How to enhance your cycling game when in quarantine
IMPROVE SLEEP HYGIENE
Where long work commutes may have once had us up at the crack of dawn, many of those now working from home have the luxury of an extra hour in bed. And without professional sport on TV at night, there’s a lot less blue light around to disrupt our circadian rhythm. It seems like the perfect time to hone one of the most critical factors in recovery, our sleep hygiene. It’s important because when we sleep better, we also recover faster.
There’s no big mystery around how to improve sleep. For many, it comes down to eliminating distractions and exercising the discipline to follow through with a plan, much like a cycling training program.
Here are several things you can incorporate into your new daily routines:
1. No caffeine in the afternoon or evening
2. Avoid screens late a night, as the exposure to blue light disturbs your biorhythms
3. Get some morning sun in your eyes
4. Consider natural supplements like magnesium, ashwagandha, or L-theanine to slow you down in the hours before bed
BUILD YOUR CORE
Despite being a vital element in a cyclist armor, core strength is often ignored among many amateur cyclists. With the extra time indoors, why not take the time to build some extra strength and address the imbalances of hours hunched over the bike?
Squats recruit the same muscles as cycling does. Start slow and increase the pace for more explosiveness.
This one is great for sprinters.
Plank is a dreaded pose among many cyclists. One useful variation for cyclists is to lift one foot off the floor at a time to activate the core muscles that help keep you stable on the bike.
Glute stretches help mitigate a condition that afflicts cyclists the world over, that of tight glutes.
Regular stretching here leads to a myriad of downstream benefits.
Lunges also help work the glute muscles. Just remember that the forward knee shouldn’t extend past the toes, and the opposing knee shouldn’t touch the ground.
EMBRACE THE DOWNTIME
For those with no energy left to train, but plenty of extra time to kill, why not meditate or treat yourself with a good cycling movie or read one of the countless cycling books. Why not use the time at home to clean and work on your bikes or to call an old teammate you used to hang out with?
With a little imagination, there are a myriad of things to do that may benefit you a lot more than being glued to a news channel in these trying times.
BOOST YOUR IMMUNE SYSTEM
In light of recent events, one of the best things everyone can do is to boost their immune system. While lowering stress levels and improving sleep will help, so too will optimal nutrition to give your body the essentials it needs to ward off sickness.
Deficiencies in protein and certain nutrients can result in a weakened immune system. Immune-boosting nutrients include the vitamins A, C, E, and B6, along with magnesium, zinc, and iron. Healthy portions of fresh fruit, vegetables, beans, lentils, nuts, and seeds, over sugar and refined carbohydrates will help ensure you’re primed to fight off any microbial invaders.
It’s also important to drink plenty of fluid, something that will increase saliva production and hence the antibacterial proteins within that fight off airborne germs.
Leave in the comments interesting or fun things you do while social distancing.