A good warm-up includes a slow ride in small gears at a high pedal cadence, gradually increasing effort as you move up through the gears until you reach periods of actual race effort. Fitting in some stretching is also a good idea.

But what about cooling down and recovery? This important aspect is often overlooked – and is potentially the most important part, especially if you are racing a number of events on the track or racing as part of a tour.

Too many people neglect the cool-down at the end of a race or after training. A good cooldown helps recovery and removes the waste product known as lactic acid, and helps prevent some of the muscle soreness you might develop after a hard ride or race.

A cruise at a slower speed in smaller gears followed by some stretching is a good cool-down, and will mean you are much more prepared for the next race or training session.

Warming up and cooling down should be part of your normal cycling routine – but for many it is not – you know who you are! Maybe the result is more injuries, or that feeling of just having tired muscles – all the time.

It doesn't take long, and it will give you that extra edge in performance - warming up and the cooling down play almost as much of an important role in the success of our national track team as the actual race time on the track.

In the build up to this year’s record breaking World Championship medal haul, John McKenzie took some time out to talk to Andy Reid, the Performance Programme Manager for BikeNZ, about the New Zealand track team’s recovery protocol.

After an extra hard training session on the track the BikeNZ track team does a number of things to get themselves fully recovered for the day’s two training sessions.

Andy says training can be anything from 5km of extreme power output, through to 50km of intervals at faster than 55km/hr. This type of training is not for wimps – he emphasises it is hard and when it has to be repeated twice per day, recovery matters and managing good recovery is very important.

What do they do after a session?
They are off the bike and straight away take in some sports drink, and then it’s to the
changing rooms for a date with the ice bath. He says five minutes in the ice bath is enough time for anyone to show how tough they are and to cause the blood vessels in the muscles to contract and remove the bi-products of hard work from the muscles.

You don’t have to be a New Zealand cyclist to get the benefit of an ice bath. If you don’t have an ice bath handy, find the nearest lake, river or ocean to stand in – I often get unusual looks as I stand in the sea by the yacht club near home in Redcliffs, Christchurch.

Then it’s out of the ice bath, a recovery shake, a shower is taken, then they slip on Skins compression gear and it’s on the bike and off for a short recovery ride and lunch.

A wind trainer can also be used for cooling down and warming up – you often see this at events, guys warming up and cooling down in the pit area at track events or in the car park at road races and time trials.

Andy says it’s then time for track team members to put their feet up for a while before
repeating the effort in the afternoon. This type of three week schedule is done to prepare for
major events like the World Championships.


“Without this kind of regimented protocol BikeNZ High Performance athletes would not have been able to bring home a haul of medals like they did at the World Track Cycling Championships in Poland.”

The BikeNZ squad finished with three medals, one of each colour, and a fifth nation placing in Poland.

New Zealand’s previous best effort at the World Track Championships was the two medals won on three occasions - Maebashi in 1990, Berlin in 1999 and a golden performance at Melbourne in 2004 with victories by Sarah Ulmer and Greg Henderson.