Fair weather rider/runner?
We hear you, onto the treadmill or turbo trainer it is then…. Or is it?
Often, we can fall into trying to replicate our outdoor activities inside, without it hitting the right spot. There are both obvious and subtle differences:
- Treadmill/Turbo doesn’t move
- Variances in undulation can’t be replicated
- Scenery and weather
- Milestones in distance
We could look at these in the negative, however it gives us some clues to how to structure our training in a way that supports our love of the outdoor training life.
Perhaps working on our speed, hill work or introduce a different protocol, such as intervals. Maybe introducing a different piece of equipment, such as the rower?
How about working to a specific heart rate range? – this could be as simple as limiting our heart to a particular zone and building speed and endurance in that zone?
Speaking of endurance, we can look at understanding more of how our body reacts in a much more controlled environment, with the bonus of being able to stop and not worrying about how far away from home we are!
Using the equipment to its strengths will allow us to build a stronger platform over the colder months, increasing our outdoor performances once fairer weather returns.
A quick example:
Sprints outdoors – we can sprint between point a and b, we can measure the time and the splits, perhaps even our heart rate. However, instant feedback is still difficult to manage and most of the time we are going to be reviewing these metrics post activity.
Sprints indoors – speed and time can be made constant, allowing us to replicate the same reps consistently, whilst focusing on heart rate, the inverse of that, focusing on heart rate and improving distance or speed.
Changing the routine can enable new targets to be set, moving the needle from ‘argh indoor time’ to ‘how am I progressing?’.
We should also consider cross-training, building up areas to support our outdoor activities, this could be resistance training or class based – we’ll touch on these over the next couple of weeks.
Need some help transitioning from outdoors to indoors? – speak to a member of Team SF to see how we can help make your indoor training more interesting and relevant – info@spikefitness.co.uk or 07597215652.