By MICHAEL BARRY
December 14, 2008

CALA SERENA, Majorca— The cycling season is almost without end. We race from January to October. And right after we get off our bikes, it seems, our training starts again for the next season.

The month without training passes quickly. Nevertheless, we lose fitness. The curse of the athlete is that conditioning is lost much more quickly than it is achieved. To get our bodies back to the peaks we reached while we were racing, we need months of long, steady riding combined with hours in the gym and crosstraining.

In the off-season, we don’t rest as much as we build a foundation. Riders who train meticulously through the winter not only perform better but also set themselves
up for a consistent year with fewer injuries.

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