I'm taking part in charity bike ride which involves riding 60 miles (100 km) a day for 8 days at an average of 14 mph (22.5 km/h).
I can do 69 miles but unsure of exactly how to ramp up the training to prepare the accumulative effects of doing it for 8 consecutive days.
Any ideas would be gratefully received.
One thing to consider is how hilly the ride is compared to what you're used to. If that average pace includes a lot of climbing, it's fairly quick, but if that's a flat pace it's gentle.
Another is how much you have to carry. Many of these rides are supported and you only have to carry day kit (and sometimes not even much of that).
If you do need to carry more stuff than on your usual day rides, get some training rides in with the weight and luggage you expect to need. They should be of a decent length.
Unless the ride gets much hillier towards the end, if your legs can do 3 days, they can do 8. The same isn't true of your contact points, so you really need to ensure your saddle+shorts, gloves, and shoes (in roughly that order of importance) work well for you. That's as important as the training and can be done at the same time.
I don't propose a detailed training plan, just some suggestions you should adapt to fit into your life. You might find you can skip over them more quickly than I say, especially if you regularly commute by bike. Try to stretch, and don't completely drop non-cycling exercise even if you need to dial it back to make time.
The key thing though is to get used to riding a proper ride the day after a long ride.
Day 3 and probably day 4 will be hard whatever you do, then it often gets easier.
Make use of drop bags, kit transport etc. so that you can have clean dry shorts (ideally jerseys as well but they can be worn damp and/or smelly). You won't be on the bike for ages each day, so getting stuff rinsed out and dried should be possible (a good start is to wash/rinse it, wrap it in a towel then tread on the bundle, if you're in a hotel).
Be sure to eat and drink plenty in the evenings. You need to reload your on-board carb stores (glycogen) and get some protein. If you find it hard to eat a lot after riding (I sometimes do), try nibbling something light and salty with a sugary drink, recovery drink, or protein shake and plenty of water immediately after the ride, then eat more later. If you don't have access to sports products, or don't like them, flavoured milk, milkshakes (preferably the thin sort), and hot chocolate are all good recovery drink options.*
You may or may not have much choice in your stops, but try to make them as pleasant and interesting as possible. If stopping for the night in a small town, a stroll to/from dinner can be both physically and mentally more relaxing than eating in a hotel room next to your bike. Meeting friends or even a little sightseeing can be fitted in if your riding doesn't occupy all your waking hours.
Especially if it's hot and you're sweating a lot, you may want to use electrolyte tablets in some of your drinks, either on the ride or afterwards.
* I go for instant hot chocolate with chocolate flavour or vanilla protein powder added, if I'm making up my own (mix with a little cold water before adding hot)
Not sure if this is the best advice, but it is what I did in preparation for a cycling vacation of 10+ days, with similar distances planned.
I'll post from the perspective of an older, fit, but very irregular and unmotivated cyclist who has done this several times.
In my case it consisted of doing several trips of 4-5 days @ 100km per day, solo, on sometimes hilly terrain, in British Columbia and Washington state. I was staying in motels, not camping, but still carrying about 10 kg of gear and clothing.
You need to go in fit, and there is some very good advice in the other answers. However, you also need to keep in mind that you will get fitter as the ride progresses. Day 1 may feel like hell, but day 5 should see a much fitter you, as long as you don't build up injuries or pain.
For example, I started out day on the Olympic Peninsula struggling to get 65km in (I had not trained because of wildfire smoke in the preceding weeks). By day 5 I decided to do 160km to get back to my car rather than cutting my day in half by staying overnight in a peculiarly uninspiring city on the circuit.
Try out your bike. Make sure you have a good saddle and good padded shorts. One of my trips involved extreme saddle discomfort and it didn't really get better, though some topical painkiller did improve things.
Watch your nutrition. Ideally consume tons of pasta or other slow carbs for breakfast. Pancakes are OK-ish. Find what works for you. These 100km rides are not really a big deal, especially if it's an easy pace. But it's easy to be finishing them very slowly because you are out of energy. When that really hits, energy bars and sports drinks don't help as much you'd think.
Watch your drink intake as well, I noticed my urine was all yellow on one trip and realized I was underdrinking. That's going to lower your performance.
Plan your bicycle tires. I have a hybrid commuter bike with quite thin tires but with some extra kevlar lining. They're a bit heavier than really good road tires but I very rarely get flats with them, riding on shoulders.
Couple of things:
Coming to prepping up for rides:
I have done almost exactly what you mention, coming from about 20km MTB ride on Sundays to a multi stage, 100km aprox per day road ride, It was a 7 day supported ride, which meant the big suitcase was put in a bus and carried for us while we cycled. This ride totaled almost 600 km over the week. The first 3 stages where mostly flat with little/short climbs, starting at sea level, 4th - 6th stages had biggest climbs and where mostly ascents.
