I also do strength work including squats and dead lifts before most runs and out door rides. My primary focus is injury prevention, as most of the strength work is for swimming/running. I do it at that point because of routine, and have had no major injuries, (touch wood) since doing them for more than a year. Not having injuries also improves performance IMO, regardless on any effect on the subsequent workout. Note my routine is not crazy heavy, but targeted to preventing prior musculoskeletal issues.
I donāt want to try to speak for everyone here, but I have an aversion to false equivalence 
so I donāt think the opposing points are of equal weightā¦While there is marginal benefit to lifting before a hard bike session or time trials there are major benefits to separating the workouts by 4hrs (endurance focus) to 24hrs (strength focus).
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My take on that research was that it was looking into strength training as a primer for a TT - so a bit like a pre-race leg opener? So the answer isnāt necessarily applicable to quesiton here ie the optimal time to add regular strength training into an overall training routine / plan.
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Iāve been lifting seriously for 3 years and riding seriously for 10+. It took me a long time to learn the proper balance between the two. You really do have to prioritize what you are trying to accomplish. Each workout sends different signaling to your body. If you squat first then ride. Your squat will be strong but then if you follow it up to closely with a ride you will counter the signal you gave your body when you lifted. You will have very little progress in the strength department because you cancelled the strength signal with the ride and your recovery will not be effective for strength gains. Your bike workout will also be compromised because you will be fatigued from the strength training so any gains from the ride will also be minimalā¦If you ride first and then lift the signaling does the same thing but in reverse. Basically no gains but a substantial amount of fatigue. You wonāt make progress and more likely youāll loose on both strength and cycling.
The best scenario is strength first followed by rest (5 - 6 hours) before a mellow aerobic ride. Even better is strength one day bike the next. This has worked best for me. Iāve made great gains both in strength and cycling by doing this. However, Iām cursed with a more is better mentality and when I try to do both in the same day it NEVER works. I find myself with a ton of TSS, fatigue, and No gains.
I wonder if the strength training is hard enough to facilitate adaptation or is it just enough for activation? Then when the cyclist gets on the bike proper muscle signaling has already been established. My experience is heavy lifting compromises my cycling workout for the day.
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Look here
Some abstract:
Science-Based Recommendations for Training to Maximize Concurrent Training
Using the molecular information provided in Sects. 2ā5, some simple nutritional and training strategies can be devised to maximize the adaptations to concurrent training. The goal of these recommendations is to maximize the mitochondrial adaptation to endurance exercise and the muscle mass and strength adaptation to strength training. To do this, the following could be recommended:
- Any high-intensity endurance training sessions should be performed early in the day. Then, a period of recovery of at least 3 h should be given, so that AMPK and SIRT1 activity can return to baseline levels, before resistance exercise is performed. This suggestion is based on the fact that AMPK activity increases rapidly and then returns to baseline levels within the first 3 h after high-intensity exercise [63], whereas mTORC1 activity can be maintained for at least 18 h after resistance exercise [8, 9].
- Resistance exercise should be supported by readily digestible, leucine-rich protein as soon as possible after training to maximize leucine uptake [64], mTOR recruitment to the lysosome [29], and protein synthesis [25]. Since, in this scenario, resistance exercise is performed later in the day, it becomes even more important to also consume protein immediately prior to sleep to maximize the synthetic response overnight [65].
- Fully refuel between the morning high-intensity endurance training session and the afternoon strength session since AMPK can be activated by low glycogen [66], and SIRT1 is activated by caloric restriction [38]. If it is not possible to refuel completely because of the training volume and intensity, it might be best to reserve a portion of the offseason (and short periods in season) exclusively for increasing muscle size and strength and then use higher dietary protein intakes to maintain that muscle mass as the aerobic load increases through the season [67].
- To improve the endurance response to lower-intensity endurance training sessions and provide a strong strength stimulus, consider performing strength training immediately after low-intensity, non-depleting, endurance sessions. Performing a strength session immediately after a low-intensity endurance session results in a greater stimulus for endurance adaptation than the low-intensity endurance session alone [68] and the low-intensity session will not affect signaling pathways regulating strength gains [51ā53].
