cycling vs muscle building

Based on your description of a low intensity ride to work you can potentially make muscular gains depending mostly on your genetics.

You can get away with short high intensity training and still put on lean muscle mass.

The longer more endurance types of rides are what may cause a problem with gaining lean mass.

A lot of it will depend on nutrition.

Depending on your goals you could cycle your training.
For example you can use the summer months to have a training program that may be to keep you leaner and then the winter months back off the longer rides and bulk up a little more. You can derive training programs for all kinds of goals.

Just keep in mind that genetics and nutrition plays a very dominant role in meeting objectives, but with that in mind drive toward the goal anyway because you never know the results unless you give it a good try.

Felt_Rider said:

Based on your description of a low intensity ride to work you can potentially make muscular gains depending mostly on your genetics.
...
A lot of it will depend on nutrition.

nutritional mistakes to date - 2 no-brainers.

(1) bi-weekly binge drinking. To keep stable weight, weekdays have wound up being negative energy through added cycling/running.
So far so good, keeping excell-generated pictures in mind i can still enjoy a social life on an amount of alcohol thats not a problem..

(2) probably overdoing protein (hence underdoing carbs) - 'instinctive eating' based on wanting regular protein - rather than following a calculated diet.

Solving these 2 problems over the past 2 weeks ( comparing to 6weeks data ) has definitely caused a change which is why i'm suddenly enthused.

genetics, i'm definitely a natural Ectomorph but have seen definite improvements in the past (with those mistakes..). I've never had controlled weight gain just accidental.

I believe you see the results for yourself.

The two adjustments that you made had positive results.
Imagine the more you fine tune the better it gets.
You are also correct results improve motivation.

Best wishes

some things about muscle building:

http://clearcell.org/

it can really help! 😎

What are we talking about as far as building muscle? I re-entered cycling this year after close to a twenty year absence to try to lose some weight. At the same time I wanted to maintain my muscle mass in my upper body. So far, I have lost close to twenty pounds, and almost all of it in my waist. I have lost some size because of cutting down on fat percentage, but I still have a good taper wearing 32 or 33 inch waist pants with a 50 jacket.

The key is to not work out your muscle groups too often. I use a 4 day split with the 4th day cardio work. At this point my bike riding is basically confined to weekends as my schedule dictates this. On weekends I ride both days, moderate pace (15 - 17 mph) for 20 - 50 miles per day. I am 47 years old.

Supplement with Glutamine and try micellar Caesin too!

I don't think commuting 2x9 won't really reduce your ability to gain lean muscle unless you are not eating properly. It should help keep you lean.

Supplements are good but you need to make sure you get enough calories and more importantly protein in a proper diet for muscle recovery and growth. roughly for every kg of lean bodyweight you need to consume over 2gms of protein per day.

Example if you weigh 70kgs you need about 140gms or more per day.
Your digestive system can only digest about 30gms from one meal over two hours.
160gms/30gms = 4.66 meals. lets say 5 protein meals a day minimum.

Approx 100-120gms of Steak, Chicken breast/ Turkey, Tuna etc will give you about 30gms protein.

In the old days for me at 85-88kgs I found that 6 meals of meat made me too bloated. I prefered having 3 solid meals, breakfast, lunch, dinner, in between 3 times a day whey protein shakes. I just got into the habit so it wasnt really like a diet for me but just the way I ate.

Resting is important between training the same muscle group again to give your muscles time to grow. I never really trained the same muscle group twice within 5 days or 3 times a fortnight.

the bi weekly binging no problems your body will burn it away, being fit you should recover from it quickly. I geuss you need to find the balance of having fun and training.

Felt_Rider said:

You can get away with short high intensity training and still put on lean muscle mass.

The longer more endurance types of rides are what may cause a problem with gaining lean mass.

A lot of it will depend on nutrition.

indeed. the key time period is about an hour. after that the level of the hormone cortisol rises to a level where it has a catabolic action on muscle tissue as a means for the body to partially fuel the ongoing high intensity exercise demand being placed upon it. for very long rides, as muscle glycogen levels start to fall, protein (lean tissue to an extent) can make up to as much as 20% of the energy source for the exercise, compared to the 5% when glycogen levels are high.
furthermore, sustained high intensity endurance exercise simply bruns alot of calories. when you consider that to put on one pound of muscle you have create a calorific excess of 2500 calories, staying that calorie positive may be hard for long distance high intensity cyclists. this is another reason why ther may find it hard to build lean muscle mass.
nutrition is important too. firstly, weight trainers need 1.7grams protein/ kilo body weight, so ensuring enough protein is in the diet is vital. however, as someone else mentioned, don't be over-obsessed with protein as it can cause under-intake of carbs. it is vital to replenish glycogen properly after exercise (immediately after but also for hours hours afterwards too- it can take as long as 20hours sometimes to fully replenish muscle glycogen) as otherwise when the next cycling session comes around muscle glycogen levels will start off partially depleted meaning a low level of glycogen will be reached sooner, and so therefore also the point at which protein becomes a bigger player in fueling the exercise.

alex. 😉

Even bodybuilders do cardio fairly regularly, just don't overdo it and you will be fine.

