Whether you scribble notes in a dog-eared journal, plan and analyse your workouts on TrainingPeaks or track goals and progress on Today's Plan, training diaries are a fantastic self-development tool for riders of all levels. A training diary will sharpen your organisation, identify weaknesses, enhance your confidence and ensure you keep improving week after week. From complex power data to simple notes on ride feel and nutrition, your diary can be as detailed or as basic as you choose. All that matters is that you start tracking the small daily details and insights that can help to make you a stronger rider.
THE PRO RIDER
Talent, dedication, adaptivity....there are countless reasons why pro riders make it to the very top. But what can we learn from their elite journey? Over to Hayley Simmonds, the 2018 Commonwealth TT champ
Key session
"Keeping a diary helps me to plan my training better. My remit with this set was to do a 2-hour ride with 5mins at 350 watts in the first half. The goal was just to get my legs going after some tiring days of travel, and to include a 'priming' effort before my 10-mile time trial race the next day. So not too hard. As this was the day before my race, my coach deliberately set a prescribed power, rather than a max effort, so I wouldn't overdo it! That's the detail you get from planning everything.
I upload my data to TrainingPeaks manually because it means I engage with the data. Today, I was 10 watts off my target. But I knew I was tired, because I didn't start the effort until 45 mins in, and I was riding at a low base before then. Also, my heart rate was 170bpm for the effort, whereas if I went all-out it would be 195-197bpm.
→ Distance 65km
→Duration 2hrs with 1x 5min effort @ 350 watts
→Heart rate during effort 170bpm
This story is from the March 2024 edition of Cycling Plus UK.
Start your 7-day Magzter GOLD free trial to access thousands of curated premium stories, and 8,500+ magazines and newspapers.
Already a subscriber ? Sign In
This story is from the March 2024 edition of Cycling Plus UK.
Start your 7-day Magzter GOLD free trial to access thousands of curated premium stories, and 8,500+ magazines and newspapers.
Already a subscriber? Sign In
Objectives of desire
Ned ponders his affection for cycling on a ride from London to Minehead
ONE OF A KIND
Project One combines premium-quality customised bikes with an endless palette of colours and designs from the creative experts at Trek. It's a winning formula. Here's why...
Trek Checkpoint ALR 5 Driftless
£2,700 Aluminium bike-packing-friendly gravel bike
Gower Peninsula, Wales
A rider powers up the Cefn Bryn ridge on south Wales' Gower Peninsula.
Slow commotion
Downing Street targeting 20mph zones is attacking popular policy
Black Series Multistrada
£5,629 British designed, all-road speedster
Helmetcam militia
Hey, bad drivers! Want to be in the movies? Then smile as you close-pass us while on the phone
Rolling horizons
2018 Tour de France champion Geraint Thomas tells us about the joy of discovering new routes
ENTER THE DRAGON
It's one of the toughest sportives in the UK, but did climb-loving cycling author Simon Warren have the legs to slay the beast of a sportive route in 2023?
LOFTY GOALS
Higher, harder, longer... the road-sportive calendar gets ever more extreme. Here are 10 of the toughest single day rides to enter for 2024