I did not train for this ride, just tackled the challenge.I took part on this ride four times, happening once per year. The first time I was able to ride the 100 km in about 4 hours. The biggest problem I had was wrist pain and saddle soreness. The body part that hurt most where my wrists. Muscle tiredness was nothing compared to wrist and hand pain/soreness. Saddle pain was mostly tolerable.
I was wearing padded shorts and using a bike that fits me "perfectly" for 3-4 hour MTB rides, but I was not accustomed to be seating for so long. Funny enough, I could do 8+ hour MTB rides no problem, but in MTB you do a lot of weight shifting, so you unload the saddle very frequently, and also, (rear) suspension helps a bit. In contrast, on this ride I used a hardtail bike with straight handlebars.
In about one hour after finishing each stage and having a meal I felt energized again. We also had the whole second half of the day for "recovery". so I felt almost as fresh as day one on the beginning of all stages. I can not say for sure how additionally tired I was after 4th - 6th stages, as they were significantly harder than the first ones.
On following years, besides having the experience of what it takes, I made a few changes:
This last point I think made the greatest difference. What worked for me was: drink every 15 minutes, and have a bite of food every 30 minutes. The "food" was my own recipe of "granola bars" (About 10cm x 2.5 cm x 1 cm, so, kind of similar to commercial sizes. Ingredients where nothing fancy, just wanted to avoid extra sugar) By the end of the each ride I had consumed near 2 litres of water+juice, and about 3 granola bars.
The idea was to keep hydration and sugar levels fairly constant though the ride by sipping a little of sugary drink between along with water, and eat "slow carbs" that is, carbs that take a while to get into the bloodstream and remain there a little longer than plain sugar.
Another key factor for me during the ride is pace. It's kind of difficult to compare or convey how I distributed my effort, but I could say that my cycling is the analogous of really fast waking or slow, long distance running, as opposed to a 100 meter sprint. I was in the non-competitive group, completing the distance in 4 hours, approximately, where the elite competitors where finishing in about 2 hours to 1:45. Another way of saying it is that at almost any point in the ride, I could always have been a little bit faster, but I was "holding" somewhat. My only goal was "to get there" on time for lunch and keep the ride fun.
Related to that, was the use of an odometer or distance trip meter. Knowing the traveled and remaining distance made a positive difference in my mindset. When you don know how much on an effort is remaining, the mind plays a trick and makes you feel more tired than you really are (I think is an instinct to preserve resources). In contrast, when you are familiarized with a route you feel more energetic the whole time. In that regard having the cycle computer meant that even if I was not so familiar with "riding" the route, seeing the number kept me aware of my progress and felt more relaxed even when pushing harder than the first time.
The most important thing to do in terms of preparing for a multi day cycling event is to find and address the problems that can stop you - or make the ride agony - but that only become critical after spending multiple days back-to-back in the saddle.
To do this, at a bare minimum, several weeks before the event I would want to plan in at least one two-day, back-to-back, full-distance, full-dress rehearsal test ride session with a tentative plan for a couple of much shorter test rides afterwards. I'd go for:
Two days back-to-back because it is the minimum necessary to highlight problems with bike fit, maintenance plans, nutrition, clothing, fitness etc that are missable with single-day rides (and the recovery periods between them) but can be deal breakers on multi-day rides.
Several weeks before the event with shorter rides afterward - to allow going into the event with fresh legs. And to provide a time window to address any problems and test the fixes. For instance, if find shoes to too hot/cold, or uncomfortable it may take time to procur replacements and those do not want to be used untested/unworn-in.
That's as a bare minimum.
If the time and motivation is available then a safer plan would be do two or more of these full-dress rehearsal test ride sessions over the course of the month prior to the event. With maybe making the last of these a three day back-to-back session for good measure.
Even for experienced riders it's never 100%; if it was too easy where would the challenge be. However, the trick in training for one-off-events, is to get close enough that at the time of the event as many of the avoidable problems are avoided and the excitement of the event carries the rest.
I think if you are already comfortable biking 60 miles, you should be fine for the trip.
Focus on just being able to stay in the saddle for as long as it takes and on staying comfortable while you ride. Padded shorts and gloves are key. I found clipless pedals really helped my knee comfort. I find drop bars also essential. Being able to use the different grips and positions that the drop bars offer is a big help.
Plan to eat more than usual, with lots of snack breaks.
From my experience, and what others have shared as well, by the end of your trip you will be crushing those 60 miles and will have a greater range than before. On a two month trip I started riding 50 miles a day, and finished around 70 miles per day without ever really pushing myself. A few years later, on a 10 day trip, I started out riding 60 miles per day, and was riding around 100 miles per day by the end.
That last trip was in very hilly conditions too - it was a grind at first, but I just took my time. It was helpful that the trip happened in early summer, so we had long days of sunlight for riding.
My emphasis is on comfort, because if you can stay in the saddle and keep moving, you can go a long way, even if you're not going very fast. If your hands, shoulders, butt, knees, etc. are getting sore though, it's going to be a rough go.
Also, this is from the perspective of someone in their early 40s, with no major health issues. Obviously one size does not fit all.
