The double ride is a great way to get your volume up and get a good amount of quality into the day’s riding. If you are pressed for time it is also a great way to add volume to your riding by taking the frequency approach to the week. I incorporate the double ride into many of my athletes’ schedules once per week. The best place to insert a day like this is after an aerobic day or active recovery day and just before your long endurance day.

Another great thing is the double ride day boosts your metabolism and fitness more than just slugging out another moderate long ride.

The general rule of thumb when creating the double ride day’s plan is each ride is between 60 minutes and two hours; anything over two hours is too long. Always work the opposite system in each ride. For example, if you do hill reps or strength endurance reps in the morning, then do a TT flat session in the afternoon. Generally you only need 15-30 minutes worth of actual work in each session.

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Here is an example of how we’d structure a double ride day:

Morning Bike: 2 hours (I suggest starting out with 60 minutes total)
Include one of the following sets:

• 30 x 1 minute strength rep, 1 minute easy (this is best done on a trainer)
• 6 x 5 minute big gear time trial position, 90 seconds recovery between
• 30 minutes worth of a steep hill reps (just find a steep hill in your area that is 1-3 minutes long and go up and down it for 30 minutes)
• 3-4 x 5km gradual 4-6%, up hill TT effort

Mid-day Swim

Afternoon Bike: 2 hours
Include one of the following sets:

• Include 30 minute TT effort on a flat road
• Include 30 minutes of a fast group ride
• You can break up the TT efforts into 2 x 15 minutes, or 3 x 10 minutes

Note: When you first introduce the double ride you may choose to just ride a aerobic 2 hours for your second ride.

You can see you get four hours of total riding for the day. 30-60 minutes is high quality.