This subject is of interest. I've been trying to convince my SO to take up cycling, but her concern is with the potential muscle build-up in her legs. So I certainly like to confirm if long distance endurance riding is the best thing to gain that nicely toned legs without excess bulk. 😎

dupe :eek:

ebola said:

( i'm sure this sort of thing has been covered before but.. i'll ask here )
After getting into the habit of counting calories & tracking trends, keeping graphs of progress in mind giving me the motivation to control my weakness - Alcohol - I'm quite curious to have a serios attempt at gaining some lean mass. ( but still want to enjoy cycling ! )

How much cycling would interfere with an attempt to gain non-cycling related muscle.

What types of riding would be most catabolic.

e.g. if you are still calorie posative, is cycling at low intensity for 2x9 miles (commuting) really going to breakdown ?
( I've typically done all my morning commutes pre-breakfast on an empty stomach as a stay-lean strategy, actually starting the day with breakfast is proving helpfull.. )

There's a gym next to the office, and a gym en route.. the commute ride could be a warmup / cooldown from a weights workout...

Are there ways to blend the two, e.g. 'more longrides when trimming down', 'focus on sprinting / intervals / hill-climbing when trying to build'.

Has anyone had success doing this.

Ebola, I'm a cyclist/weight lifter cross trainer. It can be done, but its tricky.

Like you are suggesting, I ride to the gym and then do weights. At the moment, I'm recovering from a flare up from an old shoulder injury and I'm doing weights 4 mornings a weeks mon - thur, 2 low weights high intenstisty and 2 traditional heavy weights. Sometimes a use a gym near work and on other days I use a gym on route and then finish the ride to work afterwards. At lunchtime I do yoga. Weekend is a long training ride(s) and/or a bike race.

OK, high quantities of aerobic activity will limit bulking, but how much bulk do you want? Isn't a better target to maximise your strength, while minimising your weight. Another dimension is usable strength, whats the point of being able to bench press your own body weight, if you die a death carrying 10 bags of cement around to the back of the house.

Nutrition. This is really important. Weight lifting is a 24 hour exercise, it consists of damaging muscles and repairing them. How much strength you can from the lifting is intringent with the repair process. Yes, as you know, protein is used to repair those muscles. However, don't just eat the protein in one hit. Have a bit at a time over say 6 times during the day, so for most thats the 3 meals plus 3 snacks, but something with protein in it, cottage cheese for example. Cycling nutrition, now when we go on those long rides, the body burns glyictrian (spelling?) thats stored with the muscles and then replaces the glyricitian (still wrong?) from either those calories you shoved down your throat or from fat stores. Sugar carbs is an easy way to recharge the glyritician ([censored] spelling), how much you need depends on your body type and the type of riding you do.

Schedule. You need to know your body really well, to know what you can do and how long it will take to recover. Separate days is a good way to start and has you become more exeperinced at it, you may begin to overlap the disicplines. In the end, only you can advise yourself.

Cheers, Mike.

sogood said:

This subject is of interest. I've been trying to convince my SO to take up cycling, but her concern is with the potential muscle build-up in her legs. So I certainly like to confirm if long distance endurance riding is the best thing to gain that nicely toned legs without excess bulk. 😎

Weiyum, did you see any chicks at Sutherland 7-11 servo with ugly legs? Sing her a ZZ-top song "she's got legs and knows how to use them" cheers Mike.

That reminds me, why don't you come to the gym with me on Monday morning and see that girl that can lunge almost as much as me. Her legs look like normal girly legs, but they pack a punch most boys could only dream of.

mikesbytes said:

Weiyum, did you see any chicks at Sutherland 7-11 servo with ugly legs? Sing her a ZZ-top song "she's got legs and knows how to use them" cheers Mike.

I know what you mean. I followed one up to Waterfall and was extremely impressed with the tone in those legs, hence the start of my discussion with my SO... :o Yet again, there are plenty of female cyclists with hugh quads... 😕

sogood said:

I know what you mean. I followed one up to Waterfall and was extremely impressed with the tone in those legs, hence the start of my discussion with my SO... :o Yet again, there are plenty of female cyclists with hugh quads... 😕

That would require a huge amout of exercise and genetics that permit that size to occur.

After all, I don't have a weight lifting body like the pacific islanders down at the gym, they have different genetics.

You tell her -> sporty girls rock. And send her out with Lindsay on Saturday Slowlies.

[font=Arial]Whether or not a girl gains bulk from riding will be quite influenced by what body type they are. (About body types: bodybuildingpro.combodytypeinformation.htmlOpen ↗[/font][font=Arial])

Most people are a combination of body types. If your SO is a bit mesomorphic, she may gain in the legs.

Personally, I have only *just* started to build up more visible muscle in my calves... after training on the bike four sessions a week over winter, and getting back into a 3-session week at the gym AND getting back onto an adequate protein intake for muscle building. But then I would consider myself a 70:30 ratio of ectomorphic traits to mesomorphic traits (I find it easy to build muscle in the upper body, but not the lower body, and have a classic female ectomorphic frame).

YMMV

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