a S. M. A. R. T. goal:

2. Specific: My goal wasn’t just to recover from my injury. It was to ride to Jamestown.

3. Measurable: I would know that I’d reached my goal when I arrived at the Mercentile the only business is Jamestown, population 269.

4. Achievable: I set a goal that I could achieve if I trained effectively. Importantly achieving the goal was within my control. It wasn’t dependent on the weather or other riders, factors outside my control.

5. Realistic: My family plans and coaching commitments are important and also time-consuming. Given the available time to ride it was a realistic goal.

6. Time oriented: My goal was to ride to Jamestown in 2018.

7. Planned: I had a simple, measurable plan:

I. Ride 2.5 miles up the canyon toward Jamestown to Buchanan park. I chose this because when I got tired on each ride it was downhill back to my car.
II. Ride up the canyon to the park, stop to rest and eat a snack, and then ride another 2.5 miles up to the junction of James and Left Hand Canyons.
III. Ride up to the park, take a rest break, continue up to the junction, stop again and then complete my ride to the Merc.

The first six weeks after surgery were tough. I had to wear the damn boot 24 hours a day including while taking a shower. At night I had to wear the boot and keep my foot elevated to prevent swelling. While lying on the coach watching the winter Olympics I was allowed to take the boot off to do simple strength and flexibility exercises but otherwise wore it 7 X 24.

After six weeks I was allowed to take the boot off for PT to regain flexibility and strength and to swim and walk in a pool for cardio. I set simple objectives and celebrated the achievement of each:

March 27, nine weeks after the accident, I was allowed to get on the trainer without putting much weight on my foot and I rode for five whole minutes! I wasn’t allowed to ride outside because my ankle wasn’t fully healed and if I fell I might need more surgery.
April 11 I started doing manageable intensity workouts on the trainer.
April 18 my ankle was stabilized and the surgeon removed two of the screws.
April 27 they finally removed the boot and I could walk normally! I kept up my trainer rides.
May 10 I did my first road ride up to Buchanan park.
May 14 I made it up to the junction of the Left Hand and Jamestown roads.
May 18 I rode all the way up to Jamestown and back!

I set a new goal: ride the 14.2 miles with 4K of climbing up Left Hand Canyon to Ward, CO (9,449 ft.). It’s a continuous climb and the last two miles are 10 – 15%.

June 7 I rode from Buchanan park up Left Hand, 8.8 miles and 1,690 ft.
July 13 I climbed the last 6.2 miles and 1,380 ft. to Berthoud Pass (11,307 ft. / 3,446 m)
August 6 I made it to Ward. The photo shows how exhausted I was.

Build Your Base First

Whatever your goal every roadie should start the year with at least three months of endurance riding. Base training improves:

The endurance of the cycling muscles by increasing the number of mitochondria. The mitochondria are subcellular structures in the muscles where aerobic energy is produced.
The respiratory system, providing more oxygen to the blood supply.
The efficiency of the heart so it can pump more blood to the muscles. Endurance training improves the stroke volume, the amount of blood pumped per heart beat.
The capacity of the liver and muscles to store glycogen from carbohydrates. Your body can store approximately 1800 calories of glycogen. You can exhaust your glycogen stores during several hours of hard riding. Through endurance training you can increase your ability to store glycogen by 20 to 50%!
The capacity to burn fat during long rides. Through endurance training your fuel mix on endurance rides shifts to more fat and less glycogen, sparing your precious glycogen stores. Note that this doesn’t automatically result in weight loss; that is a function of calories in and calories out.
The neuromuscular efficiency of pedaling. Power is a function both of the strength of the muscles and coordinating the firing pattern of the nerves to activate the right muscle fibers at the right time so you go forward with less wasted energy. Early season endurance training is also a great time to work on pedaling with a rounder stroke and being able to spin smoothly at a higher cadence.
The thermoregulatory system by increasing the blood flow to the skin. Your skin is your largest organ and ability to dissipate heat will pay off later in the season.

Goal to Complete a Specific Event(s)

Many roadies start the year by considering multiple interesting and challenging events such as a big club ride, century, brevets, double century, multi-day tour, race, etc. Here’s how to set your goal(s):

1. Decide priorities: Sort your events into three categories by priority:

Key event(s): Pick just one or two rides that you will build your year around. These should be “gotta do this ride” not just “this would be an interesting ride.”
Training rides: This is where you put your interesting rides to help you prepare for your key event(s).
Fun rides: After all, we ride for fun!

Make your event a S. M. A. R. T. goal:

2. Specific: For example, your key event is to ride metric century. You decide you will ride the Wildflower Metric on April 21.

