Coach Adam Pulford delivers actionable training advice and answers your questions in short weekly episodes for time-crunched cyclists looking to improve their cycling performance. The Time-Crunched Cyclist Podcast (formerly The TrainRight Podcast) is brought to you by the team at CTS - the leading endurance coaching company since 2000. Coach Adam pulls from over a decade of coaching experience and the collective knowledge of over 50+ CTS Coaches to help you cut throught the noise of training information and implement proven training strategies that’ll take your performance to the next level.
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A successful 100-mile ride is rarely the result of one thing going exceptionally well. It's what happens when your fitness, fueling, pacing, and execution all come together on the same day.
Coach Adam Pulford breaks down how much to eat and drink, why the opening miles should feel easier than you think, what to prioritize with one week versus six weeks to prepare, and how to use your training data to guide your effort.
And Adam's fourth piece of advice might be the simplest: bring your friends. Because 100 miles is usually faster, and definitely funner, with good wheels around you.
HOST
Adam Pulford has been a CTS Coach for nearly two decades and holds a B.S. in Exercise Physiology. He's participated in and coached hundreds of athletes for endurance events all around the world.
The mighty 100-miler. Some routes are flat and fast, others might have 10,000 feet of gain to them. Time segment racing over a longer distance is gaining popularity as well. And then there's the good old-fashioned 100-mile rip with your friends starting and finishing at a random coffee shop with donuts and espresso. Before and after, of course. There are many varietals to the ever-so popular 100-mile ride out there. But whichever is your flavor, there's four things I'll share with you today to help you nail your next 100-mile ride. Let's discuss.
The first thing is fueling. No matter how fit or unfit you are, come the day your best success will be found in fueling, how you eat and drink your way through the ride. Why? Because our bodies burn fuel and need hydration on long days. Real simple. Hydration and calories, primarily in the form of water and carbohydrates, give you energy all day, and choosing the right food stuff helps to prevent bonks, cramps, and crabbiness. One thing I remind my athletes often is the best nutrition plan doesn't work on a dehydrated gut. So start with your hydration plan first. 20 to 40 fluid ounces per hour is my broad recommendation for hydration intake. Yep, that's 600 to 1200 milliliters, which is about one to two short bottles per hour. If you're running bigger bottles, just be sure to know how much fluid is in them, such as a 750 or more, then run your calculations from there. Think of how to get that total fluid intake as first priority, then incorporate how that fluid plan involves your calories and electrolytes or your carbs and your salt. What works well for most cyclists is one bottle with sport drink, one bottle with pure water, then you add gels, bars, and whole food on top of that to get the total fueling game plan sorted out. But start with hydration, then plan your calories and electrolytes from there. I did a whole video on how to dial this in for any ride type, and that's called scalable fueling. And it walks you through how to scale up or down your intake of carbs, hydration, and other elements for easy rides, hard rides, and anything in between. Check it out in the description box below. And while you're down there, please hit the like button if you're enjoying this so far and maybe share this with that one friend that we all have that always asks for an extra gel on the long rides because they forgot to plan ahead. It's okay, we all have that friend. Now, in that video, I talk about fueling for performance days. And if your goal is to smash 100 miles and to do it well, that's a performance day. A high-level summary of fueling for days like this is to aim for the upper end of your fueling target, both in carbs and hydration, to have a good day out. That means, generally speaking, 60 to 90 grams of carbs per hour for most people listening to this, including that 20 to 40 fluid ounces of sport drink plus water that we already discussed. In that scalable fueling video that I just mentioned, I walk you through a process of how to know exactly what you need for your physiology based on past training and predictive modeling for these big days. 40 to 50% intake of output in kilojoules is what I use for my athletes to dial in their performance. Watch that video for more detail. Finally, electrolytes are important, but not as important as total fluid intake in carbs. So organize it like this, and I think you'll be on the right
track. There's a wide window of electrolyte intakes that are appropriate for training in racing, and you just need to know the truth behind it. The primary electrolyte that matters during training and racing is sodium, not potassium, not magnesium, not calcium, and certainly not trace minerals like molebdum or some bullshit like that that you hear from a wellness influencer. Straight up sodium. That is the main driver. In general, my advice is roughly 300 to 800 milligrams of sodium per hour. You can scale this up or down depending on the heat, humidity, or how cool the conditions are. More heat and humidity, you may find that more salt is better. In cool conditions, less. It's best to use trial and error here to see how your own body reacts in different conditions. And you do that through training throughout the year. And this is all part of putting it together for your best day. You can do sweat rate testing, but the most practical thing to do is use time-tested products from companies like Scratch Labs or GU Energy, which will have the proper amounts of carbs, salts, and calories so that you can play around with the exact ratios that you need for yourself.
