Ask the Coach: Did I Overtrain? Part 1

By Coach John Hughes

Overtraining? Yep — I’ve done that. I started training in 1975 using the Olympic training manual by the Comitato Olimpico Nazionale Italiano, which was translated into English. Although written for racers it seemed like good advice to me. Cycling legend Eddie Merckx was at the height of his career and to improve he simply said, “Ride more.” My goal each year was a faster time in the Davis Double Century. The top 100 finishers started at the front of the field the following year. Starting at the front I could get into a fast paceline. Remember those, Jim Langley? And then one year I got dropped pretty early. I finished before dark but it was ugly.

Two weeks ago I responded to RBR reader Kevin’s question, Did I Bonk on My Endurance Ride? 

On May 17 Kevin rode the indoor equivalent of the Bone ride from Madison to Milwaukee Wisconsin and back (158 miles).  Indoors!

A couple of initial thoughts for Kevin: Because you could train by power, that was a better way to gauge your exertion than heart rate. In addition to how hard you are riding, heart rate is a function of other variables: heat and hydration (both of which affected you indoors) and nerves and excitement. Because your heart fatigues over time your heart rate increases even if you aren’t riding harder.

You were right to train by time, not distance.  How far you ride in an hour is a function of terrain, weather, wind and whether you’re in a paceline.  Your longest training ride was 6:00 hours, 70% of your 8:30 hours Bone ride.

Kevin wrote,

Now, I’m planning for the Ride Across Wisconsin (RAW) August 19 – 20, which is 235 miles. There are about 6,000 feet of climbing and it is on back country roads. The longest ride I’ve done was the Garmin Unbound in 2021 which was 205 miles, 12,000 feet of climbing and a gravel trail in the middle of nowhere. My tandem pilot and I finished it in 17 hours and 14 minutes.

“I have heard numerous times to ride for 2/3 or ¾ to prepare for the event I’m training to do. For the ride on May 17 I rode for 8:30 hours. This was the Bone ride I did indoors. The longest training ride was 6:00 hours, which is about ¾ of the Bone ride overall time. Is the 2/3 or ¾ the amount of time or miles?

“My team for RAW plans to hold 20-21 MPH. Thinking of what I did for 8.5 hours (BONE) and my age of 61, I think my training plan needs to be adjusted.

There are at least seven different parts of your training for the Bone ride that could have affected your riding from which you can learn to prepare for RAW.

In part 1 of this column I’ll look at the three big picture factors:

1. Training phases
2. Cycle of weeks
3. Ramping up long rides

In part 2 of this column I’ll drill down to the other factors:

1. Content of training weeks
2. Endurance training
3. Pacing
4. Recovery

Training phases

Rather than just increasing the volume and intensity of the same program every week until the Bone ride Kevin was smart to divide it into phases. Here is what he did for training:

• 8 weeks of endurance:
  • 2d of intervals, 2d of weights and 1d endurance ride 
• 8 weeks of build:
  • 2d of intervals, 2d of weights and 1d endurance ride 
• 2 weeks of peaking: 
• Two endurance rides at 220-230 watts.

Here’s the way the phases should work:

1. Endurance phase: You’re an endurance rider, so building your endurance is the most important.  However, doing intensity is during the endurance phase is counter-productive. After intensity workouts you need more recovery so your endurance rides can’t be as long. Tempo rides(s) of 1:00 hours progressing to 2:00 would be better than the intensity workouts. Tempo rides are at the level of effort you’d expend on a sustained climb or into the wind.

2. Build phase: Increase power while maintaining endurance. You stayed with the same program as the endurance phase and increased the volume and intensity. You should have cut back on the endurance rides doing just enough to maintain your endurance.  This will give you the physical and mental capacity to do train to increase your power.

3. Peaking phase: Rides simulating the target ride.

• Your Saris H3 trainer told you 220-230 watts was about 20 mph so these were good peaking rides practicing for the Bone ride.

4. Recovery: 18 weeks of continuous training is physically and mentally hard, especially because you’re doing it on the trainer.  With my athletes I plan a very easy recovery week between each phase so the rider is fully recovery and rarin’ to go.  

Cycle of Weeks

Kevin wrote me, “Throughout the endurance and build phases I did an easy, moderate or hard week. The type of week played a factor in length and watts put out.”

Cycling through weeks with different volumes and intensities is the optimal way to train:

1. Hard week: overload to improve only one aspect of training, either endurance or power
2. Moderate week: maintain fitness
3. Easy week: recovery before the next hard week.

I use a four-week cycle with my older clients:

1. Moderately hard week: overload to improve one aspect of training. Depending on the training phase, either endurance or power
2. Moderate week: maintain endurance and power fitness.
3. Hard week: more overload to further improve the same aspect of training, either endurance or power
4. Easy week: recovery before the next four-week cycle.

Each cycle is progressively harder.

Ramping Up Long Rides

Here’s what Kevin did:

• January 21 – Week 3 was 3 hours and 53.1 miles
• February 4 – Week 6 was 3 hours and 57.3 miles
• February 18 – week 7 was 3:30 hours and 69.1 miles
• March 18 – week 11 was 4:30 hours and 89.2 miles
• April 8 – week 14 was 3:00 hours and 62.1 miles
• April 22 – week 16 was 3:10 hours and 63.2 miles
• April 29 –week 17 was 6:00 hours and 116.2 miles
• May 17 Bone ride in 8:30 hours and 158.1 miles

Note that he kept increasing his endurance rides during the build phase when he should have been building power while just maintaining endurance.

