Road Cycling Training Plan: Beginner to 100 Miles

What this plan does, and what it doesn't

From what we see in UK cycling. A typical British rider entering their first 100-mile sportive comes to it with two to four years of recreational riding behind them. The most common failure mode is not lack of fitness but lack of pacing discipline in the first 30 miles; riders who ride the first hour at conversational pace finish strong, riders who go with the lead group blow up by mile 70.

This is a 12-week plan that takes a rider who can already complete a 25 mile ride to the start line of a 100-mile sportive. By "complete" we mean ride 25 miles in two and a bit hours, finish without being broken, and feel ready to do it again the next weekend.

If you cannot yet ride 25 miles, do not start this plan. Spend four to eight weeks building to that base first. Three rides a week of 60-90 minutes each, mostly easy, until 25 miles feels routine. Then come back here.

What 100 miles in this plan looks like: a typical UK sportive between 6 and 8 hours rolling, with stops. Average pace 14-16mph. Two long stops at feed stations, occasional brief stops at junctions and for kit. The plan does not target a fast time. It targets finishing healthy, with energy to enjoy the cafe stop at the end.

What this plan is not: a race plan. If you want to race the 100 mile distance, the structure is different and would include longer threshold work, more climbing repetitions and a different taper. For most British riders, a sportive finish is the goal and that is what this plan delivers.

Equipment check before week one

Three things matter more than any training detail.

A bike that fits. Saddle height roughly 0.883 of inseam in cm, measured saddle to pedal at full extension. Reach so your back is at 45-50 degrees with hands on the hoods. If anything causes pain in the first month of training, fix the fit before you fix the training. Pain on a 100 mile ride is misery; the prevention is at week zero.

A saddle that fits. Most riders ride saddles that are too soft and too narrow. Get measured for sit bones at any decent bike shop (free service); fit a saddle that supports the bones, not the soft tissue. Specialized Power, Fizik Argo and Selle SMP are the three brands that work for the majority of British recreational riders. Budget £80-£150 for a saddle that lasts five years.

Bib shorts that fit. Cheap shorts are uncomfortable past three hours. dhb Aeron Lab, Castelli Endurance, Rapha Core or Gore C5 sit in the £80-£140 band and cover up to six-hour rides comfortably for most riders. Try them on; chamois fit is individual.

Reading the plan

Each week has four rides. Three weekday efforts and one weekend long ride. Total weekly hours rise from 5 hours in week 1 to a peak of 10-11 hours at week 9, then taper.

Intensity zones used:

• Easy: Conversational pace. Talk in full sentences. 60-70% max heart rate. The boring backbone.
• Steady: Working but not hard. 70-80% max heart rate. Three-sentence-burst pace.
• Threshold: Hard but sustainable. 85-92% max heart rate. Single-syllable answers only.
• Above threshold: Very hard, only used for short intervals.

If you do not have a heart-rate monitor, use perceived effort. The Rate of Perceived Exertion (RPE) scale of 1-10: easy is 4-5, steady is 6-7, threshold is 8, above threshold is 9.

Weeks 1-4: building the base

The job in the first four weeks is volume, not intensity. You are teaching your body to spend more time on the bike. Most rides are easy.

Week 1. Total 5 hours.

• Tue: 45 min easy
• Thu: 45 min easy with 4×30 sec strides (high cadence accelerations) in middle
• Sat: 45 min easy
• Sun: 90 min easy ride, ideally hilly

Week 2. Total 6 hours.

• Tue: 60 min easy
• Thu: 60 min easy with 6×30 sec strides
• Sat: 45 min easy
• Sun: 2 hour easy ride

Week 3. Total 7 hours.

• Tue: 60 min easy
• Thu: 75 min steady (last 30 min at steady pace)
• Sat: 60 min easy
• Sun: 2.5 hour easy ride, find some climbs

Week 4. Recovery week, total 5 hours.

• Tue: 45 min easy
• Thu: 60 min easy
• Sat: 45 min easy
• Sun: 90 min easy

Do not skip the recovery week. Adaptation happens during recovery, not training.

Weeks 5-8: introducing intensity

You have base. Now we add the harder efforts that make the long ride feel easier in week 12.

Week 5. Total 7 hours.

• Tue: 60 min easy
• Thu: 75 min including 3×6 min at threshold with 3 min easy between
• Sat: 60 min easy
• Sun: 2.5 hour ride, steady pace, hilly

Week 6. Total 8 hours.

• Tue: 60 min easy
• Thu: 75 min including 4×6 min at threshold with 3 min easy between
• Sat: 60 min easy
• Sun: 3 hour ride, last hour at steady pace

Week 7. Total 9 hours.

• Tue: 75 min easy
• Thu: 90 min including 5×6 min at threshold with 3 min easy between
• Sat: 75 min easy
• Sun: 3.5 hour ride, hilly, steady to threshold on the climbs

Week 8. Recovery week, total 6 hours.