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Is there a way to change up/break apart some elements of your strength work? For example, Iāll do bodyweight squats for explosive speedāsometimes adding a jumpāwhile brushing my teeth with my electric toothbrush that is timed at 2 minutes. Over time Iāve pushed from doing 60 squats in those 2 minutes to doing 90 (while maintaining form), and my legs definitely feel like they get a good challenge. Maybe thereās a similar way you can sneak bits and pieces of your workout in?
I do a moderate hour workout directly after my squat session (I have a squat rack in the garage with my turbo trainer). I would prefer not to but I find it less stressful to do such a workout immediately after, rather than the following days when my legs are often sore with DOMS. I also have found that if I do the workout, my DOMS is lessened.
I would say that Iām not squatting quite as much as I used to - i can barely do 110kg for reps these days, whereas I used to have no problem doing 120kg and beyond. I canāt say whether this is due to doing more TrainerRoad than I used, my age (45 in a few weeks) or both. I do know that, when I couldnāt do any weights last year, I got up to my highest ever FTP (303 tested inside, 321 calculated out). When I got my weights and started doing squats again, Iāve struggled to maintain both the level on the bike and with weights.
Hi Fstsven;
This might not be a popular response, but I personally wouldnāt even do both of things at the same time of yearā¦let alone on the same day.
I struggled for years to get better at everything simultaneously believing that I could continue to be a weight-lifter whilst becoming a triathlete. Itās just not feasible for me, and I suspect that all but the most gifted athletes are like this. The two energy systems work against each other and cannibalize potential gains. You already hinted at this yourself when you mentioned that when you do your squats early in the week it impacts your ability to cycle for many days afterwards.
To this day my biggest gains in any athletic endeavour have always come when I focus on just one activity and back WAY off on the others. I now structure my year this way. When I am working on a particular sport I work it 3-4 times a week with quality and condense all the other sports into just 2 days at maintenance intensity. Typically I do this in 3-4 month cycles.
It was initially a very hard transition to make as I felt that I would lose all the gains other sports and was afraid to take the riskā¦but this didnāt happen. It seems that maintaining gains is MUCH easier than making gains for me so I really had to learn emphasize quality and recovery when trying to make those gains.
In your case, this doesnāt mean that you stop doing squat. I like callemacodyās suggestion that you just do some body weight style strength training movementsā¦but without the goal of getting better at them while youāre focused on cycling. Then when fall/winter comes you can reverse this.
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Thanks for your honest answer; you may have a point. I feel that, for me at least, it is not possible to get progressively better at both activities. Before I started cycling I have competed in natural bodybuilding for years, and I thought I could keep working out, albeit at a lower level. However, I now feel it interferes too much with my cycling training (which is my priority now), at least at the intensities I am used to train at. So I have now decided to focus on cycling, forget about (resistance)training legs, and just do a few sets of push ups/pull ups a few times a week to hopefully maintain some strength.
I was going to suggest getting a 16 kg and a 24kg kettlebell and doing single-leg deadlifts, single-arm front rack squats, swings, and and overhead presses. You can do strength maintenance, some metabolic work with EMOM workouts, and do your pull ups/push ups, too. Itās a compromise, to be sure, but something worth looking into.
I donāt know much about cell signals but what I do know is that I did squats 2 days ago and my endurance ride yesterday and my sweet spot ride today were tough. Higher than normal RPE, high HR. I was able to finish them and it wasnāt killing me but damn it was harder than what it would have been without those squats for sure.
Whichever is a bigger fitness priority for you should be done first so you can do it at full intensity. If one isnāt a priority Iād do lifting second. Typically after a not-too-hard sweet spot session Iād be able to lift, but after lifting I doubt I could really cycle.
Nobody likes this answer, but it depends
Best advice I can give you is to ask yourself the following:
What adaptation are you looking to attain in your strength training?
