Winter Training Program

October arrives and it may seem like the season is more or less over, but this is the time of year to start preparing for next year. Now is the time that next years races are won and lost. The main objective of training at this time of year is to build up a bae level of fitness which we build upon as we move into more BMX specific work in the New Year. The right sort of training now will result in increased strength and fitness, ready for the more BMX specific stuff later.

The same program is not right for everyone, so you will need to build your own schedule based upon your age and fitness. This is how to do it.....

a weeks schedule needs to contain the key components of a winter training program. Basically, this is like a Summer program that has been shrunk, but endurance work has been added, to build base fitness over the winter.

SPEED
(downhill sprints)

STRENGTH and CONDITIONING
(Gym work)
(Basic strength and conditioning work at home)
(climbing steep hills)
(Trampolining)

POWER (Speed and strength combined)

ENDURANCE
(long bike rides or even swimming)

each session can contain more than one of these elements combined.

 

We also need to try and keep it fun, otherwise the younger riders will be turned off by it all. I think the following program should hit the mark. A good tip is to keep a training diary so that you can look back at what you have done, and feeel good about it, and it also helps to spot any problems, say overtraining.

MON - REST

TUES - Downhill Sprints for speed, or join a spin class

WED - REST or Swimming

THU - Trampolining or Boxing class or Gym work for older riders. Do sprints if you can't do anything else. Whatever you choose to do, also fit in some upper body work too, say with press-ups and pull-ups if you can.

FRI - REST

SAT - Saturday Morning coaching, including a few gates

SUN - long bike ride

The sessions can also be tweaked and moved around a bit to suit your needs, but make sure you don't end up doing too many hard sessions without rest or easy days in between.

Wednesday: could be a rest day. If you want to do more, then Swimming is good, low impact endurance workout, while not being too demanding.

Thursday: Kelvin is a strong advocate of boxing, for upper body strength and co-ordination. Alternatively, trampolining is also very good for co-ordination and a full body workout. Older riders could instead opt for a gym based programm, focusing on high-rep, low-weights for the first 6-8 weeks. Some use of free weights is recommended because they are better for co-ordination than the machines - but take advice from the gym.

If you follow this program properly, you will need to have an easy week every so often.It is good practice to have an easy week, 1 week in 4. Still do stuff, but back off on both the amount and the intensity. You need to do this to avoid getting overtrained. If you become overtrained your motivation will suffer and so will the quality of your workouts. The end result is that your development will taper off.