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by: Ken Doyle, Eric Schmitz
Topics include: movement phase, power zone, power phase, rest between sets, shoulder presses
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Reviews:
Save your money
I bought this book because I have always had a strong base in bodybuilding, but have recently expanded into mountian biking and road riding. I thought that there might be some secret to mixing strength training and endurance sports that I hadn't come across yet, as I've always heard doing more of one generally means you should do less of the other, so I bought this book as the title suggested there would be some explanation of how a sport specific individual could improve his performance in that sport through weight training.
About all that this book got around to revealing as far as that goes is not to train so hard in the gym that you become big and bulky, as you will train more fast twitch muscle fibers and will become slow and ponderous on the bicycle. To anyone with the slightest understanding of weight training, that is definately common knowledge, and I scowl at myself for expecting this book to release some hidden secret to blending strength training and cycling. A word of advice that I somehow ignored myself... you can't judge a book by it's cover.
If you have absolutely no knowledge whatsoever on how to use weights, this book would help you out I suppose, only in the respects that it can show you how to perform movements and exercises common to bodybuilding, since the bulk of the book is comprised of drawings illustrating proper form and technique. But in all respect, this book is something that a fifth grade reading teacher might have on her classroom shelves full of cheesy books for ten and twelve year olds. It basically teaches you how to work out, while giving only the slightest techincal information on cycling specifics.
If you're looking to help your cycling, don't bother with this book. If you just want to learn how to use weights, I suppose it's alright, but if you're only wanting to learn how to work out and you aren't already a cyclist, I doubt you'll be reading this anyway.
Well Written Concise Guidance,
I found this book to be an excellent tool in fine tuning my strength training regimen for cycling. There's no doubt that weight training in the off season helps a cyclist build strength which translates to better on road performance. Unfortunately many cyclists don't know where to start, and too often the cycling press publishes articles aimed towards people who don't want to take the time to get the most out of the gym. Alternatively, most of the reference material and magazine articles about weight lifting are aimed towards the "body building" crowd. If you're looking to build strength and endurance for the road (or trail, I suppose), this book is for you.
I had already been using a strength training routine from Bill Pearl's "Strength Training", when I started reading this book and within a few chapters I found that I was making some mistakes in my form and technique. Additionally, I learned about a variety of exercises and techniques which added some spice to my time in the weight room.
The lessons from this book have benefited me greatly and I would highly recommend it to anyone who is looking to put some purpose into their gym time.
Don't waste your time with this book
This book only gives the absolute bare minimum of training guidelines. It will give you a decent idea of what exercises to do, and a tiny bit of the reasons why to do them, but that is all. The authors suggest doing some very simple exercises like the bench press, for which they show photos. For the very complex, and somewhat dangerous, plyometric and power development exercises, they give almost no detail on how to do the exercise. Why would they show photos of simple exercises that everyone knows how to do, and then just skim over the complex ones that they suggest are the most important exercises??