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Interval power training is what it says on the label. It gives you more power, which will help you attack harder, climb faster, and give you more all-round strength. That in turn, gives you more speed.
Interval Power Training
How it’s Done
First, pick a hill. It is better not to be steep, a good hard climb that you can pedal on. Not struggle or be too comfortable that you will be spinning the pedals. This interval can be used for different methods of training.
You can use as big a gear as you can manage and ride as hard as you can for a set distance. If you take this to its ultimate and ride hard enough, you will be doing VO2 MAX intervals and performing interval aerobic training as you will be pushing yourself to your maximum or as close as your body and mind will allow.
Start with five intervals
Start with five intervals. Use your heart rate monitor (mine is Polar S725x). That way you can judge how hard you are trying. If you are reaching over 80% of your max heart rate, then you are training correctly. Regardless, your legs and lungs will be telling you this anyway!
If you want to find your heart rate max, this is the method needed. However, you need to warm up then do your hill interval as hard as you can without standing up on the pedals. You need to ride yourself to a standstill, 100%. If you are planning on doing this, it’s much safer to take someone with you in case you have any problems with making this kind of effort. This is the threshold interval.
Power training can be the most productive form of cycle interval training.
If you are finding that five intervals are getting too easy, then do more, be careful not to overdo it. Power training can help in all forms of cycling, form the track to mountain biking and triathlon, not just road racing, without power, you have nothing; power training can be the most productive form of cycle interval training.
More about different kinds of training you can find here:
The Training Guidelines For Strength
The 4 Interval Training Methods To Improve This Cycling Season
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