Building an endurance base of steady mileage on the road accomplishes many physiological changes in your body. You'll be doing this type of riding typically at between 65-80% of Max heart rate and should be able to maintain a conversation with a training partner without pausing for deep or extended breaths. We will cover heart rate zones in future articles. It is best to also focus on your cadence, working on a zone between 95-105 rpm for as much of the training Ride as possible. This develops good pedalling style...

 

The lower intensity that you ride at while doing base training allows you to train for long hours on the bike. Training a lot will give you the strong foundation you need to go fast later in the year.

 

Never underestimate the effect of steady aerobic training. You can train for many hours without seeing a significant effect but if you're consistent, you'll notice that after a while base training becomes almost effortless. After a few months of riding, you'll be able to maintain an average speed and heart rate that was simply unthinkable earlier in the year. It's why you rarely see elite riders riding fast in the winter months!

 

It’s important that I mention that base training is an integrated component of periodised training.  Periodised training is important to ensure that you reach your optimal racing potential at key races. We’ll cover periodised training in depth in a future article. But for now it’s important to remember that you can’t race at your optimum all year round. This leads to making a decision as to whether you’ll be seriously racing criteriums in the summer and take it easy during the winter or riding base in summer and racing the winter road season.

 

I’ve seen many a rider perform stunningly well in the criterium races over the summer while avoiding their base training, only to have them falter 1.5 hours into a 3 hour road race during the winter season. It’s certainly too late to do anything about it until the following season. This is a direct result of them not riding enough base.

As I’m a roadie I prefer to focus on building my base during the summer when the daylight is long and the weather good. Once I have established a great base I can then focus my attention on other specific facets of training during the winter that can be performed indoors if the weather is not great. The other good thing about building a solid base is that you don’t have to spend as much time training after you have completed your base. More on this in my article “how to survive A Grade racing on 150km per week”.