An amazing accomplishment... a simple-to-understand précis of your midlife as a cyclist - you won't want to put it down. ― Phil Liggett, TV cycling commentator Cyclefit continues to work with male and female pro-tour athletes, helping them control the process of building resilience to training and racing in their bike set-up.

This inherent fear of the unknown and the emotional and physical pain of the known was a prime motivation in my transition to becoming an ‘indoor specialist.’ I no longer accept the inevitable reality that ‘I could really hurt myself or worse during this race.’ A conclusion he draws from a conversation he had with the well-known UK sports physiotherapist Graham Anderson. Mr. Anderson asserts that “cyclists don’t have enough ‘dynamic chaos’ in their ‘activity diet’ and when forced to veer off course of the cozy environment of “pedaling in predictable circles” and left to stand on our own feet that “our wheels fall off.” Female cyclists also experience changes. “By your late 30s and early 40s, you can get symptoms of perimenopause, from a reduction of oestrogen,” says Roberts.I find it really difficult to stay in lower heartrate zones, it just saps all the fun and purpose out of most rides and is especially difficult on the gravel bike. It's causing a bit of a dilemma because I WANT to train properly for whatever the CX season throws at us, but training effectively just seems a bit joyless, sitting spinning gently up climbs or gently trundling along gravel sections when every instinct is to get on top of a big gear and smash it, etc. etc. I took a leap and assumed his query was more than rhetorical and replied. This was my answer to Mr. Cavell’s questions.

The age-related decline in bone mineral and muscle mass now really gathers pace. “That is why a lot of older people start to walk a certain way and feel stiff,” says Cavell. Not just cycling? Yes. A balanced training programme for the cyclist might also include a couple of weekly weights sessions, or “resistance training”, which will combat sarcopenia (that’s muscle-loss to you and me) and maybe the occasional run if your joints can stand it (good for sarcopenia but also bone density). Co-founder, bike fitter and bike designer, author. Phil rides a Seven Axiom XX custom titanium bike and an Airnimal Joey folding bike. He wrote The Midlife Cyclist and enjoys walking his dog, reading, politics and the outdoors. Phil's specialism is working with clients who have complex and frequently chronic issues. Phil is most at home working in a collegiate, multi-disciplinary team, to help clients resolve intricate issues. This subject goes in layers, so let's deal with it in layers. Overall, yes, exercise is tremendously beneficial for you – tremendously. That's the overall, overarching message. But then, within that, it's more nuanced. If you exercise moderately into middle age and beyond, even into old age, it is unquestionably good for you: the cognitive benefits or cardiovascular benefits, the feel-good benefits, everything is positive. But to exercise moderately – and by that, I mean the kind of exercise that the people we know do – there are question marks. Now, probably when all this washes after longitudinal studies and I do the revision of this book in 20 years time, it will almost certainly be the case that that was good for you. That's my opinion, and I have no evidence of that right now. So the book is taking up the evidence that we do have, looking at all the research conducted, and then on every subject, making an informed judgment. Phil Cavell: author of The Midlife CyclistMental health gets some useful coverage which fits in really well with the press coverage this important issue is getting. Good mental health is one of the reasons I’ve always ridden, in fact if I haven’t ridden for a few days my other half bundles me out of the door and tells me to do a couple of hours on the bike so that I’m more bearable to live with. It’s interesting what he says about indoor cycling, in that while it’s convenient and effective, it doesn’t have the same mental health benefits as riding outdoors, so we should all try to ride outdoors as often as possible.

These concepts taken together are not something written about much. We have a lot of books on training plans, some designed for older athletes, and the author does not stray into this area at all. But Cavell’s views, both from his past as an amateur racer as well as his profession, are food for thought. He gently ridicules our attachment to numbers, pointing out that V02 max is nothing really useful and even FTP, the measure of functional threshold power, should not be our focus. As someone with biomechanical expertise, he feels that some drills, such as one-legged pedalling, are useless or injurious. He is not impressed with our pursuit of high cadences, or even smooth pedalling, noting that the people who stomp on the pedals tend to be the ones winning the races. I was reminded of watching a Giro d’Italia stage years ago where a Russian and a French rider had escaped and Phil Liggett pointed out how awkward and gawky the Russian looked compared to the elegant spinning of the Frenchman but Paul Sherwen interrupted, pointing out that they were both going the same speed so what did it matter? As someone who has spent years building souplesse, that effortless and beautiful fusion of man and machine, well, I was a bit disappointed but sometimes looking good is better than being fast, yes? You may endure a loss of motivation, disrupted sleep and stress. “This impacts on performance and can lead to niggling injuries. Women also become more insulin-resistant, resulting in weight gain.” Is it hard to work out whether exercising past 40 is good for you? Everyone assumes that within certain parameters, it is, but we don't actually know, do we?Phil's book can help you be as good today as you always said you were ― Carlton Kirby, Eurosport commentator You may get a slight decline in joint, tendon and ligament health, and feel a bit stiff in the morning,” warns Roberts. What changes should I make?

In 2012 Cavell and Wall started the International Cyclefit Symposium ICS) – an annual and then bi-annual conference that hosted speakers from all over the world. It appears that female midlife athletes have some very real advantages over male athletes. Not only with heart health but other areas of general health resilience.This book has helped me visualise a rounded training programme that I think I should be able to implement, hopefully into my impending 60s. Both coach Fox and Dr Baker agree that the majority of riding should be steady-state to increase our oxidative capacity — as much as 80-90 per cent of our training load. We have to learn to be efficient before we can learn to be fast. But even as midlife cyclists we can gain a huge amount of benefit from the correct dose of intense interval training.