Outdoor Training with TrainerRoad
Training is tough. Really tough. It’s hard to stay motivated to push yourself, especially when you’re sitting on an indoor trainer staring at a wall. Yes, I’ve got goals, and I want to win races…but man, when I’m pushing a ton of watts, sweat is pouring off of me, and there’s a little blue line in front of me telling me “nope. not done yet…keep pushing”, I often get those nasty thoughts: “Why are you doing this? You don’t need to do this. You should go relax. Don’t you need to do the dishes? Wait, don’t you have a meeting? You’ve worked hard enough. This is good. You can stop now…” and on and on.
SO…when TrainerRoad introduced outside workouts synced to your head unit, I thought I’d give it a try. In short, they’re great. It’s a lot easier to stay motivated when I’m outside riding on the roads I love, surrounded by nature. The trick is finding terrain that suits your interval type. It turns out, Henry Coe State Park is pretty excellent for intervals in the 8-15 minute range.
Outside intervals are a little harder than inside because the terrain is variable…but that’s exactly what you experience when you race. The undulating terrain means putting out the same power feels different on a 9% incline as opposed to flat, or a 3% decline. This change in inertia/gradient definitely makes holding your power steady more difficult…but oddly, I think it makes it easier to focus. Spinning on a trainer in ERG mode can be really mindless. All you really need to do is..spin. The trainer will adjust the resistance (if it’s working correctly) based on your cadence to ensure you’re putting out the right power. Even on rollers, once you’re at your target power, you just need to keep a constant cadence. Outside, you really need to focus. You can’t trust your legs to tell you you’re pushing hard enough. Holding 300 watts on a 9% incline is one thing, but then when that incline suddenly flattens out? Holding that same 300 watts feels very very different.
Which brings me to my next point…if you’re going to train outside…PLEASE FIND QUIET ROADS. As I mentioned, hitting power targets over long intervals requires a huge amount of focus. Between that and the almost-certain hypoxia brought on by repeated high-watt efforts, you probably won’t be as aware as you usually are.
I mentioned earlier that it’s tricky to find the right terrain for your intervals. To clarify a bit, if you try to do 20 minute intervals on a 10 minute climb… You’re gonna have a bad day. You also need to consider your turn-around spots. I tried doing vo2 max intervals on a 5 minute climb. The length of the climb was fine, but when I hit the end of the first interval, I was in the middle of a set of blind switchbacks…no way I could turn around.
All that said, I think it’s totally worth the effort if you can find a quiet road with terrain that matches your interval type. It’s harder physically, I think easier mentally, and you get to ride your bike. Outside. On real roads.
