Periodization/Different Decades

Back in the 1980s, if you were a serious cyclist you bought, read, and memorized Eddie B's book, Bicycle Road Racing. Although much of the training and/or diet advice seems quaint or, um, bizarre these days ("you must eat horse meat") the sections on tactics are still superb. In the mid 1990s, the Cyclists Training Bible became the book that everyone was buzzing about. As my truly competitive days as a cyclist seemed to have stopped at a Cat. 3 criterium in Springfield Missouri on a 110 degree day in the year 2000, I haven't really bought too many training manuals since then.

But, I cracked the Cyclist's Training Bible out just yesterday, and man it is still solid. Although published before the days of SRAM, Wattage analysis and 14 pound bikes (I have the 1997 edition) what I like about Joe Friel's book is that it is really fundamentally aimed at working guys with families who are either 1) trying to get serious about the sport again or 2) already at a high fitness level but are looking at improving on an aspect of their game.

Since I'm not sure I'm in category number one, and I know I'm not in number two, you might wonder how it applies to me. What really hits home about his philosophy, though, is that to race, you must immerse yourself in cycling, you must develop a training program, you must stick to it and be patient, or else you are just "playing on a bike."

For the most part, I realize that I won't be a competitive cyclist again unless I really adhere to some sort of plan. Not that playing on a bike is such a bad thing--on the contrary, this is what I've done for the past 7 years, for the most part, aside from a brief period of success and seriousness in 2003. But, I want to try my hand at racing again, and with an active career, family, and approaching the big 4-0 the only way to cultivate success is to approach a program with a scientific or at least organized sense of what I am doing.

Its a great book, perhaps a bit outdated with the emphasis on heart rate zones, but with incredibly sound advice on the organization of one's life in order to become a successful athlete. Oh, and the diet advice isn't stuck in the pre-World War Two era, like Eddie B's, which is also a plus.