Your target ride was about 8:30 hours.  As you noted your longest training ride should be about 2/3 to 3/4 of the duration of your target ride. In your case build up to 5:20 to 6:00 hours. You raced for 14 years and then switched to endurance. You’re athletically a very mature rider. Because of your athletic maturity, ramping up to a 5:20 longest training ride would have been sufficient. 

Depending on a rider’s athletic maturity the rider can ramp up the long ride by 5 to 15% per week. Because of your athletic maturity you probably could ramp up by 10 – 15% per week. Because you were mixing up weeks with longer and shorter endurance rides, you probably could have ramped up the longer rides by 20% to 30% every other week with significantly shorter rides in between. Ramping at the more conservative rate of 20% every other week (or 30% every three weeks) is safer, i.e., less risk of injury or overtraining. You can learn more in these columns:

• Fit for Life: How Athletically Mature are You?
• Fit for Life: Improving Your Athletic Maturity

You were following a three week cycle of a hard week, a moderate week and an easy week. This is how the cycles should work.

• Cycle #1
  • #1 – 3:00 hours
  • #2 – 2:00 hours 
  • #3 – 1:00 hour 
• Cycle #2
  • #4 – 4:00 hours (30% more than week #1)
  • #5 – 2:30 hours 
  • #6 – 1:15 hours 
• Cycle #3
  • #7 – 5:15 hours (30% more than week #4)
  • #8 – 3:30 hours 
  • #9 – 1:30 hours

Given this pattern of endurance rides, your endurance phase would have been nine weeks, not eight. A word of caution:  the above is formulaic.  Listen to your body. It’s okay to shorten the second and third week in any cycle or add a full recovery week at some point.

Here’s the plan I would have suggested:

• 9 weeks increase endurance
• 1 week full recovery with not more than 3 or 4 hours of very easy riding.
• 5 weeks build power
• 1 week full recovery with not more than 3 or 4 hours of very easy riding
• 1 week event-specific peaking
• 1 week taper

You were out of town four days in January and four days in March. You could have made these full recovery weeks by adding a couple more easy days each week and modifying the above pattern.

If you had started training a few weeks earlier you could have added a week or two to the build phase and/or a week or two to the peaking phase. 

Looking Ahead

You had 13 weeks from the monster Bone ride until the 235 mile Ride Across Wisconsin.  Your team wants to average 20 to 21 miles per hour, i.e., finish in about 11 to 11:45 hours. Two-thirds of 11:00 hours would be 7:15 hours. Three-quarters of 11:45 hours would be 8:50. Your 8:30 Bone ride already met the goal of a ride 2/3 to ¾ the duration of the big event! Now it’s time to concentrate on building power and just maintaining endurance.

This column is four weeks after your May 17 monster ride so you still have nine weeks of training to RAW. I suggest something like the following as the big picture plan:

• Weeks 8 and 9 Taper
• Week 7 Peaking with a one peaking ride simulating the RAW but shorter.
• Week 6 Full recovery week.
• Weeks 2 to 5 Build power. You could alternate weeks:
  • Week 2 — two pretty hard power workouts and a moderate endurance ride of 1:30 to 3:00 hours.
  • Week 3 — two harder power workouts and a moderate endurance ride of 2:00 to 3:30 hours.
  • Week 4 — one moderate power workout and longer endurance ride of 5:00 to 6:00 hours.
  • Week 5 — two hardest power workouts and a moderate endurance ride of 2:30 to 4:00 hours
• Week 1 – a full recovery week (unless you’ve been doing just light training since your bone ride).

I build the plan working backwards because having adequate weeks for the tapering, peaking and a recovery week determines how many weeks you’ll have for the build phase.

Next week I’ll discuss

1. What should have been the content and pattern of your training weeks for the Bone ride.
2. How should you have done your endurance training.
3. What was the right pace for the Bone ride.
4. Did you get enough recovery. Under-recovering is the corollary of over-training.

Related columns:

• 12 Tips to Prevent Overtraining
• Anti-Aging: Training Rules for Older Cyclists
• Anti-Aging: 8 Mistakes Older Riders Make, pt. 1
• Anti-Aging: 8 Mistakes Older Riders Make, pt. 2
• Cycling Training Zones for RPE, HR and Power May Differ on the Trainer

Additional Resources:

Beyond the Century– Relevant to and adaptable for any endurance rider although written for longer rides. I provide a detailed primer what you need for longer rides: endurance, cruising speed, power and on-the-bike nutrition. I cover the eight basic training principles, levels of training intensity, and the various phases of a successful endurance training program. The 16-page Beyond the Century is only $4.99.

My three-article bundle Endurance Training and Riding explains in detail how to train and what to eat to achieve the above benefits. I originally wrote the articles to help riders doing 100K, 200K and longer rides; however, all of the principles and training programs also work for roadies doing shorter rides.

1. Beyond the Century describes training principles and different training intensities and how to integrate these into a season-long program of endurance rides.
2. Nutrition for 100K and Beyond provides you with the information you need to fuel your engine before, during and after endurance rides.
3. Mastering the Long Ride gives you the skills you need to finish your endurance rides.

My Endurance Training and Riding bundle totaling 50 pages is just $13:50, a 10% savings off the full price of all three eArticles.

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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.