The importance of strength training in September

With September officially here, the kids back to school, pumpkin spice back on the menu, and (my favorite) pumpkin spice ale right around the corner, many cyclists are thinking of the season we're wrapping up. It's a reasonable train of thought, given that September brings us cooler weather and the fastest loss of sunlight of any month (my hometown of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, loses 70 minutes this month!), and it seems only logical to try to rack up some miles before we whip out the trainer for our weekly parties…ahem, coach-led rides...here in BaseCamp winter group coaching.

But if we truly want to make next year our best season to date?

This is exactly the time to begin strength training.

Here are the top three reasons why.

Our tissues need time to unwind from lots of riding

After a long season logging miles and hours on the bike, our bodies have adapted to these tasks. That means that some muscles and tissues have gotten tighter, shorter, and stiffer, while others have gotten stretched out or pushed to or toward their limits, and our joints are most likely not sitting in their ideal orientations.

The next six to eight weeks are a great time to keep riding, feel the returns on our efforts, and bank a significant amount of time on the bike feeling better than we did all season before winter pushes us indoors.

Strength begins to boost testosterone levels and rebalance our internal environment

Lots of endurance sports can be really beneficial to the heart and lungs but do little for testosterone and HGH (Human Growth Hormone) levels. And with age being a critical strike against us without significant action to dull the already natural reductions of these critical muscle mass and performance-boosting hormones, well, we need all we can get.

The great news is that even just a little bit of resistance training helps to drive the body back toward a better balance. These next six to eight weeks are a great time to set the stage for an even more advantageous hormonal environment to help us see big gains this winter and spring!

We need to work out kinks and make use of physical therapists, bike fitters, or masseuses

As is almost always the case with anyone who's riding a bike at least six hours a week, turning back to strength training reveals some surprising tight spots, kinks, and maybe even new doo-dads we didn't realize we've acquired, thanks to a summer of lots of fun on the bike but much less (or zero) working with weights to counteract the riding time and balance the demands we're placing on our bodies.

These next six to eight weeks give us time to tackle these issues, hiccups, and "new features" without a time penalty or pressure; we can work around our issues and calmly build ourselves, knowing that we're going to come into winter training feeling fresher, moving better, and riding much stronger than last year!

It may not be the most popular opinion (yet!), but starting strength training by dipping in the waters now, here at the very beginning of September, has given my clients and athletes for the last fifteen years a secret antidote to the massive time on the bike over the summer, even for those who kept up their strength work through the season.

Improvements in on-bike efficiency, the body's ability to handle longer rides more frequently, and resiliency are just some of the big reasons to start strength training now.

Trading two hours a week on the bike (mid week) for a performance-based strength program can offer massive and countless rewards through the coming winter and season.

But we need to get started! And stay consistent.