• Tue: 60 min easy
• Thu: 60 min easy with 4×30 sec strides
• Sat: 60 min easy
• Sun: 2 hour easy ride

Weeks 9-10: peak weeks

The two biggest weeks of the plan. Long Sunday rides build the durability needed for 100 miles.

Week 9. Total 10-11 hours.

• Tue: 75 min easy
• Thu: 90 min including 4×8 min at threshold with 4 min easy between
• Sat: 90 min easy
• Sun: 5 hour ride, target 60-70 miles, steady pace

Week 10. Total 11 hours.

• Tue: 75 min easy
• Thu: 90 min including 3×10 min at threshold with 5 min easy between
• Sat: 90 min easy
• Sun: 5.5 hour ride, target 70-80 miles, steady pace, practise nutrition

The Sunday ride in week 10 is your "dress rehearsal". Eat and drink the way you plan to on event day. Take the kit you will take. If something doesn't work, you have two weeks to fix it.

Weeks 11-12: taper

The biggest mistake at this stage is ignoring the taper. Your fitness is built. The next two weeks are for recovery so you arrive at the start fresh.

Week 11. Total 7 hours.

• Tue: 60 min easy
• Thu: 75 min steady
• Sat: 60 min easy
• Sun: 3 hour ride, mostly easy, last 30 min at steady to remind the legs

Week 12 (event week). Total 4 hours.

• Tue: 45 min easy
• Wed: 30 min easy with 3×30 sec accelerations
• Fri: 30 min easy spin
• Sat: rest or 20 min easy ride
• Sun: event

Nutrition during the plan

Rides under 90 minutes: water is enough.

Rides 90 minutes to 3 hours: 30-60g carbohydrate per hour and 500-750ml water per hour. A flapjack and a banana per hour, plus water with electrolytes, covers it cheaply. Or sports gels and bars (SiS, Maurten, High5, around £1.50-£3 each).

Rides over 3 hours: 60-90g carbohydrate per hour and 750ml-1L per hour. This is the rate at which most riders fail; the legs run out and the brain fogs. Practise the higher rate on long training rides, not on event day. The gut has to adapt.

Recovery: within 30 minutes of finishing, eat a meal with protein and carbs. A normal meal works. Do not buy expensive recovery shakes; they are not better than chocolate milk.

The week before the event: eat normally. Do not "carb load" beyond your usual diet. The cliché 1980s carb-load meal of pasta the night before is overdone; one meal does not change your glycogen stores significantly.

The morning of the event: porridge with banana and honey, three hours before start. Coffee 30-60 minutes before start. Bottle in hand at the start line. Not breakfast cereal; the milk-and-cereal combination causes more upset stomachs at sportives than any other food.

Common errors during the plan

Riding harder than the plan asks for. Tuesday and Thursday are not race days. Easy means easy. Slower than the rider next to you. Slower than feels comfortable. The intensity weeks ask for hard efforts; the easy days are easy. Without genuinely easy days, the body never recovers and the hard days never get hard enough.

Skipping recovery weeks. Weeks 4 and 8 are not optional. Riders who skip them break down in week 9.

Adding extra rides. If the plan says four rides, ride four. A "small extra" Saturday-evening ride to "top up the legs" is the most common way to wreck the plan.

Not riding hills. Hill training builds power that flat riding does not. Find a 3-5 minute climb near you and use it for threshold intervals from week 5.

Skipping the long ride. The long ride is the most important ride of the week. Move other rides if you have to but never the Sunday long.

Trying new kit on event day. New shoes, new saddle, new bibs, new energy gels: all on a long training ride first. Event day is not for experiments.

Event day

Eat breakfast three hours before the start. Caffeine 30-60 minutes before. Arrive an hour early, register, find the toilet (queues build), warm up for 15 minutes if you can. Most British sportives roll out gently; you do not need a long warm-up.

Pace the first 30 miles slower than feels right. Conversational. The temptation to ride with the fast group early is strong; ignore it. Riders who go too hard early walk the last 20 miles.

Eat 60g of carbs per hour from mile 10. Drink one bottle per hour. Use feed stations: stop, refill bottles, eat real food (cake, sandwiches, bananas), use the loo, go. A two-minute stop saves an hour later by preventing a bonk.

The middle 30 miles are where most people lose focus. Stay engaged. Talk to other riders, look at the scenery, count something. The body is fine; the mind drifts.

The last 25 miles will hurt. Everyone hurts. The riders who finish well are not the ones who hurt least but the ones who keep eating and drinking through the discomfort. Discipline beats heroics.

Cross the line. Eat the cake at the finish. Ride home, or get a lift. Legs will be flat for two to three days. After that you will want to do another one.