DMCC RAGBRAI Training Rides and Schedule

Posted Jun 2, 2008
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Des Moines Cycle Club (DMCC) RAGBRAI Training Rides are taking place twice a week. Thursday in West Des Moines and Saturday in Windsor Heights/Waukee

Everyone is welcome! Thursdays 6:00 p.m. at Panera Bread on University in West Des Moines or the parking lot just across the street. Saturdays 6:45 a.m. in Colby Park, Windsor Heights (behind Wal-Mart) and joins with the Waukee (RRVT) group at 8:00 a.m. at the Raccoon River Valley Trail trail-head in Waukee. Training rides continue each Thursday and Saturday through the week of July 13th. The RAGBRAI training rides will be headed by ride leader Joe Laslo and others, there will be training plans and schedules available! Questions? Call Jack @ 306-7946 or jack@jackmathews.com. DMCC RAGBRAI Training Plan This year DMCC member and cycling coach David Ertl is providing members with a training template to help guide you through training and preparing for Ragbrai. Many of you are veterans and know how to train properly, but if you have never done it, or wished you were in better shape for it, this plan might help. Here's how to use it. This chart shows suggested training mileage building up to Ragbrai. It has two weekdays and two weekend days listed. With just four days of training a week, it's possible to get in good shape to be able to ride an enjoyable RAGBRAI . This plan builds up mileage in a systematic fashion with a couple of weeks where it backs off, then builds up to 150 miles two weeks before RAGBRAI begins. The week before RAGBRAI should be easy to allow you to fully recover and be fresh for the ride. Don't worry, you won't lose your hard-earned fitness in one week! If you can work up to 150 miles in a week, you will be able to comfortably ride RAGBRAI . That's because this plan has you building up to 70 miles for your longest ride. This will allow you to ride 80+ miles during RAGBRAI when you have all day to ride. This plan is meant to be a guide, not a hard and fast rule. If you can't ride four days a week, and can only ride thee days, adjust the mileage – the main thing is to aim for the weekly total and try to get the longest day in as suggested. If you need to switch around days of the week, that's fine. And, if you can get in more days, that�s great. Just don't build up to fast – try to increase your weekly mileage no more than 15-20 miles per week max. In addition to the miles, be sure to find some hills to ride. Don't avoid them because you can't avoid them on RAGBRAI . Use hills to force yourself to work hard so attack them. This will not only make you stronger but give you more confidence when you see a hill on the horizon. Same goes for the wind. Use the wind as a training tool. Ride steadily and push into the headwinds and return home with the tailwind practicing your spinning. We'll have more training tips in future issues of the DMCC Draftlines. Ride on – David Ertl David Ertl is a USA Cycling Level 1 (Elite) Coach and new BIKEIOWA.com sponsor. He is lead coach with the DMCC/DMOS/Bike World Team and coaches individual cyclists. He is also an NSCA certified Personal Trainer and owns the 24/7 X-Press Fitness Center in Beaverdale. He is accepting new coaching clients and can be contacted at CycleCoach@Hotmail.com or at 515-689-1254.

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