The purpose of this training guide is simply to get you fit for the Etape du Tour, and is not intended as a guide for general health! It covers the hard training needed to cycle over a hundred miles over mountains.

• Hard training once a week will maintain your fitness level.
• Training twice a week will improve your performance.
• Training three times a week will benefit your performance even further.
• Beyond this level, there is a danger of over training, though four sessions a week may be beneficial.
  Personally, I find this reassuring as it leaves time for real life!

Many people with sufficient keenness and available time train six times a week, with one rest day. This probably pays dividends. However, if you lead a busy working, social and home life time is scarce, and you will want to economize on time spent training. Remember that time spent training later in the year will probably have more effect than too much training early in the year.

Most competitors will find that if they plot a graph of the average speed of a ride against its length, it will look something like the above. As you become fitter, your speed over both short and long distances will rise.

It is worth keeping a diary of your average speeds and distances, then plotting them on a similar graph. You will then be able to encourage yourself by seeing how you improve. You will also be able to gauge what type of training benefits your long distance performance. For example, a week’s cycling holiday in Mallorca may raise your speed over all distances by a few miles per hour!

The method is very useful if you sometimes only have time for a quick 5 miles, and at other times manage to fit in an Audax.

It is also very useful in gauging how far you have to go to reach the required standard. It is worth annotating the points on the graph "H" for hilly, "M" for mountainous and "P" if you are riding in a peloton (group), as that makes the graph more intelligible.

Some people who ride an exceptionally high mileage per week (250 – 300 miles/week) find that their speed is similar for all distances. Most of us are to busy to even attempt this!

Fitness levels will vary greatly at this time of year. Some riders will have trained through the winter, and could make a good showing of the Etape tomorrow. Others will have crawled out of hibernation in January, and are just beginning to get the miles up. If you have not completed a 30 mile ride yet this year, get busy!

While everyone will have a different fitness level, it is reasonable to be able to complete a 50 or 60 mile ride by the end of February, weather permitting. This may be a social ride, Audax or simply on your own. Distance is probably more important than speed at this time of year, as it will enable you to build a good foundation for later in the year. I like to set achievable targets. For some competitors this will be something like 2 to 3 rides/week, building up the length of the longest rides from 30 miles to 50 miles by the end of February. I know that others are already planning 200Km Audaxes in February. For most of us 100km is quite far enough!

Many people like to do their early season training alone, to build up their fitness at their own speed. Later in the year club rides are good. If you are new to the sport, it may be better to join a group such as the CTC initially, rather than to be left in the dust by the local racing club, which is very discouraging. When you reach your peak fitness, you may be able to leave them in the dust!

If your friends are slow cyclists and you want to get fit, you may want to resort to tactics such as racing to the tops of the hills and waiting, or even riding an old tourer with laden panniers while they are on their fast bikes! I suppose a mountain bike with knobby tyres would be the ultimate in hard work – but that’s maybe going too far!

February weather is, at best, variable, in England at least. Training options in bad weather range from the use of turbo trainers, the gym, cyclo cross and mountain biking.

Above all, don’t be a slave to your training. Vary it and enjoy!