Notes from a lazy randonneur

[Toshi Takeuchi]

The PBP 1200 km bike ride is in 2027, and if I am ever going to do it, it will be next year. My daughter offered to support me at the overnight controls by finding my hotel and carrying my extra provisions and clothes to the hotel. How can I pass that up?

With that goal in mind, what is the minimum effort I can put in and still have a comfortable and fun ride?

In the case of training, it's either time in the saddle or increased pain while you are saddled. You can look up the peer reviewed literature, but the ratio can be 4:1. That is, 30 minutes of painful intervals can be worth 2 hours of endurance riding.

Well, my only riding this year has basically been commuting to work and back. I have a 7.5 mile commute each way, and with ~900 feet of climbing on the way home, it takes about 45 minutes home. If I can achieve a 4:1 ratio, then a painful commute can be worth as much as 3 hours of moderate endurance riding.

So far this year, I did a 200k and 300k with basically nothing other than my commutes. 2026 was my 7th time doing the SFR Healdsburg 300k and it was my fastest time ever by nearly an hour!

What happened? Well, there was some luck involved, as there were no flats or mechanicals. My friend with whom I rode the 200k, 300k, 400k and 600k was much stronger this year and paced us quickly through the wind. However, I think my biggest difference is the use of a power meter and Garmin watch to do power-based interval training.

My Garmin puts me through the wringer several times a week. The hardest are the sets of 20 second, sprint intervals. However, doing the "threshold" interval of 15 minutes gets me home a full 5 minutes faster than my fastest previous time!

I think my body is learning to recover more efficiently from hard pushes, allowing me to go more quickly over rollers on the road without wearing out. The longer moderate power intervals help me put out more power on climbs without wearing out. You can do all out sprints without a power meter, but the moderate intervals are really helped by the power meter keeping me honest about exactly how much work I am doing.

I have a 400k in a few weeks. In order to prepare for that, I added a longer way home with an additional hill, but I am not planning on doing any weekend rides. By the end of the work week, my legs feel like I did an all day bike ride, so I feel good about using the weekend to recover my legs for the following commute week. I'll report back after my 400k and 600k in May. These rides should be enough for me to get registered for PBP next year...

Toshi in Oakland (RUSA 7220)

[Jim Schultz]

We were just talking about this in another discord server - I believe RUSA seems to think populaires are training for a 200K, which is a training for a 300K, and so on. My local RUSA club seems to think otherwise. We have a trio PBP finishers in the club, and maybe a handful of SR series completes. At least in our club, these folks are supplementing their near daily riding with big weekend rides in between - so for the 200K, they will have done the 125/150K as well as an additional 150K in between, then maybe another century/200K before the next 300K, etc. 

As this is titled "notes from a lazy randonneur", I suspect that may not be part of your training plan. I consider myself to be a somewhat fit, multi-sport individual, but I have found that by trying to do the bare minimum of commuting and maybe a halfway decently sized ride on the weekends is not enough as I get above 200K. I'm jealous of those folks who can ride 200/300 and be no worse for wear; I typically need a few days recovery. 

What is your nutrition regiment, btw? My issue is never remembering to eat/drink enough, even though I feel like I am slamming my mouth full of it. 

[Brady Smith]

I'm in a similar boat as Toshi when it comes to cycling. I have plenty of other things to do and a dog who needs to run 15-20 miles a week, so time on the bike is precious. The only times I get to ride more than 3-4 hours at one go are brevets or the occasional organized club event in my area. Zwift--and especially Zwift racing--has been essential in keeping my fitness up. Careful discipline during events is helpful as well. I don't have a power meter, but an HR strap has been a useful way of making sure my effort is where it should be. I didn't get that far into our brevet season last year, but I did do the Triple Bypass last July. Training was a mix of intervals on the trainer, as Toshi describes, and long, Z2 rides in the mountains. In the end, I was able to climb Loveland Pass (summits at 11,990 feet) while keeping my heart rate reasonably under control.

[Patrick Moore]

This is at least academically interesting, since I have no practical interest in riding anything more than a comfortable 50 miles, especially as I just turned 71. But I’d like to know if riding a fixed gear vigorously, especially in rolling terrain or against headwinds, might in a modest way approach interval training. At any rate, riding 40 miles on the Roadeo with 11 closely spaced gears and a freewheel is certainly no harder physically* than riding a brisk (for me) 20 mile out and back in a 75” gear with a strong headwind or 3/4 side wind.

* Including the aftereffects a day or 2 later.

On Mon, Mar 23, 2026 at 9:09 PM Toshi Takeuchi <tto...@gmail.com> wrote:

… In the case of training, it’s either time in the saddle or increased pain while you are saddled. You can look up the peer reviewed literature, but the ratio can be 4:1. That is, 30 minutes of painful intervals can be worth 2 hours of endurance riding.

[Ted Durant]

On Monday, March 23, 2026 at 10:09:48 PM UTC-5 ttoshi wrote:

With that goal in mind, what is the minimum effort I can put in and still have a comfortable and fun ride?

...

