Review: Fast After 50

 Pierre, who's a much stronger and faster cyclist than I'll ever be (it takes him less than 5 days what it takes me 3 weeks of daily cycling to do) recommended Faster After 50 to me. I checked it out from the library.

The book's by Joe Friel, the author of the various editions of The Cyclist's Training Bible. Like that other book, the emphasis is on single day races rather than being able to sustain a steady pace of touring for 3 weeks, so it is of limited use for a touring cyclist.

For an aging cyclist, the emphasis in the book is on increasing intensity of training as the key to staving off the inevitable power and VO2 Max loss that comes about with the passing of years. The evidence and studies he cites is convincing and believable. It's obviously in defiance of the current trend of saying that zone 2 is best, or the niko niko running trend. Study after study cited by Friel in this book shows that long slow distance leads to weight gain, reduced VO2 Max and Strength, and correspondingly lowered quality of life.

Of course, the problem with aging is that increased intensity also brings about risk of injury, which can set you back far more than the less intense approach. In fact, near the end of the book Friel says that he adjusted his diet, and upped his intensity and dramatically improved his fitness only to crash and break bones and that set him back quite a bit.

Nevertheless, the book discusses what Friel considers to be a safe approach to increasing intensity with caution and a safety margin. It also mentions that runners end up cycling a lot as they age because of the reduced injuries associated with cycling vs running. (One contributor to the book mentioned that as much as 60% of her training time as a runner was spent cycling)

A small part of the book focuses on recovery (you need to sleep and stop using an alarm clock) and diet (less carbs, more protein is the recommendation). There's specific programs in the book on how to train for a specific set of events as well as how to adjust your training as life intervenes and derails you.

Hm... I might have summarized the book well enough for you to not need to read it. But it's not as bad as his other books would lead you to believe.