Now, let's talk about the second thing. Pacing. If fueling is number one importance, I guess I'd rank pacing as 1A. Because if you start too hard or too fast, you'll fatigue, cramp, and quit, and you won't finish. Best advice here: don't start super hard. Don't get caught up in the typical bullshit of sprinting out of the parking lot and thinking that this is my time to shine. You want to get on wheels, draft, take your polls when you have to, but do a little less in the first hour than you think you should. And that will go a long way in having a good day. Pacing as well as nutrition should be sorted out in the months of training leading into the 100-mile day. I think that's common sense, but in giving advice to someone like you who may be listening to this on Tuesday in your ride is on Saturday, and your prep has been lackluster to say the least. Yeah, that's who I'm talking to here. For most, a hundred mile or could be four to six hours, depending on a number of different factors, including the climbs, wind, fitness, your fitness, that is, or lack thereof, size of the group or groups that you're riding with, heat, humidity, and if you actually know how to draft or not. And that's just to name a few. Pacing involves all of that. So it's hard to encompass everything here other than saying start a bit easier than you think you should. Aim for an RPE of around five or six out of ten for the first half of the whole ride. And then maybe periods of seven or eight in the second half as you know that you've got the energy to bring this thing home and avoid near-max efforts, and I think you'll have a lot of success out there. Look back on past long rides for power and heart rate data. Use that to check and guide you along the way. Normalized power and heart rate would be what I look for this. Check back on the past three long rides you've done and aim to match that or slightly under. Normalize power and average heart rate for those days. For most of my athletes, I also look at kilojoules per hour and use that as a pace guide too. Ride with normalized power displayed on your device, heart rate in kilojoules. Monitor this with rate of perceived effort throughout the day to dial in your pacing, starting less heart than you think you should, so that you can finish strong. And this is better than doing the typical I blew up at mile 60 sort of story. Anyone can blow up because they pay strong. Pace wisely, finish strong, and you'll feel a hell of a lot better about yourself and your effort that you gave. Finally, stop at the eight stations or plan a gas station stop or two. Stopping isn't a sin. It's part of a successful plan. Eat, drink, ride, repeat. Now let's talk about the third thing, which is training.
Now, this is a bigger topic overall, and I guess I think of it in two simple ways. Number one, short term. Number two, long term. In the short term, if you're listening to this like a week out from your event, there's no training that's going to help you for the 100 miler, other than keeping rides short, sweet, and getting extra sleep. So do less and you'll have more success. Long term. If you're listening to this and you have, say, six to eight weeks from your event, the good news is you have time to make a meaningful impact on your training. Progressive overload on your long ride is the place to start. 100 miles is a long way for most people. It's a long way for me. And there's an element of specificity that goes on into prepping for such a long ride. So in the weeks leading up to your event or your ride, you want to do a long ride on the day of the week where you have most time, which is for most of us Saturday. Then progressively add more volume to that in the weeks leading up to the event, save for the final week, of course, because that's when we're going to do less training to arrive fresh to the big ride. It's not only about volume, though, as some intensity is definitely going to help to develop energy systems, durability, and pacing for big rides like this. Threshold training is the best place to focus for most people listening. Why? Well, that is the best bang for buck in the way of a training effect. The glycolytic energy system is the most trainable energy system that we have in our bodies, meaning in a relatively short amount of time, we can increase it a lot. Translation In about six weeks of training, a moderately trained cyclist can actually increase their FTP by up to 8%. So that's an increasing your FTP by as much as 20 watts in a few weeks, which is going to be very helpful on that 100-mile day. If you're less trained, we could see even more of an increase in FTP in that same amount of time. So again, for those whose training has been hit and miss, maybe fitness is on the low side of things and you've got that long ride coming up here in six weeks, hit the gas at zone four for the intervals during the week and the long ride on the weekend, and I think you'll be right
on track. But what about if you're already pretty fit? You have a high FTP and you really want to smash this ride. I'd hit a block of View to Max training four to six weeks out from your 100 mile ride. Why? Because you'll want to raise your aerobic ceiling and train to go fast. There's a few good ways to increase your View to Max. And of course, I've done a video on that too. So check it out in the links below to get all the full details of how to do that. Once you do, you'll know more of what I mean by long steady intervals versus on-off intervals in order to increase your VO2 max. Either way, zone five and above, structured properly, will increase your VO2 max and make you fast for whatever you really want to do, including your fastest sentry. In six weeks, a serious recreational athlete can increase their VO2 max by 5 to 8%, experienced racers by maybe like 5%, and even elite athletes can increase your VO2 max by 3% in six weeks. This is the place to go to level up before race day. Long rides and FTP are more important than VO2 max in anaerobic intensities in broad terms when we're talking about these 100 mile ride days. But again, if you're already fit and you have the goals of getting on the podium or riding your fastest century, then a VO2 block leading up to the day is the way. Just make sure to keep the volume in the program in those six weeks so you don't lose any adaptation there. Now, you may have noticed that I haven't given you any example workouts or screenshots of uh training week or something like that. Nope, not this time. Instead, I'm just gonna give you the training.
