Uncategorized – Alastair Semple Coaching

Late Season Training: Making the Most of Your Final Push

Late Season Training: Making the Most of Your Final Push

It’s August in the UK, and the end of the racing season is fast approaching. Hopefully, you’ve been consistent this summer, maintaining your aerobic fitness between events and incorporating one or two structured sessions in each mesocycle. The good news? You may still have time for one last focused training block leading into your key events.

Timing Your Final Block

Most cyclists start feeling noticeably stronger and faster after 2-3 weeks of consistently hard training, with peak benefits typically appearing around 4-6 weeks. For those of you—like myself—who have one or two target events in mid-September and early October, we still have one opportunity to lift our fitness and race pace.

Two Paths Forward

Option 1: Late Season Peak (September/October Events)

If your key events are still 4-6 weeks away, you can commit to one final focused training block. This is your chance to:

Sharpen race-specific fitness
Fine-tune power output for your target events
Build confidence through structured progression

Option 2: Season Wind-Down (Early September Events)

If your season ends in early September, it’s now time to gradually reduce volume while maintaining intensity. This approach will help ensure you:

Don’t lose any top-end power
Carry minimal fatigue into your final races
Arrive at the start line fresh and ready

The Recovery Reality Check

Recovery is crucial in both scenarios. Without adequate recovery within each mesocycle and microcycle, your body won’t have time for adaptation. If you’re feeling flat and your fitness has plateaued, chances are you need more recovery—not additional hard sessions.

Key insight: The fitness you have today reflects what you did 4-6 weeks ago, and the fatigue you feel today comes from what you’ve done in the last 7 days.

Smart Training for Late Season Success

Focus on SMART training that is:

Specific to the type of racing you’ll be doing
Matched to the duration of your target events
Appropriate for the terrain you’ll be competing on

Remember, this final phase isn’t about building massive fitness gains—it’s about optimizing what you’ve built all season and arriving at your key events in peak condition.

Make these final weeks count through intelligent training choices, and here’s to finding some excellent late-season form!

Cda assessment with Body Rocket

I have been lucky enough this year with my Legato RT team mates to be part of a 3 day assessment with Body Rocket who use state of the art sensors fitted to your bike to measure your cda and assess body movement on your saddle and across the cockpit.

Results have been fabulous with some positive cda/time gains and more fundamentally for myself, allowing me to find a position that has opened up my hip flexor without any impact on cda. Here is a short video of our first test day which gives you a nice insight into how @bodyrocket system works

Is there ever a right time?

To develop and excel as a cyclist it takes time. Early on we often see rapid changes in a rider’s performance, and then as the months and years pass the physiological changes continue, but often at a slower rate, especially in highly trained athletes.

It can take up to 10 years for a rider to develop fully, in the first 5 years we see predominantly physical development and the later 5 years cognitive development, so it’s never too late or too early to start.

The 2024 season in the northern hemisphere is now underway so the opportunity to be at your best for an event this summer are more limited, but with the correct plan, with the appropriate amount of loading and recovery, designed around your specific events requirements, improvements can be made.

If you have never been coached before or followed a plan tailored for you and your event needs, then there is no better time to start. With continuity of training time, support from your coach, you will get so much more from your training and events.