Cross training provides a plethora of benefits to our mental and physical fitness:

• Maintains cycling endurance and speed.
• Shifts focus from non-weight bearing to weight bearing activities. This is particularly important for those of us over 30 who have desk jobs and live otherwise sedentary lifestyles. Lack of weight bearing activities causes a loss of bone density.
• Shifts focus from repetitive motion activities to speed, agility, and coordination activities like basketball, soccer, racquet sports, and skiing. This is important for developing youth and those of us who don’t develop core abdominal, back, and upper body muscle groups, those who develop imbalances from repetitive motions, and/or those who suffer from atrophy of non-cycling muscle groups.
• Builds core strength. Many cross training activities employ more diverse muscle groups and recruit muscle differently. You’ll find this out after doing them the first time!
• Brings competition, comradery, and focus to keep you from becoming a listless couch potato.
• Gives you a mental break from cycling.

The next paragraph lists some ideas for cross training activities. Find a combination that allows you to get a mental break from cycling while keeping fit. If you have a reasonable amount of cycling fitness now and you wish to build upon it for next year, you can maintain most of your endurance and leg speed by doing a couple rides per week. Two hours is the magic number for maintaining endurance so if you can get out for 2-4 contiguous hours once per week and 2 hours another time each week, you maintain virtually all of your endurance through the winter. If you throw in 1 hour of speed work once or twice a week, you will maintain that great spin you acquired last year. You can combine the workouts and only have to ride twice per week if you throw in some additional activities. See the sidebar for references to info and gear for the activities.

Commuting. This doesn’t sound much like cross training, but many find it invigorating to ride to and from work and errands without the pressure of training for a specific event. You also mitigate gas, parking, insurance, and maintenance costs, road rage, dependence on foreign oil, air and water pollution, and congestion!

Cyclocross Racing. Aptly named because “’cross” is perhaps the best form of cross training for road cyclists. It consists of racing modified road bikes on a trail, often with obstacles you must dismount to cross or run up. The Europeans started doing it to get in shape for the spring classics. Later in the season the trail often turns to mud and sometimes even snow and ice. Almost all ‘cross races have a mountain bike division for those who would rather use their mountain bike than their road bike.

Mountain Biking. Many of us own mountain bikes, but let them sit idle in the summer while the weather is nice for road riding. Fall and winter are good times to pull out the mountain bike to enjoy the great outdoors, especially with friends.

Indoor Cycling. Just about every gym has a spinning program. Most use fixed gear bikes. While the flywheel is usually too heavily weighted to help your spin as much as it could, it’s still a good, motivational activity you can do with other people and without getting cold and wet. Indoor trainers are great as well. The CompuTrainer is an exceptional tool because you can monitor your fitness with specific courses and power information under highly controlled conditions. Rollers are also great for your balance and spin. You’ll get the most of trainers or rollers if you set up a fan and TV to keep you cool and mentally occupied. Work up to an hour, but get off or move around occasionally to insure nothing gets numb.

Cross Country (Nordic) and Backcountry Skiing. There are two types of Nordic skiing, skating or freestyle and classic or diagonal. Both are highly aerobic. Nordic skiers record the highest VO2 Max values of any sport. Both require special skis, boots, and bindings. Skating is faster, requires a nicely groomed trail, and uses many of the same muscles as cycling. Classic racing more closely resembles running and is done in a groomed track. Classic touring can be done just about anywhere there’s snow. As most of you probably observed, both can be done on the bike trails with special roller skis. See the sidebar for references to some of the best camps and Nordic skiing in the country.

Inline Skating. Like skate skiing, inline skating uses many of the same muscle groups as cycling and you can do it indoors in the winter.

Running and Trail Running. If simplicity and quick workouts are your thing, running is a great activity. It’s great for your aerobic capacity, it’s a good weight-bearing activity, it exercises many of the cycling antagonist muscles, such as hamstrings, abdominals, and arms, and you can generally do it anywhere with minimal time and equipment.

Weights. You can pump iron to develop core strength, turn cycling weaknesses into strengths, and increase bone density. Some good basic exercises are squats, bent over rows, back extensions, bench press, hanging leg raises, crunches, dead lifts, and lat pulls. Start by doing 25 reps with light weight for a couple weeks to adapt and then go to 5x5 with heavy weights for strength, 3x10 with less heavy weights for power, 2x50 with light weights for endurance, and finally 2x10 with heavy weights to maintain. There are great core strength exercises you can do with a gym ball and many health clubs have aerobics, weights, and core strength classes.

Snowshoeing and Hiking. The former is just the latter in the snow, although snowshoe racing is gaining momentum. You can get a great workout while enjoying wonderful scenery for these weight bearing activities.

Swimming. This is a really great one to complement your cycling. It uses every muscle in your body, although it should be complemented by weight bearing activities. Winter is a good time to hone your skills for that triathlon you always wanted to try.

Team and Agility Sports. These are great for developing balance, coordination, and core strength. Try soccer, basketball, tennis, squash, racquetball, handball, football, snowboarding, and alpine (downhill) skiing to build comradery and get a break from cycling.

Cross Training will give you a much needed mental break from cycling, provide an opportunity to work on weaknesses for the next cycling season, and give you something to focus on to keep active during the holidays. Choose the combination that best serves your needs and desires. See the sidebar for references to various cross training activities and professionals to help you make the most of your time.

Cyclocross     http://www.marymoorvelodrome.org

Mountain Biking        http://www.bbtc.org/

Nordic Skiing  http://www.kongsbergers.org/, http://www.summitnordic.com/race/, http://www.torbjornsport.com/, http://www.fasterskier.com/, http://www.mvsta.com/, http://www.xcskiworld.com/

Nordic Skiing Camp    http://www.mvnordic.com/

Nordic Gear    http://www.winthropmountainsports.com, http://rei.com/, http://www.marmotmountain.com, http://www.ernordic.com/, http://www.reliableracing.com/

Inline Skating Info     http://www.wilsa.org

Inline Skating Gear    http://www.bont.com/, http://www.breakawayskate.com, http://www.cheapskater.com, http://www.worldwidesports.com/, http://www.breakawayskate.com

Running, Trail Running Equipment, free Stride Evaluation, CBC discount  http://www.footzonecapitolhill.com/

Running, Trail, Snowshoe Racing     http://www.are-you-nuts-trail-race.com/Frames-1.htm, http://www.snowshoeracing.com/, http://www.usatf.org/

Coaching       http://meinnovations.com