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Planning Your Cycling Season Effectively

Planning Effectively For Next Season

It's the end of the cycling season once again, and that means it's time to start thinking about what you're goals for next season are.  In past episodes of the Tailwind Coaching Podcast, I've talked about setting effective goals and how to plan your season.  In this video, I'll answer a lot of the questions I've gotten recently about planning your season's training and show you how to use my Season Planning Worksheet to build your season.  I'll walk through setting your events into the program and setting up your training blocks.  I'll even show you how to modify and rearrange the training blocks as you add more events during the season!

If you've got any questions for me after watching the video, don't hesitate to contact me and I'll help you get your season sorted out!

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Happy New Year Training Tips and Zwift Workout!

With the final hours of 2017 slipping away, I spent some time on my [easyazon_link identifier=”B01GA6Z8FO” locale=”US” tag=”taicoaandthed-20″]Elite Drivo[/easyazon_link] trainer this morning putting the finishing touches on a new holiday workout for you!  Most cyclists view their new year training as a continuation of their usual routine.  But there's no better time to switch it up and make a difference than in the new year!

I've also got a couple of tips in the video below that will help you kickstart your New Year training.  Remember these two things:

1: Most of us are amateur athletes.  As I said in my last podcast of 2017, amateurs plan their training around their life, while pros plan their life around their training.  That means every single minute of training time is precious.  You need to make every minute count, so aim for quality over quantity.  Spend those precious hours training your weaknesses, building a solid functional base and ensuring your body is strong and resilient to ensure a quality cycling season.

2: Consistency is the key to improving your fitness.  If you're not riding with any consistency, you're wasting your time.  Building fitness requires your body to consistently be stressed to force it to adapt.  Get on a plan, stick to a training schedule and you'll see bigger gains than you ever saw before.

In addition to those points, take a look at the short video I put together giving you the details on my new Zwift Aerobic Round Robin workout:

I've also updated my Tailwind Coaching Season Planning Worksheet for 2018.  Yep, it's still a free download, and it's got a couple of additional bits of information attached to it.  There's also a nice coupon code attached to it that applies to any of my downloadable training plans.  All you have to do is download the worksheet and you'll get the coupon code in your inbox!  So what are you waiting for?  Get planning for 2018 and above all, have a happy, healthy and safe new year!  I'm looking forward to helping as many of you as I can in 2018!

How to Tune Shimano Di2 From Your iPad or iPhone

Shimano has been in the electronic shifting game since Dura Ace 7970 was introduced in 2009.  Their E-Tube system debuted with Ultegra 6770 in 2012 and continues to be the standard in electronic shifting systems today.  You had to take your bike to a local bike shop that had an expensive adapter and computer program to tune the drivetrain and update firmware.

Since then, Shimano has released the E-Tube app for iOs.  By adding some Bluetooth Low Energy components to your drivetrain, you can update firmware and tune your shifting from your iPad.  It's never been easier to tune and update your Di2 system.

Click through the jump to learn what you need to use your iPad to tune your E-Tube Shimano Di2 system, including a video overview of the app and how to use it.

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Solos Smart Cycling Glasses Review

Imagine riding in a tight pack, shoulder to shoulder with the rider next to you.  The group rides under the 1K to go banner at high speed, nervously shuffling as the finish line beckons.  You take a split second to look down at your power meter display to set yourself up for the sprint.  In that moment, the rider in front of you taps his brakes and you hit his rear wheel, crashing hard.

Next, imagine flying down a sinewy descent, carving sweeping turns with aplomb.  You glance down at your computer to get a speed check and miss the small pothole in the road in front of you.  Your front wheel hits the square edge and flats the tire, you lose control and crash.

The Solos Smart glasses aim to make those two scenarios a thing of the past.  By creating a pair of cycling glasses with an integrated heads-up display, Solos has put your most critical information right in front of your eyes.  You never have to look away from the road to check your power or speed.  Keeping your eyes on the road keeps you safer.

Do these $500 cycling glasses stack up to their price tag?  Click through the jump and I'll go in depth on the newly released Solos Cycling glasses.

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Muscular Endurance Cycling Training With Zwift

Zwift has revolutionized the way we train indoors with a trainer.  The emergence of smart trainers has turned Zwift into an immersive virtual riding experience.  Muscular endurance (ME) is one of the basic fundamental skills that create a well-rounded cyclist, but it can be boring to accomplish on a trainer.  Combining the two together provides you the opportunity to get tons of high-quality training and keep things from getting stale.  But before you can go about building a ton of muscular endurance and making your body bulletproof, you have to understand what the goal of a ME interval is.

So, first of all, what is muscular endurance and why is it important?

Muscular endurance is your body's ability to resist muscular fatigue under pedaling tension.  That pedaling tension is where the magic happens in your pedal stroke.  The more tension in the pedals, the more power gets to the rear wheel and the faster you go.  I'm sure you've experienced a time when you have to really dig in and push hard to catch your riding buddy.  After a short time, your legs start to get heavy and tired and you have to rest.  The more times you have to repeat this kind of move, the harder it becomes because your legs are just tired out.  Maybe your legs cramp up or maybe you just can't make the move.  No matter what the outcome, you just need more ME training in your program.

In this article I'm going to give you tips to improve your muscular endurance training with Zwift.  Click through the jump to find out how:

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