Variety is what makes your workout more fruitful and engaging. Runners, this is for you. Relieve yourself of monotony and start cycling indoors. Indoor cycling offers incredible benefits and is a certainly a way to enhance your running performance. If you want to run farther, faster and more safely, mix up your routine. Take a giant step out of your comfort zone and into the indoor cycling room.
Uphill, downhill, fast, slow, indoors or out, running works a particular set of muscles. The longer you run and the more miles you cover, progress will follow this much is inevitable. However, you increase your risk for both injury and burnout by sticking with the same movement day in and day out.
When you choose an indoor cycling class over running on occasion, you reduce your risk of injury in two ways. First, you are substituting a high-impact with a no-impact workout, giving your joints a break from the wear and tear. Second, the muscles worked on the bike vary from those used while running. Strengthening different (weaker) muscles in your body will provide greater muscular balance, resulting in reduced chance of running-related injury.
If your instructor is up on cross training, he or she will know how to gear the ride particularly to benefit the runners in the class.
So, how exactly does indoor cycling help runners outshine their competition? In each class, you will see a mixture of riding positions and cadence. The greatest benefit to a runner is riding at 90 RPM in a standing position. This is an incredible way to increase leg turnover. For many runners, increasing turnover is the single best way to improve race times.
The good news: there is no "dance step" to learn. If you don't see an outdoor cyclists doing it, you won't see it in an indoor cycling class. With flats and easier hills completed at an aerobic-level heart rate, your slow-twitch muscle fibers are developed, giving you endurance for long-distance running. The RealRyder® bike offers an extra dimension because the bike articulates, moving side to side you are also gaining the benefit of building your core muscle group and because of the flexible movement of the bike there is literally no stiffness associated with conventional stationary bikes.
As you push yourself on fast flats and steeper hills, you move to a more anaerobic heart rate and your fast-twitch muscle fibers are trained, providing a top rate sprinting advantage. Whether your goal is a 5K or a marathon, you will improve.
As athletes, we know races can be won or lost on mental strength alone. Indoor cycling supports the mind-body connection essential for success. Because you're in a predictable environment without the perils of the road, you learn to relax into a meditative and focused state despite physical challenge. Training your mind to be strong in the face of challenges will allow you to go full-force more easily, no matter what you're doing.
Credit: Laura Forman added specific methods and suggested apparatus
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