Tips for Using Bicycle Rollers Indoor as a Part of Winter Cross-Training
November 18th, 2008 • Cycling/Fitness
In one of my past posts, I highlighted why I believe using rollers as a part of your winter training program is crucial. However, there are a number of tips, tricks, and methods which can make training indoors on a set of rollers much more enjoyable.
Rollers+Doorframe=Heaven
Many cyclists shy away from using rollers. They have the reputation of being very dangerous, and hard to use. Fortunately, this is extremely far from the truth. When used alone, rollers are very daunting, as the prospect of staying in a 1 or 2 foot wide path while cycling, drinking, or sprinting through intervals is daunting to say the least. Thankfully, a door frame is about the perfect width for you to use your rollers in. If you position the roller frame so that your elbows line up with the edges of the doorframe, the chances of you falling off the rollers is slim to none. You can simply stick out your elbows and block yourself from moving off the side. Another useful tip to prevent falling while on rollers is to remember not to turn the handlebars. Instead, lean from side to side while keeping your handlebars perfectly straight. This makes it much easier to stay upright and prevents the dreaded front-wheel roll-off that many new roller users experience.
Ventilation
-Photo by mnadi
While exercising, it is crucial that you have sufficient oxygen available in your environment to sustain your high rate of breathing. On a basic level, the more air you breathe, the less lactic acid produced by your muscles, and thus your muscles will burn less. In addition, exercising in a low oxygen environment can be extremely dangerous, and potentially cause you to become dizzy, light-headed, neaseous, and even loose consciousness. This is why it is imperative to have a good flow of oxygen through your training room. I like to leave a window open in my bedroom where I exercise, and then another window open somewhere else on the same floor. This helps to create a good flow of oxygen and fresh air around your body. In addition, during the winter months, the cool outside air will help to keep our body cool.
Use a Fan
-Photo by ToastyKen
Having good air flow into and out of the room in which you are using you rollers in is next to useless if the fresh air is not being directed at your body. This is why it is very important to use a floor fan of variable speeds angled up at you. The variable speeds will allow you to use a higher or lower speed depending on the temperature of the room, and how intense your workout is. The fan will also help to prevent the amount of sweat you produce which will keep you much more comfortable and and is also easier on your bike components that your sweat drips onto. Anyone who has ever done substantial In addition, having air blowing at you replicates a more realistic road feel.
Entertainment
-Photo by autowitch
No matter how focused on cycling you are, the truth is that riding inside is very boring compared to riding in the great outdoors. Outside you have the scenery, cars, trains, houses, and people to keep your mind occupied. Inside, your view is constant, and is generally not exactly entertaining. This is why it is necessary to introduce some form of artificial entertainment into the equation. For me, movies work perfect. Some serious cyclists perform training oriented movies such as Spinervals, however, I perform normal movies to keep my mind occupied. I find that actions movies work best. I try to stick to movies with a high insanity level to keep my adrenaline up. So far, some of my favorites have been:
The only disadvantage is that unless you have a very extensive DVD collection, you will quickly watch more DVD’s than you could ever have imagined, so a Netflix account could be very useful if you plan to spend a lot of time training inside.
If movies aren’t quite your thing, music is also a great option to keep your mind occupied. Once again, I enjoy high intensity music the most. Either rap or rock seem to work best. Some bands to check out are:
An iPod or a loud set of speakers works best to overcome the buzz of your drivetrain and the roller and keep you occupied on the music.
Break up the Workout
On the road, I am able to go for hours without needing a break. I attribute this mostly to the fact that especially in the New England area, there are many hills that constantly require me to get up out of the saddle and mash to the top. On the flip side, there are also downhills which provide me with a break form constant hard pedaling. On rollers, however, things are much different. Because there are no up or down hills your are outputting a constant amount of power. This makes cycling on rollers much more tiring than on the road. In addition, because standing while riding rollers is very difficult, and potentially even dangerous, you are always using essentially the same muscles. When using rollers, you do not have the option of standing up to shift the work to another muscle group, meaning that your legs become much more tired, much faster. This also causes, at least with my current saddle/shorts combo, enough butt pain to make cycling on the rollers straight out for more than 20 minutes quite painful.
Rather than make my workouts on the rollers an uncomfortable, ineffective waste of a ride, I choose to split it up into 4 main parts. In between the different phases, I take very short breaks. Just enough time to put the resistance unit on my rollers, go to the bathroom, stretch quickly, and wipe down my face with a cool cloth. Here is the breakdown of my daily workouts:
- 15 minute warmup
- 20 minutes of intervals with the magnetic resistance unit
- 20 minutes of intervals without the magnetic resistance
- 25 minute cool down
This breakdown is still a great workout, but keeps me comfortable and entertained so that I will be motivated to come back for the next days ride.
Conclussion
Riding rollers is a great way to keep up your fitness throughout the winter months. However, it is possible for a workout on the rollers to be boring, ineffective in improving your fitness, and even dangerous. I hope that these few tips will help to make your roller workouts more fun, engaging, and safer.
Do you have any tips that help to improve your roller workouts? Let me know in the comments.
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