Yep, that's right. You can get six weeks of training for free by heading over to Training Peaks and downloading programs that I myself have built specifically leading into smashing a hundred-mile ride. I built two programs. One is for the time crunched or less fit person where they need to focus on FTP and volume. The second one is for the more fit riders that want to level up and they already have an established base of high fitness and FTP. And I guess what you could do is just uh get both, and that way you have 12 weeks of training if you have the time to do it. Just put them together with a recovery week in between, good to go. I'll link to these programs below. And for the next six weeks of time from this recording that you're actually listening to this, you can get these programs for free. Because I want you to try these workouts in real life and see how effective they actually are. So go to the links below, pick the program that best suits you, use the code CTS to get them for free. Download them into your training peaks calendar, and you're off to the races. Well, some training first, of course, then the races or group ride or whatever you want to do. It'll make you fit. They won't be free forever, so do this this week if you can. But if you're catching this video down the road, they will always be there as a resource for you to purchase. Overall, the most important part of training is not only increasing your fitness and your ability in order to nail this 100-mile, but it's also in dialing in your pacing and fueling for the big day. You see, it's never just one thing. It's not just fueling, it's not just pacing, and it's not just training. It's a few important things done well. And together, that really makes the difference. Proper training forces, proper fueling during proper pacing for short rides, long rides, intervals, and knowing your athletic self so that you have an idea of what it will take to conquer this long ride and have your best day out. But wait, there's a fourth thing, right? Yes, there sure
is. My final piece of advice here is go with friends. Friends make you fast and it makes it fun. If you have time, gather your tribe. Get them together to sign up and commit because it's way funner together. Yes, that's right. I said funner. But tell me I'm wrong. If going fast with your best five to ten friends is less fun than going solo. I don't think so. At least for most people. No friends to go with? Yeah, I've been there too. And it's all good because you can find friends out on the road or the trails or wherever you're riding. Get to the event a little early, maybe talk to some people and see what kind of pace they're planning on doing and line up next to them. When the ride starts, everyone freaks out and forgets how to ride bikes for like 30 to 40 minutes. Super normal, super weird, by the way. Then it starts to settle into a better pace. Get on the wheels of those who aren't super sketchy. Ride with people who actually want to work together versus go surgy or attack or do some stupid race thing. Talk to others while you're riding and make friends while you work together. It just makes for a better day. And like we see at our CTS camps and race experiences that we put on, normally those friendships last for years to come, planning and doing more events down the roads together, which is super cool and super special, actually. Now that I'm just like saying these words out loud. And I guess I should tell you too to check out our CTS 2027 camp schedule because that's live now. An excellent way to learn from experienced coaches and meet cool, like-minded cyclists like yourself to do fun stuff on bikes with. Check that out too in the link below and find an adventure that works for
you. Finally, in closing, I'll speak to what I hear all the time about making it to an event or not. And that is excuses. Everyone has excuses not to go. But if this 100 miler is something that you've been training for, looking forward to, and your friends are going, don't let them down. Don't let yourself down. Maybe training wasn't perfect. Maybe you're nervous because this is your first century. Or maybe the last long ride didn't go as planned. Or maybe you had a home project that nuked the whole week of your training and now you feel like poop and there. Don't let your excuses get in the way. Just go. Send it and see if your excuses are still there when you get back home. They probably won't, because most of them are just in our head, trying to hold us back from real life. And maybe some of the excuses will still remain, but then you'll have learned that you don't have to be held back by the negative bullshit that goes on in our heads. Thanks again for watching, and we'll see you back here soon for the next one.