If the adaptation you are looking to achieve in your strength training truly is strength ā or if it is Rate of Force Development (power) ā then CNS and muscular fatigue (the kind that come with, say, an indoor interval session) will make those adaptations nearly impossible. However, strength training ā which requires moderate-to-heavy loads, but low volume (1-5 reps; 75 to >95% of 1RM) will not leave you with as much relative fatigue that would impact your ride. That is not to say it wonāt leave you with any fatigue at all; but it is relatively low compared to doing a tough indoor session prior to lifting, which can make hitting the same loads under the bar next-to-impossible. Whereas, say, a 5x2 between 80 and 90% of your 1RM leaves plenty in the tank for the trainer, but still accomplishes a lot.
Now, if the adaptation you are trying to achieve in your strength-training isnāt strength and power, but rather just to look good or feel good, then CNS and muscular readiness wonāt matter as much, and the session can be done after a ride with little detriment.
Personally, I strength-train 3x/week M/W/F and I do that on my high-intensity indoor training rides.
I go from the lift right into my ride. I do it this way for a couple of reasonsā¦
- In order to do both in a day, I have to get up in the 4am hour, so those days are already more mentally taxing than the rest. So, why not go ahead and make these days my big or āhighā days
- To that end, I look to establish high and low days. In other words, I just try to stack all my bigger stressor ārocksā into one pile each of those days: a heavy lift, then a challenging ride, then off to work. Those are my āhighā days. Tuesdayās and Thursdayās become my āLowā days, with endurance or recovery zone rides, or even full off/rest days if I need to pull that lever. (Sat and Sun are reserved for rest, low intensity rides, or mashing on the mountain bike)
It may not work for you or for everyone, but this approach allows me to aggregate all my stressors into High and Low ābucketsā. And, as for the lifts themselves, I have tailored them to beā¦
(a) short (30 mins)
(b) focused on heavier loads with very low volume; OR low-load, high velocity movements. Either way, minimal fatigue accumulated before getting on the bike
(b) targeted toward only what I need with no room for fluff
Hope this helps!
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yup it depends.
I completed a weights session in the morning finished at 11am and later in the eve around 5:30pm i finished Baird which is a VO2 max 3.5
just sharing my observations are resuming focus on back squat while also trying to maintain some cycling fitness on the trainer. My TR schedule calls for mostly sweet spot stuff at the moment. Iām doing back squats 3x a week. Heavy but strength-only focused so in theory (i.e. no hypertrophy), my legs shouldnāt be that taxed for other workouts. But unfortunately, what Iāve found is that even a 36 hour break isnāt enough (i.e. lift ā 36 hours ā bike). Even on what should be moderate sweet spot workouts, my legs are just too tired, especially when doing climbing focused slower cadence intervals.
Iām finding it hard to motivate myself to bike and lift the same day but that seems like the only way to get in both without being too taxed to do one or the other. And it would have to be bike in the morning and legs in the evening.
Or I wonder if your legs will adapt over time? Anyone trying to do both right now?
The key to any consistent training is that todays workout must not jeopardise tomorrows workout.
I think the problem is that you are simply doing too much squatting volume per week. Iāve been able to balance heavy back squats with high volume TR plans but I only do one gym session per week, and that gym session is just 3x5 back squats plus a core workout. I do that right after the tuesday endurance ride. I used to only lift weights before I started cycling so my focus is on maintaining the weight I can lift rather than trying to make strength gains every week.
Cycling training is the priority for me, but at the same time I see a lot of value in squats and deadlifts for me, so Iāve been working back up to doing them regularly. Iām still at 2 sets of 10 reps each with the weight about a 5-6 RPE 2- 3x a week. Pretty manageable. And, I do these workouts directly after an interval workout, and never ever the day before. Iām working towards 2-3 days a week of 3 sets of 6 reps at a heavier weight.
Work up VERY slowly. Iāve found thatās the trick for me to not impact my cycling workouts. I canāt just lift the weights that I can without cycling in the picture.
Iām type of person who can put on leg strength very quickly, but am also susceptible to DOMS and at 46 I also just recover more slowly than I used to.
Iām 55 years old and do one set of Bulgarian split squats, dead lifts and deep squats after my hard cycling workout on Tuesday and Saturday. The rest of my cycling workouts are easy zone 2. Doing the leg work on the same day as my hard cycling work allows plenty of recovery time before my next hard cycling workout is scheduled.
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