My Garmin puts me through the wringer several times a week. The hardest are the sets of 20 second, sprint intervals. However, doing the "threshold" interval of 15 minutes gets me home a full 5 minutes faster than my fastest previous time!

Dude, that is definitely not lazy. Intervals are physically and mentally the most challenging thing you can do, and science says the payoff is huge, as long as you're giving yourself sufficient time to recover. All of the brevets I did, up to 600km, were during my working career and, like you, most of my miles were commuting, a similar distance as you, but minus the lovely 900' climb. Having not done a 1200k, I can't offer personal experience, but I believe if you can do a 600k without undue suffering, then a 1200k is definitely within reach. I felt like 300k was the threshold at which I really started to experience issues that never appeared at shorter distances. For me, it is entirely about fueling at this point, having dialed in bike fit, saddle, pedals, and shoes. Having the speed workouts in your legs should give you the luxury of riding at a manageable pace and staying well within the time limits. 

Keep us posted!!

Ted Durant

Milwaukee, WI USA

[Toshi Takeuchi]

Hi Jim,

I've basically been doing no long rides in between my brevets and it's been working for me, but I have been riding really hard on my short commutes, which I think is key to this strategy.

This is my 19th year of doing endurance rides 200 miles+. For the first 16 years of this riding, for 100% of the rides, there was at least 1 time in the ride where I asked myself, "Why am I so stupid? What am I doing on this ride?" So there was at least one point in the ride where I was miserable.

For the last three years, not once did I have this reaction. What was the key to smooth, enjoyable rides for me? It is riding slower than my fastest tolerable pace. How did I achieve this?

1. Ride with someone who is slightly slower than you. You get the camaraderie and you never feel pushed.

2. Ride with someone who is stronger but is willing to push less to ride together. I've ridden with many kind friends who will slow pedal for a bit while I catch up on climbs. The worst thing you can do in this situation is go too hard on the climb to keep up with your friend, and then lose your legs and go really slowly on subsequent climbs. I make sure to stay very moderate on climbs to keep legs for the remainder of the ride. 

3. Ride alone until the pace sorts itself out and you find someone who is well matched with your pace. The #1 mistake, which I have made many times, is to get too excited and go too fast at the beginning. Now, I go into the ride with the mindset that I can ride on my own at my own pace and it's ok if I get "left behind". I've always been fortunate to find riders at a similar pace as nightfall comes. There's a willingness and interest in riding together in a group at night for safety and companionship.

4. Keeping fed. Some of this must come from experience--what tastes good when you are tired from riding all day? In order to eat well, I have found that my pace and level of effort needs to be in a moderate zone. If I go too hard, my stomach gets uneasy. For my first 600k I went too fast and got gastric reflux and had stomach trouble. The longer the ride, the more religiously I stick to my comfort zone, and the easier it is to eat more types of food.

I do a mix of powders for my bottle and real food. I have a homemade perpetuem powder: (375 g maltodextrin, 83 g whey or soy protein, 42 g soy or sunflower lecithin)

When I get tired of this mix, I also drink this sweeter version with fructose and citric acid. I think of it as a homemade skratch labs long-distance version: 360g maltodextrin, 60-180g fructose, 6-18 g citric acid. I found that 120g fructose and 12 g citric acid give a good sweetness and sourness consistency, but you can adjust to your own taste. (It will also depend upon how many scoops you put in your bottle too. I usually use 2-3 scoops worth for 24 oz)

I love my rice rolls: rice, eggs, chicken-apple sausage + soy sauce to taste, wrapped in seaweed (or plastic wrap/aluminum foil if preferred), skratch lab recipe adds sugar, but I don't use it.

When the rice rolls run out, for me: salted mixed nuts and Lara bars-unwrapped and placed in the top tube bag (unwrapping bars beforehand makes it easy to just grab and eat right away).  I made some good homemade date and nut bars, but for now, I just decided to buy Larabars and eat mixed nuts.

Any time I feel hunger coming on, I reach into my top tube bag and eat food. If it's not a good situation for eating, I will drink from my powdered mix bottle. I start the ride with 7 scoops of powder in one bottle, but refill with 2-3 scoops per bottle. Every stop light or opportunity, I will try to remember to eat food. 

I try to carry enough food to last the whole ride, so I can make very quick stops to just fill up my water bottle and go on. Minimizing stopped time is a great way to have an efficient ride (i.e. more sleep!!!)

Good luck!

Toshi

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[Toshi Takeuchi]

Hi Brady,

Congrats on your Loveland ride! Wow, a 12,000 ft pass. The elevation must be a crazy challenge. I hope you get some good weather on your brevets. I think you were unlucky last year...

Toshi

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[Toshi Takeuchi]

Hi Patrick,

I've never ridden a fixed gear bike, but have found that riding on rolling terrain is a natural form of interval training. That's assuming that for the flats, I'm going at an easier pace, and then as I go over the roller, I put in extra effort to get over the top, and then there is a relaxation as you roll downhill. Each roller gives a burst of increased effort.

Have fun!

Toshi