3. Measurable: Your goal is to ride 100K, not 50 miles.

4. Achievable: You’ve done a number of 40 – 50 mile rides and are fit enough to train up for the 100K.

5. Realistic: You estimate it will take 6 – 8 hours a week to train and you can fit these hours into most weeks.

6. Time oriented: You’ll ride the 100K on April 21.

7. Planned: You create a simple plan of alternating weeks with progressively longer and shorter rides. So that you don’t get injured your plan ramps up slowly and you include several one-week breaks from training.

Goal to Improve Performance

You want to improve your cruising speed, power, climbing, endurance, etc. Here’s how to set your goal(s):

1. Decide priorities: improving cruising speed, climbing or endurance each requires a different type of training. After building your endurance base decide you’ll work on power or climbing or cruising speed. Note that climbing better requires more power and that a higher cruising speed requires both more power and better climbing.

Set a S. M. A. R. T. goal for one aspect of performance.

2. Specific: Work on power.

3. Measurable: You don’t need a power meter or a heart rate monitor. Do a baseline time trial and repeat it every four weeks or so. If you go faster you’ve improved your power.

4. Achievable: You have the both the endurance base and the motivation to train harder.

6. Realistic: You can improve your power by doing a couple of hard rides during the week and an endurance ride on the weekend. You can schedule the two hard rides a week knowing that you’ll be very tired after each ride, which could impact your family and work.

6. Time oriented: Starting April 1 you’ll improve your time trial performance by 3% – be conservative – by May 31 so that you can then work on climbing.

7. Planned: You create a simple plan of progressively harder intensity rides. So that you don’t get injured your plan ramps up slowly and you include easier weeks for more recovery.

Tips on Achieving Your Goals

Make only a few high-priority resolutions or goals
Choose meaningful, motivating goals
Prioritize them
Make them S.M.A.R.T. goals
Write down your goals
Post them where you’ll see them every day
Tell others about them
Develop a simple plan with intermediate objectives
Track your progress per the plan

I’m a cross-country skier and my next goal is to ski Lactic Grande before the end of XC ski season sometime in March. Lactic Grande is an expert only trail that climbs to 9,300 ft. and it takes about half a day. I have good cycling fitness, which I now need to turn into skiing endurance and climbing power. I also need to work on my descending skills to get back down without crashing!

What’s your next goal?

Resources

My 71-page two-part bundle Your Best Season Ever will help you set and achieve your goals in 2019:

Your Best Season Ever, Part 1: How to plan and get the most out of your training explains how to set appropriate goals for you. I then show you how to assess your individual strengths and weakness and set appropriate personal objectives. You then use this information to build a plan including personal training volumes for different seasons and months. Based on this plan I explain how to create your personal workouts including:

Exercising at the right intensities,
Recovering fully to allow progress,
Measuring your progress, and then
Adjusting the plan.

Your Best Season Ever, Part 2: Peaking for and riding your event builds on part 1 and shows how you can develop, test and employ a personal strategy for your key event of the season. I use as examples of key events a hill climb, a time trial, fast club rides, a 100K and a 100-mile ride. Part 2 explains how to:

Analyze your event to figure out what’s required for success.
Develop specific training objectives based on that analysis.
Create and test a personal strategy for your particular event.
Train for peak fitness for your individual event.
Learn what you should eat, and when, leading up to and during the event.
Select the optimum equipment, including how to get the most bang for your buck.
Learn mental focus so that 100% of your energy goes into your performance.
Taper so that you are fresh and on form on the starting line.
Control how you ride your event for best performance.

The 71 page bundle Your Best Season Ever is only $8.98 and only $7.64 for our Premium members with your 15% discount.

Intensity Training describes your different physiological systems and how training at specific intensities improves each system. I explain how to train by perceived exertion, a heart rate monitor or a power meter — they are all effective! The article includes over 50 different workouts and explains which ones to use depending on your goals. The workouts are both structured (e.g., intervals) and unstructured (e.g., hammering hills) at the right intensities. My 41-page Intensity Training is only $4.99.

Coach John Hughes earned coaching certifications from USA Cycling and the National Strength and Conditioning Association. John’s cycling career includes course records in the Boston-Montreal-Boston 1200-km randonnée and the Furnace Creek 508, a Race Across AMerica (RAAM) qualifier. He has ridden solo RAAM twice and is a 5-time finisher of the 1200-km Paris-Brest-Paris. He has written over 40 eBooks and eArticles on cycling training and nutrition, available in RBR’s eBookstore at Coach John Hughes. Click to read John’s full bio.

7 Keys to Effective Goal Setting