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ride inside. joe friel with jim rutberg. velopress softback 200pp £20.99

as a resident of a country apparently obsessed with the weather, i'm unsure whether other countries hold weather forecasts with the same level of suspicion as do we. and, it transpires, our lack of faith in britain's meteorological forecasts are often well founded, not only on the basis of frequently being doused with rain when the weather-girl said it would be sunny, but even a lack of cohesion between two forecasts from the same online provider.

i was already aware that this weekend, the winds across the hebrides were likley to be a bit on the sturdy side, but i admit that i gulped rather loudly when one member of the velo club sent me a screenshot showing gusts in excess of 120kph for sunday. having not quite seen that one coming, i checked the same forecast on the office computer, where it showed only 80kph winds at the same period.

but, as if that were not confounding enough, as i sat down to write this review, i took one more look to learn that at mid-day on sunday, islay will allegedly be strafed by winds gusting to a smidgeon under 115kph. i need not tell you that even idiots such as yours truly would not venture out in those conditions. that's not cycling, it's windsurfing.

and something else that i do not consider deserves to be categorised as cycling, is the fastening of a bicycle to some sort of smart trainer and pedalling like blazes, faced only with an ipad or tv screen. yet the weather conditions described above, would surely persuade the sensible to move indoors to the roads of watopia, away from the likelihood of being blown to another island.

assuming i can remain upright, i enjoy the great outdoors; the different seasons can make even the same roads week in, week out seem entirely different at each turn, coupled with the chance to ride with friends in 'real' life, endng with coffee at debbie's rather than a tassimo pod in the kitchen. however, i am well aware that even under the current covid-19 restrictions, i still have unfettered access to endless kilometres of cycling outdoors, and that my arrogance and apparent diffidence towards those who may not, is not my best work.

for some, either the weather conditions are unfavourable, time constraints are hardly designed to help, or there are restrictions on access to suitable roads. in cases such as those, and i don't doubt they affect more than just a minority nowadays, the advent of smart trainers, smart bikes and online training aids such as zwift and peloton have seemed like manna from heaven.

but i doubt that many who are in thrall to such velocipedinal technology are content simply to ride in front of a screen, marvelling at the realism of the computer animation playing out on their high-definition screen. once the initial novelty has worn off, it may be that some serious training needs to be accommodated. which is precisley where messrs. friel and rutberg enter the fray with their latest velopress publication 'ride inside'.

if i'm brutally honest, i fear the authors may have tried to sell the concept of indoor training just a tad too hard, with a sixteen page chapter providing succour to those who are yet to be convinced. perhaps the best argument for the whole concept is illustrated by the example of pro rider, matt hayman. in 2016, he broke his arm riding omloop het nieuwsblad in late february.

"Determined not to lose the fitness he had worked so hard to gain, Hayman rode more than 1,000km on an indoor trainer in his garage, while his broken arm healed. [...] After nearly six hours of racing [...] Hayman had enough left in the tank to capture the biggest win of his career".

few of us are likeley to be riding next year's paris-roubaix, so the above story might be a bit moot, but i'm sure we all get the author's point.

however, i think friel may be slightly optimistic that the modern cyclist has access to unused space in the house or flat in which to setup their new, state of the art training camp, and his emphasis on the damaging effects of the sun also seem just a bit over the top. "...a lifetime of long days out under the blazing sun can lead to skin damage and increase the risk of developing skin cancer." his reference to 'blazing sun' demonstrates that this book was hardly written for the scots. and with some turbo trainers hardly the masters of discretion when it comes to noise, there's always the forbearance of other residents with which to contend.

there is recognition that, when it comes to making space for a future of indoor pain and suffering, not all riders are created equal. "Some athletes have elaborate 'pain caves' with widescreen TVs, high-powered fans, and racing mementos hanging on the walls for inspiration. Then there are riders who carved out a little space in the garage or living room, with enough space to perch a laptop nearby."

that said, presuming no real need to preach to the converted, the training precepts offered by friel and rutberg are more than likely to have you step out the door each morning, evidently fitter than you were the morning before. i believe the continued emphasis that riding indoors is perfectly acceptable in modern society, seems a bit unnecessary; if you've read as far as page 85, when the training programme actually begins, you probably need no more encouragement.

but the one thing over which the book has no control is that of the necessary equipment. as mentioned above, some indoor riders have access to state of the art, while others exist on the bare minimum. rather obviously, the difference between a debonair end to each session and looking like a squeezed out sponge, might well be a large fan pointing in the rider's direction. however, as with bicycles and apparel, those are hardly the responsibility of the book's authors.

in truth, the principles of cycle training remain the same or similar whether you're riding indoors or outdoors, but friel and rutberg are well enough experienced to accommodate any tacit differences that might exist. there are even sections on combining both indoor and outdoor training, as well as directions for the 'aging athlete' into which category i currently fall.

"It's not that competitive goals are less valuable to aging athletes or that specificity is less effective. It's that generalized conditioning is necessary to maintain the strength, mobility and balance to prevent injuries that would otherwise take you off the field of play."

if your intentions have been firmly nailed to the indoor mast, this could be the very manual that will make continued sense of it all. a bit like a new drum set, where random battering of every tom, snare and bass drum, gets tired quite quickly, once you've explored the nooks and crannies of watopia, what comes next? joe and jim are ready and willing to hold your hand, without once suggesting that you'd be better off outdoors in the wind and rain.

however, i'm sure i need not point out that i'm probably not their target customer, no matter what xc weather prognosticates for sunday lunchtime.

ride inside by friel and rutberg

saturday 31 october 2020