Off-season – What do pro cyclists do while on holiday?

Travel itinerary replaces training schedule

While Ide Schelling was chilling on a beach in Mexico, Max Schachmann was discovering Peru’s breath-taking historic sites and mountains. Giovanni Aleotti was also on the other side of the Atlantic, mixing business and pleasure. He didn’t just go sightseeing in San Francisco, he also completed some gruelling wind tunnel tests for team partner Specialized. Emu Buchmann and Patrick Konrad put their feet up in sunnier climes with trips to the Maldives and Abu Dhabi respectively. Jordi Meeus spent his break on Ibiza, diving, cliff jumping and playing golf with friends and colleagues from the peloton, before attending an ‘El Clasico’ football match in Barcelona. Cesare Benedetti in Poland and Ben Zwiehoff in Germany also had the pleasure of watching lively games from the stands. After that, a city trip to Copenhagen was next on Ben’s itinerary.

Why roam far away from home...

...when good stuff is on your doorstep? Whether it’s Patrick doing some gardening, Cesare visiting the zoo, Nils Politt cooking with his BORA or Lukas Pöstlberger wandering his local mountains, there’s no shortage of relaxing activities to do at home. Plus, their family and close friends are always there, and they only rarely see them during the season. This allows them to really unwind and switch off mentally and physically, without getting itchy feet. But pro cyclists need to stay on top of their game, even when they’re on holiday, and to do so, they like to ditch the bike and take up other sports. Popular activities include tennis and climbing, and for the riders who live in the mountains, hiking and trail running are also favourites together with skiing and ski touring. Many pro cyclists have discovered ski touring in recent years; it complements cycling training perfectly. Riders who can’t do without their bikes go for leisurely rides around with friends, where there’s no pressure to perform, or they take their mountain bikes out to have some fun away from their usual training routes.

As soon as one season is over, the next begins

The off-season period is important for both mind and body. Dan Lorang, Head of Performance at BORA – hansgrohe, likes to talk about a ‘mental battery’ that every rider needs to recharge fully so that they can give the best possible performance in the next season. Each rider needs to use their experience and intuition to determine when their mental battery is fully charged; it is not something that the coaches can measure. A pro cyclist doesn’t have to think hard about what they’re eating on holiday, which also helps relax their mind. It’s not uncommon for them to put on two to four kilos during this period, and that’s part of it. But it’s not just their mind that they need to rest, they also have to recharge their bodies. Dan explains: ‘Physical fitness wanes during the off-season period. The heart’s stroke volume decreases, muscles lose strength, and there is a significant drop in mitochondrial function’. However, the time off is essential for recovery as this is the only way cells and the nervous system can fully regenerate. Light exercise of four to six hours a week also supports this recovery process. All good holidays must come to an end, though. The riders need to complete around 12 weeks of regulated training before the first race of the new season. During this period, the coaches perform a comprehensive check of the riders’ current condition, but not at the start – they check it after the first few weeks of casual training. They then use this as a basis to plan the following weeks up to the start of the season, enabling the BORA – hansgrohe guys to be back in top shape for the next year’s races so they can give it their all. And it’s all thanks to the off-season recharge!